Tag Archives: match.com

Return to Sender, Again

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There is no one on this planet who can say what I want to say with more heart and chutzpah than the pint-sized country chanteuse Brenda Lee:

I AM sorry, soooo very, genuinely sorry for dropping the blog ball with zero — NAY negative zero to the basquillionth power — tact and grace.

I am pond scum.

I am the dillweed douchetard who walks away at the last minute in the falling exercise of those trust-building classes.

trustfallIf I was to attempt to make an excuse, which I wouldn’t dare insult you with, but let’s just say — for arguments sake — that the “Another Earth” me version quantum leaped down here to this planet with a defense:

SHE would probably try and play the holiday card.

SHE would explain that this time of year is the ultimate creative succubus. “The horror! The horror!” of the holidays SHE would affect, saying how Heart of Darkness need not take place on a ravaged steamer choking down the cannibalistic Congo River. It need only occur in the Christmas music looping, cluster-fucked shopping malls on Black Friday.

(Why’s it gotta be “Black” Friday?)

SHE would spell it out, plain & simple. Every year, between Nov 1 and Jan 2, she walks through the chestnuts-roasting-on-an-open FIRE of 5 Holy Daze Stages:

  • Consumerism: Reason and restraint go Buy-Buy. Standing outside her own body, she watches in horror as she karate chops a soccer mom in the shoulder over a pair of retro Croc mules as if they were the last drop anti-serum in a viral outbreak.
  • Consumption: Serving size: 2 SLEEVES (also known as “1 box”) of Trader Joe’s Choco-Vanilla O’s.
  • Family communion: Self-explanatory, which leads to
  • Childhood regression: Mouth guard so as not to swallow tongue during fits
  • Total Catatonic Shock: think, Awakenings, pre-awakening.

Really (and I’m not being biased at all here) SHE does make some really good points.

So, if you can find it in your heart to forgive ME, then let’s not waste another nanosecond. Sit back, relax, slip into something a little more comfortable, and join me for another Mailbag Monday:

****

Dear Nerdy Romantic,

I’m just going to throw out a few numbers here:

14: Months I’ve been a subscriber to Match.com

23: Guys I ended up having amazing, online “relations” with. Meaning: long, intense, deeply personal emails exchanged by both parties.

0: Of those same guys — after arranging to meet — I was actually attracted to.

For the love of all that is holy, why does this keep happening? How can intense email chemistry fall completely flat in person?

Frustratingly,

Another Mr. ‘Write’ goes wrong

Oh and Girl. The virtual sound of your suffering makes me want to jump through the computer screen Twilight Zone (the movie) style — minus the demonic cartoon and girl with no mouth — and give you a giant bear hug.

twilightzonecartoonHear me when I say: You Are NOT Alone. This very situation has befallen me and yours so many times I finally gave it a name —

Ani-MAIL Magnetism (an’ i mal / mag’ne tiz’em)

n. the experience of having acute cyber fireworks with your online dating match; but no actual “fire” whatsoever upon meeting.

It always starts off the same. Shy yet hopeful, I would walk onto that cyber stage and take my place in the Electronic Slide line dance:

You can’t see it, it’s electronic.

You gotta feel it, it’s electronic

Boogie woogie woogie woo.

Two grapevine winks and a quick email message turnaround later AND boom! I’m sucked into this second life alter-reality. I’m wearing a diaper at my computer desk and sucking down Power Bar Gel Blasts so as not to break the steady stream of instant messaging.

Seriously, in one case, I hadn’t been that excited to check my “mailbox” on the hour every hour since I was 7 years old and entered a sweepstakes contest for a walk-on role on The Great Space Coaster to meet Baxter the rainbow clown.

baxterclownThen the highly anticipated meet cute came: 7 pm at our mutually favorite restaurant, being that we agreed on virtually everything. We pull into the parking lot at the same time. Shut engines off. Makeup mirror checks. Get out. (I made sure to wear flats so as to optimize leaping-into-his-wide-open-arms-potential)

But instead, when we finally do make contact, it’s the most awkward, miss lips kiss nose, pull-away-too-fast side hug shamble.

