Just when you thought it was safe - OK CUPID PART 3: The Return of the WOO!

Lots of really normal-seeming people are undercover weirdos who don't wear their weirdo costumes to work or on their dating profiles

For. Real. But then I think I pretty much put it all out there in my profile (to the extent that I don't think anyone who met me later would feel that I misrepresented myself) and I don't think it does me any real favors.

Errr. what's the proper etiquette with replying to messages. In my week on okc I've received two, and in both cases it's been pretty clearly a so-not-gonna-happen type thing.

Yeah, I hardly ever respond to these. And they're pretty much all I get. I just don't think there's much necessity in writing, "Not much is up, person with whom I appear to have very little in common, but I'm glad to hear that you also enjoy music. Is there anything else I can help you with?".

i SO don't write short stupid messages like that. i pretty much only message girls i have something in common with, who's pics make them look like someone i'd have a good shot at mutual attraction with if we met in real life. i write shortish-but-fully-literate, no-misspellings messages referencing stuff they talk about, maybe make a topical joke if i can think of one, and a leading question so they can write back easily if they're interested...

...and maybe one lady in 10 responds at all. ok maybe one in 5. which is fine! i understand that's more or less what the ratios are like. but remember ladies for every woman out there going "ugh who are these guys, do they think this would actually work?!?!" there's a perfectly nice guy going "what's up with 20 cold shoulders in a row, am i that horrible ffs?!?!?"

who's whose

guess that's why 4 women out of 5 don't answer my messages then! phew, i thought it was cause i was bald and overweight.

no wonder i can't get a date!

Ha ha, no, it's just funny that it's one of those guaranteed Things On The Internet that if you make a post talking about one's own literacy or lack of spelling or grammatical errors, it's absolutely guaranteed you will make at least one completely ridiculous spelling or grammar error. It is the Way Of Things.

i actually control-clicked the one red underlined word i typed and changed it and everything! now i guess i have to go through my entire okcupid profile again for grammar errors :/

Hey I will regret this later but if anyone wants to look at my profile and see what they think, look up a cocteau twins + harold budd song starting with memory.

btw messiah: typos are ok, they happen, its things like your/you're mistakes that ick me.

Every one has their own deal-breakers. Oddly, grammar/spelling is not actually one of mine - the quality of the thoughts expressed is far more important to me than whether they are expressed by the nonsensical and sometimes contradictory whims of English grammar. People's mileage varies.

But the only thing I would caution you about is self-describing as a "perfectly nice guy." Because that, for me, and for many ladies, is a giant massive red flag. One can usually tell guys who are perfectly reasonable by the way that they act perfectly reasonably. Any guy who has to take the time to point out that he is a "nice guy" (especially in the context of saying things like "I'm a perfectly nice guy and I still can't get women to respond to me") is doing the tell a little too much more than the show for comfort.

The only messages I get are from so not gonna happen type situations. They are always like, into Harley bikes and rednecking around, too.

Any guy who has to take the time to point out that he is a "nice guy" (especially in the context of saying things like "I'm a perfectly nice guy and I still can't get women to respond to me") is doing the tell a little too much more than the show for comfort.

― Shepton Mullet (White Chocolate Cheesecake), Saturday, August 18, 2012

100% agree here - people who describe themselves this way, it raises a suspicion, it sounds defensive + i'm never convinced that people who describe themselves as nice...are in any way nice whatsoever

...and maybe one lady in 10 responds at all. ok maybe one in 5. which is fine! i understand that's more or less what the ratios are like. but remember ladies for every woman out there going "ugh who are these guys, do they think this would actually work?!?!" there's a perfectly nice guy going "what's up with 20 cold shoulders in a row, am i that horrible ffs?!?!?"

― messiahwannabe, Saturday, August 18, 2012

there are multitudes of actually nice people that I wouldn't consider responding to (through no fault of their own, there is nothing wrong with them, just not for me) - it isn't a slight on those people and its not a slight on you if 4 out of 5 girls don't respond. I responded to a much lower % of girls than that on one profile i was on (the other i didnt at all). you can make your profile better, you can make your messages better - its just as likely to be the way you are selling yourself as anything else. they don't see you, they see what you present. can you improve it?

Hey I will regret this later but if anyone wants to look at my profile and see what they think, look up a cocteau twins + harold budd song starting with memory.

