The Man Date

Just a couple of days ago I was out at lunch with a friend of mine, more so he is a young man that I've been disciplining for some time. He asked if we could grab something to eat and that he wanted to talk to me about some stuff that was bothering him. So as we're there he was telling me about this situation that he is in and basically just wanted advise on how to navigate through it. After we ate we continued to talk for a little bit then I told him that we needed to get going. And as we were getting up he said to me "thanks man, this was a good man date." Now, instantly I was taken back. I had never heard a guy ever say that and I began to ask myself "what in the world is a man date? what kind of twisted and satanic thoughts does this guy have about this meeting? This is wrong I should have never come." Then I casually collected myself and asked "what is a man date?" He replied "a man date is when two bros go and hangout somewhere." As I heard this I took a deep breath and knew that I wasn't going to have to have a time of deliverance with this young man. But it got me thinking about what actually constitutes a "Man Date". I believe there needs to be some clarity brought to this phrase, because it can so easily be taken out of context. Webster defines the word date as "a social appointment, engagement, or occasion arranged beforehand with another person". With that said it can be made clear that a man date is a social meeting with one or more guys. The key to this is that it is social and there can be no premeditate emotions to it. Let me elaborate a little bit more. To truly have a man date you must plan the meeting as a completely social event. With that said the truth is that my meeting with this young man wasn't actually a man date. Because it was planned as an emotional time of counseling. We both knew going into it that he wanted to express emotions that were bothering him. If it were to be an actual man date it would have had to of been planned as we are simply going to lunch to just hang out. Here's a good example of an actual man date. Just a week or so ago I invited a buddy of mine to go to see a Diamondbacks game. I had an extra ticket and knew that he would probably like to go. All that was planned ahead of time was that we were going to go to a ball game and have fun. That's a man date. A man date is not inviting a couple of your friends to go watch The Notebook. That's called you can't get a girl to go see it so you asked a bunch a guys to go instead which is probably even worse than the fact that you can't get a date. And one last bit of advice, don't actually ask another guy to go on a man date with you. That's just weird. The correct wording to use would be something similar to "hey you want to go to a game?" Don't make it awkward! So don't use the term out of context. A "Man Date" can be defined as a planned social event with no emotional expectation what so ever. That's it, I'm calling Webster and added that trash.