Northeastern Connecticut's Neighbors Paper

A Web-Hikers Guide to Internet Dating- Part IV
By Douglas S. Hafempty

Lesson #3: Moving Out of the Virtual Realm;
How to Get the First Meeting

You’ve done the emails through the dating site of your choice. You’ve emailed back and forth with your own personal email addresses. You’ve done the instant messaging thing and maybe you’ve even talked on the phone. But now it’s time to meet in person, The real test.

 First of all, my mindset. I have decided that I need about 1-2 weeks to get to know a woman before I decide that I'd like to invest in getting to 'really' know her. Rushing her makes you appear needy, clingy and desperate. Women are fine-tuned to these knock-out factors. She will disqualify you immediately!

I actually like women who I enjoy, and who I'd enjoy seeing for more than just one time, if you know what I mean.

So I like to meet a woman for a cup of coffee and talk for a bit, or even let that lead to a bite to eat sometimes. So my mindset is that I'm there to qualify THEM. Not the other way around. They pick this up, and respond accordingly. Women are usually the selectors. You need to turn that around quickly!

Two Ways Women Think About Men:

I believe that women see men that they get involved with as either 'long term relationship' material or 'sex' material. You have to make the choice about which category you'd like to be in. By the way, if you get involved sexually, you can usually extend that for the long term.

If, on the other hand, you don't get involved sexually, but you still buy her dinner, call her all the time, and pursue her, there's a good chance that you'll NEVER get involved with her sexually. You’re now a “gal pal” or worse, “a friend!” If she says you’re nice or a nice guy, this means she has no romantic interest in you and you can’t change that. Now, admittedly this isn't all women. but believe me when I tell you that if you get on the 'friendship' program, you're very likely to stay there. And the friendship road is paved with gifts and dinners out of your wallet. So be aware.

Don’t Be Attached to the Outcome

It’s important to not be emotionally attached to the outcome of the meeting. This means if you meet her and she’s drop dead gorgeous, and your attraction level is so high she can see you panting behind your eyes, she’ll be turned off. Everyone wants something they can’t have. It’s wise to add a scarcity factor to your personality. Make it seem you’re very busy or involoved with events outside of work. If she’s attracted to you, your scarcity will attract her more.

Clean Up your Act

Take some time to prepare for the meeting. Your appearance is important. Women notice details and although they like the “bad boys”, they like class too. All the things that you don’t care about in your appearance, they care about.

If you pick your lady up, don’t make her wait while you shovel mounds of fast food garbage into the back seat. Making her sit in your dumpster on wheels is a bad first impression.

Face to Face

The meeting should be fun. Find out her passions and do some research on them. Everyone likes to talk about themselves and their interests. Running out of things to talk about is akward. Be prepared with subjects anyone can talk about or have an opinon on. If she gives you one word answers to everything or you feel like your playing both sides of a tennis match, she has no attraction to you and there’s nothing you can do. At this point look at your watch and say you’ve got an early morning and end it. There are too many women out there that can be interested in you to waste your time with the unterested one in front of you.

If must understand one thing from these columns it should be this; if a woman isn’t attracted to you, there’s nothing you can do to change it. She usually knows in one second of meeting you whether she’s attracted or not.

Next time I will cover what to do if it goes good and the “player” dater. That’s all for now.

 

DUDES AND DUDS Pt.II
Delete the Duds

Continuing my internet dating story from the June issue, I should review the finer points of that article.  I married who I thought was the man of my dreams.  As it turned out, he was and still is the man of my nightmares.  We had two kids and got divorced (like the other 50 percent of today’s Americans).  After my recovery, about a year later, I decided to start dating again.  I turned to my only reliable source, my computer, and looked at an internet dating site and decided that it would be harmless to join Match.com.  I filled out their mile-long profile questionnaire, uploaded pictures from the most recent wedding I attended and watched the winks, flirts and emails roll in like a tsunami.

            Now up to the point where I left off in June, I will proceed with my soap opera of internet dating.  The day I signed up for Match.com was exciting with the overwhelming number of men contacting me.  I thought to myself that maybe joining for six months was a waste of my money if everyday was like this.  At this rate, I would have to have at least one datable guy be interested by the end of the week.  It was quite the revelation when the responses slowed down after a couple of weeks.  I guess a new member is like an open can of soda in August and the “regulars” are the bees swarming around.

            All of these emails had to be opened and read along with each man’s profile.  Then, I would need to decide if he was worthy of a response.  I did not like the fact that some profiles didn’t have any pictures, so if I liked the profile, I asked for a picture (and a picture of the family pet does not count!).  Otherwise, a less than desirable, pictureless profile was deleted without a response.  These people were a waste of my time and need to realize that nobody wants to buy a product without seeing it.  Some profiles were so pathetic, they were funny.  Don’t these men know how to market themselves?  You are not supposed to expose and dwell on the negatives…or do they think that these are their best qualities?  One guy bragged that he could drink a six-pack of beer in less than a minute and a half and then let out a belch that would make global warming feel like the ice age.  Another one called himself a “neatfreak” but described himself more like an obsessive compulsive cleaner with a phobia to germs.  Clean and neat is good, but this guy would drive away the Ty-D-Bowl Man.

            I opened the first of several flirts.  It read, “I would like to talk to you.”  I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t call that a flirt.  I went along with it anyway, read his profile and discovered that men do not care what you write in your profile for “my ideal match”.  I don’t remember describing my ideal match as obese or requesting men who are as old as my father.  When I wrote “social drinker”, I did not mean to have a cocktail every time you see a person walk or drive by your house.  Needless to say, the overweight old drunk was deleted.  Maybe I should have been more direct in my preferences, pointing out what men I do not want, such as a Dattco school bus driver with no ambition or the uptight, caffeine- and-nicotine addicted workaholic who lives each minute by his day planner.

            The second flirt said, “I like your photo.”  I opened up his profile and studied it carefully.  Hmm.  His picture was okay, 38 years old, “average” body type, bachelors degree, spiritual, does not smoke, drinks socially, two children.  This one seemed to have possibilities until I got to his marital status.  The word “married” struck me like lightening.  It didn’t say divorced or separated, but admittedly said married.  It might as well say he’s looking to cheat on his wife and pay for the search of his “other” woman, or should I say whore?  Who in their right mind searches to have an affair openly through a paid dating site?  Better yet, who would be so desperate or cheap to seriously consider him as an option?  Not me!  Delete!

            The next ten or so were not exactly impressive.  There were characteristics in each guy that I found undesirable or just conflicted with my personality, until I read Ted’s email and studied his profile. 

You need to wait until October to read about Ted.  Until then, let’s get acquainted with Douglas and his endeavors.