Please, before you read this, just be assured that I make absolutely no references to sex in my profile. I don’t know where this came from.

From: doc_

Date received: March 21

Subject: lets not let our different faiths get in the way of me

Hi my name is Michael and I just came across your profile and it really makes me smile and want to meet you since it said that you crave sex and I am too an over sexual man. Would you like to get to knwo me and do you ahve any questions for me? I hope that you can over look my relous believes since I really would like to meet you and to get to know everything about you including what makes you happy and sad.

Let me preface this by saying I’ve never been a fan of the “emergency phone call” exit strategy while dating. It’s been done so many times that guys recognize it instantly for what it is — an excuse, and a bad one at that. The odds are pretty nonexistent that a genuine family emergency will occur exactly 30 minutes into your date, and I’ve always thought that it was far nicer just to suffer through the awkward situation and ride it out until the check arrived. However, after my experience last night, I’ve completely changed my mind. There are some men that you should, in fact, just run away from.

I arrived at the bar a few minutes early and chatted with the bartender, picking out an IPA based on her recommendation. It was a fantastic choice — the girl knew her stuff. I was sipping and scrolling through my phone when my date arrived, pulling off his huge studio can headphones and nodding my way. Before he even said hello, he was asking the bartender for a hoppy IPA. Trying to be friendly, I said, “Oh that’s funny, I asked her for the exact same thing.” He didn’t respond, instead continuing to grill the poor girl about his options and finally settling on something after receiving assurances from her that it was an excellent brew.

He took a sip and muttered, “Well, this isn’t that hoppy. Not at all what I asked for.” He turned to me and said, “I haven’t been here since I was 21 and thought this place was cool. Back when I didn’t know any better. See that spot over there? That’s where my friend Paul threw up on his birthday.” A little offended, as this was a favorite spot of mine, I started to defend the bar… only to have him interrupt me again and complain about what an overpriced dive it was. He made another rude comment about the bartender’s lack of expertise, well within earshot of her.

I sighed. We were less than five minutes into the date and he had already ignored me, interrupted me, and insulted the staff. This was not going to be a good night.

He launched into a monologue about his job with a startup software company, apparently trying to convince me how busy and successful and important he was. I tried to interject a few questions and make some attempt at turning this into a conversation, but he was so self-absorbed and long-winded that I eventually gave up trying to pay attention. I sat there in silence. He continued talking for close to 20 minutes before he finally seemed to remember that I was there and asked me about my job.

I told him I was a TV producer. He asked what I had worked on, and when I started to mention a few programs, he said stopped me and said, “You know what? Don’t bother. I haven’t seen any of those — in fact, I hate TV. All of your shows are totally scripted and fake anyway.” Annoyed, I told him that I thought my network had a little more integrity than that, but he waved me off and changed the subject before I could even finish my sentence.

The night went on in this fashion. He would brag about himself and his achievements, ask me about mine, and then insult me immediately. College, hobbies, weekend plans… he had a snarky comment for everything. It was so bad that the other people in the bar started to notice and whisper to themselves, casting sympathetic glances my way. Help, I wanted to say to them. Please save me from this douche. My anxiety was building and I considered walking out on him, but I’ve never been so rude before and I had no idea how to do it. I felt trapped.

The bartender noticed our empty glasses and came over to offer us another. She brought over a pale ale for my date, describing how the beer makers had intended it to have a really floral, herby quality to it — something that would smell a lot like marijuana. My date took a sip and said combatively, “I don’t think you’re right. I really don’t smell the grass in this.” A man sitting next to me at the bar muttered, “Not that you would know, asshole.” I choked down a strangled noise, something between a laugh and a sob, and my date glared over at him. Taking advantage of the distraction, I stood, grabbing my phone and announcing that I was running to the bathroom. I had to get out of there. I stumbled down the hallway and locked the bathroom door behind me, trying to breathe deeply and stave off a total meltdown. It didn’t work — I was rapidly descending into a vortex of panic. I started randomly punching numbers on my phone, trying to reach someone who could stage an emergency call and get me the hell out of there. No one was answering. I texted my mother with, “Please help. I’m going to stab myself in the eye if I have to endure this any longer.” I don’t know how long I was in there, but I finally swallowed down hysteria and tentatively opened the bathroom door. I felt like a death row inmate on his way to the execution chamber as I walked down the hallway toward my date, battling a combination of dread, anger, and resignation that there was nothing I could do to save myself.

