I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For

Tracy McMillan is an author who seems to think she knows why I’m not married (and, presumably, perpetually single) and lists those 10 reasons for me (and you, if you’re still single).  She’s been divorced three times so clearly she knows what she’s talking about.  Because nothing says, “I know what I’m talking about” like hypocrisy.  Let’s take a gander, shall we?  Tracy diagnoses me (and all other unmarried women) and I shoot her theories down as they pertain to me (for all I know, she’s right about you). 

1.         You’re a Bitch.  Here’s what I mean by bitch. I mean you’re angry. You probably don’t think you’re angry. You think you’re super smart, or if you’ve been to a lot of therapy, that you’re setting boundaries. But the truth is you’re pissed. At your mom. At the military-industrial complex. At Sarah Palin. And it’s scaring men off.  Female anger terrifies men. I know it seems unfair that you have to work around a man’s fear and insecurity in order to get married -- but actually, it’s perfect, since working around a man’s fear and insecurity is big part of what you’ll be doing as a wife.

That’s right, to land a man, I am not allowed to show my emotions.  I should bottle that anger until I’ve got that ring on my finger and then I can let it all out once I am officially a “Mrs.” and he can see the real me then.  Forget that I have a great relationship with my mother, I don’t know what a military-industrial complex is (unless you mean it literally, as in a building, in which case, what???), and while I dislike Sarah Palin, I am not, in fact, angry about her.  I love my job and school.  But that doesn’t matter.  Surely I’m angry about something.  Oh wait, that’s right, I’m angry when I encounter bad customer service and shitty drivers.  Clearly that’s why I can’t find a man.  Tracy = 0, Me = 1.

2.         You’re Shallow.  When it comes to choosing a husband, only one thing really, truly matters: character. So it stands to reason that a man’s character should be at the top of the list of things you are looking for, right? But if you’re not married, I already know it isn’t. Because if you were looking for a man of character, you would have found one by now. Men of character are, by definition, willing to commit.  Instead, you are looking for someone tall. Or rich. Or someone who knows what an Eames chair is. Unfortunately, this is not the thinking of a wife. This is the thinking of a teenaged girl. And men of character do not want to marry teenaged girls. Because teenage girls are never happy. And they never feel like cooking, either.

Holy crap, no wonder why I’m not married – I have standards!  Well, shit, why didn’t someone tell me to dump those years ago?!  And having standards is really just code for “I’m totally shallow.”  Shame on me for wanting to find a man who has the same interests as me and one that I’m attracted to – nope, all I need to know is if a man has good character.  How dare I want a man who likes music, knows how to spell, and has a great sense of humor.  Forget all the other trivial stuff, I’m just going to hop onto the first upstanding citizen that crosses my path.  Tracy = 0, Me = 2.

3.         You’re a Slut.  Hooking up with some guy in a hot tub on a rooftop is fine for the ladies of Jersey Shore -- but they’re not trying to get married. You are. Which means, unfortunately, that if you’re having sex outside committed relationships, you will have to stop. Why? Because past a certain age, casual sex is like recreational heroin -- it doesn’t stay recreational for long.

I haven’t had sex in awhile so there goes that theory.  It’s not that I couldn’t have sex, I just chose not to.  I was trying to avoid the one night stands, the casual dating sex, and men I would never consider having sex with.  Tracy = 0, Me = 3.

4.         You’re a Liar.  It usually goes something like this: you meet a guy who is cute and likes you, but he’s not really available for a relationship. He has some condition that absolutely precludes his availability, like he’s married, or he gets around town on a skateboard. Or maybe he just comes right out and says something cryptic and open to interpretation like, “I’m not really available for a relationship right now.”  You know if you tell him the truth -- that you’re ready for marriage -- he will stop calling. Usually that day. And you don’t want that. So you just tell him how perfect this is because you only want to have sex for fun! You love having fun sex! And you don’t want to get in a relationship at all! You swear!

