Friend of a friend* has a first date tomorrow night, and I’m told the plan is to spend it just driving around. The friend of a friend is a guy, his date is a girl. I’d guess they’re probably both mid-20s.
How creepy is this?
Well, do they both know, and a re they both okay with it?
Why would it be creepy if they’ve both agreed to do that? If the guy hasn’t told the girl about their plans, then that’s sort of odd, I suppose.
How well do they know one another? Have they been friends for a while and just recently decided to try dating one another or did they meet online last week? If I were going out with a guy I knew well I might think driving around for a while could be a neat way to see a lot of the city and spend some time talking to one another. If I were going out with a guy I just met a week before I would assume he was going to rape the shit out of me and wear my skin as a dress if he suggested we just drive around for a while.
Yeah, this doesn’t really sound like first date material, especially if she doesn’t know beforehand. You crazy kids today. What ever happened to dinner (read: pizza) and a movie?
That sounds… unpleasant.
As I understand it, they’ve chatted online and maybe on the phone a few times, but this is their first face-to-face. Sorry, I probably shouldn’t have put something out I couldn’t provide better details on.
Very very very weird and creepy.
So they’ve never actually met face-to-face?
I vote creepy and/or incredibly lame.
Lacking in imagination, but not creepy.
Driving is fun, and it’s how you get from point A to point Cnery.
I’m led to believe by some movies that there are places where young people just drive no where as entertainment. Is NC one of those places?
It doesn’t strike me so much creepy as potentially very boring.
Somewhat creepy, unless there are some mitigating circumstances:
– is one of them new to the area, so driving around is like driving around and seeing the sights?
– in their previous chatting, has it been determined that one or both of them like driving as a hobby? I actually like driving around aimlessly, although I probably wouldn’t suggest it as an activity unless I knew the other person also liked driving.
– or a playful joke? If they didn’t want a movie because they really wanted to talk, maybe driving was suggested as a joke and then they just went with it?
Fancy a no-speed-limit drive around the Manx TT course on one particular sunday in June?
Not creepy. Very cheap and 1950sish, but not creepy.
well, I mean, if these are 20-somethings, and they live with roommates or something, I can see that driving around and listening to music and and having a private place to chat might be… well… not for me, but not entirely unpleasant either, and I could see how it might appeal for some.
Then again, if there’s an empty living room or apartment to spend time in, I don’t know why they would need to have their private time in a car.
Without knowing the people in question, I wouldn’t go so far as to call it creepy, but it’s definitely odd. Even if I was new to a city, I’d prefer going to a bar or coffeehouse for getting-to-know-you chitchat. The fact that I occasionally get carsick probably contributes to this.
I don’t think it is creepy.
A couple months ago I met a guy and we talked hours upon hours on the phone. We emailed, texted, all that typical stuff. So when he set up a time to hang out, it didn’t bother me that it was out near a lake. We didn’t end up driving around, we just sat in my truck and talked. (And yes all we did is talk… 
) We ended up being there something like 5 hours just talking, looking out at the lake and the stars.
Might sound a little movie cliché or corny, but it was like a romantic teenage movie. Growing up, I didn’t date much. Didn’t help that I was a geek and my dad was (still is) a cop. Tends to limit the dating pool.
I vote “Meh.”
I did this a lot in high school, though not that I can recall on a first date. There was really no place in town to just “hang out” for folks younger than drinking age (and even then – I still haven’t been to a bar in my hometown). No, no coffee shops open late (or even late-ish).
So, we’d go drive around and talk, maybe intentionally get caught by a train or two so we could just sit a while. It was nice, especially in the summer. Grab some ice cream at the old-style walk-up ice cream stand, then hop in the car and wander all over town with the windows rolled down and just talking about whatever. Don’t have to worry about when the place closed or whether you were talking too loudly or about things maybe a little too risque, don’t have to worry about parents wanting to go to sleep or whatever.
'Course, gas was a lot cheaper then too.
We’ve seen on SDMB so many instances of miscommunication, fumbling around, and questions, questions, questions.
The fact is most 20 somethings don’t know what to do. They’re terrified of making a bad move, terrified of rejection, and terrified of falling into problems.
So some hormonal young guy in this condition thinks “I’m good at driving around and I’m pretty comfortable in the car. Seems perfect!”
Most hormonal 20 something men are idiots. And innocent. And scared of screwing up.
We all like to reminisce about how smooth we were but when I think of the retarded shit my friends and I thought was reasonable it’s a wonder the human species has been able to continue. My Dad used to call us Swayve the anti-suave. But none of us were ax murderers and our bad intentions were really pretty naive.
I’m also surprised at how fearful many women are of anything out of the ordinary.
Maybe she’ll have a good time.
I spent my first formal “date” with my current fiancee just driving around. (We’d been out numerous time beforehand, though not formally because she’d been dating another boy.) It was fun. We just drove and chatted. I stopped several times; take a walk down this lane, drive out to the river, get coffee.
Though, later, the girl admitted that when we took the walk down the lane she thought I was going to rape her.
Uh…and she went with you instead of trying to leave? The hell? I’ve heard of a victim mentality, and granted I have definitely done some stupid thing in my day, but if I seriously thought someone was going to rape me, the last thing I’d do is blithely go walking with them like a lamb to the slaughter.
I thought this was ridiculous so I googled some statistics.
I am shocked. It’s dangerous out there.
Be careful Ladies and forget what I said in the prior post. He’s up to no good.