Here are some handy illustrations of what dating is like when you are:
(I greyed out the important bits so this is SFW)
Friday, August 20, 2010
Dating through your ages
So, I'm still dating. I'm in my mid-30s and I've never found anyone I felt like I could put up with for long enough to want to marry (at least not anyone I was also willing to also have sex with). As you get older (not old, older, as in older than you used to be which is totally normal and happens to all of us) things change. You don't think the same way about dating unless you are a perpetual child and refuse to evolve/mature/grow the fuck up. If you are, I'm sorry, and please recognize that while growth and change are hard they are super worth it and sometimes come with prizes and/or cake.
Here are some handy illustrations of what dating is like when you are:
(I greyed out the important bits so this is SFW)
Hormones, amirite? I was a bit friskier than the average bear. Haha.
The uncertainty and mutual insecurity is half the fun.
You have very little interest in wasting time, and you realize by now that 99% of guys (if you are a hetero female) are clearly not a good match. You are able to rapidly weed them out and, every time you ignore your own instints, something goes horribly wrong. You realize that it's more important to worry about whether or not you like them than to waste time worrying if they like you. You force yourself to do it even though you don't want to because staying home with your cat, video games, and snack food of choice is so seductively appealing that you realize you are getting into a spiral that will end with you never ever leaving the house. Which, while it is a perfectly valid life choice, doesn't sound like the most fulfilling way to spend the next 40 or so years. I feel like I somehow got off track here at the end? The whole 'I'm going to die a hermit' thing may just be me.
Here are some handy illustrations of what dating is like when you are:
(I greyed out the important bits so this is SFW)
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Computer Karma
I happen to have what I like to call good computer karma. I've always had it. When I was growing up it was rare for people to have computers in their homes or even in their classrooms, but when I had a reason to run into one it always responded well to me. I took a little programming class in Jr High, BASIC or something along those lines, where we learned to make our text flash and all other sorts of extremely useful things (the kind of things that anyone under 40 can do these days). Remember, the internet hadn't been invented yet, Al Gore was still doing other things at the time. Anyway. I made it into high school with the standard computer skills, word processing, little flashy programs, the usual, and didn't think much of it.
Then I went to college. My first year of work study I tried to be all academic and landed a job as a research assistant for this guy who was writing something about immigration patterns in California history. It was so boring. I had to go to the giant library at my university and actually look things up, and photocopy them, and whatnot. I quickly decided it wasn't suited to my personality (no one to torture, after all) so I decided to get a more social job and somehow ended up selling computers on campus. This was much more like it.
Selling computers is, as we all know, the gateway into a life of geekdom. I really didn't expect it. I was a psychology major, after all, learning how to unfuck people's minds. But sometimes life surprises us and I ended up falling in love.
No, really I didn't, what happened was that I went from selling computers to fixing them to suddenly getting hired by a friend of a friend to change out this old antiquated Apple network in the Deans office and set up Exchange and SQL Servers on a Windows domain. This was in, like, 1995 or so. How did this happen? computers loved me. Seriously, I have no better explanation. I didn't know what the hell I was doing but no matter what I did, it worked. They worked. The computers...I would just touch them and POOF! They worked. I would wave my arm and bat my eyelashes and I could write ASP pages or SQL queries or clone desktops or repair any kind of hardware or software issues. It was bizarre. It was like the first time I ever gave a guy a handjob in high school, and all I could think was look what I can make this thing do? So many tricks! So easy! Playing with computers felt almost exactly like that, and computers seemed to respond to me much like the teenage boys of my youth did - which is to say, they did whatever I wanted. Soon I had minions and my own army of servers and desktop computers (this is what they looked like in the 90s, remember?).
Years passed, and I kept doing weirder and weirder things. I left that one job and decided I wanted to focus on databases, because data gets me hot. I love it. I won't bore you with any technical details but a while ago I decided to go into management and I have lots of servers in lots of different hosted locations around the world, and I still get to play with technology but my staff or my vendors do all the hands on work. But still my computer karma works for me. If something naughty happens, anywhere, I'm still the person who figures it out or gets the network engineer to check his stupid load balancer rules or whatever. Anyway. It's a thing and I love it.
