I signed up for Zoosk, because it’s free, and what the hell? I didn’t have a chance to do anything with it yet, not even so much as upload a picture – and I have TEN messages. TEN!
“If I sound drunk, it’s because you’ve intoxicated me.” – I’ve probably served him alcohol before.. he could tell it was me by my username.
“Me gustaría ser una cremallera de ADN para desabrochar tus genes.” — Which Google Translator says means “I would be a DNA zipper to unzip your genes.” If someone who speaks Spanish can translate better, please do. But, regardless.. classy.
“Is your name Internet? Because you’ve got everything I’ve ever searched for.” – Batshit Crazy must be his favorite search term. hehehe!
“I lost my phone number. Can I borrow yours?” – Sure, Google Voice for the win!
“I hope you know CPR, because you take my breath away!” – He may want to try his inhaler first.
“I think you’re cute!” – Well goodness, I’m adorable.. but how does he know?
I am now a little reluctant to actually put a picture up. Good grief.
I hadn’t logged onto The Meat Market (a.k.a Plenty of Fish dot com) in FOREVER. As long time readers know, and newer readers can probably gather from my pet name for it – I found it to be a disgusting website overall. Any time anyone has told me they met their significant other on POF, I wanted to throw up.
After my long absence, I found only ONE missed message. This message happened to be from the owner/founder of POF. I will post the message below, but perhaps POF is getting better?
“My name is Markus and I created POF/Plentyoffish. When I created POF, I wanted it to be all about finding relationships with the right person. For the first 7 years this worked really well, I got the site to 10 million users without any employees people and POF was generating a ton of relationships. Around 3 years ago, everyone started using the website via mobile phones. Today about 70% of POF use is via a mobile phone and unfortunately about 2% of men started to use POF as more of a hookup site mostly due the the casual nature of cell phone use.
In sticking with my vision that POF is all about Relationships, I’m going to make a bunch of changes to ensure it stays a relationship-focused site.
1. Any first contact between users that contains sexual references will not be sent. Anyone who tries to get around this rule will be deleted without warning. This rule has actually been in effect since last month and it’s made the site so much better.
2. You can only contact people +/- 14 years of your age. There is no reason for a 50 year old man to contact a 18 year old women. The majority of messages sent outside those age ranges are all about hookups. Anyone who tries to get around this rule will get deleted.
3. Intimate Encounters will go away in the next few months. There are 3.3 Million people who use the site every day, of those there are only 6,041 single women looking for Intimate Encounters. Of those 6,041 women, the ones with hot pictures are mostly men pretending to be women. Intimate Encounters on POF can be summed up as a bunch of horny men talking to a bunch of horny men pretending to be women.
In short the vast majority of people will not be impacted. This is because the vast majority of people are not going around spamming women saying “let’s have sex tonight”. I can’t change POF alone, I need your help to get the word out there that POF is all about relationships!
Markus”
It does make me laugh that he addresses that most of their “intimate encounter” page was guys talking to guys. Karma, people.. KARMA.
Anyway- based on this information, I shall try it out again. I will definitely report my findings.
I never really knew until just recently how far people take lying when it comes to being online. Sure, I knew people would troll, or have fake pictures, or even pretend to be someone they are not.. but the lengths some people go for this are absolutely incredible.
This right here (trust me.. read it.).. is more proof in the pudding that you need to get a short online feel for who someone is, and then get your ass to a coffee shop and meet them in person. And if they don’t show? They’re out. (Of course there are exceptions.. but, it better be a good excuse, and it better not happen again.)
#31 has a friend who got to witness a 10-minute meltdown via OKCupid, and gave me permission to share. I don’t know anything other than the messages that were received – my assumption would be she wasn’t checking her messages every 30 seconds.
That being said, friends.. If you don’t have an ounce of patience in you, online dating is not for you.
7:57PM
“Hey
I think it’s cool you’re in publishing. Do you ever think about using people for editing? You could send me your book and I could look it over, we could get a bottle of wine and talk about how genius it is. Or beer, since you seem to know your beers. I know that’s a little forward, but you seem like the kind of girl who doesn’t take any bullshit.”
8:03PM – yes.. same day.
“Well you’re online but I guess you aren’t interested. That’s fine. But you know, you say you like young adult books and I’m just wondering, don’t you think that’s kind of immature? You have this aura like you have your shit together but you read books meant for kids. What if you tried reading books by adults? If you obsess about being like a teenager all the time, you’ll never grow up.”
8:07PM – yes, just 4 short minutes later..