The second I reached my bar stool, the phone rang. It was my mother. She had seen my frantic text, but her call came so soon after my return from the bathroom that I couldn’t possibly use this opportunity to flee — my date would have guessed instantly that I had just called her and asked her to bail me out. In retrospect, his awful behavior was reason enough for me to leave immediately without crafting any kind of plausible excuse, but I was still clinging to the idea that I needed to be NICE.

I answered the phone and listened to my mother as she insisted that I needed to go home immediately. She even fake cried for good measure, in case he overheard the conversation. I realized at this point that things had really gone too far. Was I so afraid of confrontation that I couldn’t extricate myself from a horrible situation like this? I wasn’t. Hell, I’m from New Jersey — I’m tougher than that. I ignored the bait, assured my mom that I would call her back as soon as the date was over, and hung up.

I picked up my nearly full beer without a word and downed it while my date yammered on about something; he hadn’t stopped talking the entire time I was on the phone. The second I placed my empty beer glass on the bar, I took a deep breath, turned to him, and interrupted HIM this time, saying firmly, “I’m ready to go home now.” The bartender, bless her heart, already had the check ready and shoved it toward him as I stood and put on my jacket. I thanked him for paying for my drinks and walked out the door, not pausing to gauge his reaction. There was no way I was going to spend another moment with him, not even to say goodbye.

I felt a sense of unbridled relief as I walked down the street, putting that nightmare of a date behind me. I had escaped my death sentence. Granted, it took me a little while to finally take control of the situation, but I’ve learned my lesson and will not allow myself to make this mistake again. Next time I’m out with a guy who ends up being a douche, I’m walking out, bad karma be damned.

It wasn’t exactly an amicable breakup. They generally aren’t when they end with me saying, “You’re an asshole. I can’t believe I wasted two months with you. Have a nice life.”

I’ve dated a lot of different kinds of guys, but I have never had someone pull a 180 like this on me. Within the course of one night, he went from being completely infatuated with me to cold and detached. It made no sense. We had been blissfully happy for months — in his words, “The happiest [he’d] ever been with someone.” We couldn’t get enough of each other. We made plans for the future. And then one day, he just wasn’t the same person. He stopped complimenting me. He brooded in silence when I called to ask him about his day. He watched me crying over my grandmother’s illness and didn’t even offer me a hug. When I asked him — repeatedly, with increasing desperation — what was wrong, he shrugged and wouldn’t respond. Finally, when I was at a total loss as to how to get him to communicate, he told me that his “feelings had waned”, and that was it. No reasons. No apologies. It was just over.

And here I was thinking that it was only the online daters who had serious problems connecting to people.

I’m a person who always, without fail, tries to make the best of a breakup. I figure out what went wrong and resolve not to make the same mistake again. I learn from the experience and move on. But how can I make sense of a relationship that ended for seemingly no reason? I can’t wrap my head around this. This is probably the most selfish and callous thing you can do to someone. Even if you’re not the more emotive of people, you still suck it up during a breakup to explain what went wrong. It is the least — the very least — you can do for someone you once claimed to love.

So without that closure, I made do with a angry parting line and hung up on him. I’m currently dusting off my OKCupid profile, and wouldn’t you know, I already have a date tonight with a 6’ tall doctor. He drives a motorcycle. I think we’ll get along just fine.

As a wise friend once told me, the easiest way to remove a nail is to drive in another one (it sounds much more eloquent and beautiful in Spanish). So that’s exactly what I intend to do.

Here’s to getting nailed.

I learned this week that I cannot fix what is broken. That applies to conference room projectors, check engine lights, and emotionally retarded men.

Up until recently, I didn’t feel that there was any sort of disadvantage to meeting guys online. I would encourage my friends to try out Match or OKcupid, telling them it was a great way to cast a wider net and meet different types of people that they might never run into otherwise. I never really stopped to consider the massive contrast between online dating and dating in “real life”, and how differently each relationship proceeds based on how you initially meet.

