What I found today....

....after not really looking at my OKCupid inbox for the last several weeks.

"hey! i figured I would take a shot at messaging you. I have always wanted to get to know a cougar for friendship and more ;-) and yes, before you ask, my girlfriend is totally cool with this. she knows this is a fantasy i have had for a while, and she is alright with the idea of me being with a woman older than myself. if you wish to talk to her about it, feel free!"

- - -

"Greetings from a French pilot at the Hilton Logan aiport.
I love the piano
I was a drummer before...
what about a meeting ?
Sincerely,"

- - -

"You do have great legs. Yummy :3"

- - -

"Oh you are so damn attractive and complicated. Permit me I really like you! From what I can tell from your profile. Tho an LTR may be an oft desired goal, Anything from that to a "longish short term Rel "(whatever that is, just sounds kinda cool) to a Mr right now is fine with me; companionship beyond my regular friends, serious flavorful hugs are sometimes life-giving, or so it seems at times, laughing at bad puns, good jokes, or just the whole jitteriness of life. After all, as someone way smarter than me said about experiencing life, essentially enjoy it cause no one gets out alive!"

- - -

"E.B. White is indicative of your style? That's not an easy thing to accomplish--God knows I've tried."

No more p***** pics! (Can I get an A-men?)

This was sent my way today. It's from 2010. Considering how many penis photos have been gifted to me by men from OKCupid in my lifetime (including this winner), I'm amazed I didn't stumble across this myself already. It says everything I've ever said to the screen in response.

Choice quotes:

0:45: "Come on. Enough with the tricky camera angles on that baloney pony. Man, it is UGLY!"

0:57: "And, yes. Sometimes we save the pictures. But just to show our friends how weird yours looks. And make fun of how much of a douchebag you are."

Please share with a loved one. Man or woman, depending on their needs.

(PS: Thanks, MSF.)

OKC: It works sometimes!

A couple weeks ago I expressed pleasure at the lovely coincidence of coincidence:   Student Driver found herself sharing a coffee table with one of her most faithful (and previously anonymous) readers. 

As you recall, it reminded me of this blog's foremost -- of several, mostly undocumented variations -- small-world story:  The Artist from The Western Suburbs having a poor date with me, telling his next OKC interest (that very evening) about our poor chemistry, said female acknowledging she was a fan of my blog .... and The Artist using it as a reason to suggest a date with her.

I'm notoriously poor at noticing comments that come more than a couple days after a post.  However, I was so pleased to just discover that, 5 days later, the most important person who could have weighed in on that post weighed in on that post:

"Hi Karin - I had to laugh at your favorite deja vu blog moment. I am the lady that you 'helped' the Artist get. We did not hit it off either but I am happy to say that I met a different lovely man on OKC and we've been married one year! Just a little happy ending to that story even though you don't know me :) ... " 

Hey Anonymous:   Woo-hoo!

You're kidding. Someone else besides me mocks OKC profiles on a blog?

The first thing I saw on Facebook this morning was a status update from Michigan-friend Mike, who can always be counted on to put the driest spin on anything:

"Ah, February 14. The annual ritual that ends the day with me doing my taxes. :D"

I'm feeling slightly less cynical about Valentines this year ... my day started with a west coast text at 5:45 a.m. from MSF as he was getting into the shower. I've also a dinner date later with Student Driver; we were first reticent to make plans on a night we former restaurant workers like to refer to (yes, cynically) as "amateur night." However, she confirms a place she knows that "won't be filled with couples."

I'm not Anti-Couple, BTW.  I'm pro-No Hassles Dining Out Experience On A Major Holiday.

Speaking of SD, yesterday she so helpfully sent me a link to a blog she recently discovered: Inspecting Cupid.  As in:

"This blog is 80% humor, 17% advice, and 6% perspiration. It’s dedicated to translating a person’s OK Cupid profile into what will happen in real life if and when you decide to date said person."

Say no more. I was hooked at the stated concept. I became even more hooked when reading the Jan. 27 post title: "If I Answered the OKC Questions Honestly."  The first paragraph, "his" self-summary:

"I’m a 30-year-old “man” who lives with his parents and has over $150,000 in educational loans from a degree I’ll never use. Thanks in part to my diet and in part my poor genetics, I have horrible, earth-ending flatulence. I oscillate daily between bouts of egotism and self-pity, the former usually resulting from my masterful PS3 skills, the latter from just about everything else I do. I also tell a mean joke, though I do so with this highly affected pseudo-East Coast accent I developed while in college. You’ll get tired of it after 5 dates."

More recently: "Today's OKCupid Profile is Tomorrow's Awful Valentine's Day Date."

"... imagine a world where I am not only in a relationship, but I’m with someone I met off OKCupid. What then? Let’s get inspecting.