“You’re not even hot, and I was being nice to you. Females like you have such high standards when you obviously don’t apply them to yourself. You think you deserve men with a 6-pack and strong jaw, but you’re obviously happy being a tub of lard. Fine. Whatever.”
I particularly enjoy that he immediately decides she’s a girl who doesn’t put up with bullshit, and then proceeds to message her bullshit.
Guys, don’t be this guy.. He’s clearly desperate and pathetic. Take a deep breath.
I’ve been contemplating this for a few days, and that spurred because of this blog entry that Belle Vierge of Finding My Virginity blog pointed out to me. If you don’t have time to check out the blog – basically, the blogger condones form letters. (There was a lot more to it than this..) Belle posted a comment referring readers here, and I had a back and forth with a gentleman regarding form letters.
Guys – I will stick to this.. you will have better luck (at least quality-wise) if you reference something in the girl’s profile. I get that not all girls give you stuff to work with, but there’s that quality thing again.
This is known – girls get a lot more messages than you guys do. If she gets 20 messages daily that all say “Hey, how are you?” she has to do a lot of work to determine if she wants to respond or not. But I GUARANTEE you, if you send a message that says “Hey [username]! I read that you are actively involved in community theatre. What was your favorite part to play?” and she doesn’t respond… it’s not because of your message.
So – why don’t girls respond to your personalized messages, then? There could be several reasons, including but not limited to:
- She doesn’t think you are attractive. (Or your online dating photos are horrible. Seriously guys.. a lot of you post photos that make you look like pedophiles.)
- She only dates six foot two inch blonde guys with a six pack.
- Something in your profile is a deal-breaker for her.
-Maybe you don’t have much info on your profile.
- She’s in the beginning stages of dating someone else.. (or maybe not the beginning stages.)
- She online dates for an ego boost and nothing more.
- She’s not a real person.
- She meant to, but forgot.
- You have a dog and she’s allergic to dogs.
- You’re a democrat and she’s a republican. (Or vice versa.)
- You wrote her a message at 3am, and normal people aren’t online sending messages at that time of night, so you are clearly weird.
- Something in your profile made you sound like a tool.
- Something that you couldn’t possibly know about is going on in her life and she just can’t be bothered with meeting new people, dating, or responding to anyone on the internet. (Like what? Family emergencies, work drama, her cat died..)
I could go on and on forever. But it’s NOT because you asked her a basic question about one of her interests.
I know it’s frustrating.. I send out messages to guys I find attractive and don’t get responses, probably because I’m not a size 0. But wouldn’t you rather be someone who stands out than the “norm”?
A Twitter buddy of mine told me that I should start viewing Craigslist for some added humor to the blog, and sent me a specific example that was found.
For the record, I just want to say that this might be a little harsh, and definitely a stereotype – but people who search for sex on Craiglist are ultimate creeps and are disgusting. Don’t do it. Not to mention, stable and normal females don’t tend to pursue Craigslist for such things.. really, if we want sex, we can find it without the internet.
But, alas.. here is an entertaining post..
“I have a few unfulfilled romantic experiences / fetishes that I’d like to check off this summer so I can get back to being a normal upstanding gent. (Ha.. that’s a laugh..) Here’s a list. This is completely for real.
1. Gamestop girl — All female Gamestop employees welcome. If you’re reading this and you happen to know one, please forward it on to her.
2. Relatives — optimally, two sisters. But this whole relatives thing seems like a logistical nightmare, so I’m willing to settle for cousins, aunt niece, step-sisters, whatever, one male relative max. (Eww.. just eww..) 3. Three girls – at the same time, or more
4. A celebrity — D-list or higher, public officials welcome
5. A genius — have proof ready, field immaterial (I’d like to see proof of his being disease free..)
6. Someone to hire me a gigolo — but in the classy way, like I’m wearing a tux and going to the Four Seasons first
7. Sex on the 50 yard line — I’m thinking Rose Bowl or Coliseum but I won’t rule out a HS. (Let’s face it buddy… if this happens, it will be at a high school..)
8. A midget — I’m not super sure on this one, you would need to be exceptionally hot UPDATE: okay it appears the contemporary term is dwarf and the cutoff is 4’10″ which means I unwittingly checked this off some time ago.
9. A Frenchwoman — preferably born in France and a native French speaker. Plusses: smoking, horizontally striped shirts, ennui, underarm hair. Minuses: probably underarm hair again, North African ancestry
10. A Brazillian — not super picky here. Plus if you’re good at volleyball.
11. A lesbian couple — I have a couple gold stars in my back pocket, but I’ve never been with a lesbian couple in a committed relationship.
