The Unicorn Blind Date

I can find no better way to kick off my "I Heart Unicorns" blog than with a re-telling of the execution of the thought that started it all: the unicorn blind date.

Though the actual date happened only a few months ago, the idea was spawned probably half a decade ago, sitting in the foyer [foi-ey] of the institute building at the U, where Laura
and I came up with characters for each to play on blind dates:

Hers- pretending to think she was a hunchback
Mine-pretending to be obsessed with unicorns

Jump forward 5-ish years: the night of the amazing unicorn extravaganza arrived when our friends, Amanda and Brandon, set Laura and I up on a double blind date (well, triple date, because Amanda and Brandon came, but they already knew each other because they're married to each other).

Laura had just gotten home from her mission, and opted to forgo being a hunchback for dressing up like a sister missionary and talking A LOT about her mission. I however, stuck to the original plan, and, as per our half-a-century-before agreement, dressed up in every piece of unicorn paraphernalia I own (which is a lot) and became the ultimate unicorn lover. My attire included:

-Unicorn earrings
-"Born to be my Unicorn" t-shirt
-Unicorn bracelet
-Stuffed animal unicorn purse

My date noticed my unicorn ensemble.

The date consisted of dinner and meeting up with other people for a bonfire. My date ignored me through most of the evening, save a few choice moments:

While at dinner, my date broke conversation with Amanda and Brandon for a few moments to talk to Laura, her date, and I, and to question me about my preference for unicorns. Laura jumped in, saying, "why don't you tell us the story about why you feel such a strong connection to them, Andrea...you know, from when you were a kid." I wish we had practiced that part beforehand. Luckily, I think I pulled it off with a story about being rescued by a unicorn in a dream.

The next time my date acknowledged he was actually on a date was in the car between the restaurant and bonfire. After a few references to people who get engaged quickly, he made a humorless joke, asking me to marry him on the first date-ish-kind-of-thingy (which was also the last date-ish-kind-of-thingy). "Sure," I replied, "but I want to get married in the spring, because that is unicorn mating season is, and it has a lot of meaning to me." The response to that was ten-minute long string of more humorless jokes that aren't worthy of repetition, verbal or written...or typed, or calligraphied, or scribbled with a jungle green Crayola crayon.

We had to walk a little ways to get to the bonfire, so we got out the car, and I asked my date to hold my purse while I put my coat on. He rolled his eyes, sighed, took my purse, and disappeared. I waited for the rest of the group and walked to the bonfire with them, where a crowd of snickering people were waiting to awkwardly and soundlessly giggle when my date reappeared to toss my purse at me and say, "Here you go, you unicorn lover!"

I didn't see my obviously-and-overtly-disgusted-with-me date for the rest of the evening until the ride home, which was as equally spectacular as the rest of the evening.