When my friend Mia set me up with Eric, I didn\u2019t expect much\u2014but our first date felt like a scene from a romantic movie.<\/p>\n
He showed up with flowers, a personalized keychain, and insisted on paying for dinner, saying,<\/p>\n
\u201cA man pays on the first date.\u201d I was flattered and thought I\u2019d met someone genuinely sweet.<\/p>\n
Then, the next morning, Eric sent me an invoice.<\/p>\n
Yes, a real invoice\u2014charging me for things like \u201croses for a hug,\u201d \u201cdinner in exchange for a second date,\u201d and \u201cengaging conversation\u201d<\/p>\n
as payment for a compliment. It was formatted like a business receipt, and he was completely serious. I was stunned.<\/p>\n
I showed it to Mia and her boyfriend Chris, who had recommended Eric. Chris was just as appalled and decided to respond in kind\u2014with<\/p>\n
a hilarious fake invoice charging Eric for \u201cwasting a great woman\u2019s time\u201d and \u201ca lifetime of silence.\u201d We sent it,<\/p>\n
and Eric replied with angry texts claiming I\u2019d missed out on a \u201cgreat guy.\u201d I blocked him immediately.<\/p>\n
The date began with charm and ended in absurdity. It taught me that real generosity doesn\u2019t<\/p>\n
come with a price tag\u2014and that red flags sometimes wear suits and bring flowers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
When my friend Mia set me up with Eric, I didn\u2019t expect much\u2014but our first date felt like a scene from a romantic movie. He showed up with flowers, a personalized keychain, and insisted on paying for dinner, saying, \u201cA man pays on the first date.\u201d I was flattered and thought I\u2019d met someone genuinely […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":33050,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33049","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/topnewsin34.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33049","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/topnewsin34.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/topnewsin34.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/topnewsin34.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/topnewsin34.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=33049"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/topnewsin34.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33049\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33051,"href":"https:\/\/topnewsin34.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33049\/revisions\/33051"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/topnewsin34.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/33050"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/topnewsin34.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=33049"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/topnewsin34.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=33049"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/topnewsin34.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=33049"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}