Take online dating. You start out telling yourself that you’ll give everyone a chance and not make any snap judgments… but that ends fairly quickly. Maybe you realize that you just don’t have enough time to respond to every email you receive, or maybe you read a particularly disturbing profile that makes you think you need to be a little more careful. So you start narrowing down your searches. You start out with a few standard qualities. Democrats. Non-religious. College education mandatory. No kids. But you keep adding more and more until you have your search whittled down to an impossibly specific type of man, and finally you’re only responding to ENFP’s who listen to progressive indie rock and live within 5 blocks of you. So much for being open-minded.

You read their profile; practically memorize it. You learn where they grew up, how many siblings they have, what sports they played in high school. You read about their job and what their hopes are for the future. You find out about what instruments they play, what kind of sports they watch, their favorite authors, the bands they listen to the most. You read their thoughts on relationships and family and become so familiar with them that when you finally meet in person, all of the big questions have been resolved. All that’s left to do is determine if there’s any chemistry and start the relationship already.

This is why so many of my previous relationships have been rushed. My friends thought I was insane when I would meet my exes’ parents after two weeks of dating, or when we would talk about moving in together after only a month or two. They didn’t understand why we didn’t take things more slowly, but I tried to explain to them that it just wasn’t necessary. By sharing our online profiles and pouring all of our history and preferences and deepest secrets into them, we effectively skipped past six months of dating. We could throw around words like love right away because we already knew each other so well that it had to be true.

Except, of course, it wasn’t. No one describes their biggest flaws or hangups or baggage in their profiles. They create a completely idealized version of themselves and you fall for it without a second thought. You never see it coming when they finally reveal themselves. Anger issues. Manic depression. Misogynistic tendencies. The person you thought you knew so well turns into an utter monster, and you’re left reeling and wondering how you could have been so stupid.

And yet this is what I’ve gotten used to. Since graduating from college, almost all of my relationships (with the exception of maybe two) have been with guys that I met online. This bizarre cycle has become normal to me and something that I just accept and expect. So imagine my surprise when I meet someone in real life and things turn out to be entirely different.

Normal relationships. Instead of starting out with all of this intimate knowledge of them and just meeting to determine if there’s chemistry, you do the opposite. You meet, you have some kind of initial chemistry, and then you get to know them as you date. I had forgotten about this. I didn’t remember the anticipation and the surprise when you learn something new. I didn’t remember how long it actually takes to get to know someone when it’s not under completely contrived circumstances. As a result, I feel like I have no idea what I’m doing. I don’t know when to introduce him to my friends, or when to tell him I’m not seeing anyone else, or when to call it a relationship. I’m afraid that I’m going to do something wrong. I’m usually not this insecure when it comes to guys, but this is new territory for me, and I’m not exactly sure about how I’m supposed to proceed.

It’s also kind of exciting. Instead of just waiting for the other shoe to drop, I’m actually considering the possibility that he might NOT have some glaring social flaw that sends me running. Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve felt that way? Fellow online daters, I’m sure you understand.

For those of you who have tried both types of dating, what are your thoughts? Am I completely off-base here, or have your experiences been similar?

blogtitlehere-deactivated201101 asked: I throughly enjoy reading your blog. The stories are too good to be true. I, unlike yourself, got rid of my (as my friends and I like to call them) "no friend shirts" once I graduated college. Those with the "witty" comments that show how dorky we really are, I can't tell if it was a good or bad idea. Now only those who are truly aware of my nerdyness have seen my DVD collection, Yu-Gi-Oh and marvel cards as well as the huge Marvel posters in my room at home. oops.

Thanks for the comment, and good point — I need to be a little more discriminating about who I reveal my true nerdy nature to. I made the mistake of showing my latest date a shelf in my apartment that is completely filled with comic books and graphic novels. Before he pretended to act enthused, I saw a look of unadulterated horror cross his face. I think maybe I should have warned him first.

I think I did something to piss off God, because last week, He smote me with the cold to end all colds. Plagues have been milder than this. I spent the past several days furrowing a Kristin-shaped indent into my couch as I emptied box after box of tissues and cursed my mother for bestowing me with such a terrible immune system. (No seriously, it’s totally her fault. A week after I was born, she developed appendicitis and CONTINUED TO BREASTFEED ME even after her appendix burst. I’m convinced that her septic breast milk is what make me the illness prone, allergy ridden adult that I am today.)

