"Whenever I date a guy, I think, is this the man I want my children to spend their weekends with?" -- Rita Rudner

People Hira has one or two things to say about mercy dating: "This continued for a while, until finally I thought what the hell, its not going to kill me to have a coffee. And you've got to give the dude some credit for his persistence. [...] So we go on this coffee date. And of course it was excruciatingly EXCRUCIATING. He totally didn't get that I was being kind. He totally didn't get that this was not a real date. He totally thought I was interested in him."