But - and this is a big but - there's a price.
Every once in a while all that karma comes full circle and everything stops working. Within a 20 foot radius of me, when the karma goes down, so do most electronic devices. This happens once or twice a year but it is completely shitty when it does. A prime example of this is my work laptop - this is what it did last week:
It turned into a demon and tried to eat me. Actually it got suspiciously slow, and trust me when I say this, I KNOW when there is something wrong with my laptop. It was acting like it was very busy working on something and didn't have time for my silly demands for email or project plans. I tried all the basic crap and then, like a good little management type who isn't supposed to waste time, called in my laptop fixy guy. I handed him my laptop and network password and said 'it's slow, something's wrong', which while it is not the most helpful description was 100% accurate. He took it and started running diagnostics. An hour later he came in and timidly told me it was fine. I wasn't buying it, so I told him to look harder. Guess what? I had a virus - this nasty thing that was going around the office a month ago and which he swore he had removed. But no. The virus was sitting there, randomly eating my cycles and driving me batty. So he went to go remove it and then what happened? Hard drive died. He replaced that and handed it back to me proudly at the end of the day, all fixed and happy. I took it home, blissfully trusting that this was the end of the trouble.
I woke up the next morning and the wireless was jacked. Each and every application which needed a connection to the internet would start disconnecting after 15 minutes. Again, I performed the basics like resetting my cable modem and wireless router, removing and re-adding the profile, etc. No joy. Irritated, I switched to my home laptop and stuck the work laptop under the couch so it could think about what it did wrong. Meanwhile, my staff could tell I was really over this whole thing so they started building me a desktop computer for work to use while we figured everything out.
The next morning I handed my laptop back to the laptop fixy guy and told him not to give it back to me until all was well. He brought it back to me a short while later and said he updated my network card drivers. I nodded dubiously and set it up in the naughty corner, and noticed that I had 137 very important windows updates to run. I grumped at him that he was supposed to do that after the hard drive replacement, he said something panicky and nonsensical and fled my office. Guess what? It started making this weird noise and the fan wouldn't stop fanning. He ran more diags and called Dell and said they needed to replace the system board and heat sink. He then twitched and apologized that he didn't have a new one on hand to give me.
I know, I know, that was a really long and probably boring story and doesn't prove anything about computer karma. BUT WAIT. Here's some additional background: This laptop - yes, you heard me, THIS one - I've had for 9 months. The one before it lasted a year. I went through 2 hard drives on that one, and the system board also started to get wiggy. The one before that also lasted slightly less than a year. Laptop hard drives are crappy and definitely have longevity issues but no one in my company chews through them like I do. I did manage to keep one laptop for a few years once with only 1 drive replacement, but all my other ones have had multiple, horrible issues. And we switch manufacturors every few years as well, so it's not like it's always Dell. And I don't get the low end models either. Usually once one of my laptops starts to futz out - right around the 9 to 11 month mark - the laptop group just gives in and gives me a new one, since the issues don't seem to stop with the drive replacement, but we were just purchased and are renegotiating our vendor discounts and we haven't ordered any new ones lately.
So, that night the Dell guy didn't show (of course) and I left my laptop at work so they could get it in the morning. I came home and my apartment complex gate wouldn't open to my magnetic thingy, my housekeeper had somehow managed to lock me out of the garage, and my iPhone crashed twice.
Sometimes in bad karma weeks street lamps start to blow out and traffic lights stay on red for 37 minutes. It's frustrating.
But you know what? 99% of the time the computers of the world love me and things pretty much go my way, so if the price for that is that every once in a while all the electronics lose their collective shit, I'm ok with it.
PS: I have my laptop back again. I used it a little and it seems OK but it still won't take the VERY IMPORTANT Windows updates so we will see.
Then I went to college. My first year of work study I tried to be all academic and landed a job as a research assistant for this guy who was writing something about immigration patterns in California history. It was so boring. I had to go to the giant library at my university and actually look things up, and photocopy them, and whatnot. I quickly decided it wasn't suited to my personality (no one to torture, after all) so I decided to get a more social job and somehow ended up selling computers on campus. This was much more like it.