The text: [female, 26] (The first thing people usually notice about me) “My lack of coordination.”

The Valentine’s Day Date: You surprise her at home with a bouquet of flowers. So startled by the gesture, she tumbles backwards down the flight of stairs leading up to her apartment and breaks her arm. You spend the rest of the night in the hospital listening to her complain about how shitty Valentine’s Day is."

Whatever you think of the brand of humor, for obvious reasons "his" blog has now been hooked to "My Blog List" (at right) and updates will be appearing regularly.   Let the cross-polllination begin.

And, Happy Valentines Day.

Speak of the Devil

Well, no, I hadn't been speaking of him.

And, I hadn't been speaking of or to this (nicknameless) guy I saw several times in December 2009 and January 2010.  He has rarely entered my brainwaves since we bumped cluelessly by each other at the Boylston/Berkeley Starbucks (and he didn't acknowledge my hello) almost 2 years ago.

Yet, yesterday.  The other Starbucks on Boylston (755).  Just done doctoring my iced black eye and turning to walk away, I feel eyes on me.  Look to my left, and a man sitting next to the creamer station, scrolling on his iPad, with  beard, glasses and heavy coat is staring at me with purpose. 

My favorite kind of random Starbucks-on-Boylston guy. Not. I return to facing forward and head to my seat.

It's only 40 minutes later, once laptop is open and logged onto the shop wireless, that I see this message, sent nearly 40 minutes prior, via OKCupid:

Hey (Karin, yes?)

Good to run into you. I hope there are no ill feelings! You look good and I hope things are well.

No shit.

I turned to where he had been sitting.  He had already left.

There are no ill feelings, of course.  Click back to January and March 2010 for my ambivalent feelings (and his ambivalent return of such ambivalence) for the situation as it ended.  I simply had not recognized him.

As I theorized shortly thereafter in chatting with MSF, perhaps a reason Nicknameless and I never worked out was that -- nice and benign and as open to cuddling as he was -- he is the kind of guy who sees an old flame in a coffee shop and rather than sweeping up and greeting her and reintroducing himself, sends her an e-mail from 15 feet away.

Holiday Monday (I)

OKCupid message blotter:

31 - Oberhausen, Germany.   hey beauty...how you doin? It's so boring right now...and I ask myself if you are in mood to meet...a funny...smart and nice guy?! I have to be honest today this nice guy is extremely horny too:-) the hormones are going crazy:-) so we could do something against that too...so I hope you are open minded as me....would be cool if you reply

23 - N. Scituate, RI.   Hi! (5-minute gap) Hello?

18 - Avon, MA.  I was wondering if you are interested in casual sex.

26 - Boston, MA.  It's obvious that you have a problem with 22 years old men, but I'm soo old than them:) I'm 26 years old and 3 quarters:)) in April I'll be 27:)) JUST KIDDING! how e u?

21 - Peabody, MA.  Heeeey

32 - Lake City, FL.   u r so attractive can we chat or talk anytime ? my cell is 8XXXXXXXXX. (Ed. note: real number furnished upon request, in case you might want to chat or talk anytime.)

37, Washington DC.  Hi, I think a WOW is in order!! You are stunning! I bet you are as sweet. I'm a good guy, just turning a page in life, and trying to have some fun. I have an insatiable 'drive' with the stamina to match and looking for someone that would enjoy that, and we seem like a high match.

And an old friend, this gentleman, popped up and requested a chat, too.

Thanks, boys, for the attention.

Bachelor of the Day!

My e-mail account was pinged today by an OKC  'Hi!" courtesy of a 39-y-o man from Baghdad, Iraq: 

Not interested beyond the fact that I wondered who in Iraq was checking me out, I clicked for a peek.  He's a 59% Match (57% Friend).  He works in Computer / Hardware / Software and makes less than $20,000 a year.  He speaks English and Arabic.

He also seems to be, in another life, a 20-something woman from Virginia.

He likes long walks and being a good friend to others and enjoys driving to volunteer in his dad's office a couple times a week.  His peep-toed pumps are among the things he can't live without.  Also:

You should message me if:

- You want a new dental hygienist
- Need a gal to go to a concert with
- Need someone to talk about anything over a bottle of wine and good cheese plate
- Or....someone to potentially be a girlfriend.

Side note:  Don't let my age discourage you. I appreciate men in their 40's and 50's. In fact, some of my best friends are in that age group. Some would say I am old soul at times. Also, I don't mind traveling to NOVA... Gives me an excuse to get out of Richmond. Although, I am willing to host here as well! Lots of goodies here in Richmond.

In addition to the cleavage shot above, according to his profile pictures, he looks like this:

And this:

Incidentally:  between 6:30 p.m. when I first viewed his profile and 8:44 p.m. (now), his residence changed from Iraq to .... Bro, Finland.

