A few uncomfortable thoughts: a stubbed toe, a root canal, and being stuck with a date you don’t like. While they all involve just temporary pain, spending a few hours with someone you feel you don’t mesh with can seem excruciating at times. So what do you do when you feel like you’d rather be gnawed on by a herd of rabid squirrels, rather than sit through 2 more minutes listening to why Star Wars is better than Battlestar Gallactica?

While there are many approaches, here are a just a few of the tried and true tactics to get you home early:

Take the honest route. When you find your mind wondering during dinner, and wishing a friend would call your cell with “an emergency”, go ahead and lay it on the line. There are certainly ways to be polite and tactful, while asking to excuse yourself from the rest of the evening. “I’m just not feeling as if we’re a good match” is an effective opener.

Feign illness. Maybe it was the fish that made you ill at dinner… hang your hat on that excuse and then hope your date doesn’t recall that you had the chicken. I do suggest that if you decide to play The Sick Card, you go all in though. Don’t be too passive in stating you ‘feel a bit queasy’; instead, go right ahead and tell him / her “wow, I don’t know WHAT they put in that gazpacho, but whatever it was; it’s going through me like a locomotive!!” There are very few people that will attempt to detain you after that declaration.

Having a friend call you with a “so-called” emergency actually has been over played in Television and the Movies but can still work if you have children. Just be smart as to how and when during the date you play this card. Set up a code in advance, just in case your date wants to question you about the situation and asks if they could help. A text with a key word telling your friend to call back in 5, 10 or 20 minutes is helpful

If the above mentioned tips fails to get you to the exit, and an accelerated end to the date, there is always the “excuse me, I have to use the restroom” line. This works best if the restrooms are out of view of your date and have a close proximity to an exit. This is to only be used if your date actually instills a sense of fear in you and your options are limited and your safety could be compromised. Try to avoid this tip if at all possible as it is not only a method of last resort, but you are also not quite sure of the mental state of your date and whether he or she may be the type to retaliate.

These few tips to end a date early are by no means the only ones, but having a friend in the local SWAT team come in and arrest you would definitely work and probably eliminate any future requests to go out, however it may be a bit on the extreme side. The best method for ending a date early is not to go out with them. It’s difficult to ascertain whether a person is a good fit for you with out the first or second date but you can weed out a great many of the undesirables. Just use your best judgment and natural instinct and you should be fine, if that doesn’t work, pull the fire alarm and run like hell!