Weddingbee Blog

Online! Yup, on the interwebs. Mr. Guinea Pig and I met on Match.com, as I mentioned in my intro post. Don’t get me wrong, I knew there were plenty of crazies ‘out there’ (as one friend put it). It’s just that I also thought there were plenty of crazies in the real world, too. So I figured, why not give it a shot? It can’t be any more awkward than meeting someone in a bar.

Overall I’d say the experience wasn’t so bad. To be honest, I’d dabbled in online dating before, but had never really thrown myself out there and been willing to actually meet someone.

It started with Homer (names have been changed to reflect the person’s most… captivating… quality). He was the kind of guy I completely expected to find on an online dating site:

(not actual picture)

Now don’t get me wrong, I love nerds – dorks, geeks, dweebs, what-have-you. I myself am a scientist who wears glasses (when I’m too lazy to put contacts in) – that pretty much puts me squarely in the nerd category. And Homer was, of course, incredibly nice! It’s just… he was the wrong kind of nerd. I’m the kind of nerd who loves learning. Any new thing really - whether it be knitting (in high school), speaking Russian (in college), or riding a motorcycle (in grad school). I enjoy playing Halo on my old-school Xbox, was late to understand ‘fashion’ (and may still be guilty of dressing awkwardly), and listen to NPR like it’s my job. Homer was just on another whole nerd playing field. The field where people quote the Simpsons constantly.

That may be awesome for some people (I have many, many friends who love the Simpsons), but I have a confession: I have never watched the Simpsons. Okay okay, I’ve seen a few random episodes. But no more than 3, I’m sure (much to Mr. Guinea Pig’s dismay). And when you’ve never watched a TV show that a person quotes to tell a story, make a joke, or to just generally carry an uncomfortable silence… it gets hard to smile and tell them for the 27^th time: No, I haven’t seen that episode. It’s really true, I’ve never watched the Simpsons. Yes it’s a tragedy, I know.

Of course, this wasn’t the only thing in the balance of my decision, but for brevity’s sake I’ll just say: it wasn’t going to work out.

Next was … Milo (that sounds like an Emo name, right?).

(again, merely a representative)

He was a jazz musician and at first it was fun: we talked about music (I play violin and piano and played in a jazz band in high school), movies, all the usual getting-to-know-you stuff. He wore his pants tighter than me, and weighed significantly less than me while managing to be the same exact height. I will admit, this made me uncomfortable. But probably not as uncomfortable as his pants made him.

Nothing really went wrong with this guy, per se – it just sort of ended. Of course I wasn’t really even concerned about it at the time, because I was talking to someone else who seemed oh-so-very interesting… I bet you can guess who!

But for that story, you’ll have to wait. This one’s To.Be.Continued. (such a tease)

Has anyone else tried online dating? Did you like the experience?