Yoshimi Battles the Online Dating E-mails

OkCupid does have a good number of decent guys my age looking for an actual girlfriend - I've seen them hook up with my friends, I've met a few in person (we just didn't click). Sadly these men are buried under piles of the following: a) guys hoping for sex, B) Technogeeks who are single for a reason, and C) guys who are under the age of 21. Seriously, kids, no thanks.

Let's explore some of my recent messages, shall we?

E-mail 1:
Subject: Caffeine!
Body: LoL nice profile, send me a message if ya like!

Okay, what are we, twelve? Who sends a message with no content asking for a message in return? It's as bad as a wink, only it contains the blasted net-jargon "LOL" along with no grammatical structure. I checked his profile where he describes his love of partying and then to supplement this fact, he has three photos of him drinking. From what I can tell they were taken at the same party, as he's wearing the same clothes and it appears to be the same location. In the main profile shot, he's hugging a girl. He indicates that she's just a friend but dude, can't you get one photo of you alone, maybe without a cocktail? Do I even have to reply to this guy to say no? Isn't it some rule that I don't have to be polite if the whole e-mail is less than 10 words?

E-mail 2 is from a guy in Germany. It's long, so I won't post it, but at least it's well thought out. If he weren't half way across the world, he might be fun to meet. His main photo is of him wearing a bunch of liquor boxes as a robot costume and holding up a sign that reads "Free Robot Sex". While this is hilarious, he doesn't have any other photos of him on the site so I can't tell what he looks like. And again, he's in Germany, looking for a "correspondence" which I assume means pen-pal. I might write him back but that's no use in the dating world.

E-mail 3 is from a guy who says he's 30, although he looks older to me, perhaps because he's bald. Also he says he's a college grad who's worked for the same company for 11 years, so you do the math. After complementing my favorite movie (The Life Aquatic), he writes:

Anyway if you'd like to meet a cool guy who'll do just about anything to see TOOL again, seem em 8 times so far... Write me back, I won't disappoint, at least I'll try not to disappoint...

Um, Tool? I listened to Tool in ninth grade when I dyed my hair purple and wore black clothes and considered myself a Wiccan who thought Anne Rice was the pinnacle of literature. Obviously I had a lot to learn. My taste in music may be questionable and I have plenty of friends who like Tool, but I wouldn't see them live unless it was free. With free beer. While I appreciate this little detail about himself, I don't know if being a 30-year-old Tool Fanatic is a great way to pitch yourself to women. I don't find him attractive and don't see many common interests anyhow. I'll have to send him a quick "no thanks".

E-mail 4 is a quick note saying this guy liked my profile and thanking me for the laugh - he called my page "word candy". I'm blushing. But he's 21 and lives over an hour away. And you know, 21. That's still too young for me. It's sweet all the same.

The rest of my e-mails are missed IMs. I usually log into sites, get distracted, and leave myself logged in while I'm off doing dishes or something, so I miss IMs, especially from websites like this. There is a "turn off" option that I always forget about. None of them are from guys I'm sad I missed though one guy is notable: his main profile photo is an illustration of a demon-like creature with red eyes, blown up so large that it's pixelated. I don't know if this is to indicate he's hardcore or an artist or a fan of some comic but it's just freaking me out. Your main photo should always be of you, even if the rest aren't.

I added a few blogs to the link list. I've been sick so I've been reading blogs for entertainment while I sit at home on my ass. (Besides which, I don't think I can do this online dating thing sober. I'm going to have to wait until this fading cold is gone for good and come back to these e-mails when I've got a few beers in me. Otherwise they just make my head hurt. That's probably negative thinking. Stop that, Lady!)