But I digress. After spending the weekend burrowed under blankets and crying my way through my collection of Disney movies, I finally woke up this morning feeling slightly less like a zombie, although a quick glance in the mirror confirmed that I still looked like one. I decided to reward my unlikely survival of the epic EbolaPlagueCold with a trip to Sephora to see if the miracle workers there could make me look a little more human. Normal clothing was entirely too optimistic a goal for someone who had worn pajamas for four days in a row, so I slipped on some yoga pants and my worn Battlestar Galactica t-shirt and headed out the door. I was slightly unsteady on my feet due to days of disuse, but managed to make my way down the hallway and out to my car without doing the Doc Holliday impression I had been perfecting as of late.

The girl at Sephora may have winced at my puffy eyes and dry skin when I approached her, but she gamely picked up her makeup brushes and and set to work with the concentration and gravity of a brain surgeon. After about 20 minutes, she decided I was finally presentable again and released me from the chair. I grabbed a basket and started making my way through the aisles to gather up the various concealers and moisturizers that my poor reddened nose had apparently so desperately needed.

I was crouched down in front of a low shelf when a shadow fell over me, blocking all light. I looked up to see the dark outline of a huge hulking man. He was holding two tiny scraps of paper between his banana hands and was shifting nervously from one foot to the other. “Um,” he rumbled, by way of an opening line. And then he seemed to forget what he was saying because he fell silent.

“Yes?” I asked, not unkindly. The poor man looked completely out of his element and I immediately felt a twinge of pity. I stood and noticed that I only came up to about his chest. The man was a ringer for Andre the Giant.

“Um. Can you, uh, help me with this? I’m trying to decide between the two of these and I don’t know what I’m doing…”

I suppressed a smile and took the fragrance samples from his hand, carefully considering each one. “This one,” I said, waving the paper in my left hand.

“Um, really?” the man asked. “Uh, you like that one better? Why?” He seemed like he was trying to draw out the conversation, and after a quick reassessment of his body language, realized that this was about to turn into a pickup attempt.

The behemoth continued. “So you like the Chanel better than Eternity? I wouldn’t have thought you were THAT kind of girl! Ha ha ha.”

I forced a polite (yet extremely awkward) obligatory chuckle. “Um, ha. Ha ha.” I frowned, looking around me for an escape. I understand how hard it is for men to approach women and I didn’t want to be rude, but truthfully, I have something else in the works and just wasn’t interested. I glanced down the aisle and spotted a cute redhead by the nail polish display.

“You know, I have a cold [I coughed here for effect. Let it never be said that I’m a bad actress.] and I can’t smell these too well, but try asking that girl — she might be more of a help.”

The poor giant turned toward her, eyebrows raised hopefully. I waved him toward her encouragingly, and as he took a few shuffling steps her way, I called out, “Good luck! I mean, have a nice day!” I took advantage of his shifted attention to slip behind the next aisle. I intentionally looked away from what happened next, determined not to spoil my fantasy where Andre and cute redhead totally hit it off due to my awesome powers of deflection. I have no idea if that actually happened but the thought made me feel a lot less guilty, especially considering I was dressed like nerdbait and just asking for it. I may have even had a graphic novel peeking out of my purse. Terrible.

I was leaving Sephora when I passed Brookstone and stopped to join a crowd that had gathered around a remote-controlled hovercraft. I was pulling out my iPhone to take a picture when I glanced up and realized that I was the only girl standing in the group, and that the other guys around me were wearing shirts that said things like “Boldly going never looked this good” and “There’s no place like 127.0.0.1.” Shit. I zipped up my jacket over the BSG emblem and bolted to the parking lot before I could cause more trouble.

Note to self: I either need to reign in my geekiness (easier said than done) or stay away from the mall from now on.

A few days ago, I was contacted on OK Cupid by a man I’ll refer to as Dr. Dick. He was a successful surgeon, performing mostly elective laproscopic procedures like vasectomies (hence my nickname for him). His photo showed a gorgeous man with blonde hair, blue eyes, and a chiseled jaw — over 6 feet of general hunkiness. He didn’t have much information listed in his profile, claiming he had been stalked a few years ago and was still wary of putting himself out there, but we shared a few fun conversations via chat and he seemed to be open and honest in answering my questions. He was extremely complimentary, flirty, and a little bit aggressive about trying to schedule an immediate date. I told him that I’d like to have a little more time to get to know him, and as a compromise, gave him my phone number instead.

