A date with Dr. House

So, the first man up in my dating order (god I really need to STOP with these sports metaphors) was Dr. House, whom I discussed last week.

To mentally prepare myself for the date I looked at his photos multiple times throughout the day to remind myself what he looked like.  I have a tendency to romanticize things in my head and I wanted to manage my expectations so that I wouldn't be distracted, or, and I know this makes me an awful person, disappointed that he wasn't as hot as I hoped he would be.

Hey.  I'm not perfect.  I'm trying to grow as a person.  Gotta walk before I run.

I showed up at the bar, not even late for once, and there he was.  Much to my relief he was cuter in person than I had prepared myself for!  (Love lesson #4: keep expectations low and you'll always be pleasantly surprised.)  We had an absolutely LOVELY date, conversation flowed as easily in person as it did online, and we stayed for 3 drinks instead of my usual two because I didn't want the night to end.  Nor did he.

Dr. House gave off a clear vibe that he is not a disrespectful booty hound so after our drinks I invited him over to my place to hang for awhile.  I was just so happy to be having such a good time and be more attracted to him than I had anticipated.  And my gut was right: we watched TV, we smooched a little, nothing untoward happened.  When he left I went to bed with a smile on my face.

The next day while daydreaming of life as a doctor's wife and gushing to my friends about how great the date was, an email arrived from him.

Hey there.  Great night last night, and wow, I'm off the charts attracted to you.  So that's why this is going to sound strange but I need to leave it at that and not move forward.  Turns out I'm not as ready for dating as I thought I was and certainly not for something real like you are.  I hope you can understand and I'm sorry.

Donde esta?

And just like that, I went from living the high life at my summer home in Malibu and wintering in Aspen, back to reality in my rented apartment.  I get it.  He told me he and his ex had broken up in July.  But I'd be lying if I said I wasn't disappointed.

When am I going to find my doctor in shining lab coat?

They keep saying the right person will come along, I think mine got hit by a truck,
LL

How much is too much?

How many licks does it take to get to---uh, never mind.

I went on 6 dates in 5 days this week.

My friends, I am here to tell you, that is too much.  My body hurts.  I've probably drank my weight in booze.  And I'm no closer to finding "the one" than I was on Monday.  (Yet my bank account is much healthier than normal, which is what happens when you have various men essentially buying your groceries for the week.)

I'll get into specifics in future blogs because some of these dates deserve their own entries.  However, let's discuss the lessons that were learned this week first.

Love lesson #1: A man who will exchange 15 emails with you, while sweet, probably only likes the idea of a relationship, not the reality.  New rule: 3 or 4 emails, meet, or move on.

Love lesson #2: Dating multiple men is a good time, dating too many men is a disaster.  How many times this week did I reference something I thought the person I was on said date with had told me, only to realize I had confused them with another man on my dance card?  I spent half my week back peddling faster than Lance Armstrong in the Tour de France.

Love lesson #3: Variety is the spice of life but too much variety leaves the tastebuds confused.  This goes along with lesson #2.  Dating SO many men means I don't have the time or energy to really get to know any of them.  I had been told this before by Millionaire, but being more stubborn than all three of the Billy Goats Gruff combined, I had to find it out for myself.

Armed with this knowledge I now have a few choices: continue saving money, trying not to be recognized by the bartenders in the most popular date spots in town, and having a bed full of dog hair, or bench a few players and maybe find the head coach of my heart.

(OK that metaphor made me gag but I was continuing with my sports talk.  Please don't judge me.)

The true definition of a friend: a person in your acquaintance who has some flaw which makes sleeping with him/her totally unappealing,
LL

Dr. House

Why yes, this IS just what I ordered!

Last week while I was posting about those in the late 20's and up set being comfortable enough with ourselves to spend time online on a Saturday night, whaddayaknow one of said singles emailed me.  One of those guys who has the art of a casual email perfected either because they've been doing this online thing way too long (as I have) or because that's just the type of person they are.  I prefer the latter, but you never know what you're going to get.

Lucky for me, Dr. House was one of the second types.  Though upon first look at his profile he didn't seem to be my physical type, his email was so nice and fun in nature I felt guilty for considering not writing back.  Also those damn rules about stepping outside of my comfort zone kept echoing in my head.  So I responded.

In the past week we have apparently sent 17 emails each.  This of course means multiple emails a day.  And they haven't been just one sentence messages either.  We've been regaling each other with our wit, asking the typical getting to know you questions, and even getting a little bit more personal than I usually do with guys I'm just emailing with.  Not in a creepy way but in a comfortable fun way.  I've really looked forward to seeing his screenname in my inbox.

It's only been a week though it feels like much longer than that given how frequently we've talked.  But he finally asked me for drinks and so we will be meeting in person very soon.  I'm both excited and a little nervous about this.  Not nervous in the usual first date way but nervous about the reality of Dr. House.

