I have a yenta now. The friend who set me up on some of my recent blind dates asked how they were and if would I like to be set up again. To recap: my blind dates a few weeks ago were bad enough to make me feel like I was finished meeting anyone like this forever. Getting my head held hostage and becoming a rubbing pole on the street took a while for me to get over. I've had to reenact the scene a few times to make myself feel better, using various friends as the victims. I think I'm over it now. But I should have learned this lesson a very long time ago. I had forgotten about it, but my first blind date a few years ago was horrendous. But, somehow, I was asked out and ended up on TV.


When I was in college, a "curious" friend at school asked me to take her out to a girl bar. My strategy at that time for any friend who enlisted my "help" was to get said friend liquored up and then turn them loose at a lesbian bar. Our first stop was a cheap Mexican place on MacDougal that offered Long Island Iced Teas by the pitcher.

Later, we arrived at Henrietta's, a bar that I considered at the time to be the least scary for any questioning young gal; it would be like high school, only gayer. Upon arrival, we sashayed through the door and were met by producers of a popular cable show at the time. They were at Henrietta's doing a segment on lesbian nightlife. I barely remember signing the appearance release.

From what I do remember, the host took a real liking to us. She even let us feel her fake tits in the cab on the way over to Meow Mix: a real moment. I remember the rest of the night to be standard fun, ending in the scarfing down of Jewish food on the lower east side at 5 a.m., as per usual.

Months later, I was at Henrietta's and was surprised when the bartender handed me a package. Inside was a VHS tape of the show and a note from one of the producers. "You look like fun. Wanna go out?" On the bottom of the note, there was a teeny sticker that she had taken in a Japanese photo booth of herself — too small to determine anything, but hey, why not?

Flattered and excited by the novelty of the whole thing, I popped the tape in the VCR and fast-forwarded to the two-minute montage on lesbian light life in Manhattan. Hey, look. There I am, lingering in the background. But then, the montage stops, and the music cue changes. As the beginning guitar riff of Tom Jones' "She's a Lady" starts, there I am grossly close-up and in super slow motion looking like a monster, throwing back a shot. "Well, she's all you'd ever want. She's the kind they'd like to flaunt and take to dinner." I'm licking a line of salt all the way up my friend's stomach, again in slow motion, who is laying across the bar awkwardly. "Well, she always knows her place. She's got style. She's got grace. She's a winner." I'm slobbering the lemon out of my friend's mouth with my mouth. And, finally, the enjoyment of the shot and applause: "She's a lady. Whoa, whoa, whoa, she's a lady." Classy.

Anyway, I went on the blind date, but my ex-girlfriend managed to make me tell her where it was so that she could investigate. The producer was an older butch woman and seemed not only surprised that I was young, but put off by it. Confusing, considering the content of the tape. It's not like I was giving a seminar on real estate. As she called me sweetie like I was 12 and told me something about "life," my ex-girlfriend strolled by the window 10 times walking the dog and giving the universal circular hand gesture for, "How's the face?"

On the walk down the street after the date, I might have asked for an internship or something lame like that. I don't remember. But why wasn't that my first and last blind date?