No, really I didn't, what happened was that I went from selling computers to fixing them to suddenly getting hired by a friend of a friend to change out this old antiquated Apple network in the Deans office and set up Exchange and SQL Servers on a Windows domain. This was in, like, 1995 or so. How did this happen? computers loved me. Seriously, I have no better explanation. I didn't know what the hell I was doing but no matter what I did, it worked. They worked. The computers...I would just touch them and POOF! They worked. I would wave my arm and bat my eyelashes and I could write ASP pages or SQL queries or clone desktops or repair any kind of hardware or software issues. It was bizarre. It was like the first time I ever gave a guy a handjob in high school, and all I could think was look what I can make this thing do? So many tricks! So easy! Playing with computers felt almost exactly like that, and computers seemed to respond to me much like the teenage boys of my youth did - which is to say, they did whatever I wanted. Soon I had minions and my own army of servers and desktop computers (this is what they looked like in the 90s, remember?).
Years passed, and I kept doing weirder and weirder things. I left that one job and decided I wanted to focus on databases, because data gets me hot. I love it. I won't bore you with any technical details but a while ago I decided to go into management and I have lots of servers in lots of different hosted locations around the world, and I still get to play with technology but my staff or my vendors do all the hands on work. But still my computer karma works for me. If something naughty happens, anywhere, I'm still the person who figures it out or gets the network engineer to check his stupid load balancer rules or whatever. Anyway. It's a thing and I love it.
But - and this is a big but - there's a price.
Every once in a while all that karma comes full circle and everything stops working. Within a 20 foot radius of me, when the karma goes down, so do most electronic devices. This happens once or twice a year but it is completely shitty when it does. A prime example of this is my work laptop - this is what it did last week:
I woke up the next morning and the wireless was jacked. Each and every application which needed a connection to the internet would start disconnecting after 15 minutes. Again, I performed the basics like resetting my cable modem and wireless router, removing and re-adding the profile, etc. No joy. Irritated, I switched to my home laptop and stuck the work laptop under the couch so it could think about what it did wrong. Meanwhile, my staff could tell I was really over this whole thing so they started building me a desktop computer for work to use while we figured everything out.
The next morning I handed my laptop back to the laptop fixy guy and told him not to give it back to me until all was well. He brought it back to me a short while later and said he updated my network card drivers. I nodded dubiously and set it up in the naughty corner, and noticed that I had 137 very important windows updates to run. I grumped at him that he was supposed to do that after the hard drive replacement, he said something panicky and nonsensical and fled my office. Guess what? It started making this weird noise and the fan wouldn't stop fanning. He ran more diags and called Dell and said they needed to replace the system board and heat sink. He then twitched and apologized that he didn't have a new one on hand to give me.
I know, I know, that was a really long and probably boring story and doesn't prove anything about computer karma. BUT WAIT. Here's some additional background: This laptop - yes, you heard me, THIS one - I've had for 9 months. The one before it lasted a year. I went through 2 hard drives on that one, and the system board also started to get wiggy. The one before that also lasted slightly less than a year. Laptop hard drives are crappy and definitely have longevity issues but no one in my company chews through them like I do. I did manage to keep one laptop for a few years once with only 1 drive replacement, but all my other ones have had multiple, horrible issues. And we switch manufacturors every few years as well, so it's not like it's always Dell. And I don't get the low end models either. Usually once one of my laptops starts to futz out - right around the 9 to 11 month mark - the laptop group just gives in and gives me a new one, since the issues don't seem to stop with the drive replacement, but we were just purchased and are renegotiating our vendor discounts and we haven't ordered any new ones lately.
So, that night the Dell guy didn't show (of course) and I left my laptop at work so they could get it in the morning. I came home and my apartment complex gate wouldn't open to my magnetic thingy, my housekeeper had somehow managed to lock me out of the garage, and my iPhone crashed twice.
Sometimes in bad karma weeks street lamps start to blow out and traffic lights stay on red for 37 minutes. It's frustrating.
But you know what? 99% of the time the computers of the world love me and things pretty much go my way, so if the price for that is that every once in a while all the electronics lose their collective shit, I'm ok with it.
