The Boys To Avoid (at least in my case)

Before I continue, here's something for guys and dolls alike: if you're meeting someone new who appears to have potential for something more...DON'T TALK ABOUT, DON'T EVEN MENTION YOUR PAST RELATIONSHIPS/PARTNERS. I'm guilty of doing it, but only *after* the boy in question begins to do so. It creates a strange jealousy and despite the fact that you may consider yourself very self-confident, you suddenly have a need to constantly compare yourself to whatever stories they tell about their past partners. I also feel that it makes you seem like a victim all the time to your new boy/girl, while you'd rather be seen, as Austin Powers deemed himself, "an International Man[/Woman] of Mystery". What I like to do, if I find myself talking about the past, is go "Whoa whoa, wasted enough time on him...let's talk about you." Sounds stupid, but wouldn't you rather laugh and be flirtatious than go into a downer conversation? (Oddly I always seem to be the sanest girl they've ever been out with. Hmm!)

Anyway, where was I...after the failed date on PlentyOfFish, I continued looking on that site. The milieu of single baby-daddies and high-school dropouts isn't exactly attractive to a soon-to-be COLLEGE GRADUATE (this is late March of '09), so I deleted my profile and Googled for more free dating sites. OKCupid was the first one listed. Building my page, I let loose with everything I could think of that described me. Then I went back and edited - guys don't want to read a term paper, they want a description of YOU. If you're at all familiar with the site, you know that they match you with similar users by answering questions; concerning anything from sexual kinks to personal ethics and values. After going through all that (and even before I answered an absurd amount of questions), again I was messaged almost the second my profile was posted. Fastidiously, I went through my "Matches", hiding the ones who didn't catch my eye. By the end of that week (if memory serves, it was the first week of April), I was asked out by someone with whom I'd been chit-chatting. I laughed hysterically that he'd felt the need to warn me via IM that he was short, and of course I'm quite petite, so that didn't bother me.

Ladies, let's just say I was glad I didn't overdo it and wear kitten heels. I would've TOWERED over this dude. Deciding to just hit the campus 7-11 and then hang out, we made fun of the hippies playing music, the bros trying to hit on passing girls, and discussed a little bit of everything. But while the conversation was a lot easier, again we were lacking on similarity or even cohesiveness. He was an engineer, so he could talk about math/science-y things; while I can talk about anything artsy and abstract. I tried to find a middle ground, but there seemed to be none. Then and there I thought "Engineers are not for me. They're too logical." [Yet I stupidly kept giving them a chance.] We parted for the evening, and a couple of days later, I received a message on OKCupid from him saying "It was fun, but you're not my type. Bye." It barely registered as something to think about.

The next week, after exchanging a good 10 emails back and forth, another engineering major asked me to meet up. A very unconventional date, playing frisbee in Rittenhouse Square. YAY, an engineer who likes to have fun! Then we wasted the rest of the time walking around, sitting in the park and having awkward convos. I gotta say, it was extremely shocking to hear him speak and then be completely unable to disassociate him from one of my best guy friends since he had the exact same voice. Needless to say, that went nowhere.

The NEXT week (or maybe it was the same week), yet another engineer asked me out. To Starbucks. (Yawn). He played tennis so we had that in common, and I think we talked about TV shows at least. But it was still terrible, having to think of things to discuss. The highlight of that afternoon was AFTER I left the date, to go buy art supplies. So you can tell how well that went.

Starting to feel burned out already, and vaguely starting to understand Ann Reinking (Katie)'s freakout in "All That Jazz", about how she's tired of the small-talk necessary in dating, one morning I awake to find a message from a very cute and silly boy who actually lived out near me at home (in the suburbs.) He'd never come up in my matches since I had mine limited by distance by 50 miles - and since he'd listed his profile as Harrisburg for school, but was actually from the Main Line, he'd opened his distance a bit wider. We started chatting about the little and basic things, playing games of "Questions" (a la the "Whose Line is it Anyway" game, where you have a conversation only with questions.) Then I made a quick mention about cartoons, never suspecting that he would flip with enthusiasm and we could trade all these pieces of information and share a love of animation that I'd rarely found with anyone outside of my childhood best friends. By this point we'd already moved from talking on the site and to AIM (those were the days), where he surprised me by commenting on my away messages; one in particular quoting "the Look of Love" covered by the Zombies - the lyric "Let's make a lover's file and then seal it with a kiss" - his comment: "I like that idea". Flirty McFlirtster, right there.

What did I learn: again, engineers were apparently just not for me. STILL aren't, in fact. Realized that I'm not *as* socially-awkward as these boys were. But I was getting better at at least TRYING to manufacture some conversation. I hate to quote a cliche but it may be truth after all as some of you can attest: "you come across somebody special when you're not even looking." Found it to be true by this point...

NEXT TIME: the art of online flirting; best first & second dates ever; modern love letters.

Were you dateless in high school too?

Hey hey, everybody! So, after a couple of suggestions, I've decided I'll put what I've learned and experienced in the dating world down on what is well-known as "the Interwebs". Keep in mind this is primarily from using OKCupid, apart from a couple of real-life blind dates. I'm going to try to do it in sections, one guy at a time per entry; or multiple people per entry if the dates consisted of ONE meeting. Details will include what I thought we had in common, what we did on that date, and why it didn't work.
Special Features include:
-ANALYZING OF THE GOOD OL' QUESTION 'WHY WAS I WITH HIM'!
-WHAT I'VE LEARNED FROM EACH PERSON, EITHER ABOUT MYSELF OR DATING IN GENERAL!
-ADVENTURES IN TRYING OUT DATING SITES!
-And perhaps most useful to everybody out there, HOW TO SPOT A WEIRDO ONLINE!

After I get through these, or depending on demand and questions/suggestions you may have, I will write on other important topics. But...here goes: