Nehor Rants About Online Dating

[Stargazer]

19 hours ago, The Nehor said:

It is more an "if" then a when.

I am still in my mid-thirties (39). Yes, I know that does not make sense and that it proves I am delusional. I am down in Texas. Mostly looking for local or next city over.

Localish?  So, British Isles might be a bit too far?  Too bad, I have a couple of very nice nieces who are not too far off from you in age, over here in the UK.  

[Stargazer]

20 minutes ago, The Nehor said:

And then some make you keep your profile way too short. It is hard to adequately express your supervillain ambitions without room to talk about your planned volcano lair with laser sharks and your latest death ray plans.

ldssingles.com lets you carry on at some length.

35 minutes ago, MorningStar said:

One of my favorite memories - meeting you two just moments after getting engaged!

Oddly enough, it's one of my favorite memories, too!

35 minutes ago, MorningStar said:

I bet Nehor's profile is already funny. Online dating sounds like a nightmare. How do you write something that doesn't sound cliché? My husband and I never would have found each other because his profile would say something like, "Introvert who loves hiking" and mine would say, "I love talking for hours!" I have a friend who is using multiple dating apps that come up with matches for him, but a profile just doesn't tell you enough. Unless you're Stargazer!  

Yeah, well, you've seen my writing here.  I can carry on.  And on.  

[The Nehor]

Welp, no major breakthroughs. I started talking to one girl but she lives four hours away. Will have to see if there is enough of a spark there to meet up. Continue to message and try to match with people.

I would like to thank all the women who mention they have no children or family living with them other then their "furbabies". It is nice of them to so strongly signal that I should stay away.

Who knew about 50% of LDS women are world travelers? It is almost as if they are portraying what they want to be rather then what they are? The old unfair adage about picking a spouse of either gender keeps popping up.

Mood: Convivially Confused, state perhaps summed up by this video:

 

[poptart]

11 hours ago, The Nehor said:

Welp, no major breakthroughs. I started talking to one girl but she lives four hours away. Will have to see if there is enough of a spark there to meet up. Continue to message and try to match with people.

I would like to thank all the women who mention they have no children or family living with them other then their "furbabies". It is nice of them to so strongly signal that I should stay away.

Who knew about 50% of LDS women are world travelers? It is almost as if they are portraying what they want to be rather then what they are? The old unfair adage about picking a spouse of either gender keeps popping up.

Mood: Convivially Confused, state perhaps summed up by this video:

 

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/greg-hodge/online-dating-lies_b_1930053.html

Was thinking of you.  Also,

>He-man

Faaabulous!

 

 

[BlueDreams]

On 9/6/2018 at 8:28 AM, The Nehor said:

Welp, it is that time again. Every five years or so I try to find true wuv online. It usually takes about a month before I realize the entire process is awful and horrible and give it up as a bad idea and remember why I stopped last time. Here I hope to share amusing anecdotes from the journey.

Okay, put up a profile. Focused on positive, put in a few bits of sardonic wit, threw in some fun photos of me doing fun things and an adorable one of me with my infant nephew for the “Awwwwwwwws”

Okay, time to search the meat market:

Okay, what is it with the “I love to laugh” cliche? It seems to be in every other profile. What does it mean? Are they trying to distinguish themselves from  all those people who hate laughing. Can you not even share what you like to laugh at? This phrase communicates absolutely nothing.

And then you have the people who did not write anything. Okay, so all I got is your age, a few likes, and some pics. What do you want to bet these are the same people who complain the dating scene is a meat market while they ensure that it is as much a meat market as possible.

Oh, first communication from someone......who is two years younger then my mother. Yeah, no. Not unless I decide to go with whatever the male equivalent of the sugar baby route is and you have a ton of money and one foot in the grave.

Stay tuned for more updates as I run this thing into the ground.

Current Mood: Cynically Optimistic

Lol! If it's any form of encouragement, I met my husband through Mutual. Of course it took 9 months and 30+ matches and hundreds of swipes before I found the one and I was sorely wanting to take a break from the thing by the end and didn't even feel a remote sense of sadness when I could officially delete the thing. Oh, and my age range was 38-26 ish...I think for 2 minutes I did 25, but I couldn't really picture dating younger than me period, so the 2-3 years younger range I already had was pushing it.

