Episode 09: I Came For Cocktails Not Couples Therapy

A drink at a bar should not turn you into a stranger’s relationship advisor, but that’s exactly where this night goes. We kick things off with a dating app match that feels like a small miracle: he looks like his photos, conversation flows, and for a minute it seems like a rare good first date story.

Then the plot swerves. A “roommate situation” becomes a full-blown cheating investigation, complete with screenshots, emoji analysis, and the most unhinged twist of all: the roommate gets put on speakerphone so our storyteller can give “a female perspective” in real time. We unpack what that says about boundaries, emotional labor, and why so many people treat communication like a code to crack instead of a skill to practice.

Transcript

Intro And Love For Bad Dates

SPEAKER_00 0:00

She said what she said.

SPEAKER_01 0:02

Hi guys, welcome back to episode 9.

SPEAKER_00 0:07

Is it nine?

SPEAKER_01 0:08

It is nine.

SPEAKER_00 0:09

Okay. We always get lost in this whole mix.

SPEAKER_01 0:15

I actually like it. We are doing so good. I feel like that sometimes I actually like we're probably in like episode 15, 16, and I'm like, I look at that thing and I'm like, nope, just episode nine.

SPEAKER_00 0:31

Yeah, we're getting there. We've been doing pretty good. We've been, you know, keeping up with it. We definitely miss a couple of weeks. Yeah. We are probably three episodes behind the where we're supposed to be.

SPEAKER_01 0:45

See, that makes sense. I think that's where my mind is. Our original, like where we should have been. But like because we have missed it, we're in episode nine, but it's okay. We're back.

SPEAKER_00 0:55

And we're getting we're getting good at it. Exactly. It's uh, you know, it's a process, a process. Okay, what are we talking about today, Anish? So today we're gonna go back into our roots and we're gonna read a story about a first date gone wrong again. Oh can they ever go right?

SPEAKER_01 1:18

Right? My favorite one. I'm like, like, let's be honest, okay? How many I know it's out there, whatever, blah blah blah. But like I hear more how first date stories have gone wrong than right. Especially if it's from the apps.

SPEAKER_00 1:37

Yeah, and then like in even when you meet people organically, that first encounter, there's always something awkward and something like I feel good because if it's perfect, that means it's not gonna work out. You need that awkwardness to kind of be like, okay, yeah, this is the reason why I need to find more.

SPEAKER_01 1:55

Like, there's something cringy, but like sometimes it going wrong as actually like turns out to be good. Like the the first date will go wrong, and then they will just still like give it a chance, it'd go on a second date, and then it's better and better and better, and like they're dating now and stuff, right? Yeah, so it's just like first dates, I feel like they're just meant to be bad, I guess. I know, right?

SPEAKER_00 2:22

So here he goes.

A Normal Dating App Match

SPEAKER_00 2:26

So I, 24 female, matched with a guy 26 male, on a dating app. His profile was normal. Pictures, hiking, a dog, a couple gym selfies, nothing too alarming. I mean, gym selfies. If he if he's shortless, chances are he's bisexual or gay.

SPEAKER_01 2:46

Whoa, whoa, whoa. I feel like guys love taking a shirtless face. It's oh come on.

SPEAKER_00 2:55

But in the prince, they boast with their like gym, like the tank top.

SPEAKER_01 3:01

Oh, you kidding me? If a guy is happy with the body, you think he will show it to everybody that has eyes?

SPEAKER_00 3:08

I'm sorry, but the very, very like airmen that I know that go to the gym are like goddess, gods. I just screwed that one up. Um, they are like gods, they don't post without a shirt. Okay. This is just my opinion. But alright, alright. Back to the story. So, nothing too alarming. He they chatted for a few days and he asked. He seemed funny and easygoing, so they plan to meet for drinks on a Friday night. She showed up at the bar, he's already there waiting. First impression, it looks exactly like his photos, which already felt like a small miracle in the role of dating apps. We all agree. Even to just to find a nice good-looking guy, it's already a struggle. So, can you imagine if you find a book? Like it, yeah, full one miracle. I agree with this girl. The first 20 minutes are great, conversation flows easily, they're joking around, the drinks are good. At one point, he says, I'm really glad we met in person. You seem way cooler than most people on apps. Again, I agree. She's thinking, Okay, this may actually be a decent date. Okay. Then his phone rings, he glances at it and sighs. Like it's something important. He says, Sorry, I just have to take this really quick. And she's like, No problem.