PS: I have my laptop back again. I used it a little and it seems OK but it still won't take the VERY IMPORTANT Windows updates so we will see.
Monday, August 9, 2010
Sunday, August 8, 2010
Cleverbot likes 42
Anybody ever played with Cleverbot.com? It's constantly learning so the responses will vary.
I started off by asking Cleverbot "What is 42?" just to get a sense of whether or not we'd be able to get along. Cleverbot responded "The meaning of life", so I continued. Cleverbot has no memory of the conversational thread (Edited: It did not in that conversation, but in subsequent visits it did), which is a mixed blessing of fun. The 42 convo ended rather cutely:
I started off by asking Cleverbot "What is 42?" just to get a sense of whether or not we'd be able to get along. Cleverbot responded "The meaning of life", so I continued. Cleverbot has no memory of the conversational thread (Edited: It did not in that conversation, but in subsequent visits it did), which is a mixed blessing of fun. The 42 convo ended rather cutely:
These are not the same words! Part 1
I'm going to go ahead and assume I'll be doing a few of these and call this Part 1. Almost every single day I see people using words interchangeably, words which do not mean the same thing. Often, such as in this example, they are homophones so at least they sounds the same but sometimes they AREN'T. Either way it makes me cranky. When someone does this I want to shake them and yell 'that isn't the right word! BLARG!' but usually it happens online and frankly, if you publicly comment on someone's tweets, FB status updates, or blogposts about grammar or spelling issues you just look like an asshole. But if you make your own blogpost on the subject you're an artistic GENIUS.
Anyway. Part 1: Peek, Peak, and Pique - with definitions (courtesy of Dictionary.com) and handy illustrations!
Peek: (V) to look or glance quickly or furtively, esp. through a small opening or from a concealed location; peep; peer.
Look, this dude is peeking through your window. What an asshole. But I bet he can use the right word for what he's doing.
Peak: (N) 1. the pointed top of a mountain or ridge.
2. a mountain with a pointed summit.
3. the pointed top of anything.
4. the highest or most important point or level: the peak of her political career.
The definitions continue but really it's more of the same. It's either the top, the pointy bit, or something that is considered both tall and pointy. The verb form refers to getting to the highest pointy bit.
Pique: (V) 1. to affect with sharp irritation and resentment, esp. by some wound to pride: She was greatly piqued when they refused her invitation.
2. to wound (the pride, vanity, etc.).
3. to excite (interest, curiosity, etc.): Her curiosity was piqued by the gossip.
4. to arouse an emotion or provoke to action: to pique someone to answer a challenge.
See, in the picture? I'm bored until he piques my interest by mentioning dragons (I love dragons!). He is not PEAKING my interest, nor is he PEEKING it.
The worst offense with these 3 homophones usually consists of people claiming they have 'peaked' someone's interest or curiosity. An argument could be made that they really mean peak in the verb sense, that they have raised my interest to its highest possible point, but context clues usually reveal that they merely mean they have aroused my curiosity. If they had, in fact, peaked anything of mine the response would be - shall we say - rather noticeable.
That's right, unicorns, rainbows, and aliens will fly out of my ass.
So as much as I want to give people the benefit of the doubt I know that 99% of the time they are simply getting confused, when writing, that these are actually 3 completely different words that happen to sound the same. Guys on dating sites will write something in their profile or in an email referencing their desire to peak or even peek me in some way but all they get is the lonely sound of me never, ever responding.
Anyway. Part 1: Peek, Peak, and Pique - with definitions (courtesy of Dictionary.com) and handy illustrations!
Peek: (V) to look or glance quickly or furtively, esp. through a small opening or from a concealed location; peep; peer.
Look, this dude is peeking through your window. What an asshole. But I bet he can use the right word for what he's doing.
Peak: (N) 1. the pointed top of a mountain or ridge.
2. a mountain with a pointed summit.
3. the pointed top of anything.
4. the highest or most important point or level: the peak of her political career.
The definitions continue but really it's more of the same. It's either the top, the pointy bit, or something that is considered both tall and pointy. The verb form refers to getting to the highest pointy bit.
