Favourite Local Date Activity

Go for a walk

Supplied image

This year’s winner for favourite date activity took an unexpected turn. Perhaps readers are feeling a financial crunch from the ongoing trend toward precarious employment and the gig economy. Or perhaps, more than just getting cheap, we’re all just getting old.

But when it comes to a wild idea for fun with a friend, with that new special someone or with a partner you’ve been going steady with (okay, maybe not that old), overwhelmingly, you chose to go for a walk.

And there’s nothing wrong with that, if it’s accessible to you and your date. Walking dates have their perks for sure.

Awkward pauses in conversation might be a little less awkward while ambling side by side (rather than sitting across from each other at a table, as the distance between what was said and what might possibly be said next grows longer).

While walking, eventually the scenery changes, and one could take a cue from a Weakerthans song and “talk about the weather or / how the weather used to be.” If nothing else, the weather is especially relevant on an outdoor walk.

But suggestions for walking dates submitted by readers didn’t all involve epic treks, and there were some walks with indoor options – strolling around The Forks, the Exchange District or even IKEA – for those less outdoorsy types.

Others suggested eating or bringing coffee on walks, or wandering a place like the Assiniboine Park Zoo or FortWhyte Alive, which blend entertainment, amenities and wandering.

One reader suggested walking and Netflix, which possibly means walking then Netflix, but if you’d like to find a way to combine the two simultaneously, all the power to you.

Perhaps the point of these walking dates is not so much what you’re doing, or where, but who you’re doing it with.

Published in Volume 73, Number 12 of The Uniter (November 29, 2018)

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