Perfect! Thanks TC!

I was bored tonight and joined Match also.

I would message a man that interests you;
what have you got to lose?

I login to okcupid maybe once every 3 weeks, but if someone sends me a message I think it sends an email.

Green I joined Christian Mingle and I like it *so* much more than OKC and POF. Maybe it's just my area, but most of the guys look and sound like folks you wold actually enjoy talking to. And I'm not getting endless messages "hey baby I like older women wanna chat" Like seriously who would feel good to be called an older woman off the bat like that?

Good for you for sticking to the 30 dates thing. If this guy was like the exception you would have known

I just checked okcupid...I had 60 women view my profile since I last logged in.
I'm finished with online date sites.

Sorry Jedi! I would say I get the most traffic on okcupid. I've had about 5 messages on Eharmony in nearly two months, and I've had 5 from match since I put my profile up last night. I had lots of messages to sort through on OK.


NED- I'm not certain Crunchy wasn't the exception. I've never met someone I had so much compatibility with. He seemed to move really fast though, and my friends suggested it was too much too soon. We had two dates in one weekend, and he said he wouldn't date me if I was dating others. I felt he was a little too pushy with the physical stuff too.

I'm still missing IT guy too. Even though I got a taste of his angry side when I told him I didn't want to date him.

Christian Mingle would be great if I were Christian lol.

Best of luck to you!!!

Are a member of another faith? I have friends who found their spouses on JDate too.

Jedi, you're finished because you found somebody, taking time time for yourself, or 60 is just overwhelming?

I just quit because I lost interest.
I had a hard time connecting with the women online and I'm not going to advertise myself in messages to them.

Values attract like values, so if someone of similar values is around me then we will have mutual attraction.

Agreed, I don't try to sell myself either. And those meetup groups are supposed to be great for meeting folks with similar interests, so I am thinking to look into that too. I have a friend in a bicycling group and she is loving it, spending time outside doing something she enjoys. And then if she is busy she just doesn't go, it's pretty flexible.

A great movie to watch about mutual attraction is The Fountainhead, starring Gary Cooper

NED- I am a Unitarian Universalist. Very liberal and very broad beliefs. Almost more of a club than a religion. It's a more obscure religion and I've only recently found it in the last few years but it's perfect for me. I'm best suited to people who are atheist or agnostic. I'm trying to specifically look for liberals, which is tricky because I somehow live in a big city which is very conservative lol.

Jedi- I disagree. I think being proactive in anything is always the way to go. Why wouldn't you advertise yourself? The right woman isn't just going to walk into your life. It's a matter of putting yourself out there, and the right mix of chemistry and compatibility. At least that's what I think.

I'm a member of several meetup groups and it's a lot of fun. It's a little tricky dating within them, because once you stop dating, then you are trying to avoid the meetups they are going to etc. (I've gone on dates with several guys I've met through meetup groups).


I found a gorgeous guy on OK last night. Like model gorgeous. Way out of my league lol. Unfortunately he's not looking for a relationship right now. At least he will give me something to fantasize about lol.

Hey, Greenmomma--

I'm a UU too. Funny, it's so unusual to see someone mention it anywhere out in the world that I practically do a double-take when I see the words. I'm lucky to live in a city that skews liberal. I also have no interest in dating right now, heh.

Just wanted to say hello. Good luck to you!

I agree with TC. The girl I'm dating looked at my profile, so I just sent her a hello, and we are exclusive and really enjoying each other today.

In fact, she said she wasn't a member until see saw the message from me waiting in her inbox and promptly paid to see what I wrote.

So I think for a dude, just look at who is looking at you and message who you are interested in, and for the chicks, just look at lots of dudes.

btw, I used Christian Mingle which works for me since I'm a Christian, and because the type of girl I was looking for is more likely to be on that site than the others.

Ak

Hi Portula! Yes, it is a more obscure religion. One of the reasons me ex and I chose this part if town to live in is because it is near a UU church! I really enjoy my little pocket of liberals in a very conservative catholic area!

Thanks AK!

It's hard to know what to do on some of these sites. On Match for instance they can wink at you , like you, and add you to their favorites. Far more guys do all those things rather than send me a message.