As for the rest of the evening — every attempt at conversation takes off like a summertime moth… straight into one of those high-powered electric bug zappers:

SNAP. CRACKLE. FLOP

Which brings us to the “Why does this keep happening” portion of our program. I’ll show you my theories if you show me yours:

1. The Rom-com Fallacy:

youvegotmailFact: In the real world, you do not find 2 beautiful, charismatic, engaging, and mentally sound people home alone, lying in bed on a Friday night unless they’ve just had wisdom teeth surgery.

NOR are those people captured in a split-screen shot with GIRL on one side, balancing a pint of Rum Raisin Soy Dream in her lap as she types to GUY, on the other side, balancing a pint of Cherry Garcia in his lap typing back.

2. The Cyrano Effect:

Let’s face it. Communicating online is akin to having a built-in Cyrano De Bergerac. Wikipedia, IMDb, thesaurus.com — they all feed you the wittiest, funniest, and on point lines so that REALLY, you wind up search engining your way into being the perfect soul mate.

Case in personal point: When one guy sent me this beautifully worded description of the greatest moment of his life — SEEING Tony Hawk do a helipop on a half-pipe — my very first thought was —

“How the heck can Stephen Hawking get on a skateboard?”

But something told me to Google T. Hawk first before writing back. So, I was able to save face just long enough to meet in person AND find out he considers Four Loco to be a perfectly legitimate energy drink.

3. Time + imagination = disaster.

Online dating is a lot like online shopping. Let’s say you order a dress. Every day that passes in between, you go back and zoom in on that dress. You fantasize about what shoes and jewelry you’re going to wear with it; you picture yourself in it, hair up, hair down, to the side. You track its order, double check its status, and count down the hours until you can finally debut it.

And then, 7-10 business days later, it arrives. You tear open the box, pull it out, and throw it on ONLY to discover it makes you look like a walking potato sack.

Time is a dangerous thing. It allows you to form this image of a person, pieced together from their online profile pics AND a well-crafted email voice. You thought you would be meeting a silver-haired fox/tall drink of water —

— Only to come face to face with Larry King in a Sippy Cup.

My advice: Cut the email exchange down to the bare essentials. Name, phone number, place & time you want to meet in person. Go DIRECTLY to the store. Put on the dress. And find out right away if it fits.

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“In Your Eye” — from Say Nothing

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Happy Friday everyone! Today I wanted to spice things up with a little musical number. And, in keeping with the theme of online dating sites being Passive Aggressive Playgrounds (See: “F View”) — this ditty is about the ultimate DSM of mental disorders:  the Match.com “Wink.”

the screamMy song is titled “In Your Eye,” based tightly on Peter Gabriel’s iconic hit — made famous by Lloyd Dobler’s boombox serenade in Say Anything. My version is for the real-life, “WINKING” wanker, chain-yanker internet match known as Say Nothing.

Plus, I needed an excuse to sit around watching John Cusack movie clips all afternoon.

What I would give for a bouncing sing-along-ball…..

F View

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I’d like to interrupt today’s episode of Mailbag Monday for a very important PSA:

For the love of Kris Kristofferson, I finally have proof that earth veered off its axis some time ago and has been spinning at a faster-than-normal rate ever since, thus forcing time to progress at a supersonic speed.

Proof being: I just received a check in the mail for a music review I completed earlier this month. The check was dated: 9/5/2010.

Okay. Now, back to our regularly scheduled program:

Dear Nerdy Romantic,

I just got out of a long-term relationship. And by “long-term” I mean the last time I was single, Pluto was still considered a legitimate planet. So, on the insistence of my older sister, I joined Match.com to re-acclimate to the life of a bachelorette. Being totally new to the online dating world, I have a question: If a person has “viewed” my profile on several occasions, but has never made actual contact, is it fair game for me to open the lines of communication?

Sincerely,

Lost in Cyberspace

To “Lost in Cyberspace” — the short answer to your question is Hell to the No.