 

During the time, I learned some insightful and deep facts about myself and online dating . 

a) I had a definite type. I always somewhat knew that I did, deep down inside. But to see it repeated again and again in all the faces I swiped up on was a little embarrassing. Every once and a while I'd swipe on someone attractive that wasn't really my first choice cuz I wanted to be more open in the looks department. Or feel like I was. I wasn't. Turns out I'm fairly shallow. (fun fact, least attracted to blonds, really pale men, really dark men, super buff guys, and people noticeably out of shape. Oh and people with guns, fancy cars, or american flags shown in their photo....that part probably wasn't shallow.)

b) People in their 30's can get weird. As I mentioned I always dated older than me (almost always have)....which at 29, naturally meant the 30's range. There were some great guys, but some of them started to just have some cooky ideas. If anything, it made me more antsy to get out of the dating pool. Few peoples seemed to have positive words to say about dating in their 30's. 

c) That race stuff about online dating was true (see here and here). I was in UT with it's racially diverse population.  If I swiped up on any minority male (it didn't matter what type of minority male), I was very likely to match....probably 80-90% of the time. If he was white, it was more of a crapshoot. Which meant that about half (if not more) of my matches were brown guys in all their flavors. Which was fine with me, except that to find half of all those brown men, I had to scroll through 70-80% of all of single UT to get them. Yea me. 

d) Oh man the odds game. I kept making parallels in my head to the success rates on missions. Except these entailed lower odds. Still I kept picturing it as a funneling system between matches, then texting contacts, then actual dates, then regular dating, them maybe hopefully something else.   

e) a couple of times I had my friend swipe for me. I was tired of choosing. She was so much better at being cut throat about it.

f) after a while, there almost seemed to be a pattern in men's profiles. Over and over and over again. Was the algorithms filing them base one who I would likely swipe up on? Was everybody just this outdoorsy? Were there stock backgrounds that people used to take their photos in some distant and exotic location? I will never know....

.....But I did find him. So there is hope.

 

With luv,

BD

Edited September 10, 2018 by BlueDreams

[strappinglad]

I watched this a couple of days ago. Discusses dating algorithms and political preferences.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ePqGBKOJEGY

youtube disclaimer!

[BlueDreams]

15 minutes ago, strappinglad said:

I watched this a couple of days ago. Discusses dating algorithms and political preferences.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ePqGBKOJEGY

youtube disclaimer!

For what it's worth, Mutual didn't have any specific questions about politics....or really specific algorithms that you could see right away. You would have to actively label yourself as something to get it down. To be fair, I wouldn't have dated that guy and the algorithm would have been great from wasting our time dating. I dated for a couple months someone who was more conservative and another that was more liberal than me. They both had perks and problems for me. The conservative wasn't good with conflicting opinions and would get a little nervous with any form of debate. I enjoy debating. The other guy could get stuck in super amorphous principles and philosophical debate. I was more pragmatic than that. With both, the biggest problem was that they wouldn't be in the area long enough to really figure things out. They had heavy traveling feet and likely were still figuring out things from pretty painful divorces. And that was problem #1. Don't know where that fits in this video, but yeah. 

 

With luv,

BD 

[Stargazer]

55 minutes ago, BlueDreams said:

Oh and people with guns, fancy cars, or american flags shown in their photo....that part probably wasn't shallow.

I didn't mention anywhere in my profile (not on Mutual, btw) that I was a gun owner with several weapons. It didn't even occur to me to put anything on there or show a pic.  But when it came to finding the one whom I ended up marrying, I was a bit nervous about telling her about the firearms --- especially since she was from the UK where there are virtually no guns in private hands (gun ownership is very restricted here).  Turned out she was OK with it, and I got the pleasure of taking her out to shoot a gun for the first time!  She's a good shot, as it turns out.

If one has reservations about gun ownership, one is to be advised to avoid people who provide profile pics with guns!  But that might actually be the point of such a pic!  To pre-filter those who have problems with guns, as it can be a big issue in a marriage where one person loves guns and the other hates them!

