Entry 58: Yes, I am asking in Much Ado About Nothing

So, I do genuinely want to get input from folks but that will come after two specific things.
(1) Yes, this is labeled Entry 58 instead of 57 because I should have titled the last Entry as 57 but, in my haste to get what I wanted to write out, I simply labeled it RAD instead of Entry 57: RAD; so that is why this Entry is labeled Entry 58.
(2) This is a little unorthodox of me, but on occasion I do tend to write poetry and fiction and I do want to make sure I am not letting that part of my brain atrophy. So if you will permit me a brief interlude to write a bit of fluff, I would like to do so now:

Harvey Bullock sighed heavily. He knew the current standing order for all lead detectives on a homicide and he hated it. He never liked the idea of the Bat Signal but using detectives like messengers to a vigilante who may not even be out there was demeaning. He sighed again, and had the uniformed officers and forensic teams vacate the street. Finally, he closed his eyes and spoke the words he was required to speak. “Batman, I don’t know if you’re out there. We’ve all been told to say at any murder scene that the Commish wants to see you in his office.” Harvey shook his shoulders and readjusted his coat. There, I said it, I’m done, he thought as he stomped off and away from the scene of the crime.
About 40 feet away, crouched on the roof of a nearby apartment complex, Batman almost smiled. He knew Bullock had hated to do that, would have found the entire exchange demeaning. But despite his terrible manners, Bullock was a good cop. A good soldier. Batman suspected he knew what Gordon wanted but he wanted to know how much Gordon knew.

Commissioner James Gordon sat at his desk, his back to the open window and stared at his computer screen. He hated this part of the job. His late second wife Sarah had known him as a Lieutenant on the street and had once told him that Commissioner seemed awful “desk jobby” for him. Nights like this proved her right as Jim reviewed a mix of crime reports and press briefings. Every so often, a news story would pop up, and he would review it. Write it in his notes as either “important”, “unimportant”. or “needs further review.” The “needs further review” portion, on this night, was getting too long.
“It’s been too long.” a gruff recognizable voice said from behind him. Jim Gordon’s heart froze in his chest as an instinctive panic gripped him. He forced his breath to come back to him as he spoke without turning to greet his guest, “That’s still a terrible way to treat an old cop like me! One of these days, you’ll pull that little trick and I’ll have a heart attack on you. And it’ll serve you right.”
Gordon kept his left hand on the keyboard, still cycling through his work, while his right hand reached into his desk and removed a single manila folder. Without taking his eyes off the screen, Gordon held the folder up, offering it to the shadow in his office. As soon as the folder had left his hand, he started to give the oral summary.
“We’ve noticed a series of explosions throughout the city are connected in a few disturbing ways. We’ve had one of these every week for the last six weeks. A building set for demolition gets exploded the night before demo crews are supposed to take it down. No property damage but for the building itself. No loss of life as each building is totally vacant. That is except for the bombers themselves. Far as our explosives experts seem to figure it, these guys go into the building with a bomb and every time the bomb goes off before they can get away. A few guys fail to outrun a bomb, that happens. Every guy? That’s suspicious.”
Batman looked through the files as Gordon spoke. Each building, the building’s history, the demolition schedule. Then the police reports, describing the scene, identifying the single body in each explosion. Photographs of the exploded chest cavities and dental records to confirm identities. Batman was aware of the bombings but hadn’t felt terribly compelled to investigate much.
Gordon continued, not slowing to confirm if his guest was following, “So we looked into these guys. Tried to figure out if they were all using the same bomb manufacturer or what seemed to connect them. Turns out, that may be the same answer. Bit of a gruesome picture as the bomb took off his head, but if you look at the most recent corpse…”
Batman had already found the page and recognized the tattoo still clearly visibly on the man’s chest: A skyscraper background with a Minute Man clothed in white on horseback in the foreground. “Gotham Revolutionary White Power Movement,” Batman said.
Gently turning his head to the shadow behind him, Jim scowled slightly and continued, “Exactly. Now I’m not exactly crying over a half dozen neo-nazis suddenly exiting our fair city in this manner; but if these are all practice runs for something bigger, we need to know about it. If I go through official channels on this, it gets turned over to the Feds, we get cut out entirely, and after the No Man’s Land incident? I’m not comfortable trusting that they’ll actually work to prevent it if there is something bigger going on.”
Batman placed the folder on the desk and went to the window. “I’m on it”, he assured his old friend before disappearing completely. For the first time that night, Jim Gordon stood up from his desk and stretched his legs. He knew that Batman had left and that there would be no point in checking the window to see to where. He stretched his back, heard a few typical pops of his vertebrae and lumbered off to find some coffee.