I don’t lie, I don’t need to nor do I want to.  When I was on a first date with a man going through a divorce, he said, “I’m not looking for anything too serious” to which I honestly replied, “I’m not looking for anything too casual.”  So we said, let’s see where this goes.  As things progressed over the months it became obvious that there wasn’t enough middle ground for us to both be happy – he wanted to be more casual than I did while I wanted to be more serious than he did.  We were both honest and upfront about what we wanted and gave it a shot to see if there was a happy medium.  See, I was honest and ended up single again.  Another time, I told a guy that I didn’t want to be too casual and that I didn’t plan on having sex with him unless/until we agreed we would be serious enough that we wouldn’t be having sex with other people.  He didn’t want that so we stopped seeing each other.  There you go again – I was totally honest upfront and yet…still no man.  I don’t lie about what I want and I don’t make apologies for it either.  Tracy = 0, Me = 4.

5.         You’re Selfish.  If you’re not married, chances are you think a lot about you. You think about your thighs, your outfits, your naso-labial folds. You think about your career, or if you don’t have one, you think about doing yoga teacher training. Sometimes you think about how marrying a wealthy guy -- or at least a guy with a really, really good job -- would solve all your problems.  Howevs, a good wife, even a halfway decent one, does not spend most of her day thinking about herself. She has too much s**t to do, especially after having kids. This is why you see a lot of celebrity women getting husbands after they adopt. The kids put the woman on notice: Bitch, hello! It’s not all about you anymore! After a year or two of thinking about someone other than herself, suddenly, Brad Pitt or Harrison Ford comes along and decides to significantly other her. Which is also to say -- if what you really want is a baby, go get you one. Your husband will be along shortly. Motherhood has a way of weeding out the lotharios.

Wait, because I’m single and have no children and therefore think about myself and my needs, I am…selfish?  Who else am I supposed to be thinking about right now?  I think about my friends and family but I also think about me because my personal life only includes me right now.  If I don’t have a child (which, clearly, having a child is the only way a man can tell you know how to think of people other than yourself), then I’m never going to land a man?  Is this shit for real?  I should go adopt a kid so I can snag a husband?  Uh, no thanks, I’ll stick to the old fashioned way of hitting on them at bars and searching for them with online profiles.  That’s a lot better than becoming a mother for the sole purpose of becoming a wife.  Tracy = 0, Me = 5.  [ETA: I just adopted a kitten so clearly that proves I am not selfish.]

6.         You’re Not Good Enough.  Oh, I don’t think that. You do. I can tell because you’re not looking for a partner who is your equal. No, you want someone better than you are: better looking, better family, better job.  Here is what you need to know: You are enough right this minute. Period. Not understanding this is a major obstacle to getting married, since women who don’t know their own worth make terrible wives. Why? You can fake it for a while, but ultimately you won’t love your spouse any better than you love yourself. Smart men know this.

But I am looking for a partner that is my equal.  I’m not trying to find someone “better” than me.  I’m trying to find one that knows how to spell and enjoys live music.  A partner that can hold an intellectually stimulating conversation.  One that likes sushi.  A guy with a sense of humor.  Because that’s me and I want a guy that is equal.  Tracy = 0, Me = 6 (do I even need to keep posting these totals, clearly this woman is crazy).

7.         You’re a Mess. You overdrink. You overeat. You overspend. You under-earn. Whatever it is, there’s (at least) one big thing in your life -- an attitude, a behavior, a vice -- that you absolutely, for sure, under-no-circumstances want to let go of. And the bad news is, that is the ONE THING you absolutely, for-sure, under-no-circumstances WILL NOT be able to keep. At least not if you want to move forward. The sneaky part is that this thing holding you back feels like it is making your life more bearable! It’s also telling you that you’re fine! So how do you know if something is a problem? Easy. YOU’RE KEEPING IT A SECRET. If there’s something you can’t (or don’t want) to tell your mom, your best friend, or the guy you’re dating -- you can be sure it’s getting in the way of having your best relationship.

Random House Dictionary defines vice as “an immoral or evil habit or practice" or “immoral conduct; depraved or degrading behavior” (continued definitions are pretty much the same).  Now maybe I’m in denial but I can’t think of any “immoral” or “degrading” behaviors that I exhibit, ergo, I don’t have any I need to give up.  I’m not hiding anything from my mom, best friend, or men.  Tracy = 0, Me = 7.