That’s when things started to get strange.

As soon as I gave him that information, his photo disappeared from the website. When he called me later that night I asked him why he had removed it, and he told me he had talked about me at work and was asked to remove his profile because of his security clearance. “Clearance?” I asked. “But you said you were a surgeon.” Dr. Dick informed me that he was both a surgeon AND a military lawyer with a top secret security clearance. He rattled off a few names of high profile war criminals that he had represented in court. Trying not to get off topic, I told him that his profile hadn’t actually been removed — only his picture was missing. He told me vaguely that it must be a mistake and changed the topic.

Then he started telling me about how much money he makes. Between $500K and one million each year, he said, depending on how active he was in his surgery. And did he mention that he’s a colonel as well? I was a little confused and asked him how he had time for both professions, and he gave me some non-committal answer about being ambitious. He then started telling me about the cars he owned — a “small-dick” Mercedes coupe (his words, not mine), and an Acura SUV, and a mini cooper that he had bought off a neighbor “just for the fun of it.” He described his 4-level townhouse, and the types of lavish vacations he liked to take, and how one girl that he met online had become so enamored with him that she stalked him for years until he eventually got a restraining order against her. I didn’t say much. The entire story sounded just a little too fantastic and I was beginning to get seriously creepy vibes from him, especially when he started calling me “my girl” and making plans to take me on trips with him. I ended the conversation by asking his last name, openly admitting that I wanted to google him. He gave it to me, and told me to try to ignore his bad military haircut if I came across any photos of him.

I was confused. His profile picture (which I managed to retrieve from a cached page, even though he deleted it) hadn’t shown the requisite military buzz cut, and if he had been active in the military for over a decade, shouldn’t he have had that same terrible style for that entire time? How old was the picture he had posted? I hung up and raced to my computer to type his name into google. The first images that popped up showed a much older, overweight man in military fatigues. I figured I must have typed his name incorrectly and entered it again, refreshing the search. The same photos appeared. I clicked on one, reading the linked headline from the Associated Press: COL. JON ____ DEFENDS WAR CRIMINAL _____ IN COURT. It was the same client he had mentioned to me on the phone, but the man in the photo was NOT the one I had seen on OK Cupid.

I pulled up both images on my desktop. They were from the exact same angle, and showed a drastically different man in each. One was a handsome man in his early 30s with movie star good looks. The other was a man… but that’s where the similarities ended. To be honest, he looked a little bit like Shrek, and he was at least 45 years old. There wasn’t the slightest bit of resemblance between the two images.

I did some further searching. I loaded a medical website that I frequently use at work when fact-checking doctors that we feature in some of our programs — it’s a way to make sure that no one has been sued for malpractice before. Dr. Dick’s name was nowhere to be found. I tried searching for the name of the medical group he had mentioned being a member of. It didn’t exist.

I’ve caught people in lies before. People exaggerate about their height, or their body type, or the level of education they’ve completed. But this is the first time someone has so grossly misrepresented himself. Dr. Dick lied about everything. It’s possible that he isn’t even the ogre that I found in my google search — he may very well be someone else entirely. The possibilities terrify me. Who on earth was I speaking to on the phone last night?

Dr. Dick called today and left a lengthy voicemail about how excited he was to meet me. I didn’t answer. I’m going to ignore his calls for the next few days, and if he continues to pursue me, I might eventually just tell him that I met someone else and hope he backs off. I am not the kind of person who’s afraid of confrontation, but I have no idea who this person is and how he might react. I feel like it’s safer to take the most passive approach possible and just avoid him until he goes away. The last thing I want to do is antagonize a crazy person.

I’m just so relieved that I didn’t take the bait and meet up with him. I can’t imagine how that date would have played out.

So I’m five minutes into my date with Mr. OMGWTF (the 27-year-old man with the texting tendencies of a tween) when he starts telling me about the book he’s writing. A book that he has plans to turn into a movie, or at least a TV series. And he’s looking for a producer who can introduce him to network execs and get him a contract.