Nice. The Cocteaus are one of those things I will occasionally plug into the keywords field on the match search in the hopes of discovering someone with similar-ish tastes. A method by which I discovered that there's presumably only one female OKC-er in the Chicago area who's a fan of Inland Empire (confounding!).

ha ha, actually i was just being self depreciating (i mean, i *am* bald and overweight, but i rock it like it was in style) maybe i shouldn't have but i was actually kinda speaking for all the other perfectly nice guys out there when i said that! i would never EVER describe myself as a "nice guy" in a dating profile, ever. i know that much at least

i mean, i'm pretty sure i *am* a reasonably nice guy (i'm super tight with my band, guys and gals both, we've held together for a decade and counting, all my old high school and college buddy's seem to like hanging out w/me when i'm in town, i still have pleasant, cordial relationships with my various exes etc etc) but that said i've been cultivating a bad boy image since i started my first band in junior high, and tbh i'm pretty sure i've gotten that shit down to an art by this point. actually after a bit of a dry spell i have three dates this weekend! only one from okc but honestly i have no real complaints about the site or my results there.

i'm just saying! it's funny to hear people talk about how much they hate behavior x, but then when you try behavior y you still get plenty of cold, hard rejection... again i'm not complaining, i understand it's the nature of the beast and if i go ahead and send out 10 messages over the course of a couple evenings, i'll usually get a date or 2 out of the effort. which is fine.

some of the women on that site must get dozens of messages a day i guess? i just sorta imagine these "responds selectively" types sitting there going "nope, nope, nah, ugh facial hair <bangs delete button as hard as possible>, hey this one looks ok... nope shirtless pic never mind, delete delete delete, mmmm maybe, nope, nope, coldplay?!?!?, oh hell no, delete, hmmm this one looks ok, maybe, oh, look, it's 9pm already, time for the colbert report!" <closes browser without responding to anyone>

oh great, i just realized i'm being defensive about being a nice guy, no really! which means i'm not. good thing this isn't a dating site i guess

"responds selectively" isn't a bad thing!

your problem is you're putting "some of the women" on a pedastal, and yourself as one of the dozens competing for a reply - when you should be equals. it also sounds like you are just throwing stuff at a wall and seeing what sticks - are your eg 10 messages similar? this kind of approach is always going to result in a lower %

No one is saying you are or aren't a nice guy, its just at this is at best a) like saying, "Hey, I got shoes, I wear shoes, 3 pairs" and at worst b) "I'm nice ok, don't let anyone tell you different, I don't hit anyone - I got ZERO issues. Nice. with a capital N, got it?"

I maybe got it wrong, I only got your words to go on but there's a lot of "which is fine", and "I'm just saying" and "I have no real complaints" which kinda reads like frustration + the scattershot approach suggests impatience which maybe not a good combo

sorry if i got it wrong i don't mean to be a dick

ok who just visited my profile? Curious.

(hands up)

Your profile seems to paint an accurate picture of you, fwiw. To the extent that the ILX you is the real you. It's a favorable portrayal, is what I'm saying here.

thanks! :)

Also anyone who worked out what my username was from what i said earlier is win :)

trayce are you from portland? i have to admit i did the search you suggested. if that's you, our music tastes are pretty similar! would you guys find me if you searched for bali + waterproof ipod + hardboiled wonderland? i can't tell, my internet is being super patchy right now.

so yeah, sure, i may very well be coming off as insecure, here anyway. maybe in real life too, i suppose. probably! i made a decision sometime last year to stop being so player-y, stop dating loads of women casually all at once and concentrate on finding A Woman Of Quality who i could have a long term relationship with, maybe get married and have kids and stuff. obviously as soon as i tried to do that (and i've never been the kind of guy who couldn't get dates) BAM! it was like a desert. it was spooky! i've spent the better part of a year trying to get my mojo back, and it's only been over the last month or 2 i've been getting any attention from the opposite sex again. i still feel a bit spooked too.

really i don't know what i was thinking! i've always, ALWAYS done better when i've just embraced my inner nymphomaniac, it's somehow my best look <shrugs> in the past, when i've just let it all hang out, eventually i meet someone cool. hopefully that'll happen this time as well...

hahah no I'm australian!

messiawannabe it sounds like its best if you're just yourself and don't try and look for something different

perhaps it is time for messiahwannabe to shrug off the shackles of restraint and become messiah

:)

i totally have a plan to be the new messiah, but i need about 3 million dollars to pull it off i think. it's a very specific plan, but i recon it would work if the stars aligned correctly. and if i had approximately 3 million dollars. i also have a plan to make the 3 million dollars, which isn't really completely implausible! i need to get on that actually.

it would be nice to find a mz. messiah to be in my corner along for the ride and stuff.

