I've met some women in some very interesting ways. Looking back on my life recently, I realized that I don't think I was ever really normal. I know, that's a conclusion most of you came to within hours of meeting me, but still... In recent years I've connected with women via Facebook, Myspace, repeated and random bumping into a complete stranger, and in not-so-recent-years via aol's Instant Messenger and even a wrong number. Yeah, somehow I parlayed a wrong number into a date. It was the most bizarre thing...

Flash back with me to 1997. Freshman year at UF. I'm living in a "temporary" triple (for those of you who don't know what that is, basically, it's a room meant for two people that they put three people in because each year they overbook the dorms under the assumption that 10% of the people will move off campus.) My roommates are J-Train and Alec. J-Train was my buddy from High School, so we were actually planning on being roommates. Alec was... well... first off, he was Eugene. He went by Alec, though. He was an interesting guy, but, fortunately, not really involved in this story.

So yeah, Me, J-Train and Alec living in a room meant for two. Since there were three of us sharing the same room, that meant three of us sharing the same phone line. To elliminate some of the confusion of having to write each other phone messages, we got one of those answering machines with more than one mailbox. You would call our landline and the machine would pick up and prompt you to Press 1 for J-Train, Press 2 for Alec or Press 3 for David.

Well, during the first week alone I think we must have received two dozen phone calls for Will.

So, that was 1 for J-Train, 2 for Alec or 3 for David. Who in the world was Will? We sure didn't know.... but we did get tired of getting calls for him, and I was curious. I mean, this guy was getting more calls than any of us were, so I changed the voice mail to something like this:

"Hello, you've reached Jennings, Room 4-1-1. We're not picking up the phone, so levae a message. If this is for J-Train, Press 1. If this is for Alec, Press 2. If this is for David, Press 3. And if you're calling for Will, he no longer has this phone number, but if you want to leave him a message, Press 4. If you have any information as to where he might be or what his new number is, let us know so we can pass along any messages we have for him. Thanks! Bye!"

Kind of silly, right? I mean, who would leave a message for a guy on an answering machine that says he doesn't live there anymore?

You'd be suprised. Lots of people left messages. No forwarding information, though. Not yet, anyway.

One day, during the third week or so of school, I wasn't thinking and actually picked up the phone without screening the call. Oops, oh well. Too late.

Me: Hello?
Caller: Hi?
Me: Hey... umm... who is this?
Caller: Amber. who is this?
Me: David. How's it going?
Amber: Not bad... is Will around?
Me: Nope.
Amber: Do you know when he'll be back?
Me: Nope. Actually, I don't even know who he is. I just moved in here a few weeks ago and got this as my phone number. Been getting tons of calls for him, though. He was a pretty popular guy, wasn't he?
A: Ha! Wait. Are you serious?
M: Yep.
A: Oh. Yeah, he was a cool guy....

.... and the conversation went on for about an hour or so longer. No clue what we talked about, just remember that she sounded cute, so... why not? Total stranger. Called for some guy named Will who no longer lived there. We bonded over the phone. It was weird.

A few days later, Amber called again. This time, I wasn't there to pick up, so she went to the answering machine. She left a message in the Will mailbox, saying she'd found out what happened to him and left his new phone number. I ended up writing down a list of all the people that had left him messages and gave him a call to relay the names.

I got his machine. Go figure. I just left him a long message explaining the situation and gave him the names of all his callers.

He never called back.

He must have thought I was a freak or something... I probably would have.

A few days later, something totally unexpected happened. I checked my messages after class one day and I actually had one! I know, amazing, right? Well, it gets even better... the message was from Amber.

She left me her number.

I was grinning the rest of that afternoon.

I was pretty busy that night (playing video games or something, I'm sure) but I didn't get around to calling her until the next day. When I did, though, she said that she just wanted to make sure I'd gotten her message about Will's new phone number.... yada yada yada... we talked for another hour or so, getting to know each other a little better. Somehow at the end of the conversation we'd agreed to get together later that night to hang out.

I don't know what I could have said to convince this girl that meeting a complete stranger at Denny's for some desert was a good idea... and I don't know what convinced me of the same thing.... but it happened.

We met up for desert.

She was hot.

I was ... me.

We hung out and talked for a while, then went back to her place to hang out with her roommates.

The whole experience was kind of surreal.

It was a good time.

We ended up going on a couple of dates, but nothing major.

So, yeah... the first girl I ever dated in college I met because she called the wrong number.

Who else does that?

Nobody.

And that's why I'm Dave.... Just Dave.