Disclaimer- While Michael Andrew is not a fan or supporter of blind dates….he happens to have extensive knowledge of the subject matter and wishes to pass it on to protect the innocent and defend the naive. Its nothing personal.

In the wonderful world of blind dating, I have come to find a few key phrases that require interpretation for both the setter upper and the setter upee.

“Cute”- as in “she is cute” – This is not a good adjective in the blind dating process. Everyone, and I mean EVERYONE is cute in some way or another, especially to their mothers. While dating someone who is “cute” is perfectly acceptable, it is usually better if the setupee is the one designating him or her as cute. If you are trying to set someone up, avoid use of the word “cute”.

“Really” – as in “she is really cute” – This is much worse that “cute” alone. It is as if saying the word “really” before cute makes the person “beautiful”, yet for some reason the setter upper doesnt use the word “beautiful”. The more “really”s you hear before the adjective, the less likely it is to be truth, as in “she is really, really, really cute”. Unfortunately, “really” in the world of blind dating means “not” or “this is a lie”.

“Beautiful” as in, “she is beautiful”. Let me ask you something…. if she was really beautiful….why would anyone need to set her on a blind date? And if she really was beautiful, perhaps there is another reason why she is being set up…I have met a few women who were as crazy as they were beautfiul and they were complete knockouts. Still the whole sanity thing weighs in there somewhere…not sure where. Yes, so beautiful usually means “crazy”.

“Sweet” as in “she is such a sweet person”. Not sure who coined this phrase….what it really means is “there are occasions when this person is capable of being sweet., though it is usually less than 50% of the time.”

“Smart” as in “she is really smart”. This means “power hungry” or “likes to argue”. Think about it, what man would like to date/marry a woman who was “smarter” than he?

“Amazing” as in “she is the most amazing person I have ever met”. Amazing doesnt always mean a negative or positive quality. I have seen some amazingly bad manners, for example.

You are probably wondering which adjectives to use when setting someone up on a blind date. Truthfully, if you think you have a match for a friend, the best way to go about setting them up is to introduce them in a large group setting, let them meet and talk with each other in their own elements, if its there, they will do the rest.

Sometimes this isnt possible, the next best thing would be to show each of the setter upees pictures of the other person. To the set up ees I would say beware of very tight head shots that appear to be more than 5 years old based on the bang formation of the young woman.

If the woman is indeed a knock out, interestingly, there is no attempt at description. The settupper will say “Just wait till you meet her”, or “dude….you have no idea” or “I have found your wife” or “you have no clue how lucky you are” or “You are going to be thanking me for the rest of your life” or they will just laugh to themselves and shake their head as if they have the biggest secret in the world (smiling….if they are frowning….its not good).

The one word I have found to be used accurately 95% of the time is “hot” as in good looking “hot”. See, if the setter upper says the word “hot” there is very little room for interpretation like cute, sweet, nice, etc. and if the blind date wasnt “hot” the setter upper would be a liar, so yes….”hot” is usually reliable.