Not that I am one to judge how other people productively or unproductively spend their time, but .... what the hell?

Feet (again)? Really?

One of my life mantras is, truthfully:  To each one's own.

This applies to anything:   to weird food likes,  to careers in questionable fields, to drug use, extracurricular sex lives, and one's decision to judge others if one feels like it.  Mostly because, despite my relatively open nature, I can't help but judge even when it goes against my own mantra.

(And it is my mantra, damn-it.)

That said:  what is it with folks and feet? Admittedly, I have an Inexplicable Need to Take Pictures of Them, as you well know.  But I would never pick a partner or a friend to be my partner or friend based on what their feet did or didn't look like,or if they liked me to touch their feet in a certain way or not, and I don't think I would ever choose to use it as a pick-up line.

Nonetheless, from a 40-y-old Bostonian on OKCupid recently, a couple hellos (in their entireties) to my inbox:

Yesterday:  "This is a lovely message."
Today:  "Do you have beautiful feet?"

In hiw writeup, he mentions nothing of any special foot requests or indications of why that might be important to him.   However, 1 of his 2 profile photos is a shot of a pair of black-haired shins, connected to feet in bright green socks printed with cartoon characters, without explanatory caption.

I'm curious what tomorrow will bring.

And I still don't get it.

The CFO (Redux)

From the Single in the City archives (2/2/09):

"So....we left it with a kiss and a goodnight and I wrote him a note that night to say thanks.....but I haven't heard back yet. Not worried about it, either, and that itself is a weight off. Really. It seems important that we had a reunion....for me to realize that I still liked being with him but could live without him."

I know I wanted to tell you yesterday all about the boy from San Francisco, who dominated the weekend and deserved the space.

But I didn't mean to not tell you the details of my CFO date on Sunday afternoon, our first since November 2009.

(We reconnected via e-mail after I thought July 4th was his birthday -- it isn't -- and wrote to wish him a happy one.)

I saw his apartment, saw photos of his 2 sons for the first time ever (one recently graduated from college and one from high school), and he gave me the book I picked up while browsing his bookshelf, not expecting its return.   We then cruised out towards the Lynn Woods Reservation for pajama brunch at the place of his longtime female friend.   Him indeed wearing pajamas. Me too, recalling this is how he rolls: taking one woman he used to date to a party given by another woman he used to date -- everyone wearing pajamas, everyone totally fine with everything.

Brunch was decadent and tasty and the afternoon quite nice.   The CFO still oozes joie de vivre and ranks as a gregarious and giving conversationalist. Unchanged in his conviction that he's already been married and raised his kids and wants to date as many women as he has time and energy for without commitment. Still as frank as ever about his (still) varied dating life and skilled at drawing frank details about sex and other assorted wildness out of mine.

What our "date" came down to be was the equivalent of a couple hours of road-trip girlfriend chat. He asked for my take on perplexing females in their 50s. I bemoaned men in their 40s who had never settled down and didn't seem to ever want to. He drove me home and we left it with a kiss and a goodnight again -- followed with a solid, lingering hug -- and I went off to go running and watch the sunset with the boy from San Francisco. It was the CFO who wrote me later that night, saying thanks for making the date. We haven't (yet) made another.

With all due respect to my past self, it amuses me now to read how I wrote about the CFO in 2009 with such heartbreak because we weren't working.  (We certainly wouldn't work today, either, despite his being a guy who commits to reading the Sunday Times cover to cover.)  Three years younger, yes.  But that level of naïveté doesn't feel like an emotion I remember having. 

Of course, though, I did.

Am I more laid-back since then? More circumspect? More seasoned?

Maybe more of a realist, most of all?

20-Minute Monday: Pay-off

It was set to be a good weekend anyway.  Beach weather.  Brunch in Ball Square on Saturday.  Reunion (has it been 2 years?) with the CFO on his turf on Sunday.  These things all happened and were good. 

But, too, on Thursday night I answered a (yes, true) OKC message from a man from San Francisco who had traveled to Boston for a week, whose original travel companion couldn't make the trip after all, who was weary of playing solo tourist, who wanted at the very least a one-night drink special with someone new.

The cliché pickup of the century, no doubt.

So ask me this afternoon how I feel about having said to self, "Self:  why the hell not?"

Could I have anticipated the rejuvenation resulting from our 3 evenings together? A casual encounter that instead became a gelling of tastes, wants, compassions? Of walking the greenway at 2 a.m..... of the beers and sunset at Thomas Park?   Of the Mt. Auburn Cemetery (Longfellow's grave!) and foie gras at the gastropub and the free tickets to The Donkey Show and being able to do it all with someone, and then the breakfast over bittersweet goodbyes? The kissing? The laying-next-to? His skill at knowing I'd feel good about being called sexy and even better, sans sleaze factor, about being treated as if I were? Knowing that had we not gone in that direction that companionship, as fleeting as it would (and necessarily has to) be, would still have been worth it? The sex serving as not the ends but as the the proverbial frosting on this cake, and that it would be the truth?

