I tend to say something like, 'Fancy meeting up sometime soon? I'm free next week on [lunchtimes] and/or [evenings]. I'm happy to [drive/take the train/whatever], or you're welcome to visit here (I'll cook).'

I'm pretty used to this because I have friends dotted around the bay area, so whilst there are people within walking distance, I often also go to see people in Oakland and Berkeley which is about an hour's drive from here. Before I moved back to Mountain View, basically any socialising required significant commuting, so I feel a little spoiled now. I tend to think that it's better to occasionally risk pushing the boundary a little to arrange to meet up with people I don't know well. As a consequence of this, I've gone from no social life to a not-bad one in a couple of months.

Yeah, that's a sensible sort of suggestion.

I do occasionally end up saying "Do you want coffee/DVDs? I'm free tues, wed, fri night, thu 6-8, sat 12-7, sun 9-11..." and cringe at myself :) Though if you've already established you do want to meet, but are both busy, it does make sense. Not as a first gambit, though :)

I actually don't see it as much of an issue, even for a first approach to someone. I might leave out a list of possible times until they reply in that case, but I would typically still take the same approach. For a first contact, I would probably suggest lunch rather than dinner though, because in some sense it is lighter weight, in that both parties have an easy out, whereas a dinner thing implicitly has the assumption of staying in someone's company for much longer.