I have faith in you, you can do it for less than half of that

Um. Wow. I am going to try really hard not to give unsolicited advice, because I hate when it's done to me (as it's usually completely off base) but I really think things might work out better for you if you stop trying to think about things in terms of "I've stopped playing and I'm looking for Mrs Me now!" like you have this five-year-plan for A Woman Of Quality and you. And just try to work on meeting women and interacting with them on their own terms and seeing where their ideas intersect with yours. Because that's a heck of a lot of expectations for any one woman to have to measure up to.

Maybe that's just me. But if any guy said to me "I am looking for a Woman Of Quality" I'd be all "Look! Over there! Behind that tree!" and run in the opposite direction because who knows what kind of expectations that entails.

Yeah, I generally try to avoid wasting the time of anyone who doesn't at least implicitly suggest that they're okay with slightly-damaged goods.

Well, it's partly that. But it's also.. I'm me. I have my own hopes and dreams. I'd like someone we could build a new plan together and work out what we want from each other, once we know each other. Not someone who wants to slot me into this pre-conceived idea of "now I'm done with being a player, I am looking for a wife and mother of my children."

I remain convinced that the #1 reason why this dating/relationship shit keeps blowing up in my face is the cognitive dissonance that develops in the ever-widening schism between someone's idealized notion of who I am (or, conversely, some fantastical and increasingly-negative notion of who I am) and, y'know, the person I actually am in real life. Which is massively confounding, given that I think I'm pretty honest and WYSIWYG. So I definitely sympathize with that.

Maybe that's just me. But if any guy said to me "I am looking for a Woman Of Quality" I'd be all "Look! Over there! Behind that tree!" and run in the opposite direction because who knows what kind of expectations that entails.

me too. i'd love to find someone to date, but it's more impt to find someone i can connect with generally. i had a phone call with a guy who was Interviewing To Be My Boyfriend, and it was just WEIRD and ick. i just want to get to know people, and see how that goes.

there's one okc guy i'm talking to on skype. he knows i'm hesitant about meeting in person, and hasn't brought it up past my first mention of it. so we just keep on skyping. he hasn't hit on me, told me i'm beautiful, any of that shit. he just talks to me! like i'm a person! and i like talking to him, tho i'm unsure whether i'm attracted to him romantically. i'll probably meet him soon, and i'll figure it out.

i keep debating about temporarily shutting down my acct b/c i can't handle messaging anyone lately. feels like a lot of pressure and expectation and i'm just not in the right headspace to cope with it. this shit is exhausting.

I went out with the music teacher from last week again. Super fun! Oh heck. We walked around downtown and watched trains from a parking garage, got some sushi, and played a totally ridiculous game that started out 'hey let's doodle with colored pencils' and ended up turning into a set of very complicated rules. He played Bad Romance and a bunch of traditional songs on the balalaika. Whoever on here said this guy was Michael Cera – I could not stop thinking 'Michael Cera aw shit' when he was sitting around in my barrel chair playing the Parks & Rec theme on a balalaika. Also he dresses like Michael Cera (as George Michael...oh well). Anyway I think this guy is a keeper.

yay Abbs!

people definitely put too much pressure on themselves (and others!), and it can be hard not to do

imo a good way of taking the pressure out, is to almost specifically say, you know what lets just scrap this date rubbish and just hang out

Julia, it sounds like the second person (the skype one) is good, does it necessarily matter if you are attracted to him romantically? you like talking to each other and there's no pressure, do you have to decide right now what "it" is, or could you just go hang out grab a beer?

wait, xposts but - a BETTER way of taking the pressure out is to just do the following

"walked around downtown and watched trains from a parking garage, got some sushi, and played a totally ridiculous game that started out 'hey let's doodle with colored pencils' and ended up turning into a set of very complicated rules"

that just sounds like a really fun day, honestly dont think a person could ask for more!

I mean i know i'm not the cleanest of fuels these days, and I'm not trying to lobby for any kind of deregulation here or get into anyones good books, but seriously, Julia (or anyone!), thats a good low pressure fun day where it doesnt matter what "it" is

Yay Beckotts!