But who am I to take short cuts when there’s a perfectly long winded response waiting to get lost in. 3-2-1 AND Lift off:

In all honesty, there was a time in the far distant past of 2011, when online dating sites like Match.com were actually good at what they claimed to do. I really believe the 100-plus clams you had to fork over for a 6-month subscription actually went toward the food and living costs of a 5-member think tank holed up in a white, windowless research facility somewhere in the sacred regions of the Himalayas.

This Stephen Hawking-esque brain trust was paid to sit around listening to Barry White records, playing the flugelhorn, and devising a sophisticated scientific algorithm that pairs compatible online profiles together.

But that was long ago, a B.K.**  time of innocence and hope. Yes, it was in these glory days that the “Guided” steps to communication on Match.com were used for just that… communicating.

(**B.K. denotes the calendar era Before Kristen: When K-Stew reached into Rob-Pat’s chiseled chest and pulled his still-beating heart out with her bare, adulterous hands)

But since then, Match.com has gone the way of most things that decline in quality as they rise in popularity. Nowadays, I’m pretty sure the $100 member fees go toward retaining the site’s class-action lawyer.

saul goodman

Better Call Saul

Oh yes, dear readers. I actually had one guy “View” my profile several times over a 2-week period, without so much as a wink. Finally, I get an email from him that reads as follows:

“[Sad Face Emoticon] Wow! I really thought we had a connection. I guess I was wrong. I hope you find what you’re looking for.”

To which I should’ve replied: “ARE YOU SMOKING BATH SALTS?!!”

Seriously, Match has this new feature called STIR events, in which paying members are invited to crawl out of their virtual caves and convene at a local bar to meet other members face-to-face. If they behaved in person how they do online, it would be like Samuel Beckett’s theater of the absurd:

Act One:

Guy (dressed in all black. Face painted blue)

Girl (dressed in all blue. Face painted red)

Guy: Stares at girl, looks away. Stares at girl, looks away. Stares at girl, looks away. Stares at girl, looks away. Stares at girl, looks away.  This goes on for 30 straight minutes without interruption.

******

Act Two:

Guy: Winks at girl at bar

Girl: Winks back at guy

Guy: Smiles at girl

Girl: Smiles back at guy. Proceeds to walk over to guy and introduce herself.

Guy: Turns back away and completely ignores girl.

Chorus shouts: “I say what I mean. I don’t mean what I say.”

All said, I am resigned to think that anyone who “Views” my profile repeatedly over a course of many weeks without making contact does so because they are either —

  • A)     A serial killer
  • B)    The guy from Memento
  • C)    Their 1st, 2nd, etc… choices have failed to respond to their actual emails, so they’re sifting through the dregs of the other matches, trying to psych themselves into thinking maybe the more they look, the better I’ll seem, all the while hoping upon hope that their real favorites are just away on vacation and haven’t had a chance to check their inbox.

Ultimately, Match.com (and its online dating brethren) has essentially become the Passive Aggressive Playground — raucous, confounding times had by all on these fun-filled diversions:

  • Monkey Around-With-Your-Emotions Bars
  • Mood Swing Set
  • See-No-Seesaw.
  • Imbalance Beam
  • Wink-en Logs

Bottom Line: You won’t see the Old Spice Man “viewing” or “winking”at someone’s online profile as he repels off the side of an ice-capped mountain straight behind the wheel of a runaway speed boat, onto a jungle shore where he wrestles a giant panther to the ground, and then falls gently onto a 1000-thread count, rose-petal covered bed smelling of grit, daring, and the sea after a storm.

So “Lost in Cyberspace,” to make a short story long, I say to you this: Only respond to matches who send an email, or at the very least, follow-up their winks with actual contact.

As You Wiiiiiiiiiiiishhh… (Dear John… Part Deux)

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Over the last few days, I’ve received several (okay, 2 to be exact) requests for “real-life” examples of the first-date-dud “Dear John” letter from my previous post.

