Online Dating: A Story of Intrigue and Failure

I have been gone for awhile. I have no excuse good enough to justify how long it has been since I have contributed. Here's to new beginnings.

So awhile back, I posted about how I had signed up for online dating on OK CUPID. In the coming months, the dates I went on and the people I met were, well, interesting to say the least. But that is not the point of this post. This particular story of online dating is about the failure, maybe it's my failure to build a meaningful relationship sparked by the internet.

Now before you go "Dammit Nonberg, you are getting emotional and love is possible over the world wide web.". I get it. I understand that people can meet, but hear me out.

1. Meeting Someone you started chatting with based off a picture and some paragraphs about themselves is one of the more unnerving experiences I have ever had. Moreover, it never helps that the picture posted bears no resemblance to the person you saw on the internet. I don't know if people who online date are masters in Photoshop, or their pictures just don't accurately depict what they look life in real life. I have been met by disappointment in this facet of online dating many a time.

2. OK CUPID tends to be the luggage compartment beneath an airplane. I mean everyone has some sort of baggage, or so it seemed. It could range from religious, personal, or other unexplainable baggage, but the bottom line is that every date was a lesson in psychology. I'm not saying I'm not without my flaws, but as my roommate put it. "There is a reason some of these people are into online dating"

3. Ultimately and maybe obvious to someone like me, online dating will never work. I am not saying one can not be successful with online dating. Heck I know a couple of guys and girls who have had wonderful experiences, but at the end of the day, there is just an inorganic nature to interweb socializing.

I have stopped online dating and I don't have any real plans to go back. I just think there are too many people to meet outside the walls of my apartment and not on the screen of my MacBook.

Sober blogging

Hey guys. I think it's my turn to do one of those "It's been too long posts."

I got a chance to catch up with some of you, but there are still lots of things for me to blog about, so I'm just going to go James Joyce stream-of-consciousness on this bitch.

Like Mark, I've been thinking about the decade we just left behind. I actually thought about doing a post a month and a half ago but decided it was too soon. Now it's too late. Oh well.

Anyway. I think we'll all remember the Aughties better, or differently at least, than any other decade in our lives. After all it was the decade in which we lived the most formative part of our lives. I know it shaped my worldview quite a bit.

To me the 90's feel like a decade of comfort. And when you look back on them they certainly were pretty simple and comfortable. The 00's on the other hand were clearly pretty turbulent and, I want to say, complex. 9/11, two wars, two recessions, global warming, Katrina, we all know the stories. In many ways, things really went south in the Noughts. But I certainly had many good times in the past decade as well, so I have a lot of mixed feelings about the decade. Also, the 2000's saw the rise of the internet, which, while it was certainly around in the 90's, but not like it is today, not as ubiquitous. In general this has been a good thing, though sometimes more ambivalent. (Sidenote: those Evony ads have gotten pretty ridiculous haven't they?)

I was thinking about signs of the decade to come. I thought it would be interesting in the theme of the whole Father-Time/Baby-New-Year thing to look at the notable deaths at the end of each decade (babies generally don't do anything notable, so births probably wouldn't give any insight).

In December 1999, there was Scatman John and just 33 hours before the year 2000 oldest living person Sarah Knauss. The death of Scatman John was truly saddening and probably marked the end of nineties music, oh how I loved thee. And could it have been an omen of things things to come that the oldest living person didn't hang around to see the new millennium? Maybe, but probably not, 119 is really fucking old.

In December 2009 there was evangelist Oral Roberts, wide-receiver Chris Henry, and actress Brittany Murphy. I have no idea what these mean.

I've sort of lost my train of thought. This is what comes out when I try to do stream of consciousness. I don't think I'm doing it right. I was going to also include some life updates, but I've been writing long enough.. I'll have to post again soon.