Am meeting someone for dinner. After weird psycho-shit with awful neighbour, I nearly cancelled but this thread has reminded me there are good things in life.

That early 30s shit was awful, all the EXPECTATIONS and the PRESSURE and the "ARE YOU GONNA BE MY LIFE PARTNER" and the one nice thing about being in your 40s is there's a lot less of that and a lot more of "are you just someone I can chill with?"

imo a good way of taking the pressure out, is to almost specifically say, you know what lets just scrap this date rubbish and just hang out

I flat-out state this in my OKC profile. Like, let's just hang out and maybe decide at some point down the road whether legit dating is a good use of our collective time. Rather than you deciding after a date or two that we should jump straight into "Serious 'N' Steady" (as has happened to me several times via OKC, to my eternal befuddlement).

There is so much bullshit pressure that is thrown at women to Have A Boyfriend and if you don't Have A Boyfriend you might as well not exist and you must put all your effort into FINDING ONE that I completely understand why people act like that. I went through a totally manic and out of character period in my early 30s which was just traumatic and awful for everyone concerned. But it's hard to turn off the internalised pressure once it's been turned on.

(That said, men get so skittish that even questions like "Are we gonna have sex again?" just so one can figure out, say, one's birth control and toothbrush needs can led to guys going OMG YOU ARE TRYING TO GET SERIOUS AND STEADY WITH ME AFTER THE SECOND DATE!!!! Like, no, I'm just trying to figure out if I need to bring condoms and a toothbrush next time I come round.)

xp

yr right, coal, i don't have to decide. i'm overthinking.

there are enough msgs from Srs Ppl who aim Relationships that it feels overwhelming.

so this skype guy seems really weird because he's no-pressure and cool!

(and yaaay abbbottt!) :D

messiah: I'm single, let's mingle. I like balding overweight guys in bands.

That said, men get so skittish that even questions like "Are we gonna have sex again?" just so one can figure out, say, one's birth control and toothbrush needs can led to guys going OMG YOU ARE TRYING TO GET SERIOUS AND STEADY WITH ME AFTER THE SECOND DATE!!!!

By the time I was out of my 20s and no longer so spooked by the idea of Serious Business, I eventually found myself happily ensconced in a series of serious/semi-serious situations with ladies I liked a great deal and who seemed to like me a great deal and with whom I seemed to be on the same page for a while but with whom things ultimately imploded at least partly because they decided against the level of commitment we were collectively approaching. And which has resulted in my becoming more gunshy towards LTRs than at any other point in my adult life thus far, unfortunately (more to the extent that it's gonna take a herculean effort to ever trust someone with my heart to that extent again). So I've learned that people of all stripes can be and are commitmentphobes, for perhaps a variety of reasons.

The solution, WCC, is to always have a condom and toothbrush on your person at all times. Don't keep them in your breast pocket though.

Also, Trayce you need to find the profile called flowered_knife_shadows it is obv. your soulmate.

I am about to meet someone from OKC! Technically.

so against my better judgement and the advice of this thread i had been (non-exclusively) still dating that guy who dumped me last month, who begged me to take him back a week later, and he dumped me again last night. i had sort of prepared myself for this but what really blew my mind was his emotional selfishness. i was like "well, i can't say i wasn't expecting it, but it sucks and i'm sad" and he said he was sad too. and i was just like, wtf you are not allowed to be sad, this was your decision!! and then he started crying and kind of tried to sleep with me but i asked him to leave.

anywayssssssssssssss yeah.

where does one find non-selfish non-emotional vampires in this city, i would like to know. i think this dude was too self absorbed to ever realize i had feelings. and the one before too.

Ugh, that's awful. If I get the sense that someone doesn't know themself or what they're looking for in a partner or the level of seriousness they prefer, it's just about my biggest dealbreaker anymore.

And it's really just an extension of that old "if you can't love yourself you can't love someone else" saw.

yeah i mean, in his grand tradition of saying things that made me feel pretty awful, he said that last saturday when we were sleeping in his bed together (i almost never sleep over, because he lives with a family who has kids, but they were out of town, and he never sleeps at my place because he has a dog) he just felt anxious and terrible the entire night, and had wanted to talk to me about it that morning but didn't. who tells someone that? now i am mortified that i was sleeping in bed next to someone that totally didn't want me there and was having a terrible time. and to me it was just a lovely evening and i have no clue what i did to make him have these feelings.