On Second Thought...

Will you guys let me be irrationally neurotic for a minute?

Well, the overwhelming consensus seems to be that I should go for the date with Mr. TA. I am still a little apprehensive about it, not just because he's 8 years older than me, but also because he's still my TA. Grades aren't in yet, and this date could make or break me. What if he holds it against me if I don't accept? Truth be told, I'm boderlining something serious in this class. I'm trying not to think the worst (that he's trying to get a little somethin' somethin' in exchange for giving me a good grade) but you never know with people these days. And then too, I can't help but wonder why he's interested in me. He said he thinks I'm sexy. But what else? He's a TA to over 200 students. We've had a very impersonal teacher-student relationship, except for the time I contacted him letting him know about my "extenuating circumstances". So, all he knows about me is that I'm a former victim of Depression and that I suck at Geology. What are his motives? What's the appeal? Besides my boobs, that is.

At any rate, I realize that I my over cautiousness may not be just due to fear of rapage, but also due to fear of the unknown. I've never dated a white guy, anyone this much older, and I've never been asked out like this before. I'm a little nervous just because I don't know what to expect. But alas, I know I'm only over thinking the situation, and that it's just one date. I already replied to him, so we'll see what happens. I want somebody to commit to issuing an Amber Alert because if you guys don't hear from me in a week, it's probably because he kidnapped me. And if that happens, needless to say I'm blaming y'all. For realsies.

So today I got a couple of messages on Ok Cupid, that made me rethink my Internet dating idea.

I got a message from an admittedly married dude looking for a "fuck buddy". Instead of replying, I looked at his profile. When asked what were the top six things he couldn't live without he said:

pussy, money, guns, pussy, pussy.

Oh how I hate everything.

About a half hour later, I got a message from a 44 year old guy who condescendingly asked me why I was "stalking" him:

Listen, kid, this is like the second time I've seen you stalking me. You're cute and all, but what's up?

Okay....tell me a little about yourself, and if your nice maybe I'll introduce you to my nephew. He's a great kid and about your age.

By the way, what exactly do you mean by "open minded"? That's become another of those another of those nonsense phrases.

As I mentioned before, the site shows you your stalkers--people who lurk your page but never message. Well, this dude kept winding up in my matches, which made it look like I was going to his page, but I definitely wasn't. I had to set the record straight, informing him that:

Umm, seeing as you're older than my father, I can assure you that I definitely wasn't "stalking" you. For some reason you keep coming up in my Quickmatches. I can't for the life of me figure out why. But I just hid you from my match results so problem solved! Take care, sir.

To that he replied:

HA! Gal, you are a delight!!!

I always wondered why older guys like being insulted by younger gals. ::scratches head::

Finally, I received this message:

u r a q t. wat r u doin on this site?

After taking about 30 seconds to figure out that by "u r a q t" he meant "you are a cutie", I asked myself the same question: What am I doing on this site?

He's right, I am far too fly to be solicited by married men, male chauvinists, and guys incable of writing a complete sentence. In the real world, I don't have problem meeting guys. It's just when I get down here in the boondocks that it's hard to find a man (not a horny, immature, Weezy quoting college boy) who I think suits me. Maybe my decision to e-date was a bit hasty. I'll be back in Chicagoland by this time next week. If I don't get any prospects within the first few weeks home, then I'll consider online dating again (just for the sake of shaking things up). But in the meantime, I'm hanging up my e-bow & arrow.

Even though I've encountered enough douchebaggieness to last a lifetime today, I have to say that online dating does have a lot of blogging potential. I mean, where else can you meet a guy who openly divulges that he's never been circumcised? So, though I won't be an active member, I'm not going to delete my account. I'm thinking it's just what I need to bring me out of my writers block.

Sucks To Be Cupid...

Today when I logged into Facebook, I had two notifications. The first said, "You are missing out on flirts because your date card is incomplete. Click here to complete your date card." The second said, "Here are new men for you to meet on SpeedDate..." and proceeded to list the guys who recently joined. Now, I don't even recall signing up for either of these applications (ahem), but that's beside the point. It's the fact that with all of our new age technology, dating isn't what it used to be.

What ever happened to the days of old fashion courting rituals? A guy would see a girl he liked. He'd catch her eye. They'd do a little long distance flirting. And then he'd approach her. I don't remember the last time I was physically approached by a guy. I'm not talking about a Facebook message or any other type of e-holla. I'm talking face to face. It's been a lonnnnnge time.

About a month ago I went to a lecture on campus called, "It's Not You, It's Me: Reflections on Commitment Phobia in the Late Modern Era," given by the author Eva Illouz. In it she proposed that the reason why dating is so complicated in this day and age is because of the way we go about doing it.

She opened with this analogy. In her home back in Germany, there is a larger Jewel-like supermarket she sometimes goes to. She said that she hates the store though, because it is large and crowded with so many brands of the exact same product, that she can never decide on what to buy. So, she prefers to shop at a quaint, private owned supermarket. Even though the prices are higher, she likes that she doesn't have to spend a year trying to decide what type of butter to buy.

What it ultimately comes down to is options. In this technological age, we have everything at our fingertips, including people. So, Illouz's point was that, because we have so many options of who we want to date with the aid of the Internet, it's harder for us to make any actual commitments. Before the Internet Age, people had to actually get to know each other individually. They had to put time into courting each other. But now, we're picky, impatient, and insatiable. We look through online profiles like we're walking through an aisle at the Walmart Supercenter, reading label after label and moving on to the next until we find the perfect product. We spend hours and hours in the bread aisle looking for the perfect loaf, but we never find it.

The point is, because we're living in this fast paced world of instant gratification and infinite options, old fashion dating rituals are obsolete. First there was dating. Then came speed dating. Then there was the Internet dating. And now there's Internet speed dating??? Have we really gotten that lazy?

Ugh, I hate the Internet. It's numbing and obscuring our humanity.