I just took the elevator down from the office to sit at the Copley Square fountain.   In the reflection of the Hancock tower doors, I definitely look like I had a weekend of being loved. Maybe my own knowledge of what I enjoyed makes me see myself as satisfied. But then, the man who passed me in the doorway as I exited smiled right at me for no reason, as if he knew something too. It has be the calm on my face transmitting my discovery that, occasionally, the risk of temporary pleasure is worth taking.

-- Monday, August 1 (3:31-3:51 p.m.)

Copley Square Fountain

Swingin'

A few moments ago, a 37-y-o Available Man (i.e. attached but looking) from OKC wrote to say

"Hey Hun... :) Wanna check out a swingers party tonight?"

I probably won't write him back to explain that my schedule tonight is already full up with grocery shopping, making salsa and sangria and scrubbing the fridge. And I'm trying to get over going out (or making out) with Available Men.

It did, however, remind me of the movie Swingers, from 1996, about a pack of single dudes trying to find love among the "east side" of L.A. Written by my hero Jon Favreau, who spends the duration trying to move on from an ex-girlfriend, and co-starring Vince Vaughn (doing his best imitation of a tool) when his cheekbones were still visible. First watched with Joshua one of my first years in Boston. Eminently quotable; YouTube is overrun with people's posts of their "favorite scenes," almost so that you can almost reconstruct the movie if you surf long enough.

I thought about doing that, but instead am pasting the 2 I found hit my spot this afternoon. The first one, serious, featuring Favreau and his buddy (Ron Livingston), who's trying to help pull him out of his funk:

"You gotta let go of the past and Mikey, when you do, I'm telling you, the future is beautiful."

Then the closing, when Vaughn interrupts his friend's good news (he eventually gets over the ex!) to make contact with a woman across the diner he's convinced his hitting on him.

Enjoy the weekend.

Playing the %s

I often berate old flames for checking back in with me after the fact, especially those who dumped me.  Having no patience and mocking them for being alone on a holiday and getting either nostalgic (or horny) or regretful.

Well, that was me today. Facing a solo holiday weekend (which I'm actually looking forward to, mind you) and slightly curious, there I was after work ... back-checking the old flames who still have OKCupid profiles.

Yes, many of them still have profiles.  Yes, I'm being flamingly mildly hypocritical.

OKC "matches" folks based on many factors, but most specifically by age, location, and "match percentage." This is reached when respondents answer anywhere from 20 to 2000 questions on all manner of topics, ranking each question's relative importance. Through an algorithm that I cannot summarize in more than 25 sentences, OKC takes the results of:

1.  Your answer, compared with

2.  How you’d like someone else to answer, and

3.  How important the question is to you.

Your answers are then compared to everyone else's on the site and when you look at a profile, the resulting match percentage supposedly summarizes how much your and that profiler's answers made each other happy. "Friend" and "enemy" percentages are also gleaned .... a calculation that, even after a thorough scouring of both Google and the OKC website, I don't see explained.

Anyway, it was fun to revisit how I matched up with some of the more memorable men I've encountered. No surprise to see who tops the list (and why my heart still breaks a little every day).

C-2: 
86% Match / 78% Friend / 21% Enemy

But even those I had either spectacular flame-outs or fizzlings with were uniformly positively ranked:

Sunday-Night Man: 
79 M / 67 F / 27 E

The Almost-Date: 
79 M / 73 F / 30 E

Young Politican from Brooklyn: 
76 M / 71 F / 27 E

Mr. Reach The Beach Relay: 
72 M / 77 F / 25 E

Likewise, I knew immediately that these were not going to be possible, which also bore out:

Mr. Craigslist: 
51 M / 59 F / 38 E

Canoe: 
36 M / 51 F / 54 E

Besides, they're all now in the past.

Since I'm feeling on the feisty side this weekend anyway, I decided to search for some high-% men, write them, and point out that we're perfect for one other. See what happens. In a test run a few minutes ago, I came up with some starting data by searching the pool of:

1.  Guys who like girls

2.  Aged 35 to 45

3. who live within 25 miles of Boston and

4.  have been online in the last month,

5. who show a photo and

6. are single.

I found:

My Best Friend: 

Age 39, Watertown

81 M / 94 F / 10 E

The most private thing I’m willing to admit:

I have a crush on Michelle Obama...

My Worst Enemy: 

Age 36, Boston

28 M / 33 F / 90 E

The most private thing I’m willing to admit:

i love desperate house wife

Perfect Match: 

40, Somerville

94 M / 88 F / 15 E

The most private thing I’m willing to admit:

I'm not nearly as serious as this profile makes me sound.