Well, in the 3 enduring words from the farm boy-turned-pirate we all know and (true) love:

Here is the original template:

To _____,

Start off with a neutral compliment regarding his/her choice of outfit, restaurant, movie (date activity in general), and/or personal hygiene, etc…

Quick transition into but, however, even still, shockingly l I do not see us being romantically compatible. Further explanation is up to you.

(Do NOT suggest being friends. That will only leave the door open to hope. You must kill hope.)

Express luck in their future dating endeavors so as re-establish the complete and total massacre of hope.

Sincerely,

Proper Name (no nicknames. Too familiar. Gives hope a fighting chance)

___________________________________________________________________________

And, now for the actual letters:

(1)

To ___

I’m so glad you suggested the new coffee shop near Piedmont Park for our first date.

When you said you were “close to your family,” however, I didn’t realize that meant your mother would be joining us. Too much, too early, I’m afraid.

I hope you and Gladys find that perfect partner soon AND please tell her to send me that delicious sounding Kugel recipe first chance she gets.

Nicole

**********************

(2)

To ____

Can I just say “WOW!?” That is literally the first time I’ve ever seen a bicycle with beer koozies welded to the handle bars!

When you said you were a “people person,” I didn’t realize, however, that meant you were a 45 year old man with 3 room/Steely Dan cover band-mates. A bit crowded for me, I’m afraid.

Best of luck in your romantic future,

Nicole

**********************

(3)

To ____,

I won’t beat around the bush. I didn’t realize that online picture of you dressed up as a warlock was NOT for Halloween.

I’m so flattered that you and your coven have chosen me as your “fourth” to “call the corners.”

But, as the ole’ Groucho Marx saying goes, “I don’t want to belong to any club that would have me as its member.”

Many happy Solstices,

Nicole

**********************

(4)

To ____,

Thank you for opening my eyes to the disturbing amount of uneaten food that gets tossed in our city trash cans everyday.

I also didn’t realize when you said you were an “outdoorsy” guy — that meant you lived in the park and slept on an inflatable playground bounce house.

I hate squirrels. This will never work,

Nicole

**********************

(5)

To _____,

High praises for getting us a table at Woodfire Grill. I’ve wanted to eat there for years!

However, I completely lost my appetite when I realized the “FBI agent” part of your profile meant “Firm Believer In Christ” who thinks that I, as a Jewish person, am fated to burn in the fiery pits of hell lest I give my soul over to the Messiah.

Hey jacktard. They call us the “Chosen” people for a reason.

Mazel Tov,

Nicole

**********************

(6)

To _____,

So, by “great listener,” you really mean, “loves the sound of my own voice.”

Good luck with that,

Nicole  

**********************

(7)

To _____

You had me at your Ed Hardy t-shirt.

And then you lost me when — as I was ordering the chocolate mousse cake for dessert — you said Penelope Cruz used to be a “hot hottie” before she had a baby.

But don’t worry. I know it was only your teensy weensy eensy dick talking.

Nicole

**********************

(8)

To _____,

Lovely cologne you wore last night. What was that intoxicating aroma? Cedar Nettles?

Anyway, when you said you were “an adventurous guy who thinks outside the box” — I didn’t know that meant you liked to pee on women during sex.

This is a judgment-free zone, but I myself am more of a separation of church and state kind of gal — if you get my drift.

You should really try OK Cupid,

Nicole

Peeing Calvin

Dear John… or Joe, or Jack, or whatever your name is,

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Sorry for the Mailbag Monday delay, folks. I had a dear friend come into town last night and instead of opening up my digital post box to answer your burning questions…

… I opened a bottle of Bulleit Bourbon and babbled on about how Walter White of Breaking Bad has done to my moral compass what a Pit Bull does to a peanut butter Kong Stuff’N toy. Thank AND You for that.

kong stuff'nSo, now that I’m back on track, let’s begin:

Dear Nerdy Romantic,

“I started an account with a popular online dating site a few months ago. So far, so… blah! Several dates but no chemistry, at least from where I was sitting. But each time, the man sent me a follow-up email or text to schedule our next date. I never returned the messages, and eventually he (they) got the picture and stopped contacting me. Is this a totally douche bag thing to do?”