8.         You’re Crazy. Crazy is where you LOVE INTENSITY. You want life to bring the exclamation points!!!!!!! Normal people, and relationships? Big, noisy YAWN. You think of yourself more like Angelina Jolie when she was with Billy Bob. Crazy is where you use your cell phone like an automatic weapon. You meet, have sex, fight and break up -- all by text message. Another sign you’ve got the crazies is if you are constantly telling long, involved stories in the break room about what happened this past weekend. You think your listeners are wowed and they are, but to them it’s like watching an episode of “Fear Factor.” Who doesn’t want to watch another person eat bugs? In fact, a sure-fire way to know you’re crazy is if more than one person has told you you’d be great on a reality show -- and you agree with them.

I only tell long, involved stories in the break room about what happened this past weekend because I’m lonely, not because I’m crazy.  I don’t want drama and intensity.  I want happy.  In fact, I got into it with a friend today who was being a drama queen and since the friend was not only acting like a drama queen but has been a total dick to me over the last couple months, I  told them to delete my phone number.  I don’t want toxicity in my life nor do I have time for it.  Life’s too short to deal with bullshit.  Tracy = 0, Me = 8.

9.         You’re a Dude. It’s not that you love the Cardinals, have short hair, or make more money than most guys. It’s that, when it comes to relationships, you want to hunt them down and kill them. You call guys, you text guys, you ask guys out. You have sex like it’s a temp job, hoping that if you rock a guy’s world, you’ll get hired full-time. And it’s not working for you, because right now, you are in a long-term, committed relationship with EXACTLY NONE of those dudes. Am I saying you should join a quilting circle? Wear ruffles all the time? Um, no. But you might want to see what it’s like to let the game come to you. Because there’s one requirement above all others a guy needs to possess to be your man: he has to REALLY WANT to be in a relationship with you.

Do I even have to respond to this?  There’s nothing wrong with calling, texting, or asking a guy out.  It’s mother fucking 2012, women are “allowed” to do that now.  And if a guy is turned off because I made the first move then he’s not the kind of guy I want to date, now is he?  No.  In fact, I made the first move with my ex-husband (our being exes has nothing to do with me making the first move, either) and we were together 8 years.  If a man can’t handle a woman who knows what she wants and isn’t afraid to seek it, then he’s not the right guy for me.  Tracy = 0, Me = 9 (she’s only got one more chance).

10.       You’re Godless. Remember how I said that marriage is a spiritual path? Well, we’re there. The point where I suggest something totally radical and punk-rock as a way of transforming whatever it is you have going on (or don’t have going on) in the area of relationships. And here it is: I want you to get a god. Wait, come back! It’s not necessarily what you think. What do I mean by god? Well, I don’t mean a bearded dude in the sky who is going to give you a Mercedes and a husband if you’re good and punish you if you’re bad. That would be Santa Claus. I mean I want you to cultivate a sense of SPIRIT in your life, a relationship with the intangible, the unseen -- the power behind the oceans, gravity, chocolate and the Beatles. You know, the thing you experience in life where the hair stands up on your arms? The Big Something. You could just call it Love. Whatever you name it -- it’s the game changer. Because when you mix the idea of spirit into your relationships, it no longer matters how many men are, techincally, out there. No more demographics, no more short guys and tall guys or chicks with cankles or ten extra pounds. There are no more lists of things you think you have to have in a mate. There are only two people on a spiritual assignment: TO LOVE EACH OTHER.

To all the single, atheist women out there - you’re fucked.  Look, I’m a spiritual person.  I believe in God though I have a lot of questions about him/her (there, that’s one question right there), and religion in general.  But let’s say I didn’t believe in God - I believe in kindness, and love, and being a good person.  I see the beauty in a setting sun, hear calm in the sound of the ocean, and feel love when my nieces and nephews hug me.  All of that already exists within my soul.  So once again, Tracy strikes out.  Tracy = 0, Me = 10.

This woman has no idea why I’m still single.  But I do.  Because I’m the exact opposite of what she says I am.

I’m not a lying, shallow, selfish, bitchy, slut, that’s not good enough because I’m a crazy mess, who acts like a dude without a god.  (I'm almost tempted to put that sentence in my online dating profile.)

Instead, I am a kind, caring, loving woman with a good head on her shoulders.  I love my family, friends, and career.  I haven’t slept my way around town to pass the time while looking for Mr. Right.  I know what I want (a man that is my equal) and I make no apologies for it.  And if I find him, I’ll have no problem asking him out…unless he asks me first.