12. Someone with pronounced tanlines — the tanner the tan parts and the whiter the white parts the better, must be Michelle Rodriguez complected or lighter naturally.
13. A deaf chick — not sure if this makes me a really good person or a really bad person, can probably sort that out later. I had a really pretty deaf girl in a class once, and then it dawned on me, I can fuck pretty deaf girls. I’m also open to really hot blind girls . . . but I wonder how many of them read craigslist personal . . . and can drive out to [city] — anyway, if you’ve got a hot blind friend that you want to get laid, please refer her. (Why would this make him a “really good person”? Does he really think deaf people don’t ever have sex with hearing people?)
14. Someone who can defeat me at bar trivia — I don’t think there is a human female alive that can do this. But if you’re a really smart but not so conventionally attractive chick that wants to fuck a really hot guy — this could be your in. (Oh… so he’s one of those guys who think women have smaller brains than men, too… Bonus.)
15. A murderess — Classic murderess to the front to the line, followed by female soldiers who’ve killed with small arms, then vehicular manslaughtereresseses. Just to be clear, you still need to be hot. Jailhouse facial tattoos are disqualifiers.
16. A furry — one of my earliest sexual memories is Babs Bunny. I don’t really know anything about the furry scene, so you would have to honcho this one. If you are one of the myriad gay dudes that will inevitably ignore the m4w m4ww classification, this is probably your best bet — dressing up like a lady furry and hoping I don’t notice.
Now I know what you’re thinking “that list was too funny and delightful to be serious.” Nope, I’m totally serious. (Oh Buddy, none of us thought for one second that you were kidding..)
ABOUT ME: I’m 6’4″, tan, and handsome. I have green eyes and sandy blond hair. Very fit body, rugged good looks with lots of confidence and perfect health. I’m not this immodest in person, but I will be here for brevity: I’ve been around the world, founded a successful little electronics company, served in the military, done philanthropic work, written books, earned advanced degrees, coached high level women’s volleyball and had many misadventures not suitable for publication. (Bullshit.. all of it.) Confession time: some of those books were comic books. Maybe, Craigslist isn’t the right place for somebody like me, but I have a sneaking suspicion that a smattering of awesome people pass through here.
I have a righteous place of my own right on the sand in [city] with a hot tub. The balcony is directly over the crashing waves. Yes, I am peculiarly handsome and stable to be on CL but I assure you this is not to good to be true (Oh, yes it is.) – if you can help me with one of the 17, please email and we’ll meet somewhere public and get a bottle of wine and then adjourn to my place on the beach. Thank you.”
*
I would bet that this guy is not that attractive. I think men think much higher of themselves than women do, or so I have witnessed in the past. I actually wish more girls had a guy’s confidence level in their attractiveness. While it’s not a bad quality to have, I think most confident guys tend to oversell themselves. (I know this is a parody, but
But, for sake of argument, let’s believe this guy when he basically says he is God’s gift to women. That apparently makes it okay to have a fetish list? And how nice is he to perhaps give an ugly girl a chance if she can beat him at trivia? …I would bet anything that he is a walking STD.
This has been weighing (no pun intended) on my mind the past few days.. so I figured I best get it out there. This one, in particular, is for my female readers.
I had #31 and his roommate over the other day for some grilling and a bonfire. When I asked him if he was going to be bringing the meat, he replied with “a big slab, naturally.” Overall, good times were had.
But – while grilling, #31 said to me, “This is kind of awkward, and I never know how to bring this stuff up..” I raised my eyebrow, and he continued, “You’ve lost some weight.” Indeed, I have been shedding a few pounds by watching what I eat, and working out.. so I responded a “Heck yeah!” and we high-fived.. and I then proceed to ask why that was awkward to bring up.
Both #31 and his roommate said that girls get offended when they have mentioned weight loss before. I understood what they meant right away by playfully saying “OMG, are you trying to say I used to be FAT?!” .. because I KNOW that’s what girls say.
Ladies – What is wrong with you (us)? If a guy has noticed you have lost weight, say THANK YOU.. It’s a compliment. I am going to speak on behalf of the guys (and Guys: If I am wrong, feel free to comment..) and tell you that this means you look good, and your hard work is paying off (if you are attempting to lose weight). It does not mean “Wow, I used to think you looked like a cow.”
I understand that if you haven’t been trying to lose weight, or haven’t lost weight, and someone tells you this that it kind of throws you for a loop. Can we not read into it, though, and give people the benefit of the doubt? People are going to stop complimenting if they get attacked when they do so.. so take a deep breath, eat some chocolate and drink some wine.