The Roommate Crisis Hijacks Dinner

SPEAKER_00 4:55

He steps outside. Five minutes pass, then ten minutes. At this point, did he stir her up? I don't know. I'm reading the story, you know, as much as I do. At this point, she's sitting there awkwardly sipping her drink, wondering if he just ghosted her middle. Finally, he comes back inside. See? He's a decent man after all. Finally, he comes back inside, slightly stressed. He apologizes and says, My roommate is having a bit of a situation. Oh. I'll be like, Can I see a picture of your bathroom? Make sure his roommate was a guy and not a girl. Like, I guess it's his girlfriend having a bit of a situation. Nowadays you never know. Sorry. Where was I? Oh. She asks if everything is okay. He hesitated and then says, Well, it's kind of a complicated complicated. Naturally, she's curious now. Right? Sounds like me.

SPEAKER_01 6:07

I mean, who I'm sorry, who wouldn't be? If you tell me that there's a situation, you either tell me the situation or then why bring it up in the first place? I mean, depends. Nah, if you tell Alice, if anybody comes to me and says I have a situation in silence and nothing, I would go crazy.

SPEAKER_00 6:31

Thank you guys. Apparently, his roommate just found out that his girlfriend has been texting another guy and he's freaking out. The roommate is at home spiraling and asking for advice. Her date pulls out his phone and says, Do you mind if I shoot the messages? I need a female perspective. No way! Haven't I done something similar one time? Didn't I ask a guy for his perspective on something? I'm pretty sure I've done that. That's not something on the first date? No, in general. Oh.

SPEAKER_01 7:11

But like perspective of your roommate's girlfriend's situation. Oh my god.

SPEAKER_00 7:17

I'm pretty sure I've asked a guy for their perspective on something that I was sending. But okay, okay. Now, this is when she probably should have said no. Right? But she didn't. I mean she's sounding more and more like me. Run girl. Run for the hills. Suddenly, our date turns into a relationship. Their date turns into a relationship crisis analysis session. He's showing her screenshots of text between his roommate and the girlfriend. Oh my god. He's asking things like, Do you think she's cheating? What does this emoji mean? Is ha ha ha okay passive aggressive? Oh my god. What do you mean? Do like you know, when you say okay, like there's certain messages that we say to like look like we're chill, but we actually know so the ha ha ha okay is probably passive aggressive. Look at you analyzing it now. Oh, I know I do it, but I do it on purpose, and I love when they don't pick it up and then just keep going. I'm like, are you kidding me? Like, I'm just gonna keep playing this game. Like, hello. I'm mad. For the next 30 minutes, they're both analyzing strangers relationship drama, like it's a group assignment. 30 minutes? Yes. Oh my god. At one point, he literally says, Okay, wait, let's break this down logic logically. He starts listing possible scenarios on a napkin. When he got a pen bowling in his pocket. You don't know what he does for a living.

SPEAKER_01 9:13

No way, he started writing it down like.

SPEAKER_00 9:21

So scenario one, she's cheating. Scenario two, she's emotionally cheating. Scenario T three, she's just hot she's just bad at texting. So she wishes she was kidding with all this story.

SPEAKER_01 9:41

Right.

SPEAKER_00 9:41

Eventually, his roommate calls again.

Speakerphone And Accidental Counseling

SPEAKER_00 9:44

This time, her date answers at the table, puts a phone on speaker, and says, Okay, bro, I'm here with someone who can give a girl's perspective.

SPEAKER_01 10:00

That I oh my god, I don't even know what to say. You speechless?

SPEAKER_00 10:04

I'm speechless. Who does that? So she freezes, the roommate immediately goes, Wait, are you on a date right now? Yeah! Like, bro, what the hell are you doing? I mean I was on first day, I wouldn't answer. Two, if I was the guy, the friend, the roommate, I would probably wait. As soon as he says yes, I'd be like, Okay, bye. Exactly. I don't think that's the case. My dad says, yeah, but she's helping. My god. Now she apparently she's apparently part of this man's support team. Yeah. The roommate starts asking her questions directly, like, so if a girl says, I'm just tired, LOL, what does that actually mean? I know. I'm like he got comfortable very quick. Where are these people? At a restaurant. Um she gave some vague answer mostly because she was too deep into the sist into the situation to escape. Eventually the crisis calms down and they hang up. Her date leans back, looks relieved, and says, Whoa, that's thanks for that. You're really good at this. Then he acts, you'd get along great with my roommate. Now is he setting her up with him? Yeah, what does that mean?

SPEAKER_01 11:50

What does that mean? Hello? Mike, like thanks?