Pique: (V) 1. to affect with sharp irritation and resentment, esp. by some wound to pride: She was greatly piqued when they refused her invitation.
2. to wound (the pride, vanity, etc.).
3. to excite (interest, curiosity, etc.): Her curiosity was piqued by the gossip.
4. to arouse an emotion or provoke to action: to pique someone to answer a challenge.
See, in the picture? I'm bored until he piques my interest by mentioning dragons (I love dragons!). He is not PEAKING my interest, nor is he PEEKING it.
The worst offense with these 3 homophones usually consists of people claiming they have 'peaked' someone's interest or curiosity. An argument could be made that they really mean peak in the verb sense, that they have raised my interest to its highest possible point, but context clues usually reveal that they merely mean they have aroused my curiosity. If they had, in fact, peaked anything of mine the response would be - shall we say - rather noticeable.
So as much as I want to give people the benefit of the doubt I know that 99% of the time they are simply getting confused, when writing, that these are actually 3 completely different words that happen to sound the same. Guys on dating sites will write something in their profile or in an email referencing their desire to peak or even peek me in some way but all they get is the lonely sound of me never, ever responding.
Sunday, August 1, 2010
Don't feed the narcissist
The narcissist just wants your attention. When you first meet the narcissist they will suck you in with how fascinating they think they are, somehow convincing you that it's true. (It may in fact be true. Later, when you realize what happened, you'll be so pissed that you'll then convince yourself that they were never that awesome to begin with).
If the narcissist is clever, they will also initially show some interest in your life. Don't worry, this soon passes.
Because to the narcissist, you are just a mirror.
The narcissist wants you to show them good things about themself. They will spend increasing amounts of time getting you to talk about them, doing things for them, them them them.
If you give in, the narcissist swells up like a tick, feeding on your compliments and attention. They stop talking about your things at all, or at most listen in bored silence when you need to talk about a you thing. They barely acknowledge when you've done something they've asked you to do.
And you shrivel up inside, until you feel hollow and empty and sad. You have to detach the narcissist before they explode from the life they are sucking out of you, leaving you just an empty shell.
You cannot have a relationship with a narcissist because they will only ever be emotionally involved with themself.
If the narcissist is clever, they will also initially show some interest in your life. Don't worry, this soon passes.
Because to the narcissist, you are just a mirror.
The narcissist wants you to show them good things about themself. They will spend increasing amounts of time getting you to talk about them, doing things for them, them them them.
If you give in, the narcissist swells up like a tick, feeding on your compliments and attention. They stop talking about your things at all, or at most listen in bored silence when you need to talk about a you thing. They barely acknowledge when you've done something they've asked you to do.
And you shrivel up inside, until you feel hollow and empty and sad. You have to detach the narcissist before they explode from the life they are sucking out of you, leaving you just an empty shell.
You cannot have a relationship with a narcissist because they will only ever be emotionally involved with themself.
An online dating guide for men
If you are dating or thinking of dating, especially online, here are some tips that will help you. After all the experiences my girlfriends and I have had I decided that instead of continuing to complain and make fun of the ridiculous and self-defeating behaviors of male online daters it would be more constructive to just tell you how to step your game up. (Note: I will still make fun. With drawings.)
1) You have got to smile in your profile picture. Think about it - when you look at our pictures you usually notice our pretty smiles, right? Guys will message me and compliment my smile and then I go look at their profile and am irritated to find some lame super serious face. Really? You can't figure out that most people are more attractive when they smile, yet you are online dating? What's that, you feel self-conscious when you smile? Get over it. Seriously. You are selling yourself online, 50% of your attractive power lies in your picture. Do not think that your sensitive thinker face or stone-faced 'I'm so hard' pic are appealing. You look like an asshole or a serial killer - and if you've read the Venn Diagram of Dating, you know that at least one of those won't get you to the little red dot of happiness. They won't even get you an email response. If your serious thinker image is important to you use those for supplemental pix but smile in your main one. If you really ARE a serial killer, thank you for being stupid enough to make it completely obvious by wearing an expression that says you want to eat my face with some bbq sauce.