Make no mistake: This is NOT the “Just Let Me Know” debate of 2012 all over again. The 2 scenarios couldn’t be more different. Basically, the “JLMK” (trademark pending!) post was about a date that without question knocked the socks off, rumpled the locks on both parties involved. There were 4 eyes smizing, 4 pupils dilating, 4 legs shifting ever closer under 1 table shrinking, 5 hours passing like 5 minutes, and 2 sets of shoulders bobbing from 2 laughs blending into 1 synchronized blissed-out buzz.

What we’re talking about here is the first date dud. No sparks. No chemistry. No connection. The conversation falls flatter than matzah bread, and as you sit there watching the other person’s mouth move up and down, the muffled voice inside your own head cries out:

“Dear God when is this hostage crisis going to end so I can go home, tear off this pair of tummy taming Spanx, slip into my red flannel footsie pajamas, open a family size bag of Pirates Booty, and fall asleep watching ‘Legends of the Fall’ for the 15th time?”

So — is it REALLY necessary to let that person know that said first date was also the last?

To which I say, YES! To not do so is the luxury of likee alone. But I have been the LIKER. Oh yes, I have been the liker. Totally oblivious to the mushroom-cloud-sized-signs that HE is not into me: The incessant shifting in his seat; the regular “Wow! Look at the time” remarks when it was only 1:30… in the afternoon; the sudden emergency-have-to-leave-now- phone call; the snoring…

And yet I still drove home all googly-eyed, humming the Partridge Family’s “I think I Love you,” and wondering if when push comes to shove, will I really stick to my promise to keep my last name.

WHAT I WOULD HAVE GIVEN right then and there for someone to have walked me up that hilltop of delusion and tell me to “look at the bunnies” while putting a cap right in the back of my foolish fantasy.

So now, immediately after any first-date flop, I send an obligatory email: short, simple, straightforward. No room for doubt “Dear John,” for the sake of decency, non-douchebaggery, and future match.KARMA.

Basic template below:

To _____,

Start off with a neutral compliment regarding his/her choice of outfit, restaurant, movie (date activity in general), and/or personal hygiene, etc…

Quick transition into but, however, even still, shockingly I do not see us being romantically compatible. Further explanation is up to you.

(Do NOT suggest being friends. That will only leave the door open to hope. You must kill hope.)

Express luck in his/her future dating endeavors so as re-establish the complete and total massacre of hope.

Sincerely,

Proper name (no nicknames. Too familiar. Gives hope a fighting chance)

Text in the City Part 2

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Gratefully, I’m not alone. This IM-tercourse is a growing phenomenon in our cyberspace replacing real physical space culture. Urban Dictionary.com now defines the hookup that literally has to be hooked up to a cell phone charger as a “Textationship.”

textationshipNot surprisingly, at the 2-week no-face-time itch, my coworker also decided to end things with Balki — who, as it turns out, really is “Mr. Big” in this “Text in the City.” To wit: A short time after kicking Balki to the virtual curb, my coworker ran into a friend at a party who described meeting an all-too-familiar “great guy” — one who sends hilarious texts but can never seem to get together in person. (Hint: It was Balki)

So, Balki the cell-phone boyfriend, you smooth keypad operator, if you’re out there in the world wide webosphere, this is my homage to our 2-week textationship. Thanks for the MEME-ories!

(The creation of this video would not be possible without the help of the following:

Video Technician: Ohki Komoto

Director of photography: http://theirreverentcouponer.tumblr.com/

Music: Sigur Ros “Hoppipolla”

Cat: Poppycock Artemis Schmute the III)

Text in the City Part I

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A few weeks ago I was carpooling with my office mate to work. She and I are both active in the match.community and so our hour-long commute regularly flies by with entertaining/horrifying tales of online profiles distorting reality:

  • By “middle age,” he meant that he knows who Methuselah was… personally.
  • By “separated” he meant his wife thinks he’s at a Bible study meeting.
  • By “male” he meant the “Crying Game,” only backwards.