Hmm.  While it should follow that I need to now write my Best Friend and Perfect Match to beg for our imminent togetherness(es), I should also note that above-mentioned Perfect Match is someone I already took the initiative to contact back in February ... and who never replied.

Hmm indeed.  Wonder if it is worth trying again.

...and it's only Wednesday

It's been quite the week.

So far:

1) The New Yorker acknowledges online dating on the same day that I get a message from an OKC guy calling himself "Guy Noir."

2) Meteorologists acknowledge the following extended weather forecast for the Boston area:

Saturday, July 2: Beach Weather
Sunday, July 3: Beach Weather
Monday, July 4: Beach weather.

3)   I acknowledge that the Marine Corps Marathon is 17.75 weeks away, and if I'm going to do an 18-week training plan I'd better start running, even if it is Beach Weather.

4) Biking to work today, circling around on Trinity Place towards the Stuart Street Starbucks, I nearly knock over House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio (dressed in a golf shirt and emerging from a town car), relieved the state troopers flanking him didn't think I was doing it on purpose.

Etc. Etc. Etc.

I knew Bill wasn't going to be satisfied with a cryptic and über-crusty Guinness photo as the only description of my weekend:

Bill: What was up with the blog entry? Did that guy no show?

Karin: Nah. It’s a more involved story ... We hung out both Saturday and Sunday. Didn’t end well last night at 12:30 and I was pissed so I drove over to Foley’s to unwind with a Guinness. Surprisingly, just doing that rather than going home and going to bed being angry was a good approach. I e-mailed him today and apologized – he was a bit of a quirky guy in person and the fallout came because of my frustration with that, which is hardly his fault. He doesn’t seem aggrieved and said he’d write more later. Which is fine. It was good for us to hang out. We’re definitely not worth dating or even romantic involvement, but we do have a lot of shared interests and I’d like to stay in touch.

B: Sorry it didn’t work out so well. Sure this guy is really worth your time?

K: Well, yeah, enough so. Considering our level of interaction the last 3 months, I don’t want to make an enemy and don’t want it to end badly. Even if we just get square and then the relationship trails off because there’s nothing romantic going on….so be it. Better that. Interesting guy, smart guy, definitely eccentric – which, again, is something not entirely apparent until you hang out. Kind of like what happened with C-2, I’m glad to have erased ambiguity. Frustrated to have wasted time on a level, but it’s all a learning experience and this taught me something about me too.

B: Well, what’s wrong with cutting ties now? If you’re going through the motions just to “not make an enemy”, it just doesn’t sound right. Don’t waste more time if there is no potential, your time is too valuable.

K: We’ll see. I’d like to end it on a good note if nothing else. I’m a bad person when it comes to regrets.

B: Well, you probably regret too much in general. You’re a good person that way in that you care about how you treat others, sometime regardless of how they treat you.

K: I know. He didn’t treat me badly. He didn’t misrepresent himself. It just took meeting him to understand that him being quirky made for great e-mail exchanges but less chemistry in person. I didn’t have the patience for his real-life persona. So I don’t have to. I think we’ll just go back to swapping YouTube videos.

Actually, I did that last night, sending along this link of the great mezzo-soprano Lorraine Hunt Lieberson singing Handel. It closed the loop on our brunch at the Algiers Coffee House, where we sat for 2 hours on Sunday afternoon dissecting the text and origin of the Bach cantatas playing in the background. Which, again, seems like the kind of relationship he and I should and could have. Those 2 hours of Bach minutiae, in that (speaking of quirky) Harvard Square relic, were easily the best 2 hours of the weekend.

Lesson learned.

(The regret comment probably requires reflection and a separate entry at a later date.  As does my curiosity about whether or not he thought I was an eccentric, too ....)

Meanwhile, The New Yorker yesterday revealed this 10,000-word essay by Nick Paumgarten on online dating, with a heavy focus on OKCupid -- interviews with and discussions of the dating lives of its creators and all.

Well, it's about time .... 2 of my most regular reading habits in one handy location! (Highbrow and lowbrow meeting in the middle, perhaps?) Mr. Paumgarten is gifted and clever and did a mountain of research. I particularly enjoyed learning about the Technical Automated Compatibility Testing (TACT), the first known "computer-penpal" service that originated around the time of the 1964 World's Fair. Nonetheless, that everything (but TACT) sounds like something I've heard before, even in a piece of this length, is a testament to both my well-documented history and the over-ripeness of still writing about it.

Mr. Paumgarten is married. For research purposes, rather than creating an fake online profile, he made coffee dates with women who had OKC histories. His conclusion rings of accuracy .... particularly the highlighted line at the end...

