Match game

Get to know your online mate on a real-world blind date

10/07/03

By Ellen Fox

So you've found a match on Friendster and you're meeting face-to-face for the first time? Try these ice-breaking first dates: They'll keep the two of you occupied while you get to know each other--and furtively check out each other's butts.

Bottle barometer
If the prospect of sitting across from each other and talking forces you to drink, it might as well be good stuff. With more than 200 bottles and a menu of shareable Italian eats, Enoteca Piattini wine bar is an intimate way to break the ice. Try a $25 bottle of light, bubbly Nino Franco prosecco or medium-bodied, peppery Borgo Scopeto chianti classico. Plus, the bottle's like an hourglass: When the wine's gone, the date's over.


Dress to impress
Sifting through capes and costumes at Rogers Park's Lost Eras is a sure-fire conversation-starter, not to mention an efficient way to get Halloween's most important chore accomplished. She chooses to be Cleopatra and he chooses … Hitler? Maybe love's not in the cards, but the pickings at this prop house ensure you'll still leave matched up with something.

Heavy petting
The Anti-Cruelty Society welcomes visitors to sign in and play with the cats and dogs. It's a great way to gauge your compatibility (dog lover versus cat lover) as well as her tolerance for having her crotch sniffed. Then again, just because she's shrieking "down boy!" here doesn't mean she'll be able to keep her paws off you later.

Crash the love party
Fall is a busy time for betrothals. Test your date's adventure streak--and dance moves--by sneaking into a luxury hotel's ballroom on any Saturday night and crashing a wedding. We suggest the InterContinental Chicago. Plus, there's no cheaper reason to get dolled up in cocktail wear.

Ellen Fox is a metromix special contributor.