But this time, instead of the usual “who let the circus sideshow out” grimace on my coworker’s face, she was, dare I say, smiling.

 “What’s with the grin?” I asked, dying of suspense.

To which she replied, “I actually think I may have met a really great guy.”

 “This, I have to hear.”

And so she went on to describe this super attractive, hilarious, intelligent, ambitious, did I mention hilarious 30-something man who truly seems to be the Honey to her Graham, the wig to her wam.

“This is so amazing. When are you guys going out next?” I pried.

“Well, that’s the thing,” she shifted. “We’ve never actually met in person. But we talk all the time; he texts me like 7 times a day just to check in and see how things are going.”

Suddenly, I felt as if I had been mowed down by the green goblin semi in Maximum Overdrive.

Maximum Overdrive

Green Goblin Semi

“What’s wrong,” she asked nervously.

“His name,” I hesitated. “His name doesn’t happen to be [Here I will use an alias to protect the innocent] Balki Bartokomous, does it?”

perfect strangers

Balki Bartokomous

She: “Yes!”

Me: “No.”

She: “Yes!!”

Me: “Nooooooooo!” (This went on for a while until I finally explained HOW I knew the WHO she was talking about)

A few months earlier, I too had met Balki Bartokomous on the same online dating site. I “winked.” He “winked” back. I emailed. He emailed back. We exchanged digits. And then, my cell phone lit up like the night sky on the Fourth of July.

It was like nothing I had ever known before. All hours of the day, a cute “Good Morning” prompt at 8AM, and a silly “Sleep Tight, don’t let the bed bugs bite” at midnight — then in between, a steady stream of funny, engaging, entertaining, and affectionate bulletins. At first, the sound of my phone’s incoming message alert was like a sweet, chirping cartoon songbird flying into my window and tying yellow ribbons in my hair with its adorable cartoon beak.

But, after 2 weeks of him shirking every suggestion I made for us to actually meet in person with one apologetic “I have to work late” excuse after another — those melodic cartoon songbirds became the shrieking raven, nevermore.

As much as it hurt, I had to pull the plug on our unreal-ationship. Because after all the Carpal tunnel thumb cramps, and all the countless hours of him Wink Face Emoticoning sweet nothings in my ear, we would forever be but – WAIT FOR IT – “Perfect Strangers.”   

Mailbag Monday

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Shabazz! I’ve decided to designate the first day of each new week as “Mailbag Mondays” — the day I reach into my digital postbox and address a randomly-picked comment. (By “random,” I mean intentionally chosen for strongest audience appeal.)

mailbagI fished today’s comment out of the “Spam” folder – which I’m beginning to realize is WordPress’s way of shielding me from any negative feedback. But I say any publicity is good publicity. So without further adoodley-do:

The comment is in response to my August 10 post “Dumbroll, Please.” Said reader writes:

“Honestly, if you had received those “clever” emails from a guy, would YOU have responded? They don’t sound real enough to bother. They sound like a chat bot wrote them. …They are not stupid enough to answer!”

There’s a lot going on here so I’m just going to dive right into the main argument of – “Would you have responded?”

My “Honest” answer: ABSO-FRUITLY!, and without question. Have you not read my blog? Any guy that is going to nab my attention is going to do so via his sense of humor.

WORDPLAY is my FOREPLAY! Commuter folding bikes and puns do to me what sports cars and rippling biceps do to the Jersey Shore girls. You show me your glue gun and backlog of Tiger Beat magazines and I’ll show you mine. You stimulate my brain, and you stimulate everything else.

Across the board, the guys who have won me over in their emails fit into this “clever” category, with several of them actually evolving from digital pen pals to dating partners. One guy — who I believe to this day is the secret love child of Macgyver and Martha Stewart — emailed a miniature box likeness of me constructed out of cardboard paper and pipe cleaners.

On our third date, we made a small army of these 3-dimensional figurines and went around town, leaving them on random door steps with sweet messages like, “You put the bop in the bop shoo bop shoo bop”  — AND — “Work your cares away, down at Fraggle Rock!”