 

[Stargazer]

9 minutes ago, BlueDreams said:

For what it's worth, Mutual didn't have any specific questions about politics....or really specific algorithms that you could see right away. You would have to actively label yourself as something to get it down. To be fair, I wouldn't have dated that guy and the algorithm would have been great from wasting our time dating. I dated for a couple months someone who was more conservative and another that was more liberal than me. They both had perks and problems for me. The conservative wasn't good with conflicting opinions and would get a little nervous with any form of debate. I enjoy debating. The other guy could get stuck in super amorphous principles and philosophical debate. I was more pragmatic than that. With both, the biggest problem was that they wouldn't be in the area long enough to really figure things out. They had heavy traveling feet and likely were still figuring out things from pretty painful divorces. And that was problem #1. Don't know where that fits in this video, but yeah. 

 

With luv,

BD 

I like debating and am not threatened by opposing opinions, as long as the other person can be flexible enough to at least consider opposing views.  My late wife was if anything, more conservative than I (who am actually libertarian).  My new wife doesn't particularly care about politics and it can frustrating sometimes to get her to talk about the subject!  I have to call my new sister-in-law to get a good debate going.  And my new son-in-law is, for a Brit, extremely conservative and he's no fun because he agrees with me too much about everything!

[Rain]

2 hours ago, BlueDreams said:

Lol! If it's any form of encouragement, I met my husband through Mutual. Of course it took 9 months and 30+ matches and hundreds of swipes before I found the one and I was sorely wanting to take a break from the thing by the end and didn't even feel a remote sense of sadness when I could officially delete the thing. Oh, and my age range was 38-26 ish...I think for 2 minutes I did 25, but I couldn't really picture dating younger than me period, so the 2-3 years younger range I already had was pushing it.

 

During the time, I learned some insightful and deep facts about myself and online dating . 

a) I had a definite type. I always somewhat knew that I did, deep down inside. But to see it repeated again and again in all the faces I swiped up on was a little embarrassing. Every once and a while I'd swipe on someone attractive that wasn't really my first choice cuz I wanted to be more open in the looks department. Or feel like I was. I wasn't. Turns out I'm fairly shallow. (fun fact, least attracted to blonds, really pale men, really dark men, super buff guys, and people noticeably out of shape. Oh and people with guns, fancy cars, or american flags shown in their photo....that part probably wasn't shallow.)

b) People in their 30's can get weird. As I mentioned I always dated older than me (almost always have)....which at 29, naturally meant the 30's range. There were some great guys, but some of them started to just have some cooky ideas. If anything, it made me more antsy to get out of the dating pool. Few peoples seemed to have positive words to say about dating in their 30's. 

c) That race stuff about online dating was true (see here and here). I was in UT with it's racially diverse population.  If I swiped up on any minority male (it didn't matter what type of minority male), I was very likely to match....probably 80-90% of the time. If he was white, it was more of a crapshoot. Which meant that about half (if not more) of my matches were brown guys in all their flavors. Which was fine with me, except that to find half of all those brown men, I had to scroll through 70-80% of all of single UT to get them. Yea me. 

d) Oh man the odds game. I kept making parallels in my head to the success rates on missions. Except these entailed lower odds. Still I kept picturing it as a funneling system between matches, then texting contacts, then actual dates, then regular dating, them maybe hopefully something else.   

e) a couple of times I had my friend swipe for me. I was tired of choosing. She was so much better at being cut throat about it.

f) after a while, there almost seemed to be a pattern in men's profiles. Over and over and over again. Was the algorithms filing them base one who I would likely swipe up on? Was everybody just this outdoorsy? Were there stock backgrounds that people used to take their photos in some distant and exotic location? I will never know....

.....But I did find him. So there is hope.

 

With luv,

BD

Serious question. You said you have a fairly specific type. Why do you feel the white guys not matching with you was a race thing rather than a type thing for them?

[BlueDreams]

2 hours ago, Rain said:

Serious question. You said you have a fairly specific type. Why do you feel the white guys not matching with you was a race thing rather than a type thing for them?

