Woohoo! Today is the one-year anniversary for me and Mr. Wonderful! If you look back at the post I wrote the day after we met, you'll notice it leaves much to the imagination. Today, I will chronicle that fateful day. Mr. Wonderful is now with limited Internet access, so I feel like I can embarrass him without dire consequences.

Hm, now that I start writing this, I realize that this story will probably be more embarrassing for me. Humpf.

So, it all started, sadly, here. At that time, I was living with my parents, working at a seniors apartment as a computer trainer, and was bored out of my mind. So, Lavalife (henceforth known as "LL") provided me some entertanment while sitting at work trying to look busy. I was never on there to seriously meet with anyone. In fact, I never intended to meet anyone. I was just there for the compliments from the 40 year old men (ha.). I had met someone from LL earlier, but it wasn't an ideal first date. So, after that fiasco, and after realizing that there was no one on LL who had higher than a fifth grade education (ex: "wut color pantys r u wearin?"), I left LL.

Then, one evening, one particularly boring evening, at home, I logged back in to see if I had any new messages. Lo and behold, I did. I wish I had kept it, but alas, I didn't. It caught my attention right away, though. My first impression was that he was cultured, worldly, intelligent, strong, and confident. He seemed very serious.

I then looked at his picture. The picture was of him, in a tie, giving the mock-gunshot/wink. So goofy. I was hooked.

So, we begun MSN-ing, as all these 'net romances start out. Honestly, in the back of my mind, I had no intention of ever meeting this guy. Though I thought he was great, and I was quite smitten with him, I assumed that once he actually met me, I would be dumped like a bag of hammers, and I would be heartbroken.

The phone calls started, and the little bugger wouldn't let me off the hook. He was so goddamned endearing. I remember him calling just to tell me he couldn't stop thinking about me. Egads. It was very exciting. Yet, I still tried to weasel out of meeting him, bringing (I thought) all the excitement to an end.

Eventually, of course, I gave in. We decided to meet on a Wednesday. He suggested the Nutcracker and dinner. I vetoed and suggested a walk along the waterfront, followed by drinks. I didn't want our first meeting to be inside a theatre, not talking. So, we decided to meet on the bridge at the waterfront.

I spent the day at the mall, getting my Christmas shopping done. It was a spectacularly good shopping day - where little thought had to go into anything... the gifts just found me. As the afternoon wore on, the butterflies kept getting noisier and more active. However, the time had come. I started walking across the mall parking lot, across the street to our meeting place (and fuck, it was cold). I was early, so I walked up and down the boardwalk. I must have looked a litle nuts. Who hangs around there on a night like that? I waited, and I paced. I tried not to do anything embarassing or clumsy in case he showed up right then. For those of you who don't know me, to go more than 10 minutes without embarrassing myself is quite a feat.

Then he showed up. This tall, dark, and handsome man in a navy blue coat. He was taller than I imagined, and much better looking than I had anticipated. He had big brown eyes, with nice glasses. He looked mature. I was instantly attracted to him, even though I still felt nervous and weary. I gave him the space bar from my keyboard at work (it's a bit of a long story..) wraped in a blue ribbon.

Did I mention it was like Artic-wind freezing out? We made our way along the waterfront, shaking off our nervousness and making small talk. I remember thinking "this isn't so bad!". I quickly relaxed. We arrived at our first destination. A nice, dark bar/restaurant. We had drinks and food and great conversation. I remember talking a lot, and I remember him smiling at me - the heart melting smile that he has. I asked him why he was looking at me like that, and he said "You're lovely." Swoon.

On we went, from bar to bar. With each bar we went to, things kept getting more and more exciting. At one bar, we were the gag-me-with-a-spoon couple you see, holding hands and canoodling in the corner. It was after this bar that he asked to kiss me. It was a very nice, gentle, soft kiss.

We walked down the street, arm in arm, and I remember feeling... electric. We arrived at a pool hall, where we sat on a leather couch near the fireplace. We were both feeling the effects of the alcohol, but I was definitely feeling sober. All of a sudden, he turned his back to me, and I could hear crinkling sounds. He asked me to wait, while he got something ready for me. When he turned back around, he had a blue gumball in one had, and a red gumball in the other. He then proceeded to recite that entie scene from the Matrix.

Things going through my head at this point:

Attractive? Check.

Intelligent? Check.

Confident? Check.

Biggest Geek I Ever Met? CHECK!

With that, I popped the red pill in my mouth, laughing the while time. At that point, I knew that this would be good, whatever it was.

We left the bar. He said that we could go to his office so I could call a cab home (in hindsight, this made no sense, because I had a cell phone, and there was a phone at the bar... however, I knew there was a method to his madness..). We ended up in his office, and I somehow became topless in his boardroom, looking out over the city.

I (eventually) caught a cab home. I went to bed, but never slept a wink. That electric feeling never went away.

Not even a year later.