Like to Get to Know You Well

Here's a general recap of what's going on so far with all this online dating crap.  As you can tell by my use of the word "crap" it is not going so well.  In fact, I'm not actually partaking in online dating yet... no, I'm still in the online browsing stage.

Plenty of Fish – This is the site I’ve been on the longest (and by that I mean “about a month”) and the one that generates the most attention for me.  However, it’s not necessarily attention I want.  As in, the guys talking to me are not my kind of guys.  I’m not attracted to them, they have horrible grammar, and/or they are creepy.  Unfortunately, the guys that I am interested in on this site think I am 600 pounds, have extra limbs, and snore like a jack hammer.  At least that’s what I’m telling myself when I wonder why they are not replying to my messages.

RECOGNITION LEVEL:  High.  I’ve recognized five guys on this site: two I went to school with, two are from the rival high school, and the last one is friends with someone I went to high school with.  I’m friends with 3 of them on Facebook even, but I didn’t sign up for a dating site just to meet people I already know.

Match – I’m not very popular on this site.  In fact, I’m only popular (sometimes) when it’s free because the only men interested in me on this paid site is that one guy who wouldn’t stop emailing me, which would have been awesome if he’d been my type.  (Desperation is only unattractive when the guy is, otherwise we call it “persistence” when he’s cute.  Shut up, that’s totally true.)  My hesitation for joining a paid site has come true – I was getting rejected for free on Plenty of Fish but now I get to pay for the same rejection on Match.  Awesome.  Only, not so much.

RECOGNITION LEVEL: Low.  I’ve only recognized one person so far on this site, one of my Facebook friends.

Nerd Passions – I thought I would have a better chance of finding a smart guy on a site like this.  Nerds are smart, right?  I skipped second grade, started reading Millay when I was in junior high, read the entirety of my English Lit books on purpose, know how to spell (most of the time), love Star Wars humor, and get excited when my latest book by Bryan Garner shows up.  I’m nerdy, right?  Well, aside from the totally old school, shoddy web set-up (think “what the internet looked like when the internet first arrived,” total NERD FAIL), this site is a total bomb because not a single guy has reached out to me.  Maybe I’m not nerdy enough because I don’t play video games, shop at comic book stores, and don’t partake in cosplay.  But that’s okay because there isn’t a single guy I want to reach out to either.  Total snooze fest but thankfully it’s free.

RECOGNITION LEVEL: Zero.  Then again, a lot of profiles feature avatars, not real photos, so for all I know, all my nerd/geek/dork friends are on this site looking for love but are too embarrassed to admit it.

Brainiac Dating – I tried this site because Nerd Passions was a total waste of my time.  Again my thinking was the “smart” sites are where I can find a guy who knows how to spell.  Someone who knows the difference between there/their/they’re.  A guy who likes to read books, not just play video games.  Hopefully a guy who doesn’t text like a thirteen year old girl and list his location as “the ‘oc’ lol.”  (True story.)  Unfortunately this site doesn’t appear to hold much in store for me either.  Only 2 guys have looked at me so far and one doesn’t even have a picture of himself on his profile.  What is UP with that crap?  Call me cynical but when you don’t post a picture of yourself, I automatically assume you look like the Hunchback from Notre Dame or the Elephant Man.  Hey, prove me wrong.

RECOGNITION LEVEL: Medium.  I’ve only recognized one guy from this site which should get a “Low” rating but I said “Medium” because…it’s someone I dated briefly a couple years ago and I think he’s an asshole.

In summary, the only guys that want me are guys I wouldn’t go out with.  Also, I keep running into people I already know, one of which I don’t need to know again.  So yeah… online dating totally sucks.

Hot Child in the City

Today's romantic horoscope for Scorpio:  "Poor, misunderstood you. Just when you think nobody gets you anymore, a hottie says something that totally clicks. Where has this person been all your life? Who cares, just go with it. Grab their hand and get ready to tread some common ground."

I'm beginning to think the stars are just fucking with me now.

"So I creep around..."

The last time I tried this online dating thing (spring of last year), there was a cute guy I started chatting with through the site's email.  At first it was harmless, talking about things that make us nerdy.  For instance, I said that in junior high I read the V.C. Andrews books while also reading Edna St. Vincent Millay, and in high school, I was the girl that read her entire English Lit book on purpose.  Then I mentioned that I fall asleep listening to Mozart.  So he asked if I masturbated to Mozart, too.