"I talked to men, too, of course, but there is something simultaneously reductive and disingenuous in most men’s assessments of their requirements and conquests. Some research has suggested that it is men, more than women, who yearn for marriage, but this may be merely a case of stated preference. Men want someone who will take care of them, make them look good, and have sex with them—not necessarily in that order. It may be that this is all that women really want, too, but they are better at disguising or obscuring it. They deal in calculus, while men, for the most part, traffic in simple sums.

"A common observation, about both the Internet dating world and the world at large, is that there is an apparent surplus of available women, especially in their thirties and beyond, and a shortage of recommendable men. The explanation for this asymmetry, which isn’t exactly news, is that men can and usually do pursue younger women, and that often the men who are single are exactly the ones who prefer them. For women surveying a landscape of banished husbands or perpetual boys, the biological rationale offers little solace. Neither does the Internet. "

And here's a take on a gender issue:

"Good writing on Internet dating sites may be rare because males know that the best way to get laid is to send messages to as many females as possible. To be efficient, they put very little work into each message and therefore pay scant attention to each woman’s profile. The come-on becomes spam and gums up the works, or scares women away, which in turn can lead to a different kind of gender disparity: a room full of dudes. “There is a fundamental imbalance in the social dynamic,” Harj Taggar, the investor at Y Combinator, told me. “The most valuable asset is attractive females. As soon as you get them, you get loads of creepy guys.”

Finally, this story was my favorite: a woman in her 70s, with a PhD, married and divorced twice and who lives ... outside of Boston. She's in her 70s, I'm in my 30s, we're both internet dating, we're having similar experiences.

"She met a mathematician who lived in Amsterdam, and flew over to meet him but discovered within minutes that he suffered from full-blown O.C.D. She drove up to New Hampshire in the rain for lunch with a man with whom she’d been carrying on a promising e-mail and telephone correspondence for a few days, but he told her that he found her unattractive. She met a financier on Yahoo’s dating site. They got together for coffee at Café Pamplona, in Cambridge. (K: Just down the street from the Algiers, of course!) He was handsome, charming, and bright. He was also, as a friend’s follow-up Google search revealed, a felon, and had served time in prison in a RICO case. “I did see him again,” she said. “And then I realized how crazy he was. He wasn’t nice, either.” For two years, she has had an off-and-on affair with a forty-seven-year-old man she met on Yahoo, and she recently met a man on Match.com who showed up for their first date wearing a woman’s sun hat, slippers, and three purses. He invited her to accompany him to Norway to meet the Queen.

“You have to learn the rules,” she said. “But there are no rules.” More often than not, she initiates contact. “At my age, I have to.” She also feels that, in her profile, she has to shave a few years from her age and leave out the fact that she has a doctoral degree, having concluded that men are often scared off by it. She has gone online as a man, just to survey the terrain, and estimates that in her age range women outnumber men ten to one. “Men my age are grabbed up immediately by friends,” she said. “Or else they believe that younger women are more interested in sex.

“I’ve learned, forget about writing,” she said. “Meet a person as soon as you can. Anyway, the profiles you read, they’re like bathtubs. There’s no variation.”

Depends on your definition of the word

From an unsolicited message this weekend, my new favorite OKCupid pick-up line

(for real my favorite and for real, a message):

"Are you available for short term data?"

Randomness

Cause it's a dreary Sunday evening and I'm on 3 hours of sleep and am trying to keep myself occupied enough to avoid napping before bedtime ....

1) This here blogging platform went into glitchorama on Thursday and into Friday, and it wasn't even related to the 13th. Error messages everywhere. The powers-that-be behind Blogger ended up removing every post made everywhere (everywhere! on every site!), including mine, in those 30 hours to perform the necessary back-office maintenance. After which they ostensibly restored all the content they removed. This firstly meant I couldn't post or edit that day, and it affected this post by deleting a long comment from Student Driver about how it's probably best if Piano Man just stay a mysterious sex-based chat buddy, and that the reason things are funny between us is probably because I just don't really want to be with him. Which does seem kinda right. It secondly means I am WEIRDED OUT that random Google code geniuses can just remove and return my thoughts like that.

2) Speaking of Piano Man, on Friday I caved and checked in.

Karin: So now who's being quiet?! How are you?

Piano Man: I know, I know, sorry. Just been a tense week. How's yours going? (etc. etc. etc.) When the dust settles would be nice to talk. Cheers,

K: Tense? Why? What's wrong?

PM: My (name-omitted income-producing) project seems to be idling, which is rly bad for me.

The project he speaks of has been idling both before and since we met. During which he talked to me all the time and at all hours. So he's either now otherwise engaged. Disinterested, perhaps. Or waiting for my musical to end. Or else the whole situation just ran its course. Or not. Because he just texted me.