As I said, he's not really my physical type.  And while chemistry is important, finding someone who is NICE and fun and funny and consistent is equally, if not more, important.  I am so hoping I am not going to get in my own way and write him off immediately because I don't feel some kind of instant attraction to him.

I mean, I felt instant attraction to Funions and look how that is going.

This is really going to be my chance to put this new dating mindset to the test.  Or so I think it is.  For all I know he could walk in and have some kind of air about him in person like he does online and I'll want to drop my pants in the middle of the bar.

Fingers crossed.

The only thing wrong with being an atheist is that there's nobody to talk during an orgasm,
LL

A photograph of modern day romance:

It's hard out there for a pimp.

Here's a snippet of a conversation I had with a friend over the weekend.  Said friend thought he/she* had discovered they had an allergy to alcohol, but at the last stop on his/her Sunday Funday path of destruction showed his/her differently:

Friend: It may just be tequila!!!!!!!

Me: Excellent!!

Friend: It may be!!  I just drank 3 vodka sodas and....no rash!!

Friend: The downside: I kissed two guys in 25 minutes.

Me: That's a downside?

Friend: Okay fine, it's tough to be me.

And thus we have the typical weekend evening of the modern day single.  And they say romance is dead.

*gender not revealed to protect the innocent.  This is not like a Jamie Lee Curtis hermaphrodite situation.

Too sexy for my love?

Amen sister.

This past week I had date 2 with Funions.  I was looking forward to the evening because he had been consistently texting me every day, called me in advance to make plans, and came to my side of town instead of making me haul ass to him after a long workday.  A trifecta of nice.

We had a lovely and long dinner filled with good food and good Funions.  Lot of talk about relationships, but in a non scary way.  Told me some about his divorce, asked me what I'm looking for, and it's very clear that Funions wants a long time relationship, not a love 'em and leave 'em type girl.

But Funions may be a bit quick on the "love 'em" part and not in a good way.

After dinner we went back to my house "to watch TV" which is of course just a more socially acceptable way of saying "make out in a non-public place."  I welcomed this because I was into Funions.

So we're playing tonsil hockey on the couch for 10 minutes or so and Funions says, "maybe we should go to your room."  Again, this is not 1950, I'm a sexually liberated woman, and I'm ok with this, as long as there are some boundaries.  I say:

"OK, but as long as you understand that just because we are going upstairs it does not mean I am going to sleep with you."

He says yes, absolutely, he would never just expect that.  Though in hindsight I should've said to myself, "Self, of COURSE he's going to say that.  What, is he going to say 'Actually I think I DO want to get laid tonight so I'll probably just coerce you into sleeping with me once we get up there.'

Because that's exactly what he did.

Now, to be fair, I am not totally blaming him for this.  There were 2 people there and if I had really forcefully said "Keep those Funions in your pants," I'm sure he would've stopped.  But the back and forth, the wheedling, the pressure he was applying to get me to sleep with him  was so constant that I just gave in because it seemed the easier thing to do.

And it sucked.  The sex sucked, the talking afterwards sucked, and the way I felt the next day REALLY sucked.  I was mad at him but even more so at myself.  So why'd I do it?  I KNEW it was going to make me feel bad, I KNEW it would make me think less of him, and I KNEW it had the potential to ruin any budding relationship with him.

The answer is: I don't have the answer.  It's a bunch of factors playing with and against each other and it's something I have to figure out if not for this relationship than at least for the next one.  All I DO know is that I definitely don't want to feel this way again.  Not with him, or with anyone else.

Women need a reason to have sex, men just need a place,
LL

Rock, meet Hard Place.

So, after days of radio silence from The Aficionado, I had received his message loud and clear: he just wasn't that into me.  I was a little bummed, sure, but at least I still had my pride.  That is, til I remembered he had a pair of my shoes.  Kenneth Cole shoes to be exact, and those suckers weren't cheap.  I had no choice but to shoot him a quick email:

Hi Aficionado,
I'm getting the feeling you aren't feeling it anymore.  I understand, this is how these online dating things often go, though I wish you would've just said something instead of disappearing.    I was enjoying getting to know you and wish you all the best.  One last thing, I need my gold shoes back, do you mind if I come pick them up sometime?


Thanks!
LL

He responded immediately:

Hey there,


Actually it isn't that I am not/was not feeling it.  I have been going through some pretty stressful stuff.  I totally like you and think you're an AWESOME person and I have the utmost respect for you.  


The only challenge I saw was your career path, which I totally respect and want you to be a super success, and you also have pets which would make it a challenge to see each other.  I want to travel and enjoy life and see the world while I can.  That would be challenging for you, though I know you would like to.


I'd love to have a friendship with you.  Regardless of whether romance could/would happen, I can see us being great friends to each other.