I tried to casually change the subject and that's when this guy started going off on a tirade about how women have such hang-ups about sex.  So I pointed out to him that I'm a Scorpio (the most sensual and sexual of the 12 astrological signs) and that I've had a great sex life (you know, back when I still had one), so no, I don't have a hang-up about sex...

Until some dude that I've never met in person, let alone even spoken to on the phone, starts asking about my masturbatory habits.

Really?

I don't know you, I couldn't pick you out from a police line-up, I have no idea what your future goals are in life, what you want out of a relationship, what you wish for you when you throw coins into a fountain, but sure, let's start talking about sex. 

I'm not here for booty, calls, casual sex, or to talk dirty to you.  I'm not going to tell you what color panties I'm wearing and I'm not sending you nude photos.  If you're serious about wanting to get to know me, get to know me, not my vagina.

If the chemistry is right and we decide to meet in person, and things go well from there, all the sexual stuff will fall into place when the time is right.  But not talking about sex right away doesn't make me a prude and it doesn't mean I have hang-ups about sex, it means I'm saving the good stuff for later.

ETA: While browsing through the site where I met the aforementioned creepy guy, whose profile should I come across but his?  Apparently he's still looking for love.  Why am I not surprised?

3 is the Magic Number

So I signed up for Match a couple weeks ago but didn't get a subscription until last night (finally).  Prior to getting the subscription, I had received emails through Match but couldn't read them until I gave Match some money (there's no such thing as a free lunch).  One of those emails was from C.  I forgot what it said but I deleted it because I wasn't interested (and from what I've learned of online dating, if you're not interested, you just ignore the messages, you don't write back and say "No thanks," except that one guy that did but I digress).  I cleaned up my profile and photos a bit and started searching for love (or, you know, a date).

This morning I check my Match email and what should I see but three emails from C.  Not one, hell, not even two, but three.  Count them: one, two, three.  In a span of 2 minutes. [ETA: That's three emails and a wink, in 2 minutes, in case I didn't get the hint from the three emails.]

Now some of my friends are telling me that I need to go easy on the online guys, that I'm being a little too picky or stringent with my standards; I need to give these guys a chance.  And to that I say...

Fuck you.

Okay, just kidding.  To that I actually say, I don't want a guy that asks me, "Do you have sexy feet?"  I don't want a guy with horrible grammar and spelling, because that matters to me.  I don't like guys that come on too strong, i.e. three emails in a 2 minute timeframe, or guys that wonder why I haven't called them within 24 hours. 

I shouldn't have to apologize for having these standards - this is what I want, why should I compromise?  If I said I wanted a Catholic guy, would you tell me to give the Jewish guys a chance?  If I said I wanted a tall guy would you say I should check out the short guys?   Why shouldn't I seek what I want?  Granted, if I keep searching the way I am, with these current standards, and I find that I'm unsuccessful, then sure, I can re-evaluate my standards if necessary  But for now, I want what I want.  Why shouldn't I look for that and weed out the men that don't fit that criteria?

Friends have joked that I'm trying to find the perfect man and that's just not true.  I'm trying to find the man that's perfect for me.  There's a difference.

ETA: So C, the aforementioned guy from Match, not only sent me his first email a couple weeks ago, and then three more emails last week in a span of 2 minutes (including a wink), but Saturday he sent me a fifth email.  I asked the universe (aka Twitter and Facebook) how I should handle this - do I just keep ignoring him, do I tell him "No thanks," or do I block him?  Before I could get a full consensus, C goes and emails me a sixth time, that same day.  So I opted to block him.  I'm not trying to be a snob here and I'm not a supermodel who can afford to be picky.  However, I want what I want and what I want is not a guy who emails me six times in hopes that maybe, JUST MAYBE, that sixth time will do the trick.

"I feel lucky"

Today's romantic horoscope for Scorpios: "If you're single, your intuition's telling you everything you need to know about a romantic situation." 

I'm going to take that to mean that I was right about the guy who gave me his number on Monday and then messaged me 24 hours later, basically asking why I haven't called him yet because he "can't be on this site all day."  (While that is pretty much a direct quote, I think I cleaned up his grammar/spelling a little.  You know how I feel about those things.)  I'm right in the sense that my intuition is telling me to pass on this guy.  Consider it done.