3) Very early this morning at the closing party for The Secret Garden, I sucked myself into a game of "how old do you think I look?" with a couple cast members. Drinking a second homemade cosmopolitan at 3:15 a.m. is the perfect occasion and time to claim to be the oldest person in a room full of extremely attractive people. One girl said she was sure she was older. Gasping with jaw hanging down, I asked her to lean over and whisper her age. "I'm 30!" she exclaimed. I gasped again ... but with some delight.

4) Speaking of the age issue, spring is the season on OKC when shirtless wonders point cameras into bathroom mirrors and send the headless results to women 15 years their senior. Between yesterday and today, 3 of 'em. Some ones wearing shirts (and backwards baseball caps), maybe not ready to bare anything, otherwise entranced me with their poetry (a sample):

(23, Roselle, IN): "damn your a sexy woman....like younger men?"

(22, Portland ME) "I know I'm a little younger then your baseline, but hear me out. Why would a beautiful women such as youself, wanna put up with all the BS on this site? I don't believe for a second you can't get dates off the internet."

5) Because I have seen that last phrase or a variation of it so many times, I Googled it in its entirety to see if it was part of a collection of online-dating pick-up cliches. No dice. But it did randomly connect me to the site Thought Catalog and an essay by Charles Warnke (21, Berkeley, CA) titled "You Should Date An Illiterate Girl." Which is totally literate. I just can't discern if I'm reading rant or ironic tongue-twister in his premise that it is better to date a woman who doesn't read because

"A girl who reads lays claim to a vocabulary that distinguishes between the specious and soulless rhetoric of someone who cannot love her, and the inarticulate desperation of someone who loves her too much. A vocabulary, god damnit, that makes my vacuous sophistry a cheap trick.

"Do it, because a girl who reads understands syntax. Literature has taught her that moments of tenderness come in sporadic but knowable intervals. A girl who reads knows that life is not planar; she knows, and rightly demands, that the ebb comes along with the flow of disappointment. A girl who has read up on her syntax senses the irregular pauses—the hesitation of breath—endemic to a lie. A girl who reads perceives the difference between a parenthetical moment of anger and the entrenched habits of someone whose bitter cynicism will run on, run on well past any point of reason, or purpose, run on far after she has packed a suitcase and said a reluctant goodbye and she has decided that I am an ellipsis and not a period and run on and run on. Syntax that knows the rhythm and cadence of a life well lived."

What a relief Charles isn't sending me shirtless photos, eh? I might not be able to hold myself back.

Day 13 of 31: 2.20 miles

Day 14 of 31: 4.25

May Total:  27.93

2011 Total: 240.13

Too deep

It was after 12:15 and 2 beers that I spoke with Piano Man last night, at his request, our first conversation since Holy Thursday.  We went through the litany of our respective weekends and the day just ended, after which I branched into a tale about a former love interest.  (One of those times that, when I'm buzzed on high-test stout, it seems essential to spare no detail.)  Piano Man, to his credit, murmured assents, commented, urged me to continue.  After which I felt sheepish for launching into Karin's Greatest Story Ever mode.  And thusly declared, "OK!  Your turn!  Tell me a story of a love lost!"  To which he hemmed and hawed (even clearing his throat) and suggested he did not feel like sharing at present and pointedly returned to subjects we have already worn well -- purchase of a keyboard,  rehearsal schedule for the show, his addiction to his local wine bar, and if I've recovered from my cold.  AKA, we headed back to the surface.  Fair enough -- I had brandished my past lover without him asking, but as a way to share an experience that has made me me.  I thought.  Which I figured if he likes me as he says he likes me, he would want to know.  I similarily want to know more about him.  Is this not how it works?  The deflation was so acute it pinged in my stomach.  His sudden discomfort, equally so.  Perhaps he and I are at that point where avoiding the depths is stagnating. 

Day 26 of 30:  3.0 miles

Day 27 of 30:  4.8 miles

April Total:  58.21

2011 Total:  212.2

Quandry (I think)

Last night I started a load of laundry, did a short run, put a chicken breast on to saute with some onions and mushrooms, and called Piano Man at 11:22 for a phone date. We hung up at 2:38.  I had to get up for church this morning. He did not. He texted early this afternoon:

"Feel bad I kept you up so late.  Enjoyed talking though."

Whether it was the chardonnay I drank with my (very wee-hours) dinner, I also enjoyed talking. I recall being chatty. Piano Man, a good sport, indulged me as I talked about my hometown (Cando!) in North Dakota, my first job out of college in SW Minnesota (Pipestone!), my most recent Christmas Eve making sage risotto and breathing in incense for several hours at Church of the Advent. He in turn Googled to find reviews of the chardonnay (Bogle Vineyards) I was polishing off, which I indulged, amused by his seeming endless curiosity.

