Grace
Year: Third
School: College and Curry
Major: Elementary Education and Anthropology
Hometown: Great Falls
Ideal Date: Taller than me, in a tie-dye shirt with a mouth in a smile shape. Someone who’s unapologetically themselves, easygoing with a purpose, enjoys thinking about how society can be pretty hysterical.
Deal Breakers? Patriarchy, recreational hunters
Describe a typical weekend: Getting my free Friday slurpee, being told I can’t touch the pregame playlist, asking people if they want to get tased.
What makes you a good catch? I mean, I can make a mean sandwich, so yeah, I’ll make you a sandwich.
What makes you a less-than-perfect catch? I may be too easily amused by puns and I am too willing to tell you why I dislike Buzzfeed and Subway.
Matt
Year: Third
School: College
Major: Environmental Science
Hometown: Richmond
Ideal Date: Ideally athletic, somewhere around 5’8”, blonde or brunette doesn’t matter. A pretty face is the first thing I look for.
Ideal Date Activity: An afternoon of fishing on the water, coming home to cook the fresh catch, dinner with wine and a few beers, then putting on a shirt and tie to try out a classy local bar.
Deal breakers? Not much. I overlook a lot if she’s a great person all the way through.
Hobbies: Exercising, pickup basketball, hiking, fishing, music, cooking and grilling
What makes you a less-than-perfect catch? We’ll spend so much time talking that we miss our dinner reservations.
Describe yourself in one sentence: I am the most easygoing guy you’ve met—trying something new every day and still only scratching the surface.
Matt and Grace met at 7:30 p.m. at the Rotunda and went to The Virginian.
Grace: I just thought [Love Connection] would be funny. I’m the kind of person who thought “I’ll just do it for the hell of it.” I think meeting new people is fun.
Matt: My friend, Colin, did the Bachelor Edition [Love Connection] and I thought it was hilarious. I’m all about meeting new people and having a good time, so I figured why not?
Grace: I had not been on a blind date before. I was hoping that it would be someone like me who thought they’d just have fun with it, so my expectations were hoping that it would be chill and fun.
Matt: I’ve been set up by friends and stuff, but usually you preclude it with a little Facebook stalking. I’ve never done a true blind date before, so this was an interesting experience. I didn’t expect anything; I just wanted to have a good time and get dinner with someone cool. It turned out to be a lot of fun.
Grace: I got there, and basically right after someone walked up and said, “You looking for someone?” and I asked, “Love Connection?” and he said, “Yup!” We both walked toward the Corner, asked about majors and other stuff. I don’t need to know everything about you; I’d rather just have interesting conversations.
Matt: I had this weird fear of there being two other people there and I’d be awkwardly asking around, but luckily she was the only one there and I thought, “Hey, this is pretty easy!”
Grace: My first impression was that this seems like an actual normal person. I can see girls wanting to go on a blind date, but I’m not sure what kind of guy would want to fill out a survey.
Matt: She was mad chill. I had a good time talking to her; the conversation flowed really easily. I was worried she’d be really shy and introverted.
Grace: I think the conversation was very easy. There weren’t really any pauses. I don’t think either of us really talked more than the other person. He told me about how when he was in Tanzania he got run at by a giraffe, which intrigued me because I like giraffes.
Matt: We shared stories about places we’d traveled, interests and stuff. Not your typical first date conversation—much more relaxed.
Grace: We paid for our own stuff. I put patriarchy as one of my deal breakers, so I’m not going to judge him for not paying for my food.
Matt: Anybody would flirt with someone on a first date. I don’t see that kind of connection really; it was just two really chill people having a good time and meeting somebody new.
Grace: I can’t really tell if there was flirting. I’m not really an overt flirter; I just talk to people and enjoy it various amounts. We were getting along, but since I just met him it was hard to tell if it was just friendly or flirty.
Matt: We had a lot in common, actually. We had seen a lot of similar movies, which is exciting because I’m a movie buff. She definitely followed along with all of that.
Grace: After the Virginian, he brought up that it was $2 beers at Boylan, but I had my leftovers from the Virginian, which I didn’t want to bring to Boylan. I asked him if he could come by my apartment so I could put the leftovers in the fridge, and when he came by, my roommates bombarded him.
Matt: We had a few drinks at Boylan, and I told her I was going to meet up with a couple friends later so we just parted ways there. I’m sure we’ll definitely hang out together sometime in the future.
Grace: Considering it was a blind date, I think it worked out pretty well, so I’d say a seven.
Matt: I would definitely rate the date a nine out of 10. I had a really good time and it was great getting to know her.
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