I have a type, but it's still broad enough that several men from several races can fit it (dark hair, nice eyes, not too tall or short/big or small, tan to brown skin, and a generally attractive face). It's not race specific, in other words. If you look at these stats you'll notice that not only is there very obvious racial biases in who received responses on the dating site, there's also a solid chunk of people (around 30%) who blatantly said they prefer someone of their own race. That's reduced from initial rates, but the actual behavior hasn't budged. I dated on an LDS based app, which meant I got far fewer offers to NCMO (one looked like model Jesus....the irony). So I didn't get people who were looking just for an experience, which a lot of the behaviors described in the other sites were pointing towards. But I've been exoticized in the past and have talked to full black women enough to know they have fewer opportunities for dating than I do in UT. And I've at times had fewer than my full white cousin. It's anecdotal on my part and it didn't mean that I had no experiences whatsoever. I'd have a couple of older white ladies try to connect me with their grandson, nephew, relative of some sort because they liked me from the temple. I've been on more dates with white men (or mostly white) because I live in utah....it's sort of the nature of the state. But I've had a disproportionate amount of my dates, attention, etc be with other minorities.

Obviously some of the men didn't swipe up for similar reasons I didn't....they didn't like my profile, face, job title, etc. Its the volume and disproportion and the statistical precedent that stated part of it was likely race. 

 

With luv,

BD

[Rain]

8 minutes ago, BlueDreams said:

I have a type, but it's still broad enough that several men from several races can fit it (dark hair, nice eyes, not too tall or short/big or small, tan to brown skin, and a generally attractive face). It's not race specific, in other words. If you look at these stats you'll notice that not only is there very obvious racial biases in who received responses on the dating site, there's also a solid chunk of people (around 30%) who blatantly said they prefer someone of their own race. That's reduced from initial rates, but the actual behavior hasn't budged. I dated on an LDS based app, which meant I got far fewer offers to NCMO (one looked like model Jesus....the irony). So I didn't get people who were looking just for an experience, which a lot of the behaviors described in the other sites were pointing towards. But I've been exoticized in the past and have talked to full black women enough to know they have fewer opportunities for dating than I do in UT. And I've at times had fewer than my full white cousin. It's anecdotal on my part and it didn't mean that I had no experiences whatsoever. I'd have a couple of older white ladies try to connect me with their grandson, nephew, relative of some sort because they liked me from the temple. I've been on more dates with white men (or mostly white) because I live in utah....it's sort of the nature of the state. But I've had a disproportionate amount of my dates, attention, etc be with other minorities.

Obviously some of the men didn't swipe up for similar reasons I didn't....they didn't like my profile, face, job title, etc. Its the volume and disproportion and the statistical precedent that stated part of it was likely race. 

 

With luv,

BD

Thank you for explaining that to me.

[BlueDreams]

4 hours ago, Stargazer said:

I didn't mention anywhere in my profile (not on Mutual, btw) that I was a gun owner with several weapons. It didn't even occur to me to put anything on there or show a pic.  But when it came to finding the one whom I ended up marrying, I was a bit nervous about telling her about the firearms --- especially since she was from the UK where there are virtually no guns in private hands (gun ownership is very restricted here).  Turned out she was OK with it, and I got the pleasure of taking her out to shoot a gun for the first time!  She's a good shot, as it turns out.

If one has reservations about gun ownership, one is to be advised to avoid people who provide profile pics with guns!  But that might actually be the point of such a pic!  To pre-filter those who have problems with guns, as it can be a big issue in a marriage where one person loves guns and the other hates them!

 

Haha, yeah. I've never really wanted to have guns in my home. They do not make me feel safe at all and I'm a terrible shot, so the recreation side isn't that great when I can't hit the broad side of a cow. But I think I would have respected a man who quietly owned them as opposed to broadcasting it to the world. The profiles of the guys who had several of those descriptions were the sort that often also rang a little....grandiose...in their personality. That's putting it nicely. Some were normal, but others screamed a little too strongly of Amurrika! and "strong man" compensation. And that's just not me. Plus I had a sour taste in my mouth from a guy who fit a bit of the aversion.  As it is, my husband loves cars, but he had the dignity to not place himself hugging a car like it made him look hotter by association in a profile pic.

4 hours ago, Stargazer said:

I like debating and am not threatened by opposing opinions, as long as the other person can be flexible enough to at least consider opposing views.  My late wife was if anything, more conservative than I (who am actually libertarian).  My new wife doesn't particularly care about politics and it can frustrating sometimes to get her to talk about the subject!  I have to call my new sister-in-law to get a good debate going.  And my new son-in-law is, for a Brit, extremely conservative and he's no fun because he agrees with me too much about everything!