It was nearing 2 and we had transitioned into bedroom chat, at which point he said,

"I'm imagining right now how much more I'd enjoy this if you were here with me."

I thought that too, yes. Who wouldn't rather be kissing someone rather than talking over the phone about kissing? But I also thought, I can't say, really, that I know how much more I'd enjoy this. I've never watched his facial expression in response to a comment. Listened as he tried to sing and play "Ihr Bild" (Schubert). Had a chance to find out if affectations endearing on the phone are creepy in person. Or not. Kissed him.

I have no time to travel to New York in the next month to find it out, either, unless Piano Man figures out how to come here for a day. So we can meet in person.

And I can't figure out in the meantime, assuming our conversation continues, how much energy I should invest in him and not invest in other possibilities. Maybe I'm just not used to a man willing to talk to me about piano technique and wine varietals.  Who thinks about me on days after we talk and tells me so. Who called on Friday evening to say he was driving through Prospect Park, thinking of me, and just wanting to talk.

Maybe I'm just afraid to admit that we are indeed simpatico. Maybe I'm thinking that maybe if I just keep talking to him and have patience the answer will become obvious. Maybe he's a serial killer. Thrice-divorced and harboring moldy food in his cupboards. Talking to women in California, Montana and Vermont, too.

All questions I should ask. Although I don't want to assume this is serious. Or want to get emotionally tied up in something with no possibility. Or miss out if it is one. Or date someone who is 48. I don't think I have the stomach to start something that is long-distance from the get-go.

Yet I wonder if I should learn to have one, and try.

Or wonder if I'm being lame, idealistic, impatient or naive, or all of the above.

Day 16 of 30:  1.90 miles

Day 17 of 30: 5.51 miles

April Total: 36.99  

2011 Total: 190.93

Reinforcement

From a Gmail exchange, today, 10:45 a.m., with Piano Man:

(Who still lives in Brooklyn, who I still haven't met in person and might never and I wonder even if we did if e would have any chemistry, who I nonetheless communicate with daily, who is 40-plus but slings internet slang as guilelessly as a teenager, who is exhaustively opinionated about music, who scanned and sent me the Ferruccio Busoni transcription of Bach's organ chorale "In dir ist Freude" and has been asking ever since when I'll be not too tired or not too wimpy to try playing it.)

Karin: You awake?
Piano Man: depends what the meaning of "awake" is... ;)
K: I have set the bar low, so I'm sure you're over it.
PM: What I'm talkin 'bout
K:  I _think_ I got that. (see previous e-mail about the low bar)
PM: s'ok. have you had a chance to fool around w/ the Bach/Busoni (herinafter B/B) yet?  It's not so easy. But it rocks, as you know.

I do know. Do you? Here's a reminder both of how much it rocks and how not easy it is:

K: I haven't. I had to print it out at work, and it is sitting here on my desk. It actually makes me afraid. Tomorrow night, I have time and a night off, so perhaps I'll experiment with the futility of trying to play it.
PM: "afraid"? An intrepid NoDakian like you? HA!

IN·TREP·ID [ in tréppid ]

ADJ   fearless: courageous and bold

To recap:

I say, "I'm futile."

He replies, "You're fearless, courageous and bold."

Is there really any reason, even if we'll never meet in person, to rid myself of a correspondent with such powers of positive reinforcement?

Day 11 of 30: 1.57 miles

Day 12 of 30: 1.68 miles

April Total: 22.18

2011 Total: 176.17

If only I hadn't given up chocolate for Lent....

A (very) (approaching half my age) young man  left me a message this morning on OKC:

"I'm looking for a sugar mama and I'd like it to be you."

He is totally serious about this, no doubt.

To clarify what he is asking me to do on his behalf and for him to do on mine, I had to check out  the Urban Dictionary definitions of a Sugar Mama:

1) ... an older woman who buys extravagant gifts for a person and may/most likely will receive sexual favors, in return.

2) ... usually semi-professional caucasian women that are overweight and always have stringy hair and work in administrative positions. They usually have blue eyes and put on a ton of makeup.

3) ... woman (often an older woman) who holds her man/woman in nice standing with money, food, an apartment, etc. -- not always used in a derogatory fashion, or merely in exchange for sex, but because she can.

4) .... distinguished species of older females who seek the company of younger males whilst avoiding the entanglements of a relationship, in favor of a lack of restrictions. The sugar mama has overcome society’s proscribed behavior for women’s sexual behavior. Thus, embraces her true self and lives her life to its fullest. She know what she wants and isn’t afraid to hunt for it!

Distinguished, wealthy, empowered hunter with stringy hair, eh?

Tempting.

Day 29 of 31:  2.31 miles

March Total:  48.93

2011 Total:  151.99