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The art of (internet) dating - year 2020
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Ed.Kloonk:

--- Quote from: peter-h on February 11, 2020, 09:44:02 am ---Awful "modern PC virtue signalling" attitudes in that video. People should be free to make their own lifestyle choices - so long as they don't impact on others excessively (e.g. having 10 kids when you cannot afford to feed them, etc).

There is somebody for everybody and internet dating puts them within reach. Not easy, usually, but it is a process that will work eventually. Just got to get stuck in and get on with it :)

--- End quote ---

Yes, but I wonder how much of this poisons the well.

peter-h:
In life, you might get a lucky break or two but mostly you make your own luck.

You just have to get on with it. It ain't gonna happen otherwise :)

For sure you will meet some strange women :) Follow the rules and use your instinct.
Ed.Kloonk:
For those who missed out over Valentines day, remember, Hitler had a girlfriend.

What about one that's ready to settle down?
She's out there, gentlemen..

vtwin@cox.net:
I met wife #1 in college. Was married 17 years, and then divorced 13. Had one 9 year LTR with a woman in those 13 years, but I had to break that off as I found out she had a substance abuse issue and in my line of work I can't have any of that.

I tried online dating when I first got divorced (2003 @ age 38). I can't remember all the sites... Match (obviously) and Yahoo Personals were two I can recall. I actually met a nice woman on Yahoo but after a couple of months it was clear she wanted something (eventual marriage) I was not looking for, so she broke it off. Match was an absolute nightmare. I think I had one or two dates from Match and it was clear the women were just going out for the free meal. I had a few really strange interactions with other women on Match back then. I completely avoided other sites like 'AdultFriendFinder' which was the 'Tinder' of those days.

There was another site, I can't remember offhand, where I had a couple of dates from... one turned out to be a woman who I think (but never could confirm) was married (she was incredibly secretive about herself, for example one time we went to a restaurant where she had made a reservation and when the receptionist asked the name it was under, she leaned over to whisper the name). The other woman seemed nice, until she wanted to break out the different colored candles and read my aura.

To be honest, I think back in the early days of 'online dating' the only women who were online were damaged somehow, or just really, really strange. Now its a lot more mainstream.

Fast forward to 2014 after I broke up with the LTR, I figured I would give online dating a try again. Keeping in mind, of course, I was substantially older (49) now. It didn't seem Match changed all that much, except how much they were charging. After 3 months, I dropped the Match subscription, it really didn't seem to change all that much from 2003. Had a lot of really strange interactions again this time too. For example, I was chatting with a nurse who accused me of "stalking" her when I asked if she was going to see her family in a particular town a couple of states away over the labor day weekend (she had mentioned in a previous conversation a week or so earlier she had family in that town).

By this point I was pretty turned off online dating. Eventually for s#its n giggles I created a pretty sarcastic profile on OkCupid (if its free, it's for me!) and threw up a pic I found on the internet of a biker dude with a huge beer gut and a six pack of beer tattooed on his stomach. This was in the summer of 2014 when it was dead at work, so I needed something to do, so I just starting rating profiles there.

It was actually pretty enlightening, some of the profiles... I recall one where the woman (late 20's/early 30's) was quite angry towards men yet couldn't understand why she couldn't find a "quality man". Then there seemed to be a whole series of women with various substance abuse issues -- I recall another woman who was actually quite attractive, and made it a point of noting how much pot she smoked during the week.

Then I ran across another woman's profile that was pretty interesting. She was in her early 30's and had just moved back to the US from Europe after getting divorced after a 10 year marriage, had a BA in psych and an MS in CS. However, of all the profiles I had read (and I had been 'ranking' dozens if not hundreds to kill time at work) hers was one of the best I had seen -- was actually well thought out and it was clear she was smart. I dropped her a message telling her telling her this (I was not a 'match' for her, as her criteria was male < 40, but it was still a nice profile).

She wrote back, thanking me, and asked if I were a troll, or a sarcastic prick (after she read my profile w/ the guy w/ the Dubbs beer 6-pack tattooed on his beer gut). This resulted in a month-long email exchange between the two of us (keeping in mind I was outside of her 'match' criteria, I didn't consider her dating material (or vice versa) but we would exchange dating advice with one another, her asking me to 'mansplan' things, and I asking her to explain 'hinteeze' I would get from some women I corresponded with.) The fact I worked in IT (BS in IT, MBA in Finance) gave us a lot to talk about work-wise too.

We actually did have a really good friendship online, and up to this point, had never met or spoken on the phone. One Friday night, I was working late, and she had written me an email telling me about her work week and how she just wanted to go out, have a drink and relax after a hellish week. She lived a couple towns over from where I worked, so I wrote back and said I was working late but if she wanted to, I'd take her out for a drink at 7 so we could both put a face and voice to the words on the screen.

Well, we met at the restaurant, and had an awesome time and a lot of fun. It was pretty clear from the moment we met that we had a lot of chemistry together, even with the age disparity.

Fast forward again to 2020, our 4 year wedding anniversary is in a few weeks. I'm 55 now, and she's 38, but neither of us notice the age difference... well, I do... sometimes... because occasionally something will come up which I experienced before she was born... like, I tend to forget she wasn't alive when I went to see Star Wars for the first time back in the 70's at the theatre. We have an 8 month old daughter keeping us busy too.

So, I guess "internet dating" worked for me the 2nd time around, even though I never intended it to work out the way it did.
peter-h:
Nice story :)

I am not surprised that "odd one out" worked out for you.
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