A partner not a pet

I thought I'd given up on the blog, but then I received this absolute gem of a message:

Well all I'm looking for is someone who wants something simple and satisfying, not just a one night stand. I want someone who at the end of the day wants to get together watch a movie cuddled on the couch and fool around. I will say I do enjoy things a little rough, hair pulling, spanking, and lip biting are a few of my favorites. Otherwise I'm fairly vanilla and boring as for what I like to do to pass the time, I really enjoy good food so someone who wants to help make dinner at the end of a long day would be nice or someone who feels like getting out a bit and taking in a few of the sites.

The rest of his profile is just as weird. Nearly all of his pictures are him posing goofily with various wax celebs at Madame Tussaud's, like Woody Allen and Martin Luther King Jr. (hilarious!!). 

He is also extremely particular about what he is looking for in a woman: 

I'm looking for someone who wants to do fun little things with me on a daily basis, a workout and dinner companion who wants to see me as often as possible. I like being active but do enjoy those relaxing days at home.

My ideal woman is a contradiction. I want a partner not a pet, someone like me who has a career and a plan. Someone who like me has put their personal life on the back burner for a little bit and now that we've got the professional side squared away it's time to build the relationship side. I like a strong woman with her own opinions but at the same time she has a softer side that likes to let down her guard with me. A woman that likes to curl up in my lap at the end of a hard day or that randomly likes to be held tightly when she feels lonely. I do enjoy those lazy days that are spent laying on the couch together, hopefully you do too.

Any Commentary Would Be Superfluous

Just received this:

Hey, how are you? Can i ask if you would let a guy serve as your domestic slave? Nothing sexual, could just have me do chores, clean, run errands, serve as a driver, anything you want

Andy Kaufman is Alive and Well and Messaging Me on OKCupid

Andy Kaufman (or as he is better known now: the guy who was played by Jim Carrey in that movie from the 90s with Courtney Love back when she seemed to be kind of holding it together) became famous for 'The Foreign Man' a character he invented while doing stand-up and then played with only a slight variation as Latka Graves on the sitcom Taxi. The Foreign Man was a bumbling, extremely clueless, but indisputably sweet and well-intentioned, heavily accented, recent immigrant from a made up Eastern European country. Watch the first few moments of the clip below for an example.

I bring this up not merely to reminisce about my late-90s movie-going experiences but because I just received a message from a guy who simply must be proof that Andy Kaufman faked his own death (snopes.com be damned) and is now doing performance art on OKCupid. Check it out, I really think I'm on to something: 

My self-summary

Well im very nice guy :), who like to meet new people and discover new cultures and show mines!!! im friendly, like to parties and also good talks!!. im openmind and respect others ways of think!

You should message me if

if you can catch me ;) ....

Thank you very much.

Cannibal Cop's OKC Profile

You can read it on Gawker here.

Sadly, his profile is probably better than average.

Another Male Perspective / Guest Blogger: I Love to Read About You Loving to Laugh

My apologies dear readers for the lag time between posts. Blogging is apparently much easier to do in law school than as a lawyer. Fortunately many of my talented and funny friends are also embarking on the absurdity that is online dating. The following is written by Jesse:

Ladies - suppose, just for a second, that I am a potential significant other of yours. This is the central conceit of any online dating service, for the most part. 

Now, try to figure out what the most common bit of information given by women on OK Cupid is. The movies they love? No. Their jobs? Not close. What they're looking for in a partner? Eh.

Overwhelmingly, it is that they love to laugh. Just love it. Adore it. Often with friends and families, I suppose to assure all of us that they are not random laughing lunatics parading around their neighborhood giggling uncontrollably at litter and street signs. 

But why does anyone share this information? Is there something about the physical reaction to humor and/or tickling that's in doubt for a significant portion of the female population? Are ladies' nights out spent staring stone-faced into umbrella-stabbed drinks, talking about famine? Do you sit around watching YouTube clips of kittens falling off tables, working your laughing muscles from a mild titter into a full-throated guffaw? 

After asking numerous women with the known ability to laugh, they all coalesced around a roughly similar take on the "I love to laugh" (ILTL) line: it's what people with nothing interesting or funny to say about themselves write in order to seem interesting or funny. 