My husband finds american politics funny. We laugh a lot with colbert, trevor noah, etc. But he's more meta and finds the binary american system a little stupid. I enjoy his outside perspective while still having someone that can understand my frustrations and political leanings in other ways.

 

With luv,

BD

[Stargazer]

9 hours ago, BlueDreams said:

Haha, yeah. I've never really wanted to have guns in my home.  They do not make me feel safe at all and I'm a terrible shot, so the recreation side isn't that great when I can't hit the broad side of a cow.

I was comfortable with them due to 8 years in the Army, but after returning to civilian life it wasn't all that big a deal for me.  Before I was in the Army, though, I remember feeling a bit scared when on rare occasions I happened to be interacting with police officers -- those big pistols made me nervous.

My late wife was the same way as you about it.  Until some very sketchy people with connections to the Crips moved in next door, and there began to be wild parties on weekends, complete with knife fights and apparent drug action, and then  the local police department started camping two or three police cars in sight of things at night on the weekend, and sometimes during the week.  Then she got quite nervous about it and asked me to buy a gun. So I bought a .22 semiautomatic rifle for cheap at a yard sale, and a little pistol. She had me teach her how to use them.  Owning them didn't make me feel any better (because I wasn't that worried about the neighbors, I guess), but it gave her a little peace of mind.  Later, after the Crips moved away (evicted by the landlord, I suppose), she was then comfortable enough with them to not feel threatened by owning them.  A few years later we were at a gun show and she took a shine to a Mossberg 500 shotgun and had me buy it for her.  We'd go out a couple times a year to shoot our "arsenal" at a local gravel pit.  One of my nice memories of her: it was HER shotgun, she made that very clear, but she wasn't fond of shooting it, because a 12 gauge packs a bit of wallop to the shooter, even with light target loads!  When she passed away I gifted the shotgun to her best girlfriend.  

Believe it, if you practice with them, even if you're not a natural good shot (my late wife was a great shot from the get-go), it's something you can learn to do well.

9 hours ago, BlueDreams said:

But I think I would have respected a man who quietly owned them as opposed to broadcasting it to the world. The profiles of the guys who had several of those descriptions were the sort that often also rang a little....grandiose...in their personality. That's putting it nicely. Some were normal, but others screamed a little too strongly of Amurrika! and "strong man" compensation. And that's just not me. Plus I had a sour taste in my mouth from a guy who fit a bit of the aversion.  As it is, my husband loves cars, but he had the dignity to not place himself hugging a car like it made him look hotter by association in a profile pic.

That sounds about right.  My new wife says she hurriedly passed by those men whose profiles declared themselves to be fond of sports and cars and looking for partners to go glacier diving with!

9 hours ago, BlueDreams said:

My husband finds american politics funny. We laugh a lot with colbert, trevor noah, etc. But he's more meta and finds the binary american system a little stupid. I enjoy his outside perspective while still having someone that can understand my frustrations and political leanings in other ways.

He's a Canadian, then?  If he finds American politics funny, he ought to try British politics.  I occasionally watch "Prime Minister's Questions" (where the members ask the PM pointed questions), and the whole thing reminds me of a pack of schoolchildren being theatrically rowdy.  

 

[The Nehor]

I find I am not cutthroat enough on Mutual. I have gotten three matches in the first week and two of them I am “Meh” about contacting. I just contacted the last one.

On LDSSingles I have only really talked to people pretty far away. Tired of finding exes there too.

Current Mood: Whatevs

Oh, just got messaged back. Mood shift to optimistically whatevs.

 

Edited September 17, 2018 by The Nehor

[BlueDreams]

Lol! Good luck Nehor. Ya never know  

[mrmarklin]

3 hours ago, The Nehor said:

I find I am cutthroat enough on Mutual. I have gotten three matches in the first week and two of them I am “Meh” about contacting. I just contacted the last one.

On LDSSingles I have only really talked to people pretty far away. Tired of finding exes there too.

Current Mood: Whatevs

Oh, just got messaged back. Mood shift to optimistically whatevs.