Another guy introduced me to the strange and fantastic craze of Mexican Pointy Shoes:

mexican pointy shoesHe and I spent a full week in back-and-forth emails brainstorming everyday activities confounded by said shoes. Partial list reprinted here:

Playing hacky sack, running a 3-legged race, playing the piano, pole-vaulting, bobbing for apples, walking on stilts, decorating the top of an Xmas tree, trying to slide down the chimney as Santa, scuba diving with flippers, playing hide and seek, using an airplane bathroom, walking a tight rope, lying inside a magic saw-in-half box, rowing a boat, walking up a mall escalator, trying to get off a moving sidewalk, being buried in sand on the beach,  blowing up a balloon, climbing a tree, mounting a horse…

So the answer is YES! I would respond to those kinds of “clever” emails.  I have responded to those kinds of “clever” emails. And I will continue to respond to them.

An important CAVEAT:  There is a very fine line between charmingly corny and criminally creepy. I have received my fair share of match.com messages that motivated me to foster a Rottweiler and take up Krav Maga. 2 particular examples:

  • “Hey gorgeous. I’m in town for the weekend from New York. Staying at the W Hotel. Come by and lets listen to the Cure in my hotel, room 343.”
  • “I think I saw you in the produce department at Publix. I was the one in handcuffs being escorted out of the back by the store cop. Where will you be in 9 months to a year?”

The Meetup that spawned a revolution… or, not

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Enough was enough. My fear of choking to death all alone in my apartment — only to be found 9 days later after my cat had eaten my face off and the stench of my decomposing body finally forces my next-door neighbor to call 911 — had reached a point where I started cutting my food into tiny, baby-sized bites.

poppycock the cat

Tastes Like Chicken!

I owed it to myself and all social retards like me to create a safe place to come together and revel in all the dorky entertainment we could find. So, I crawled out of my hermit shell and organized the “Nerdy Romantics” Meetup. Here is the survey for qualifying members:

If you can answer YES to the following questions, this Meet Up is for you:

1. Are you single or single-ish (i.e. still claim ‘0’ dependents on your W4) WHILE all of your closest friends have either joined the rat race, moved away, gotten married, and/or squeezed out a litter of rugrats — SO that on the off chance you do, in fact, get together, their minds are preoccupied by thoughts of breast pumps and butt paste AND not the new, hip farm-to-table bistro?

2. Are you newish to the city and find that your coworkers or classmates are not people you’d want to meet in a dark alley behind a convenient store — all the while, the already established circle of friends are about as easy to penetrate as the Heathers?

3. Have you tried event planning sites but find most of them host activities far outside the city and at peak traffic hours during the weekdays?

4. Has your Match Dot-Com Bubble burst?

5. Are you somebody who doesn’t mind going out to a movie or dinner alone, but is finding it harder and harder to appreciate other interests without the company of others? Examples:

  • You can’t feasibly run a three-legged race with your shin tied to a crash-test dummy.
  • Going white-water rafting with just yourself makes for a death-defying uneven weight distribution.
  • And finally, nothing is sadder than getting stuck in mid-air after trying to ride a see-saw solo. Take it from me!

6. Are you someone who prefers backyard bocce ball games to smoke-filled bars – AND — picking apples in North Georgia to picking off squirrels with your sawed off shotgun?

7. Have your past four weekends included watching re-runs of Downton Abbey in search of rare, historically inaccurate idioms?

8. Are you one “Teach Yourself to Crochet” You Tube video away from eating cat food out of the can and reviving your old Angus Macgyver Fan Club?

9. Do you go on “The” Facebook primarily to play Scrabble? Do you still wear “Sneakers”? And, did you use the phrase “Bob’s your uncle” recently in casual conversation?

10. Are you tired of coming to the realization that cutting your cookbook recipes down to accommodate ONE single serving turns Rachel Ray’s tuna casserole into a baboon’s ASS-erole?baboon ass

In less than 2 months, Nerd Rom’s have grown to 225 members. Yet, in the 2 events I actually organized, only 1 other person actually attended, and that was my already-existing friend, who I bribed with free cookies to go.