(More happens; Batman is able to trace the bomb parts to Janus Chemicals and Barrie Electronics. A brief investigation reveals that Barrie Electronics is owned and operated by an ex-con who was once put in prison by then-District Attorney Harvey Dent. As Batman investigates Janus Chemicals, he is interrupted by Harvey Two Face’s arrival. Harvey notices that one of the redundancy to the redundancy alarms is silently flashing. He has his henchmen clear the building, but monitor every door and window, and put all of his other men on the roof covering the skylights.)

Harvey Two Face slowly spun in a circle in the middle of the empty space and shouted, “Batman, I’m going to the office. If you’re not already there, I’d like you to meet me there.” He placed his hands in his pockets but before starting towards the stairs, his good half added, “Please?” As he opened the door to the office, he saw the unmistakable form of the bat standing behind the desk. Harvey tried to smile at him, but with Two Face, it always came out like more of a grimace. “Would you indulge me by standing in front of the desk? I’d like to sit down and at least talk like… well, whatever our equivalent to rational adults might be.” Batman seemed to glide instead of step, but he was acquiescing to the request and moving around the desk. Harvey Two Face countered him so that they were performing almost a ballroom move counter-posed to one another. Even as Harvey Two Face sat down, Batman began, “Really, Harvey? I’m surprised at you! I figured even you wouldn’t be willing to work with Nazis!” Two Face chuckled, an unintentionally eerie and raspy sound emanating from deep in chest. “I knew you didn’t understand us, Batman,” Two Face croaked. Batman balled up his fists and spat, “I have all the evidence, Two Face. You supply all of the bomb equipment. I even have video evidence of you approaching this organization with the plan!” Two Face’s laugh was growing heavier as he casually put his hands behind his head. “But you still haven’t figured out a motive, Bats. Not if you actually think I’d work with these people.” Batman stopped. He didn’t like it when a villain was right, about anything, but he did have to admit that he hadn’t figured out why his old friend would suddenly take up with the Nazis. He’d just assumed that this was some binary option Harvey lost to Two Face and that his old friend’s evil half had really pushed him into something this awful. “I think we’re both offended, actually. No, I’m more offended. Harvey would forgive you for blaming it all on me; but I’m not so caring! But you’ll also note that I haven’t started shooting at you. And won’t.” Two Face even set his hands on the desk in a show of non-violence. Batman knew his old enemy could still be hiding any number of weapons, but stood giving no indication of trust or disbelief at this show of peace. “Then tell me why, Two Face!”
Two Face turned slightly, so that his unscarred side was prominent to Batman. “Well, Batman,” Harvey began, “We’d seen how bad the White Power thing was getting. And… well, as conflicted as we can be, this is actually something we agree on. Neither one of us likes it when those guys succeed or even when they think there are no consequences for what they’re doing.” Harvey Two Face snapped back to full facing of the cloaked figure in front of him, both halves visible. “And we couldn’t just let them keep spreading in MY city. So we decided to take advantage of their prejudice. Much like you, they thought ‘Two Face must support us.’ and as that clown we hate so much might say… that was the joke. You see, it wasn’t that Two Face supported them. It’s that we decided to live up to our name. Each bomb came built to their exact specifications. Timers and wires and everything they asked for. And a little extra, too. A remote detonator. Just our little way of cleaning up Gotham. In two ways.“

Thank you for indulging me.