2) If you are married: Please stop dating. Get off the dating sites. No one wins by you being on there. If your wife doesn't want to have sex with you you should probably focus on fixing that. See also: Find the little man in the boat, he is your friend and ally.
3) Do not start immediately telling your female companion that you are meant to be together, perfect for each other, etc - especially if you have not even met yet. This is not how to get a first date. This is a really good way to get blocked and possibly get on a creepy potential stalker watch list. Do not say it on a first date, either. We find this instant desperate attachment just as squicky as most guys do if a girl tries it on them.
4) Do not propose marriage in your first email. This should be obvious but, based on my experiences, apparently needs to be said. Even if you are kidding it will most likely not get you anywhere good. Other jokes that don't go over well in a first email: Offering to let her cook for you. Jokes that make you sound like an asshole aren't that funny.
5) If a girl does not respond to your first message please do not assume that she didn't receive it or needs more encouragement to respond to you. She didn't answer because you look like a serial killer or, possibly, she just wasn't into you. It happens. Don't try to escalate the action by sending more and more personal contact information. It's not like we are sitting there thinking 'oooh, I really like this guy but answering his email is just SO HARD. I'm so hot. I hope he sends me his phone number and address so I can call him and/or just come over for sex.' (Note: Does not apply to Craig's List ads. Things like that actually happen there. This is specific to actual dating sites.)
6) Stop lying about your height. There is no point to this behavior. According to an OKCupid study height is one of the biggest misrepresentations of men online. Most female online daters already knew this. Men, seriously, no one likes details that are fudged. If you are 5'11 you do not need to say you are 6'1 - this is a pointless lie. Here is a small tip: women know how to do math. I promise. If I am 5'3 and wearing 1.5 inch heels - and yes, even girls who say they are bad at math do this little formula instinctively - and you claim to be 5'6, I WILL NOTICE IF I AM TOWERING OVER YOU. If me + shoes = 5'4.5 > your height, you are not 5'6. Also, if I am taller than you and you have smaller hands than I do, you might be a little person. It's ok to be a little person. It is not ok to lie about it. Also not ok? Lying about your weight/body type. Don't say 'average' if you know you are overweight. Someone out there will like you for you. Just be yourself and, even if you feel like you are getting fewer first dates, they will be more productive ones.
7) Plan the first date. This is your JOB. If you cannot be bothered to plan the first date then you are too fucking lazy to be dating. We know it gets tiring. We know that the emails, messages, first phone calls, and constant disappointment are a lot of work - because we are doing it too. Every time we go on a first date there is a lot of outfit planning, makeup, smelling nice, etc that goes into it. Sack up and plan it. Even if it's just coffee/drinks - the recommended quick first date of the online dater - do the work and suggest some locations, dates, and times. If you want to sit back and let the girl plan every other date after that, fine, that's up to you guys if you make it that far. Also if the first date IS just coffee and you've both agreed to have a second date, the second date kind of counts in the you need to plan it category, since it is at that point the first real date. If you and the girl are both looking for a long term relationship and you cannot be bothered to plan 1.5 dates in the beginning it is a giant red flag about your energy level, intellect, excitement about the girl, or actual interest in working on a relationship.
8) Don't yell at her. If your first email exchange shows that she is not the girl for you, a big ole ranty email won't accomplish anything. If you are the type of person who is EVER tempted to go off on women on dating sites then you really, really need to spend some time with yourself and a good therapist. This is not normal. If you want to yell at a girl because she isn't into you, or because girls have so many silly rules, or you think all women are superficial sluts, or because you think they hate your job, you need some help. Any woman who gets these bizarre yelly emails knows exactly what it means about what you would be like in a relationship.
9) Respect her communication boundaries. If your first email to her is an invitation to talk on the phone, and she says she wants to email once or twice first, relax. If you want to meet before she does, have sex before she does, etc, you have got to be able to respect her boundaries. If you can't do that in the beginning it is really clear you won't be doing it later. I'm not saying that it's ok to get sucked into 3 weeks of emails; online dating, like any other initial relationship, should have an escalating pattern of communication and intimacy and should lead fairly quickly to a first meeting so that the two of you can establish if there is any real life chemistry. The point here is that your first 3 messages shouldn't be pressuring her to comunicate outside the intial 'safety' of the dating site. Remember, the woman you are talking to has many many guys emailing her, some of whom are complete assholes and/or serial killers, and she is trying to make sure that you don't fall into those categories. Yes you are excited about her and want to get to know her but be appreciative of that slight difference in context. Also, if you are too lazy to write 1-3 decent emails in an ONLINE DATING SITE you might want to try singles bars.