The horscope continues: "Wednesday and Thursday just might serve up something very sweet for you! The key now is to let love take its course -- your efforts to control it are futile."

Well guess who I saw this morning at Starbucks?  That's right, Howard, the hot guy (hereinafter "Hot Howard" because really, he deserves the title).  There wasn't an opportunity to talk to him though I did keep glancing across the room at him in hopes of catching his eye to at least throw him a smile.  The stars got the first part right - they totally served me up a tall cup of Hot Howard - but now for the second part: not controlling love but rather waiting for it to take its course, wherein Hot Howard notices me and falls madly in love with me.

Now I know what you're thinking... It's a horoscope.  That I read online.  But everybody knows that the stars never lie and you should always believe what you read online.  (By the way, the word "gullible" is not in the dictionary.)

Oh, and for the record, Hot Howard had on khakis from Banana Republic.  I shop there too!  See, we're totally meant for each other.  (And yes, I was checking out his butt.)

"Can't forget you only get what you give"

Everyone keeps telling me to ditch the free dating site and get on the paid sites, where people are presumably more serious about this whole online dating thing.  Seeing as I'm not really having any luck with the free site (except for blog fodder), I think I'm going to have to fork over the dough if I'm going to find my romeo.

Wish me luck!  (Opens wallet...)

Mama Said Knock You Out

I’m very popular today – I’ve received four messages already!

Message #1:  lookin?

What? That's not even a complete sentence.

Message #2 was something simple like “Hi” but I already deleted it because the guy was totally not my type.

Message #3:  Ur a cutie I like well first of all I'm mark I'm 35yrs not 25yrs lol what u up2?

I’m up to deleting messages from men who type like they are a thirteen year old girl texting her best friend.  Wait, that’s offensive to thirteen year old girls.

Message #4:  Hello i love your pictures and your profile… i hope you will say the same on my picture and my profile.

This is the exact same message this man sent me six days ago.  If I haven’t told you in six days that I love your picture and profile then I do not, in fact, love your picture and profile.  You don't need to message me again, just to be sure.

Oddly enough, my romantic horoscope for today says, "Today you could be tempted to lower your standards just to get a date. Whoa there! The romance you deserve won't happen if you let desperation get the best of you. Be patient for the right person to come along. They're out there!"  See, even the galaxy of stars doesn't want me dating these chumps!

In other news, I did message a gentleman yesterday and he actually wrote me back, including his phone number.  So... I suppose I should call him?  I mean, that's sort of the whole point of online dating, right?  (Why am I so nervous?)

Hit That Perfect Beat Boy

Totally unrelated to online dating but this is my blog so I can do whatever I want.  Have you ever played the Shuffle game? 

1. Set your iTunes / iPod / iPhone* (or other MP3 device) to “shuffle.”
2. Ask your device a question, such as, “What should I do tonight?”
3. Hit NEXT on your device.
4. The song that comes up is the answer to your question / describes your situation.

I just tried it and started laughing.

What describes my love life?

SHUT UP AND DRIVE.  Hmm, I’m driving the Flying Tiger to a car club meet tonight.  I wonder…

What about the guy I have a crush on?

IF DREAMS COME TRUE.  iTunes totally nailed it.

My career?

HOME.  Not sure what that means.  Did iTunes just fire me and tell me to go home?

Finances?

WHO’S LOVING YOU?  Um…I should become a prostitute and let people “love” me to increase my finances?  I should find a sugar daddy?  That's it, I'm not playing this game anymore.

ETA: I came home last night to find another letter about taxes -this time from California.  So to answer the question of "Who's Loving [Me]?" it's the tax boards.  The tax boards won't stop sending me love letters.

* This image is from the Apple website.  Don't get me busted for copyright infringement - I totally credited them.

"I get knocked down, but I get up again..."

I've been doing this online dating thing for a couple weeks now and have been striking out worse than [insert name of shitty baseball player here].  That's right, despite my sheer and utter awesomeness, I am not having any luck with this dating thing.  My friends keep telling me to be patient, that this doesn't happen overnight, but I'm beginning to think my friends are all just lying - they don't have the heart to tell me that I am not, in fact, utterly awesome.

