Met at work, but neither of us had much invested in the place – he was planning to quit as soon as he found another job, and I was just working there part time while I was in college. Only a few people there even knew we were an item. We both quit within a couple of months after first kiss. Married 19 years this summer.
Cégep; I thought he was cute, and when the opportunity presented itself, I went and said hi. Hit it off pretty quickly, started dating a couple of months later, and the rest is history. That was 9+ years ago, amazingly enough.
Ditto. Well, almost ditto - it was OKCupid, and it’ll be 4 years this June. The wedding’s next spring. 
I met my last girlfriend at a sailing class; it was a bit of a fluke, because the previous one that I’d signed up for was cancelled due to light weather, and she was just about the only young woman I ever saw there. (It was mostly later middle-aged people and a smattering of kids.) I haven’t been able to replicate this since moving to California; all the women somewhere near my age I see in classes and whatnot are invariably accompanied by boyfriends or husbands.
Like the o.p., I’m somewhat at a loss as to how to meet someone; meeting an appropriate woman at social functions and classes hasn’t panned out, I can’t date from work, no one in or about my admittedly modest social circle is or knows a suitable prospect, and attempts at online dating have uniformly been bust. I’m pretty happy just knocking about on my own or hanging out and going on vacations with friends, but I’m in particular need of a diversion right now, and my best efforts have been for naught, which is driving me slightly nuts.
Stranger
She was in a creative writing class with me.
This may be premature.
Just yesterday I was walking out the the grocery store with a six pack in hand.
I walked past these two lovely ladies when one says to the other (behind my back)
“You know what we need? Some of that!” (She points to the beer in my hand)
Me, being the witty person I am, turn around and say: “You talk’n about the beer or me?”
Her: “(laughs) uh, I was talking about the beer”
Me: "Well darn!’
As I started to walk away towards my car she called me back. We chatted each other up. Turns out she and her room mate are new to the area wanted to know were some nice, quiet local bars were. I told her I’d be happy to show her around Saturday night (tonight). We exchanged phone numbers. I plan on calling her in a couple of hours.
I thought this whole encounter rather amusing. I hear about people all the time hooking up in grocery stores but I’ve never actually done it myself.
I met mine in Mensa. We met at a Regional Gathering, got to know each other over board games at Games Nights, and I gave him my phone number at another Mensa event. We are geeks to the core! On the other hand, we’ve been ridiculously happily married for just over 11 months now, and we danced the “Time Warp” from The Rocky Horror Picture Show at our wedding reception, so at least we’re enjoying it.
Single ladies and gentlemen of the SDMB, if you’re looking for someone who thinks smart is sexy, you could definitely do a lot worse than Mensa. As the saying goes, “The odds are good, but the goods are odd.”
I took sailing lessons and he was the instructor. We dated 4 weeks and eloped, a quarter of a century ago. We’re on our 5th boat, not counting the hobie cat and the jet ski.
We met through friends, the first time at a bar, I’m afraid. I’d always had a thing for her, but either she had a boyfriend, or I had a girlfriend, or we were living on different continents, etc. Finally about a decade after we met were were both finally single at the same time and upped the friendship a notch. We’ve been married a little over two years now.
Met in the army during a garden party in Korea. That doesn’t mean we hung out under a canopy eating foie gras and sipping champagne. In the army a garden party is when someone wakes you up at 5:30 on a Saturday morning, hands you a rake, and points you toward the grass. I was raking, and she was shovelling, and we just started talking about where we were from back in the states. Things just kind of snowballed from there and after a two year long distance relationship, we got married.
That was over ten years, and we still talk about that goddamned garden party.
At the time SWMBO and I first met, it was business. She enrolled her son in the Taekwondo school. She was a parent and I was an instructor.
About six months later, her marriage fell apart. About a year later, my marriage fell apart. About six months after that, we very tentatively had our first date (a baseball game). We’ve been by each other’s side since then.
College frat party nearly seven years ago… I was sitting at a table running a drinking game and singing the song about a goblin from Blackadder, and she looked over and thought, “well, he’s an idiot, but he’s cute”.
We went out occasionally for the next four years (and both had LTRs in the meantime), and finally got together three years ago. Wedding’s next May.
At work. We worked in different departments but I saw enough of him to know that I really liked him. He was the exact opposite of my exes … smart, funny, respectful, caring, and did I mention funny? I knew I could fall in love with him asap after our first real date, and I did … he is the bestest!!!
met in school through mutual friends. I was fairly clueless, but when invited over for beer and tequila I took the hint. We’ve been married for 22 years.
Dopefest
Match. com
Met on a college semester abroad. She was a fellow student who, for her final project of the semester, led a walking tour of Sir Christopher Wren’s churches in London. I thought, “She’s smart, pretty, and loves history? Damn. I’ve got to get to know this girl better.” So I did. We’ll celebrate our nineteenth wedding anniversary in August.
Meet at our local folk dance. Then i got together with someone else, dated them for 8 months, and broke up with them when I realized that girl #1 was a much much better match (and had been pining). 
I’m not a tender person by any stretch, but after reading that I said “awwwww” out loud.
He was one of the college’s newspaper columnists, so I knew a bit about his personality to begin with. We met at the next editor-in-chief’s (who is my friend from high school) apartment-warming part. He was discussing politics and demolishing a few people; I stepped in and mocked him for the brow beating. Didn’t exactly hit it off.
Next time we meet at another college newspaper party, this time we actually spoke civilly and agreed to make the pizza run at the end of the night. We came back empty handed and agreed to go get pizza again. Although I had to gently remind him of our scheduled outing via facebook (that makes me sound so young!), we hit it off. Even if I didn’t think it was a date.
We were clients at the same county mental health facility.