Could I become a bar fly?

It's really interesting how my dislike of alcohol and, thus, my general disinterest in bars and clubs, has made it quite difficult to find and meet single men. Sure there are lots of other ways to meet people, but meeting new people at bars seems like something most twenty-somethings are good at. Therefore, I would like to announce that I've found a bar that I actually like. It's got half hour pizzas at happy hour (and they're really good too), nice staff, a good location, cool art on the walls, and lots of good places to hang out with friends or sit by oneself and read a book. I've been with co-workers twice, but yesterday I decided to go over on my own with a book, have some pizza, and just enjoy being somewhere other than my apartment. I plan to make this a regular Friday thing. It's a really nice way to unwind after a long week.

Why am I telling you all of this? Well, you see, after an hour and a half or so of sitting there at the bar with my book, pizza, and non-alcoholic beverage, a guy sits down next to me. He doesn't look out of place, but it seemed like maybe he hadn't been there before. The waitress gave him a food menu and explained that the pizzas were half-price. I decided to go for it: I turned to him and made a pizza recommendation. We ended up talking for two hours.

Now, I'd like to point out that while it was flattering to have his attention, I don't think I'd really want to date this guy (let's call him James). Here are my reasons (and don't hesitate to comment and let me know if I'm being too petty):
- He's 38 (he told me about having recently been to his 20-year high school reunion).
- He's the father of a four year-old boy. There was no ring, so I'm guessing divorce, but I didn't ask.
- James drank about five glasses of Stella and had just started on his second bottle of Bud Light by the time I left (7 beers in 2 hours? Isn't that a lot?)
- He spends most of the week in San Jose, but comes up to San Francisco regularly. However, he travels for work A LOT
- James doesn't care about current events. We had a chat about this and we both agreed that the mainstream media is too full of depressing stories about violent deaths, wars, and the recession; however, we disagreed in that I still am a regular consumer of news, just from other sources.
- Going along with my previous point, I felt smarter than him, by quite a lot. I'm not sure if I could enjoy being with someone who wasn't my intellectual equal.

In the end, I gave him my card, mostly so I could pass along my Yelp reviews (he'd never heard of Yelp) since he seemed desperately in need of knowledge about where to go and what to do when he's in San Francisco. He asked me if he could call me and I said I prefer e-mail. We'll see. I'm not sure whether I would actually want to see him again. However, it was nice to have this kind of interaction. Perhaps next time it'll be with someone I definitely do want to see again.

Back to the online world for now. I'm probably going on a date tomorrow night with a guy from the dating site (he'll be Henry). We're both classical music fans and there's a cafe that has free classical music on Sunday nights that I've been meaning to check out for a while. I told him about it and he thought it sounded good. Henry gave me his number and I'm to call him to set up the date. I'll let you know how that goes.

Finally, because this post is already long, I'm going to make it a little longer by sharing with you this tidbit from Craigslist:

DATE ME NOW - 25

Shut up, do what I tell you, I'm not interested! These are just some of the things you'll hear if you answer this ad. I'm an idiot and I don't care about anyone but myself. P.S. No dogs!