Well.  THAT'S a first.  I have a rather intense job and I know that that has been intimidating for some men.  But guys like Aficionado, who have incomes well into the 7 figures, usually aren't that type.  They're so wary of a woman wanting them for their money they usually are refreshed by someone like me who's not a struggling actress.  This is the first time my career has ever worked AGAINST me.

I honestly don't want to work at what I do now forever.  It's why a man's financial security is very important to me.  I still don't know if I want kids but if I do, I would want to have the freedom to be able to work part time and stay home with the kids.  But when am I supposed to disclose that?!  If I say it too soon, I'll scare the man off, but if I say it too late, maybe he'll be totally unsure of how he feels about me because he fell in love with this intense career woman.  What's a girl to do?!?!

I know, I know, the obvious answer is that he's not the right guy for me, and I get that.  But it IS making me think about how I come across to men.  I know I give off the vibe that I don't need anyone and I'm completely self sufficient.  I DO come across as a strong career woman.  It is a defense mechanism because I'm terrified of being vulnerable and getting hurt.  But I've been this way for years and clearly, it's not working for me.

How do I find balance?

Take your work seriously, but never yourself,
LL

Saturday Night (online) Fever!

Sounds about right.

Online dating makes me want to be a psychologist.  It is FASCINATING to me the patterns that people have, what profile pictures say (and more importantly, don't say) about a person, and the things that people believe they require in another person to be happy.

I have also noticed some differences between online dating in my mid 20's and online dating in my late 20's.  When I first came online, around the ripe "old" age of 25, the majority of my activity would be between Monday and Thursday.  Even if I was home on a Friday night I wouldn't log on for fear of appearing to have no life.  (Narcissism, party of one, your table is now ready....)

However, now that I am fast approaching 30, times have changed.  Now I absolutely embrace my lame weekend nights at home, and it seems I'm not the only one.  While I have been looking at profiles tonight, a lot of the men I have been looking at have also been online.  I love this about getting old.  Gone are the days where standing in line to get into Drai's and thus leaving the online profile untouched for 3 days are "cool", now it seems many of my male counterparts are in the same boat as me: tired.  Now we've traded the VIP line for our laptops.  And it's awesome.

Dating....with children?

First things first: I hated the Matthew McConnaughey nickname.  And one of my favorite joys of this whole dating process is coming up with new nicknames for my datees.  So!  Matthew McConnaughey, OUT, Funions, in.  It's fun to say, Funions (the man) is fun, it works.

These are fun.

Funions and I had our first date last night.  (Try saying that 3 times fast.)  We almost did not, thanks to his tardiness, however.  Now, I am chronically late myself so I figure this was just karmic payback but really?  I drove 20 miles south to his neck of the woods, and he was 22 MINUTES LATE.  I was exactly 8 minutes away from walking back to my car and driving back home, all dressed up with nowhere to go.  He WAS texting me and apologizing, but something felt off.

Finally, he arrived.  Skinnier than I expected but I was in 3 and a half inch heels and he was still taller than me so at least he was as tall as he promised.  Hey, it's the little things.  I really wanted to be little miss breezy "Oh you were late?  Who noticed?  I am so laid back and easy going I'm like the fiber of life."  But god, I just could.  not.  help.  myself.

"OK so what HAPPENED?"

Yes, these were my first words after the exchanging pleasantries.  He hemmed, he hawed, he said he didn't want to start the date off on this note, but I waited expectantly and didn't let him worm his way out of it.

And thus, the first bomb of the evening was dropped: he has a 3 year old daughter and the baby sitter was late, hence his lateness.

Oh boy.

I am still not entirely convinced that I want children of my own, so I am not sure how I feel about someone ELSE'S children.  But, in keeping with the preaching of my dating bible (keep an open mind, no one is perfect) I gulped down some wine instead of running out the door.

And I'm glad I stayed.  I actually ended up staying til 12:30, which is WAY past my bedtime.  We had some wine, we cracked some jokes, and then we went back to his place and snuggled on the couch for a bit.

New experience: snuggling and hearing a 3 year old coughing in the other room.  *gulp*

A child is a curly dimpled lunatic,
LL

Exciting emails.

Due to the holidays the blog is on a bit of a time delay.  Well...the holidays & my laziness of 2011, but I digress.  Anyhoo, I've been dating The Aficionado since just before Thanksgiving.  So roughly 2 months.  However 3 weeks of those 2 months have been spent with both of us on various vacations and business trips, so we have gone long periods with out seeing each other.  In fact, I haven't seen him since December 16th.  (Don't worry, I'm not obsessively counting the days and marking them on a calendar in my blood.  The last time I saw him was the day my office closed for Christmas vacation, hence my remembering the date.)

This has led to a minor insecurity attack and what do I do when I feel insecure?  Amp up my action on the dating site.  True to form, I did just this and I have 2 exciting new prospects:

The dude abides.