SPEAKER_00 11:55

Mike, okay, great. Are we starting dating and I need to be friends with your roommate? Like, what's going on? At that moment she realized something. She had just spent 45 minutes of her first date solving someone else's relationship problem. They finish their drinks and he walks her outside. Before leaving, he says, you know, tonight didn't go how I expected. Yeah, no. She's like, same buddy.

unknown 12:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:34

Then he says, but honestly, I feel like we worked really well as a team. That you forced me to be part of. Like, in her mind, she's like a team, like, we just completed a project together. Like, welcome back to high school. Here's your problem. Find a solution.

SPEAKER_02 12:56

I saw it.

SPEAKER_00 12:58

Get together, the next day his roommate messaged her to thank her for the advice. Then the words started spreading. And so, you know, I guess this is the story of how one terrible first date didn't turn into a relationship, but somehow she turned into a relationship advisor.

From Terrible Date To Life Lesson

SPEAKER_01 13:32

No way! She became a relationship advisor?

SPEAKER_00 13:37

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 13:39

Well, I guess as terrible as the date was it she got something out of it.

SPEAKER_00 13:46

I mean she found her dream career, her path.

SPEAKER_01 13:51

I guess. Um She realized that she was uh natural at it, huh?

SPEAKER_00 13:57

I'll be good at it. You? You know, coaches don't play. Oh please, if anyone's gonna be good at it, it would be me. Sure, you don't play at all. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. If anyone's being good at it, it's me. Yeah, you're worse than me. Oh, whoa, whoa. You don't get out there at all. But I give good advices and you know that. But most of it is because you hear of my experiences and you build on it. Exactly. Plus your brother's he's not a great at it either.

SPEAKER_01 14:38

And my other friends, they'll trust me, all of them said, how is it that you're gonna add it when you don't play? And I say what I that you just said, coaches don't play.

SPEAKER_00 14:49

Yeah, and then she learns everything from me. So I guess I am a good teacher after all.

SPEAKER_01 14:56

Oh, look at that! Or just uh what do you call it? What thing?

SPEAKER_00 15:04

Nothing, nothing. Forget it. You know what? Like my dad says, one day I will find someone. Yeah, I think he's more hopeful than I am But he kind of cur contradicts himself sometimes.

SPEAKER_01 15:21

No, I think you will find somebody too. I don't know. Back to our story. What the hell was that? What's up with people? And just like I we I know we said that at the start of the this podcast. The first days are meant to go wrong, I guess. But damn, like where did do you people find these men?

SPEAKER_00 15:48

On dating apps.

Dating Apps Communication And Attention Spans

SPEAKER_00 15:50

Does that mean that dating apps are the problem? To be honest, if you think about it, yes, I do think that that's the problem. I think that people rely on it so much because reality is if you're in a coffee shop and some guy comes to you and kind of like furts a little bit or says something, you're kind of gonna be like, oh my god, who's this weird? Right? Like, we are not used to that anymore. So that's one of the problems that I see is that people when it's organically and in person, people tend to run away from it because they don't recognize it anymore. But then at the same time, if you look at like how things have gone and how, like, for example, divorce rates have increased, I'm like, okay, a lot of people met organically and then they got divorced. A lot of people nowadays are meeting in dating apps and then getting married very quickly. Is that a good thing? A bad thing? We don't know, we gotta wait a few years to find out. Let the data collect. I just think everyone in general society just stopped giving a crap about things and stopped me working through stuff and learning how to communicate and understand each other and building something.

SPEAKER_01 17:15

Generally, and another thing is like listening, generally like listening and actually understanding and taking the time to understand, right? Like, I know this has nothing to do with dating or anything, but again, it kind of if you think about it, it will match. I saw a video, okay. I don't know if you have ever saw these two guys that just go stand at parks and they have like the sign, like and like something to do, and then they give money to people to do it. Yeah, so they had this very tiny sign, and they had what do you call it when you look at things?

SPEAKER_00 17:51

Magnifying glass.

SPEAKER_01 17:52

Yes, a magnifying glass. They had that, okay? So when people would come, they would take the microwave and they would just give it to the person. It's obvious what you have to do. Take that and put it on the thing because you can clearly see a small sign on the thing. People were so confused, Anish. So many people stood there and just looked at that my the the thing and were like, what do I do with this? Do you press it? What do you do with this? So they find somebody finally figured it out and they put it and they read the sign. And I said that you have to take a picture, you have to print out okay, this exact size, but bigger, and you'll get $200. Easy, right? So many people in Asia brought a picture of the tiny sign. They printed out a picture of like the guy with the tiny sign. Oh god, and they're like, nope, so I was like, Oh, then I'm confused. What do I have to do? It's literally written right there that you have to just say so. Finally, somebody figured it out. But I was like, people, what are we doing? Is this our society? Yes, yeah, yep, yep, yep, yep.

