Recently, I signed up for a dating app called How About We. Some friends have had some success with it, and I felt like I needed a dating win, so I gave it a shot.

HAW (Yes, I am calling it that) followed myriad matchmaking sites and apps I have been using on-and-off for the past couple of years, but I thought it appealed to my style for trying to meet girls. Which consists of writing something that gets their attention on the Internet. This sometimes outweighs the fact that I am kind of overweight in some of my pictures, not sexy, rich, et. al.*

The way you garner initial interest on HAW is by pitching date ideas that start with, obviously, “How about we…”

I want to seem appealing and original. So I wrote a bunch of ideas. I’m going to put some of them on my profile and see what happens. Feel free to use any of these if you dig them.

How about we…

• Meet at a soup kitchen or some other place where we can volunteer and do some good for the specific purpose of doing some good while we get to know each other. Then let’s vow to not post about doing so on social media, or randomly insert into conversation that we did a kind act that we were not paid for (except in the currency of bright smiles from the downtrodden!). We’ll talk about our deed only when asked how our date went. (OK. I’m not totally pure of heart. I figure if we’re around a bunch of homeless dudes, there won’t be a ton of competition who have their lives put together better than I do.)
• Meet at a bar and critique each other’s online dating profiles, and then share the worst online dating experience we’ve ever had. (Hopefully our date will not end up topping it in awfulness/awkwardness.)
• Get together and come up with a bunch of wild scenarios we could use as a “how we met” story. Like that you were stung by a jellyfish on the beach while I was passing and I offered to pee on your leg to make the pain go away.
• Share an earnest list of our self-perceived faults, so we can get that out of the way.
• Lie in bed together. No touching or anything like that (unless you’re into it). We can just, like, talk and then read. Maybe take a nap. I feel like this might be jumping over many steps, but whatever. If you’re going to be with someone, you need to be comfortable with them a) in bed together, and b) doing nothing at all.
• Meet early in the morning for coffee, crullers, bagels (or whatever you like to Hoover on to break the fast) while sitting on a stoop in East Village and watching all of the Walk of Shamers hurry past.
• Go for a run or to the gym together. Don’t worry, I’m not a weird fitness freak or anything. I just think if we sweat it out and look all trashy from the beginning, that could actually be a good thing. You know, no frills as far as looks are concerned. We can be natural. I never wear makeup to the gym.
• Get together, have some drinks and talk for a while. If we like each other, we can start a social media campaign where our friends and family members suggest crazy ideas for our subsequent dates.
• F**k each other’s brains out!!!!
• Meet at a subway stop. Get on a train. Start screaming obnoxiously at each other about some fake fight scenario we’ve dreamt up. Then we can get off of that train, board another, wait for those annoying kids with boom boxes who always want to pole dance to get on, and then throw projectiles at them.
• Watch every single movie Patrick Swayze has ever appeared in.
• Go to a movie theater to see a terrible movie that we won’t mind whispering to each other during. It’ll make us feel young again, you know? And if things go well, I wouldn’t be opposed to some making out and heavy petting. Shit, I’m no prude. I’ll even go under the shirt and over the bra for a quick feel-up, if you’re down.
• Do a power hour. We can get to know each other on high-level things during, and then drunkenly ramble about whatever bullshit we want afterward.
• Head to one of the city’s finest T.G.I. Friday’s locations and drop $10 on the all-you-can-eat appetizers promotion they’ve got going currently. Then let’s see how much and for how long we can eat. And how many slushies we can consume. As an added bonus, I will write your name inside of a heart using only mozzarella sticks and marinara sauce.

*I’ve been getting girls in this way mostly since I used to chat for hours a day on AIM in middle school. The longest relationship of my life began with me randomly Facebook messaging a girl to tell her I thought she had good taste in music. The most beautiful girl I have ever bedded came into my life after she read a story I wrote about both my mom and dad catching me masturbating.