I have sent messages to 24 men, saying hello.  That's right, twenty-four.  As in, 24 hours in a day or Jack Bauer is going to kick your ass on 24 (past tense of course, the show got canceled).  Not 23...but 24.  You would think, hey, 24 guys, surely one of them replied?  Exactly three have replied.

1. I decided that I wasn't really interested in the first guy after all, so that should probably be considered a foul, not a strike.
2. The second guy to respond was the poor man's Johnny Depp who resides in Berkeley.  That was a positive response but he lives in Berkeley.  Not only do I spell it wrong sometimes (it's very fond of the letter E), but I live nowhere near Berkeley.
3. The third guy that responded basically said thanks, but no thanks.  And I'm not sure which method I prefer if a man is not interested - ignore my message or flat out tell me that he's not interested. (We'll come back to that later.)

I know I should be patient but seriously, it's like I'm fishing with no bait.  Wait, that's not exactly true, because I am catching something, it's just that when I draw up that line, I'm throwing back what I've caught.  (So far I've referenced baseball and fishing - that should earn me brownie points with all those outdoorsy, sports types.)

I have received a lot of messages, they're just not from anybody I've reached out to.  Which would be okay if the guys messaging me were guys I would actually consider going out with.  But they're not.  They either have horrible grammar (shut up, it matters to me!), I'm in no way attracted to them, or they say creepy things like, "Do you have sexy feet?"  No, no, and no thank you.  (P.S. I totally have cute feet but I'm not interested in dating someone with a foot fetish - unless he's offering to pay for my pedicures and cute shoes, in which case, I may have to reconsider that one.)

Now some people have told me that I need to sign up for a paid dating site; that people are probably more serious about dating on a paid site than they are on a free site.  Hopefully the incentive is that people aren't going to goof off or be as creepy when their credit card is getting charged for it.  I have signed up for Match.com but I haven't paid for the subscription yet, which I am seriously considering doing.

My hesitation?  Right now I can get rejected for free.  If I sign up for Match.com then I'll be paying for rejection.

***sigh*** I think I should just move to Berkeley so I can drink wine and speak French with my poor man's Johnny Depp.

Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree

I added this photo to my dating profile for two reasons:

1) It shows off my cheekbones.  The breeders will appreciate my fine bone structure and deem me worthy of bearing their children.

2) I'm in my pajamas and I'm not wearing any make-up.  What you see is what you get.

I know you're supposed to be a little mysterious when it comes to dating - at least that's what they say, whomever "they" are - but let's get real.  I'm almost 40.  I don't have time to play games when it comes to love.  This is me.  This is what you're going to see when you wake up the morning after the first night I let you go all the way.

"My Momma told me...you better shop around."

I used to love to shop.  I could spend hours at the mall, just wandering around, window shopping, trying things on, coveting the latest Coach bags.  But somewhere along the way my desire for shopping died out and I just don't love it like I used to.

And online dating feels like online shopping.

Think about it... You go to a site that you think will have what you're looking for.  Then you put in your search parameters: height, weight, ethnicity, religion, likes/dislikes.  How is that any different than logging onto the Gap website and telling it you want to see: jeans, white, size 12.  Searching an online dating website is like shopping online for clothes, despite finding a mate being much more important than finding a cute pair of jeans.  Yet I go through the same process for both.

Something seems wrong about that, to me.

Don't get me wrong - I know a lot of people who have found true love online.  In fact, I'll be the Maid of Honor this summer for C, who met her fiancee on Match.com.  However, the whole process of scrolling through profile photos, adjusting my search settings... it all feels like the same thing I did when I was trying to buy a couch two years ago.

This one's cute, that one's ugly, too expensive, too cheap, too big for the living room, too small to lay on to watch tv.  (That's the couch, not the guys.)  But I may as well be looking at the guys the same way.

Too old, too young, too full of himself, too bad he doesn't know how to spell, too bad he lives in Berkeley.

I feel like Goldilocks, waiting to find that "just right" porridge.

Now my friends tell me to be patient, that the right guy will come along eventually, and to that I say, "BUT I'M ALMOST 40 AND I'M GETTING LONELY!"

