Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader, for reasons now passing understanding, was much delayed in publishing this piece for the Men’s Club/Divas Thursday. Indeed this topic, “Embarassing Dates” is a toughy for your Maximum Leader. He doesn’t recall that many embarassing dates. Perhaps he’s blocked them out. Perhaps he didn’t date enough to be embarassed. Perhaps all his first date were embarassing and he was just too egotistical to admit it.

Regardless, one date stands out as particularly bad. So he will recount that experience…

A few months after the Minister of Agriculture was lucky enough to wed the lovely Mrs. Smallholder, your Maximum Leader went to visit the happy couple at their domicile in the suburbs of Chicago. At this point, your Maximum Leader was a not-so-swingin’ bachelor. The Smallholder, being a good friend, started working over Mrs. Smallholder to present him with a list of suitable young ladies who might act as a “date” for any nights out we might have during our visit.

It turns out that a college friend of Mrs. Smallholder was in also living in the area and was open to meeting your Maximum Leader. So one night during your Maximum Leader’s visit, “S” joined us for dinner. As it turns out, your Maximum Leader and “S” hit it off and discovered that we had many things in common.

Your Maximum Leader returned to Virginia, but he and “S” kept in touch. Some e-mails. A note or two in the mail. And phone calls. Your Maximum Leader returned to the greater Chicagoland area and tried to pitch a little more woo in “S’s” direction.

After a little while, “S” agreed to come to VA to spend a few days with your Maximum Leader. And that is where the detail of our story begins.

After picking up “S” at Dulles Airport, your Maximum Leader returned her to the great valley of the Shennendoah in Virginia. It was May (as he remembers) and the weather was great. “S” claimed to love the mountains and wanted to go and see some of the sites along Skyline Drive - a scenic route along the ridge of the mountains.

So the day after “S” arrived, your Maximum Leader took “S” up to the mountains. We resolved to go on a little hike and see the Black Water Falls. A particularly nice set of waterfalls with a nice 3 mile hike beginning and ending at a single parking area.

Your Maximum Leader had done the hike before, so he knew the grade wasn’t bad and that it was a good trail on which to walk and talk and pitch a little woo. The trail wasn’t so difficult or technical that one had to pay contant attention to what you were doing.

And therein lay the heart of the problem.

Your Maximum Leader and “S” drove out to the trail’s beginning in your Maximum Leader’s much beloved 1991 Honda Civic DX. The car was red. Got great mileage. And was fun to drive because it handled pretty well and was manual transmission.

We started out on the trail. The trail began by going downhill to the bottom of the falls. That was the really steep grade. Then there was a gentle arching path back up to the top. Your Maximum Leader and “S” did the downhill stretch in no time. We stopped at the bottom, looked at the falls. And chatted about lots of mindless subjects.

At this point your Maximum Leader started to notice that “S” wasn’t quite as warm and open as she’d been in times past. Indeed she seemed a little standoffish and distant.

Your Maximum Leader, while walking and making small-talk, was going over in his mind how he might change tactics. And around that time he noticed a large tree had fallen across the path. There are a number of ways one can traverse a tree which has fallen across your path. Your Maximum Leader, breaking one of the cardinal rules of hiking, decided to take the glamourous way of traversing the fallen tree. With a few steps of a running start, he bounded over the tree. He hoped to impress “S” with this (rather minor) show of agility and prowess.

Alas and unfortunately for him, upon landing on the other side of the tree his first leg to touch down did so in a small hole covered by a flurry of leaves and blocked from view by the bulk of the tree. This leg became caught and twisted violently as the rest of your Maximum Leader’s (considerable) bulk tried to gracefully and athletically finish the follow through.
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