10) Read. Her. Profile. There is a reason that dating sites have those giant profile sections and are not just lists of pictures for you to choose from, and that reason is that women are actual people with preferences, wants, desires, and thoughts. We are not just faces attached to empty heads and blow up doll bodies. If you want that SHOP ELSEWHERE. Sorry to get so shouty about that but the whole point of having picture + self description is so that you can get an idea of what someone is like and what they are looking for to help figure out if it is a good match. I spent a whole 15 minutes writing my ridiculously clever profile, do not just email me and ask me to describe myself. I already DID. So when 15 guys email me in one week to ask me questions that are answered in my profile I think, hmmm, gosh I want these winners. (No, really, I don't. I ignore). If you don't read her profile she thinks that you are a) functionally illiterate b) just looking for sex c) too lazy to spend 5 mins reading basic information d) too stupid to understand her. You can imagine how attractive that isn't. If you do read her profile please pay attention to what she says she wants and ask yourself, honestly, if you think she won't notice/care that you are 15 years older than she says she wants. If a woman sets an age range most are willing to go 2-3 years outside it but not more than a decade. If she wanted an older dude she would say so, so please, please stop trying.
1) You have got to smile in your profile picture. Think about it - when you look at our pictures you usually notice our pretty smiles, right? Guys will message me and compliment my smile and then I go look at their profile and am irritated to find some lame super serious face. Really? You can't figure out that most people are more attractive when they smile, yet you are online dating? What's that, you feel self-conscious when you smile? Get over it. Seriously. You are selling yourself online, 50% of your attractive power lies in your picture. Do not think that your sensitive thinker face or stone-faced 'I'm so hard' pic are appealing. You look like an asshole or a serial killer - and if you've read the Venn Diagram of Dating, you know that at least one of those won't get you to the little red dot of happiness. They won't even get you an email response. If your serious thinker image is important to you use those for supplemental pix but smile in your main one. If you really ARE a serial killer, thank you for being stupid enough to make it completely obvious by wearing an expression that says you want to eat my face with some bbq sauce.
2) If you are married: Please stop dating. Get off the dating sites. No one wins by you being on there. If your wife doesn't want to have sex with you you should probably focus on fixing that. See also: Find the little man in the boat, he is your friend and ally.
3) Do not start immediately telling your female companion that you are meant to be together, perfect for each other, etc - especially if you have not even met yet. This is not how to get a first date. This is a really good way to get blocked and possibly get on a creepy potential stalker watch list. Do not say it on a first date, either. We find this instant desperate attachment just as squicky as most guys do if a girl tries it on them.
4) Do not propose marriage in your first email. This should be obvious but, based on my experiences, apparently needs to be said. Even if you are kidding it will most likely not get you anywhere good. Other jokes that don't go over well in a first email: Offering to let her cook for you. Jokes that make you sound like an asshole aren't that funny.
5) If a girl does not respond to your first message please do not assume that she didn't receive it or needs more encouragement to respond to you. She didn't answer because you look like a serial killer or, possibly, she just wasn't into you. It happens. Don't try to escalate the action by sending more and more personal contact information. It's not like we are sitting there thinking 'oooh, I really like this guy but answering his email is just SO HARD. I'm so hot. I hope he sends me his phone number and address so I can call him and/or just come over for sex.' (Note: Does not apply to Craig's List ads. Things like that actually happen there. This is specific to actual dating sites.)