Does anyone have a hard time finding people to be interested in? I find it so much harder to pick out someone from a picture. Like I'm somehow more judge mental online than in person?

You're supposed to be judgmental. It's about finding the right person, no? I look at it like this: you have certain things that are no brainer, not going to work for you deal breakers. These things are MUCH easier to spot with online dating because you have so much hanging out there and even during a first date or two, you're sizing the other person up. This is a vastly different dynamic than the guy you ran into at the grocery store a few times, talked to, perhaps went out with a few times and THEN found out things you don't like that may have turned you off earlier but you might ignore now because he's a good guy, you're infatuated, etc.

I guess that's a long way of saying that I think online dating allows you to be more objective as opposed to being more judgmental. On the flip side though, we have to stay away from being too picky; it's easy to get into the mentality of, "this person doesn't meet all of my one hundred checklist items and there are 40,000 more guys/gals on this site. Next." It can be a tough balancing act at times!

A good tip is also to stay away from anyone on Match who's profile picture is themselves with a bloody chainsaw and uses the name "Chainsaw Serial Guy"

Thanks TC! I do like the ability to sort through people based on qualities online. I'm having a bit harder time determining if I'd have chemistry with someone just based on a picture. I know that is the point of the date. Good point about overlooking things because of other reasons once you know a person. I am guilty of that kind of thinking for sure. In fact, that's the trouble I had with IT guy. I met him in real life, and we had chemistry, but I decided to end things because I wanted more compatibility. But it was really hard because he was such a nice guy, and we had great chemistry. I agree about the challenge of being too picky. I'm wondering if I am being too picky online.

Jedi, I'll look out for Chainsaw Guy. I'm also avoiding any men who admit to Rape Fantasies on the questionnaire for OK Cupid.

And just in case anyone is interested, I checked out Match's new online dating site called Chemistry. I was not impressed. They have you take a quiz and put you in one of four categories, but match you with everyone and just tell you the pro's and con's to your potential relationship based on your personality category. They don't list people's information or picture on the initial match page. They only show the kind of personality they have and their name. You have to click on a person and then their information and picture comes up. Plus very few people are on there, and it's another pay site like Match.

OK Cupid is still my favorite site. I'm still trying to figure out how to work Match's levels of flirting. I looked at a guy, he looked at me, I looked at him, he looked at me, I finally sent him a wink, and he sent me a message. I'm not very patient with this kind of thing lol.

I have several dates set up for this upcoming weekend. We'll see how they go! I also have a date set up with Crunchy guy again. I feel like we are very compatible. He didn't want to date me because I didn't want to be exclusive right off the bat. Some friends suggested he is either insecure, or too controlling. We had stayed FB friends, and I suggested we could give dating another try, or just hang out as friends. He declined again. So I unfriended him on FB. Now he wants to date lol. We'll see how it goes.

Any particular advice to use to tell guys you don't want a second date? This is the part I struggle with the most. I don't even want to talk to guys because I don't know the best way to tell them I don't want another date, or I don't want to give them my number (if we meet in person).

Telling anyone no is a tough thing to do. Nobody likes to hurt anyone's feelings after all! But at this point in the dating process, you really don't owe anyone anything other than politeness and your "rejection" should take that into consideration. A simple e-mail or text message stating, "I enjoyed getting to know you (yesterday/this evening/etc) but I don't think we're a good match. Thank you so much for your time!" You can elaborate a little more if you like, ie - we're not compatible, we live too far apart, etc but it doesn't need to be a long, drawn out affair.

Saying no gets easier over time, the first times are rough! But it's kinder than wasting your time and theirs.

The other thing folks do is just say they are busy. Because if it's someone you really like, you would say that you are busy and propose and alternative. But if you don't want to see them again you won't propose an alternative. So after 3 times of that at the most it will be obvious.

The part I'm having a hard time with is thinking about meeting more than one person. There's one guy I connected with first, we're meeting for the first time tonight after messaging and then talking on the phone a couple of weeks. But I really have no interest in talking to the other guy I was talking to anymore, even though we were getting along well in messages.

I'm nowhere near ready to do online dating, but I've enjoyed reading your thread. I heard Tinder is only for "hookups". My friend's little brother said his college friends use it for booty calls. That freaks me out! I decided I'd be staying FAR away from Tinder. Lol