This is not meant to consign anyone with ILTL in their profile to the bitter dustbin of horrific, sour doom. You're a living human being who has almost certainly not been through anything so horrific or earth-shattering as to completely devastate your ability to tell or enjoy a joke. So instead of tossing out ILTL, tell a joke. Say something funny or self-deprecating about yourself. Even talk about the kind of funny things you like, if you can't think of an actual funny thing to say. 

But for the love of all that is sweet and merciful, do not use ILTL unless you're also going to list other basic facts of the human condition that apply to you, such as your deep enjoyment of respiration and the utter delight you take in how letters combine into words that you can then use to communicate ideas and concepts. If you're going to pull an ILTL, do it all the way.

A Male Perspective: The Dirty Little Truth Behind Stock Messages Revealed

The following was sent to me from a guy, who shall remain nameless, in response to my initial post on how much I hate stock messages. Prepare to have your mind blown. Mine was.

A while ago, when I was bored, I started up an OKC profile to amuse myself. 

I spent most of the time on there experimenting with stock messages I could send to 20 or 30 girls at once. You see, there are two big issues with OKC. One is that any remotely attractive girl gets tons of messages, so the signal-to-noise ratio is garbage and it's just not worth the time to craft something unique to every girl. The second is that 90+% of those girls basically have identical profiles with the exact same shit written in them and the exact same kissy-face out-at-the-bar-with-friends picture. 

The solution to both is to send something slightly shocking but amusing to large swaths of women at once. You might be surprised how well it works. You might really be surprised that it works FAR BETTER than sending personalized messages that actually show careful reading of your profile. The fact that stock messages are irritating, as you point out, is actually beneficial - irritating at least prompts an emotional reaction in the reader, which is a better outcome than the complete indifference to the competing messages she received.

The best stock messages accuse the girl of something off-beat, prompting both humor and a defense response.
I repeatedly used the "bet with the friend you're male" message, a little tweaked for individuality (it's been floating around the internet in various versions for about 4 years). My "friend" was female, a fact that 0 of the recipients called out despite the messages usually being sent between 11 PM and 12:30 AM (if “she” was “looking over my shoulder,” we’d be in bed together…). I also added one fact from the recipient's profile as a reason why she was "totally a dude" - usually “a profile with so little information,” or that "only a dude would really like" The Big Lebowski/Dexter/UFC/whatever. The message had roughly a 75% response rate, with the vast majority of those being positive/willing to maintain the conversation. Only ONE girl (out of maybe 100-150?) said she had seen the message before, and she still messaged me back numerous times afterwards.

Occasionally, I got lazy, and didn’t bother tweaking the “reason she was male” between profiles, often resulting in a “reason” that made no sense for the profile I was messaging. Another time, I accidentally copied and pasted less than the full message to several girls, cutting off a portion of the message in a strange manner. These errors made no difference in response rate or receptivity to further contact.

By now, you're probably wondering what kind of lady falls for this crap. In truth? All sorts. I met several. They ran the gamut from brick-dumb to smart as hell, snarky to cheerful, ultraflaky to responsible.

So not only are stock messages effective in their own right, they are actually more effective than personalized messages. I am shocked. Women of OkCupid I think we need to talk.

A Deciedly Less Thorough Examination of 'Stock' Messages

Not a whole lot to add to my last post (which I have to imagine is the most in-depth analysis out there on the art of the stock online dating message -- yes that is the extent of my  dedication to you my dear readers) but just received 2 I thought were worth sharing.

Message 1:
Hi, I really like your profile. How's your weekend so far? 

Contrast with Message 2:

Greetings. How are you doing? I hope all is well. 

I found your profile really interesting and thought I will send you a shout out (Oops now my throat hurts!!). You seem like a person who is smart, kind and full of life, so I guess you are probably an endangered species lol. 

I can tell you a little bit about me: I am 31, work in Bethesda, MD as a software engineer (enough with the dumb guy jokes already). I am laid back, sarcastic and relatively simple. Some of the things I really enjoy are visiting museums, hiking, running, going on random road trips, and playing cards. I love watching college and professional football and am a big fan of the New England Patriots. 

Just a quirk about me: I turned vegetarian seven years ago, it was not that I realized that I like animals, I just realized that I hated plants so much. lol just kidding. 

Anyway I will end now. I hope to hear from you sometime.

What's weird is I can't decide which one is worse. I'm inclined to think message 2 as it is indicative of the incredibly delightful mix of self-absorption and cluelessness whereas message 1 just shows a complete lack of effort. Guess I'm kinda torn.