Also, last night on Glee -- yes, I watch Glee and yes, maybe that's why I'm still single -- Coach Bieste was afraid to leave her husband even though he hit her because she was afraid nobody else would ever love her.  And I'll admit, I totally understood that fear.  Let me pause to say that I would NOT stay with a man that hit me.  What I'm saying is I identify with the fear of, "What if this is as good as it gets?"  I thought that when I got divorced and moved back to L.A. almost five years ago.  Some nights as I lay in bed, alone, I thought to myself, "What if I was wrong?  What if that unhappy marriage was as good as it was going to get for me and I just gave it all away?"  It's like that song "Possibility" by Lykke Li (it was in the second Twilight movie -- and yes, I watch Twilight, perhaps another reason I'm still single):

There's a possibility
There's a possibility
All that I had was all I'm gon' get

Clearly that's the loneliness talking -- the fear -- because I know deep down inside that I would rather be out of an unhappy marriage and lonely than falling asleep each night next to a man that is not the right man for me.

But sometimes...

Sometimes I wonder if that was my only chance at love.  If I had that one shot, just that single shot, and that's as good as it was ever going to get.

I clearly don't want that to be my reality though.  I don't want to believe that this world only holds one shot at love for me.  So I keep "shopping" online for a date because I refuse to accept that there is nobody else out there for me.  And somewhere, maybe in the Valley, or maybe on the west side, there is a man who is waiting to be loved.

I just hope he's shopping online, too.

Comatose

Received a message and this is one sentence from said message, unless you count the accidental period before "walk."

"I can’t surmise 46 years of life’s on going lessons in a paragraph and writing about oneself is so very one dimensional to me , I would rather have a 3 D coffee, tea, pool, Dave&Buster,mini golf, bowling.walk on the strand or a juice date or meeting and see if we can spark additional interest."

Do people not proof anything before they hit send?  I get that people make typos but that's why you should proof things before you send them. 

Of course, now I'm beginning to think that I am being too nitpicky about grammar, that I'm putting too much emphasis on how things are written instead of what these guys are actually trying to say.  But then I remind myself that these men are trying to make a first impression, yet can't be bothered to proof a message before they send it.  Is that really the kind of guy I want to have sex with?  (Eventually, of course, not today.)

Oh sure, maybe I'm reading too much into this non-proofing issue (I do like to read), but seriously... If you want to catch someone's attention by sending a message to say hello, shouldn't you take the time to execute proper spacing, punctuation, etc.?  Am I really the kind of girl that deserves a run on sentence?

Or, maybe, just maybe, these guys read that I dislike poor grammar and are sending me these crappy messages just to fuck with me.


.....


Nope, pretty sure they're just illiterate.

Maybe I'm just destined to date an English teacher.

Except I never heard back from the one I sent a message to. 

Maybe I spelled my name wrong.

Cat Scratch Fever

While searching through available men in the Los Angeles area in an attempt to pick a suitor worthy of my affections, I came across a gentleman who didn't seem too bad...

...until I got to the last paragraph of his profile.  And I quote, verbatim...

“love dogs, have had quite a few in my life.  Cats are cool, although I think in there eyes were the pet and their the master. Pretty much love all animals”

A man who loves animals is sexy.  A man with poor grammar and punctuation is not.

Unfortunately, I keep stumbling across men whose profiles need to be corrected in red pen.  And men that write like 13 year old girls text.  Men posing shirtless; men who write in their profiles about how all L.A. women want to be the next Kim Kardashian or Paris Hilton; men who sound boring; and men who sound full of themselves. 

However, there are one or two men that seem like good prospects so I've sent them messages - only I haven't really received any responses yet.  I'm sure all those men are reading my profile and criticizing me.  Heck, I totally expect that to be happening.  For all I know they're blogging about me too: "Did she seriously post a picture of herself wearing a Christmas tree on her head?  The mental hospital called, they're sending an ambulance for you now."  (But they probably would've spelled it all wrong.)  And of course they've read that my TURN OFFS include poor grammar, spelling, and punctuation, which means they're thinking, "What a snobby know-it-all!  No wonder she's still single!"  I'm not saying I'm perfect, but I know the difference between there, their, and they're.

In fact, the closest thing I've found to a "match" is the poor man's Johnny Depp - who said that yes, if he were ever in L.A. or I were in Berkeley, we would totally have wine and speak French.

Fuck that, I'm moving.