NOW ON TO THE HELP I AM ASKING FOR

.... in two cases

(1) So, I have to admit- the more I think about the date on Saturday? I can definitely say I am more attracted to her than I thought I would be. She is a very attractive young woman. Which is absolutely what cranked up my nervousness. With my nervousness cranked up so much… I worry that I talked too much about myself and that I might have come across as something of a jerk. Discussing Theater and such and… the nerves of being recognized at a thing like Speed Dating but not knowing if it would be theater recognize or criminal recognize and… yeah. I know first dates are interviews so I was trying to let her see who I am and what matters to me and all of that, I’m just… yeah. High Nerves… worried I came across like a jerk. THAT SAID- I would like to ask her to a second date. But I can’t think of anything more than “Buy you lunch” which… doesn’t exactly seem… I don’t know. I looked into it. One of the best reviewed restaurants in the town where she lives is a Cafe that serves a wide range of options including gluten free, veggie, vegan, etc. Now, nothing about this woman makes me think she is vegan or vegetarian but it is the TOP REVIEWED restaurant for her town according to Trip Advisor. But see, there’s the rub as well. I know from her that she works from home, has a big family, is catholic, loves her nieces and nephews, stays fit, doesn’t swim much, doesn’t do theater much, her family runs an Auto Mechanic Shop. I’m genuinely a bit worried that we’re too different and/or I’m just… I’m not sure what to do on dates outside of things like restaurants, taking walks, seeing movies, going to theater shows. I know that, once there is a significantly heightened sense of the relationship, staying in dates… I know those, I’m good at those, I was married once. Games, and movies, and TV shows, and cooking together, and all those things- I got. It’s the early stuff I still feel… turned around about. Especially with a woman who seems so different from me. So I am looking for input. Should I just text something like, “I really enjoyed talking to you on Saturday and was wondering if you wanted to meet up again? Say, Saturday around noon at RESTAURANT?” or something like that? I’m really… I’m all over the place on this one.

(2) I must offer a retraction. I think. A few entries back I think I said that I did text the final matches or that I was going to text the final matches; and the truth is I haven’t yet. It was on the list of things to do and it didn’t get done as is becoming a terribly bad habit this winter that I truly need to break. (Personal Note: This does seem to be a common Winter Reaction, often re-set by the Daylight Savings reboot). That said, I have not texted them yet. And likely will. But I still don’t remember one at all. NOW, you’ll note I said ONE when there are two people that were on that list. And that’s because Facebook was nice enough to do the work for me. I should think. I don’t know how this wound up as a “You May Know” but I have guesses. We both were on the SINGLES Facebook page to do the Speed Dating, so it could be that loose of a connection. Part of me hopes that she found my facebook page and so Facebook was like “Hey, do you know her?” But either way, her picture and name wound up on my “PEOPLE YOU MAY KNOW” and elements flooded back quickly. The one I can now remember, I can’t remember much of what we talked about. It may have been one of the ones that I said, “Good energy. Altruistic possibility. Didn’t even get 3 minute conversation, so would be open to more.” But that isn’t a reason for hesitation right now. She is another beautiful red head… but looks a bit young generally. That’s already something of a concern for someone who is 40 to be dating someone who looks 24 (and may actually be in her 20s). But based on “general appearance” I would neither accept nor reject someone. Then we get the “but here’s the deal” which also has moralistic caveats. You see, she is an adult woman who already looks fairly young… and then she smiles. She has braces. Now I’m not one to hold that against anyone. Taking care of your teeth is not age restricted. And especially for something like orthodontia, it could easily be that her family could not afford such expensive correction as she was growing up but now that she is working and has a job and benefits, she can afford the dental care she requires. That’s admirable! But you can see how it acts as a rather… modifier on my initial concern? Someone who already looks young… then you add braces… that takes the moment from “That old man is dating a girl far too young for him” and threatens to thrust the whole affair into “I didn’t know you had a daughter!” territory. Now, of course, all of that may be silly in general. I haven’t texted her nor the other and, frankly, on my texting for Speed Dating, I’m only bating about 50% success rate, so wondering about things that may never be is not required (but certainly something I do a lot of). I’m just… I’m wondering if it is a thing, if I should let it be a thing… should I go ahead and text both of these women? Should I not? Should I wait to see about Méav first? If I do text the last two, do I actually text BOTH of them or just the one I can’t remember at all?

ASSISTANCE IS APPRECIATED