It wasn’t a date. It was a pitch.

I think I better change my profile around a little bit and take out the part about being a producer.

Date: July 11th, 2007

Stats: 25 years old, 5’11”, brown hair, brown eyes, real estate agent

I met The Skin Flautist (we’ll call him SF for short) on Match a few summers ago. He was my very first online date, and after the way this one ended up, it’s a miracle I was willing to date again at all. He was ten shades of suck. As with the last bad date, I’ll make this an easier read by highlighting all of the red flags in bold.

SF seemed cute at first. He had a crooked smile and played the ukulele, and I enjoyed the banter in our initial emails. He was quirky and funny, and after about a week of emailing, he suggested that we meet in person.

SF and I planned on meeting at a Starbucks near his condo in Ballston. He called me while I was on my way over and said it would be easier if I just drove straight to his building instead. He explained that there would be more street parking and that we could walk the short distance to the coffee shop together, which all seemed very reasonable. When I called to tell him I had arrived, he said, “Oh cool, I just got home and I’m still getting ready… why don’t you come on up?” Um, no thank you. This may have been my first blind date, but I’d seen way too many Lifetime movies that started this way. I told him that I would meet him outside, and ignored his grumbling.

SF met me downstairs and gave me a lingering hug that was just a tad shy of creepy. I backed out of the embrace awkwardly and we had started walking toward Starbucks when he suddenly stopped and said, “Wait, have you eaten dinner yet?” No, I said patiently, as if speaking to a child. We had agreed to meet for coffee, so I ate before I arrived. “Well,” he said, “I didn’t eat so we’re going to go to El Ranchero instead.” In the spirit of trying to be a nice first date, I good naturedly agreed and we walked to the restaurant instead. Where I sat and watched him eat.

SF ordered a pitcher of beer and drank the entire thing in between shoving fistfuls of nachos in his mouth. I had a soda, which I sipped at daintily while trying not to stare in horror at the way SF was crouched over his food. It reminded me of those prison movies where the inmates hover over their trays, glaring distrustfully at the people around them as they guarded their slop. I was imagining him in an orange jumpsuit when I realized he was trying to ask me a question through a mouthful of food. I shook myself out of my reverie and asked him to repeat himself, and he swallowed and said, “I was asking, do you play any instruments?”

I smiled, grateful that he was finally trying to have a conversation with me. “Oh, well I played the piano for years, although I really haven’t practiced much recently…”

“What about the skin flute?”

“…I’m sorry, what did you say?”

“What about the skin flute? Do you play that?”

He snickered evilly to himself as I sat dumbfounded, no clue as to how I should respond. I considered the options and was still trying to choose between laughing uncomfortably and throwing my soda in his face when he solved the dilemna by asking another question.

“So you work in TV production? Have you ever considered producing adult films?”

The snickering escalated into a kind of high-pitched man giggling, the likes of which I had never heard before. It was deranged. I gritted my teeth and resigned myself to just finishing out the date, at which point I would never have to speak to him again. The thought comforted me. I changed the subject and he rolled his eyes, disappointed that I hadn’t taken the bait. We continued to chat and he mostly behaved himself until the check arrived. He picked it up, frowning.

“I only have a few dollars cash on me and it’ll take too long to run my card. Can you cover this?”

Classy. Clearly this is the point at which I should have walked out, but I figured the cost of SF’s meal was a small price to pay to end the date a few seconds earlier. I laid the cash on the table and stood, ready to leave. The Skin Flautist followed me out the door, pausing for a second to shake the last drops of the pitcher into his mouth. He managed to drink the entire thing in a span of 30 minutes. If I had been five years younger and still in my frat boy stage, I might have been impressed.

I started heading back toward my parked car when he stopped me and asked if he could buy me dessert. I told him I was tired and just wanted to go home, but he was insistent, and silly me, I thought maybe he was trying to make some kind of peace offering after his disgusting behavior at dinner. I reluctantly agreed and we walked next door to a small Italian cafe.

He ordered two glasses of wine and tiramisu without consulting me. I ignored the wine and was reaching to pick up a spoon when something caught my eye — he was holding his spoon up to my face, offering me a bite of the dessert.