SPEAKER_00 19:16

I didn't need to say anything else, right?

SPEAKER_01 19:18

Yep, but I was like just like, we're doomed, like we are truly doomed. Nobody like takes the time to actually sit and like look around and actually try to understand something, okay? If we actually like think about it. Because we're in this side that like everything has have to come easy.

SPEAKER_00 19:40

No one works for anything anymore.

SPEAKER_01 19:42

Exactly. It's like they it's everything is easy, like even with work and stuff, they're like try to find an easy way around it.

Work Ethic Recognition And Closing

SPEAKER_00 19:51

I'm like, we were actually talking about this at work today. Like, the people that do the bare minimum are the ones that get the most respect, are the ones that get the most uh like compensation, like, you know, and it's like then why am I going through all the trouble? Why am I picking up on everyone's slack to make sure we work better, make sure we have what we need for when things come up? But then it's like I feel like I'm wasting my time when I'm not being recognized and people are not giving the value to it. Yeah. And it's like, okay, maybe I should just do the same thing as everyone else. And then what happens? Apple will get fired because I was uh like, oh, you're not performing like you used to. And it's like, you kidding me? Right? Everyone around me does the bare minimum and they get recompensated, and I decide to do the bare minimum, and now I'm I'm not good anymore.

SPEAKER_01 20:54

It's because they get used to it, it's like that person that they can fall back to, you know.

SPEAKER_00 20:59

Yeah, but then you know, compensate them, show appreciation.

SPEAKER_01 21:04

Yeah, exactly. That's what I mean. Like, everyone is out to take advantage of somebody else and like try to find an easy way out. And I'm like, babes, life don't work like that. I'm sorry, it doesn't. Life is not meant to be easy, okay? If like if it's easy, it's boring.

SPEAKER_00 21:23

You know, it's and it's funny because like sometimes I go home and I will complain to my family and be like, oh, you know, like this is happening, and blah blah blah, and and I like why am I picking up on this? Why am I doing this for this person? Blah blah blah. And then my dad is always like, Why did you got your promotion? And I'm like, I got my promotion because I do everything, I don't ask, I just go ahead and do it, and I pick up on all the slack, like I get things done. And he's like, Then you're doing right. Because if you got promoted because you're doing that, why would you stop now? And I'm like, but then Still, like, yeah, I got promoted, but I pretty much got promoted because they didn't have any other option. Like it's not like there's the recognition part missing. And like, yeah, I get promoted, but I'm still the one like doing what I'm supposed to do, plus everything else. And it's like when I do something and I'm like expecting someone to be like, oh my god, this looks great, but someone else picks up on it and be like, oh, here you go. And that person's like getting all the credits for it. And when I comment about it, it's like, oh, why do you want the credits? And I'm like, because I did it. Like exactly. It's those small things. Exactly. To be to be honest, doesn't make a difference to me. But it's just knowing that recognize. And it's knowing that the people that pays me knows what he's paying.

SPEAKER_01 22:51

Yeah. Like, is it so hard to understand? It is. That's what I mean. Like, we are in this thing that now is like everything is hard to understand, apparently. Which makes me lose my mind.

SPEAKER_00 23:05

I know. Common sense went out the window.

SPEAKER_01 23:08

Exactly. We had a podcast about we had an episode about that, guys. Go listen to it.

SPEAKER_00 23:14

Common sense without the window. So bad. I feel bad for the new generations. And it's like they're gonna be lost. Truly lost.

SPEAKER_01 23:26

Okay. Alright. So this was another episode. I I think I really love this story actually. And the story was good. Right? Yes. Please get in track with us and let us know what you want to hear. What episodes is your favorite? And should we dive into more stories like this? Yeah. Because I actually like it.

SPEAKER_00 23:49

Feel free to send a message with some comments, opinions, where you think. I want to say thank you for everyone who has taken some time to listen to us. I've been getting some feedback. I've been hearing people say that they love seeing a different side of us. Because reality is not everyone gets to see this crazy part, or the very chatty, oh very truthful opinions. We tend to be politically correct outside of the podcast. That's true. Maybe Sah. I'm not very good at it. I really try. The thing is, I become very comfortable with people. So there's so much that I can do.

SPEAKER_01 24:32

No, these are the truly these things, and like filming our podcast is one of my favorite things to do, and I look forward to it every week. So thank you again.

SPEAKER_00 24:42

Two weeks. Okay. It will get better, we'll get better. I promise.

SPEAKER_01 24:49

So this is Shepherd.