Ashley popped up on Match one Sunday morning. I was on my balcony, drinking a coffee, and looking at downtown from 20 floors up. It is a good time to scan the dating sites... quiet.

We had chatted, moved to text, had a short, but good, first meeting and then when out to dinner a few days later, and had a nice time. I had put Ashley in the "strong prospect" category. As far as I am concerned, if things are not moving forward, they are moving backward, so I decide to try to setup a third date with Ashley.

"What are you doing this weekend?" I text. "You!" she replies. Yup, that was Ashley, a little bit of a jokester. But I like it. "Friday night?" I text. "Any night!" she replies. It seems our second date must have gone even better than I remember. "Lol, How about Malio's at 7?" I text. "Perfect, this time I will take an Uber, see you then 😘." she replies.

Uber is awesome. It has probably prevented untold numbers of DUIs, and most likely some deaths as a result. As a guy, what I hear, when a girls says "I'm Ubering to you.", is that she won't have a car to deal with. It is the ultimate in flexibility. If a woman is going to drive her car to meet you downtown, it creates a several challenges. First she has to park, or valet it somewhere. At the end of dinner, her car is hanging out there like a boat anchor. If we decide to maybe go back to my apartment, it's even more work. "You can ride with me." The valet brings her car up, she gets in and reaches over to unlock the passenger door for me, realizing her car is a shithole. "Sorry, my car is dirty" says every woman whose car any man ever got into, because they are always shitholes. My apartment is in one of the three high-rises on Harbour Island, a short drive from anywhere in downtown, Ybor or South Tampa. I'll direct her to the garage in my building, where visitors can park, some kind of empty food bag crunching on the floorboard under my feet.

I'm sitting at the bar at Malio's sipping my Manhattan at 6:45, considering whether I should wait for Ashley to come in here, or if I should go meet her at the valet stand, where Uber will drop her. As much as I really enjoy watching a woman enter a place scanning for me, this is our third date. I'll slug the drink, and walk out to meet her.

As I approach the Valet stand, I see an Uber pulling away, and Ashley is standing there... 5 minutes early. She looks stunning. She's wearing a much slinkier dress than our first two meetings, and I take that as a good sign. I reach her and go to give her a hug. I guess she was expecting a kiss, as I felt her lips graze my cheek as my head moved to the side of hers. I pull my head back quickly and give her a quick kiss. Damn, now I remember giving her a kiss goodbye on our second date, which should clearly be the proper "Hello" on the next one... but she seems fine.

I grab her hand and we start walking up the walkway back to Malio's which is at the back of the "Beer Can" building. "How was the ride?" I asked. "Well, the guy adjusted his mirror to be looking at me the whole way, but it was fine." she replied. Ashley has one of those bodies that looks like it was combined from two slightly different sized women. From her head to her waist, and her feet to her thighs, she's a size four, but her hips and butt are a size 6. I let go of her hand, and motion for her to keep walking. She smiles over her shoulder and complies, knowing exactly what I am looking at. We reach the door to the office building lobby, and when I pull it open a gush of wind from pressure blows her hair and her dress. Damn she looks hot.

"Reservation for Steve." I say to the hostess. "Yes, right this way." says the hostess, who turns and starts walking. We follow her as she goes through the lower lever, and up to the upper deck, and starts moving towards a table opposite of the view. "I think we'll sit here." I said, motioning to a four-top with an great view. I detect a slight annoyance, but I don't give a shit. "Of course sir." the hostess says as she collects the menus off the shitty table she was trying to put us at. I never understood this effort to seat people at the worst available tables first. Why is the person behind me going to be any better? We take our seats facing out to the river, with our backs to the restaurant. Not normally a position I like, but it somehow works, and feels almost like we are alone.

"Can I start you guys with some drinks?" says the waitress, interrupting the beginning of our conversation. "You go first." says Ashley. "I'll have a Woodford Manhattan." I tell the waitress. Ashley looks at me and says to the waitress "Same." without looking away from me. She is pretty fucking awesome.

Ashley is beautiful and sexy, but she's no dummy... far from it. If that was all she was, we would not be on a third date. I've had sex with beautiful, but vapid, women before... it is not very satisfying. I have not slept with Ashley yet, and may not this evening either... but I'm in no hurry. The dinner conversation is stimulating, and even though she is showing a fair bit of cleavage, my eyes stay on hers as we talk. Dinner is wonderful.

After signing the check, I say "Shall I call you an Uber?" I'm thinking, Please don't say yes! "What do I look like? Cinderella?" she says... and I am thinking she kind of does. "Okay, how about we walk off that dinner on the Riverwalk?" I suggest. "Perfect" she says. How nice is it that neither of us has a car to deal with. We get up from the table and turn, and the restaurant is packed, and suddenly it seems very loud. I had not noticed the noise level before. We head out.

"Right or Left?" I say as we reach the Riverwalk. "Your place is left right?" she says. I'm thinking... so it is.. and grab her hand and we make a left. The Riverwalk in Tampa is really a jewel of the city in my book, especially at night. We are walking silently for quite a while, I am wondering what she is thinking, as we reach the Sail Pavilion. "Do you want another drink, or water?" I ask. "Is that Jackson's?" she says, looking across the channel at Harbour Island. I lean in close to her and point my outstretched arm down her line of sight "That's Jackson's there, and that's America Social next to it." "Let's go that way." she says, and starts walking, pulling me by my hand.

A few minutes later, we are at the peak of the Harbour Island bridge, we can already hear the people sounds from the clubs, and she stops "Which building is yours?" "That one." I say, again pointing like you might, if you where showing a kid a particular star in the sky. "Do you have drinks there?" she says, smiling. "As a matter of fact..." I reply, and she grabs my hand and starts pulling me to walk again. We go right past the crowded clubs, and continue the few blocks to my building.

"Welcome back Mr. Steve." says Carlos, from his desk in the lobby as we enter. "Thanks Carlos, this is Ashley." I say, as I slowly continue past him towards the elevator bank. "Nice to meet you Miss Ashley." he says. She smiles at him, possibly wondering how many women Carlos has been introduced to. The middle elevator opens, a woman with two small yipping dogs comes out, and we replace her. I press "20".

My apartment is very nice. As we enter I say, "Alexa, I'm home!" Alexa runs my pre-programmed routine in the dark, turning on certain lights to certain levels and starts playing smooth jazz. Ashley looks at me, her brow slightly furrowed, and says "Really?" "Hey, I'm kind of a tech nerd." I say. I give her the quick tour, my 2nd bedroom that is an office, the master bedroom, and end with the balcony. This night, Tampa did not disappoint, the view of downtown is spectacular. "What would you like to drink?" I ask, as she sits in one of my Adirondack chairs on the balcony. "Can you make a Manhattan as good as Malio's?" she asks. "Better" I say and head to my bar.

Five minutes later, which felt like a very long time, I was pushing the balcony door open with my hip, as I brought out two Manhattans in Martini glasses. She took a sip, and smiled. I asked "Better?" She responded, "Yup, I'm thinking maybe we call Uber in the morning." "Yup." I smile.