“No thanks,” I said. “I have my own spoon.” He grimaced and shoved the spoon at me, trying to force me to eat it. I stood quickly and stammered an excuse as I bolted for the bathroom. I told myself to calm down, that it was almost over. When I finally returned to the table, the dessert was finished… as were both glasses of wine. 

“You said you didn’t want the wine, right?” I ignored the question. At least he had paid this time.

We left and I led the way back to my car, practically running. He complained that I was walking too quickly and asked me to slow down, and I told him over my shoulder that I was really tired and needed to get home right away. I was almost at my door when he called out to me, “Don’t you want to come up for a drink?”

“No,” I said decisively. “I do not.”

He glared, regarding me maliciously. “Oh no? You sure about that?” He turned a few degrees past me toward the street, where a group of youngish guys stood about 10 feet behind me. And then he opened his mouth and called out a racial slur to them.

I froze, shocked.

The group of men started to mutter angrily. I glanced hesitantly, terrified to see their reaction. They looked wounded, and with good reason. SF turned to me with a satisfied look on his face and said, “Well, it looks like it’s pretty dangerous out here now. You better come inside with me.”

I didn’t even need to consider my options — clearly the Skin Flautist was the scariest thing out there at that moment. I walked past him to my car and slammed the door shut. He called out to me plaintively, the sound muffled through the car windows, “Don’t you want to see my ukulele?”

I drove off without a backward glance.

… until I received the following text from him.

Ok, u got a hot date 4 2moro then, lol. Ttyl.

I’m sorry, did I accidentally set up a date with a 12-year-old girl? In the age of T9 text input, there is no excuse for this. It takes more effort to write this garbage than it does to text in complete words. This is not cute. This is a turnoff.

At least he didn’t include any emoticons. Oh, wait. Receiving a second text:

C u soon, QT ;)

I’m going to need a lot of beer to get through this one.

From: LuvMind69

Date received: Sept 25th

hello my lovely one. i am so happy that you honor me by reading my e-mail. i will say my interest is genuine. you make me feel like a little fat boy in a candy shop on christmas eve. lol… i have not been in a relationship or had sexual relations, by choice since 2001. i await my true love. you seem love lovely on the inside reading your profile. as i read, you’re like the morning sun to a delicate flower. i desire more. i enjoy all music. i was a former musician. movies, arts and crafts„ cooking, but all that takes a back seat to pampering my love when i have one. i love making her laugh an blush. i love her being with me„ the little things we do for each other and needing to talk to each other as well as the touch, the smile, thought sharing and the ache of her body… i work as a computer engineer. and i want you to know„ i think you’re breath taking.. a woman like you makes me nervous cause i know you would have my heart.. the good thing is if you were my lady, i would give it and my mind willingly. i desire more pictures of your succulent self…….. kisses to you… france

Please, check out his screenname. I couldn’t make this up if I tried.

From: EatNUgood

Date received: Sept 21

Subject: **HELLO BEAUTIFUL**

Hello, how are you doing today? I’m looking for a FRIENDSHIP WITH BENEFITS with a lovely lady. I’m separated, 41, attractive male in Owings Mills - Maryland, 6’1”, tall, 230lbs, average build, neat appearance and I live life to the fullest. Are you interested in us getting to know each other better?.

You have a wonderful day,

C.

ACT 2, SCENE 1

(A bar. Kristin is drinking with some old college friends, trying her best to ignore the pervasive fratmosphere around her. No such luck. She is approached.)

FRAT GUY: Hey there.

KRISTIN: Hi.

FG: So, you’re kind of pretty.

K: Um, thanks!

FG: Yeah, you’re really beautiful, actually. Except for the big head thing.

K: Excuse me?

FG: You know, your head’s a little big.

K: …

FG: You’re still gorgeous and all, it’s just one little flaw.

K: … Dude, I read that book.

FG: What book?

K: The Game. I read it. Don’t try those lines on me.

FG: What are you talking about? I’ve never read that book.

K: That’s one of the lines in it. The technique is called “using a neg.” You approach a girl, tell her she’s beautiful, and then slip in something negative to make her feel insecure so she’ll keep talking to you. One of the examples was to tell a girl she has a big head.

FG: …

K: Go away.

END SCENE.