6) Stop lying about your height. There is no point to this behavior. According to an OKCupid study height is one of the biggest misrepresentations of men online. Most female online daters already knew this. Men, seriously, no one likes details that are fudged. If you are 5'11 you do not need to say you are 6'1 - this is a pointless lie. Here is a small tip: women know how to do math. I promise. If I am 5'3 and wearing 1.5 inch heels - and yes, even girls who say they are bad at math do this little formula instinctively - and you claim to be 5'6, I WILL NOTICE IF I AM TOWERING OVER YOU. If me + shoes = 5'4.5 > your height, you are not 5'6. Also, if I am taller than you and you have smaller hands than I do, you might be a little person. It's ok to be a little person. It is not ok to lie about it. Also not ok? Lying about your weight/body type. Don't say 'average' if you know you are overweight. Someone out there will like you for you. Just be yourself and, even if you feel like you are getting fewer first dates, they will be more productive ones.
7) Plan the first date. This is your JOB. If you cannot be bothered to plan the first date then you are too fucking lazy to be dating. We know it gets tiring. We know that the emails, messages, first phone calls, and constant disappointment are a lot of work - because we are doing it too. Every time we go on a first date there is a lot of outfit planning, makeup, smelling nice, etc that goes into it. Sack up and plan it. Even if it's just coffee/drinks - the recommended quick first date of the online dater - do the work and suggest some locations, dates, and times. If you want to sit back and let the girl plan every other date after that, fine, that's up to you guys if you make it that far. Also if the first date IS just coffee and you've both agreed to have a second date, the second date kind of counts in the you need to plan it category, since it is at that point the first real date. If you and the girl are both looking for a long term relationship and you cannot be bothered to plan 1.5 dates in the beginning it is a giant red flag about your energy level, intellect, excitement about the girl, or actual interest in working on a relationship.
8) Don't yell at her. If your first email exchange shows that she is not the girl for you, a big ole ranty email won't accomplish anything. If you are the type of person who is EVER tempted to go off on women on dating sites then you really, really need to spend some time with yourself and a good therapist. This is not normal. If you want to yell at a girl because she isn't into you, or because girls have so many silly rules, or you think all women are superficial sluts, or because you think they hate your job, you need some help. Any woman who gets these bizarre yelly emails knows exactly what it means about what you would be like in a relationship.
9) Respect her communication boundaries. If your first email to her is an invitation to talk on the phone, and she says she wants to email once or twice first, relax. If you want to meet before she does, have sex before she does, etc, you have got to be able to respect her boundaries. If you can't do that in the beginning it is really clear you won't be doing it later. I'm not saying that it's ok to get sucked into 3 weeks of emails; online dating, like any other initial relationship, should have an escalating pattern of communication and intimacy and should lead fairly quickly to a first meeting so that the two of you can establish if there is any real life chemistry. The point here is that your first 3 messages shouldn't be pressuring her to comunicate outside the intial 'safety' of the dating site. Remember, the woman you are talking to has many many guys emailing her, some of whom are complete assholes and/or serial killers, and she is trying to make sure that you don't fall into those categories. Yes you are excited about her and want to get to know her but be appreciative of that slight difference in context. Also, if you are too lazy to write 1-3 decent emails in an ONLINE DATING SITE you might want to try singles bars.
10) Read. Her. Profile. There is a reason that dating sites have those giant profile sections and are not just lists of pictures for you to choose from, and that reason is that women are actual people with preferences, wants, desires, and thoughts. We are not just faces attached to empty heads and blow up doll bodies. If you want that SHOP ELSEWHERE. Sorry to get so shouty about that but the whole point of having picture + self description is so that you can get an idea of what someone is like and what they are looking for to help figure out if it is a good match. I spent a whole 15 minutes writing my ridiculously clever profile, do not just email me and ask me to describe myself. I already DID. So when 15 guys email me in one week to ask me questions that are answered in my profile I think, hmmm, gosh I want these winners. (No, really, I don't. I ignore). If you don't read her profile she thinks that you are a) functionally illiterate b) just looking for sex c) too lazy to spend 5 mins reading basic information d) too stupid to understand her. You can imagine how attractive that isn't. If you do read her profile please pay attention to what she says she wants and ask yourself, honestly, if you think she won't notice/care that you are 15 years older than she says she wants. If a woman sets an age range most are willing to go 2-3 years outside it but not more than a decade. If she wanted an older dude she would say so, so please, please stop trying.
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