 

I have a Nephew exactly your age.  He recently married a Mexican woman from Monterrey Mexico that he met on line using a site called LDS Global or World or something like that.  They were married about a year an half ago in Mexico.  I attended the wedding in Monterrey and it was all very nice.  She is a very nice Mormon girl from a good family south of the border.  They now have a daughter and live in Lehi UT.

As I was attending the reception I noticed that the bride had a LOT of single girlfriends, members of the church.  Many were very attractive and active in the church AFAIK.  These young women were in the late 20s early 30s range, and a lot of them spoke English.  Quite an educated group IMHO.

Since you are in Texas, Monterrey is not that far away.  It's a modern Mexican city and relatively affluent.  There is a temple there.

I'd give you a link, but I can't seem to find anything.  But as an old married fossil, I'm not motivated.

Give this a try.

 

 

[Garden Girl]

Hello Nehor...

If I was 40 years younger... 40 years!!  Yikes!  I would be very curious about you...  sigh...

GG

[The Nehor]

4 hours ago, Garden Girl said:

Hello Nehor...

If I was 40 years younger... 40 years!!  Yikes!  I would be very curious about you...  sigh...

GG

Making me wish I was 40 years older.

[nuclearfuels]

On ‎9‎/‎6‎/‎2018 at 10:28 AM, The Nehor said:

Welp, it is that time again. Every five years or so I try to find true wuv online. It usually takes about a month before I realize the entire process is awful and horrible and give it up as a bad idea and remember why I stopped last time. Here I hope to share amusing anecdotes from the journey.

Okay, put up a profile. Focused on positive, put in a few bits of sardonic wit, threw in some fun photos of me doing fun things and an adorable one of me with my infant nephew for the “Awwwwwwwws”

Okay, time to search the meat market:

Okay, what is it with the “I love to laugh” cliche? It seems to be in every other profile. What does it mean? Are they trying to distinguish themselves from  all those people who hate laughing. Can you not even share what you like to laugh at? This phrase communicates absolutely nothing.

And then you have the people who did not write anything. Okay, so all I got is your age, a few likes, and some pics. What do you want to bet these are the same people who complain the dating scene is a meat market while they ensure that it is as much a meat market as possible.

Oh, first communication from someone......who is two years younger then my mother. Yeah, no. Not unless I decide to go with whatever the male equivalent of the sugar baby route is and you have a ton of money and one foot in the grave.

Stay tuned for more updates as I run this thing into the ground.

Current Mood: Cynically Optimistic

If it helps, I hate laughing.

Nothing's wrong w/ marrying for love and money, a one-foot-in-the-grave sugar mama.

Honestly if all we're aiming for is marrying in the Temple, the nearest single member of the opposite sex will do.

[The Nehor]

Well, I have moved into the ennui stage. Seems hopeless and the only people I have met so far that I would want to meet are far enough away that it would be difficult.

Also, found my mom. Well, a younger version of my mom. Same name, same general look, same interests, kind of creepy.

Spent the weekend binging on games and then got sick from eating delicious garbage food. Then got a massive dehydration headache which I could not treat as I was vomiting up the cure (all the water). Missed church and gave Bishop heads up but forgot to tell Sunday School President I would not be able to teach so now I feel bad. Sleep schedule is shot as I slept through most of day Sunday. Two weeks and I am taking a whole week off of work just because I can. It will be glorious.

Current Mood: melancholy, not expecting much but weirdly sentimental:

[Amulek]

On 9/6/2018 at 9:28 AM, The Nehor said:

Okay, what is it with the “I love to laugh” cliche? It seems to be in every other profile. What does it mean?

It probably means they enjoy being tickled. Try that first and see what happens.  

 

[The Nehor]

2 hours ago, Amulek said:

It probably means they enjoy being tickled. Try that first and see what happens.  

 

Tried your approach. Ended up in prison for assault. Rating your advice at 1 star. Would not take your advice again.

[mnn727]

It works, my wife and I found each other on an LDS dating site way back in the early days of the internet.

She was in Texas and I was in Florida

Edited September 17, 2018 by mnn727

[mnn727]

On 9/6/2018 at 1:17 PM, The Nehor said:

Still no responses to my messages or any incoming messages except for the lady with a kid my age.

 

Is that a problem?