Matthew McConnaughey : Ah, ladies, I see that that nickname has piqued your interest.  This guy seems to be a "dude" in every sense of the word, but not in an annoying underachieving way.  38, hot, lives at the beach, likes to ski and drink beer.  Fortunately he is also an executive at a company so he is a little bit more adult than your average dude.  His emails are funny, he responds quickly, and he's already suggested we get together for drinks, hopefully this week.  He's also tall.  Very tall.

The Partner : I want to call him The Lawyer 2.0 but I think that will get confusing.  I winked at him, he winked back, I emailed him, he emailed back.  After 2 emails he told me to call him.  Uh uh my friend.  I'm fine with making the first move but I do not want to be doing ALL the work.  But you can see the parallels between him and The Lawyer: lazy and selfish.  But also really hot.  DAMMIT.  Gets me every time!

Naturally, since I was thinking about these 2 this morning and looking forward to emailing with them today, The Aficionado called.  Never fails.  Left a somewhat cryptic message apologizing for being distant lately and he'll tell me about it when we talk.  Then he kind of passively invited me down to his place this afternoon.  When I returned his call I got his VM, left a message, but didn't say anything about coming down there because again, MAN UP.  If you want to see me, say hey, I'll be watching football later, why don't you come down? Don't give me this "I'll be around all afternoon watching football and not doing a whole lot."  I've picked up on this kind of "suggestion" from him before and said outright, "So, was that an invite?" but again, not doing it regularly.  Takes two to tango.  And do the nasty.

So I enter another week with a little more beef in my man cabinet.  Hopefully will have a date with Mr. McConnaughey and maybe find out what the heck happened to the consistency of  The Aficionado.  A girl can dream....

Love is not something you can put chains on and throw into a lake.  That's called Houdini,
LL

Second time's NOT the charm.

Since the weekend is prime dating time, I thought a good way to kick off the festivities would be another story from the Bad Date Hall of Fame.  That way, when you're on what you think is an awful date you can always think back to this and tell yourself, "Well, at least it isn't THAT bad."  Thanks to a dear Foxy Friend of mine for sharing her holiday dating woes with us.  Take it away, Foxy!

Plan was to see dinner and a movie and to meet at his place.


So I drive out there and am kind of confused because the house that I think is his has a blow up Santa on the lawn, a Christmas flag, a wreath on the door, and a light up reindeer that moves on the front line.  But yes, it's his.  And no, he does not have a female roommate.


I'm trying not to judge and then I walk into his house that looks like the Griswold's family Christmas threw up on it.  He has a tree in the living room, a crochet Santa kleenex box cover with Santa on it, a poinsettia kitchen mat in front of the sink, and velvet bows on all his door knobs.  Remember, no female roommate....he just really likes Christmas.  Onto the house tour.


He has a blue and white Christmas tree (he is a huge Duke fan and is obsessed, which we will get to later) in his BEDROOM.  Full size.  WTF?!  You are 29 years old!!!


The second bedroom is almost worse.  It seriously looks like an 8 year old boy's dream bedroom.  Everything Duke that you can imagine.  Laptop cover, the wallpaper border is Duke patterned, 27 bobble head dolls arranged neatly on a book shelf, a REAL locker from the Duke locker room with signed jersey & cleats.  Walls covered with signed Duke stuff....yet no TV or couch so it's not like he hangs out in there.  It's just this weird Duke shrine.

This is not turning me on.

We then go downstairs and he has me sit on the couch (but before I sit down he straightens the blanket I'm about to sit on.  Oh and his room was OCD clean with shirts & shoes organized by color.  I assumed he had a cleaning lady but when I asked him nope, he just likes things neat.).    So he says, "Wait til you see the early xmas present my mom got me.  It's great!"  Then he proceeds to show me this shutterfly picture book his mom made for him of his life from birth til age 30.  THIS IS OUR SECOND DATE.  


Finally, mercifully, we head out to the movie.  He tells me he picked a movie for us and we are going to see....ARTHUR CHRISTMAS!!!  I mean, I like xmas and all, but for a DATE?!  And get this, when we get there, there is an 8 year old girl having her birthday party.  So picture us sitting behind a row of 10 little girls, with him trying to put his hands down my pants.  Really, this is not getting me off at all: Arthur Christmas & a children's birthday party.


We went to dinner after and at last, the date is over so we head back to his place.  He is shocked when I say I'm going to leave and asks why I don't want to spend the night.  Really dude, really?  You do not want me to answer that question.


He has texted and emailed me since.  I finally had to send him a polite "break up" email.  Merry Christmas, buddy.


Got a Bad Date Hall of Fame story?  Remember, misery loves company.  Email me and loveanddatinginla@gmail.com and you may see yours featured in a future blog!

How many of you have ever started dating because you were too lazy to commit suicide?,
LL

The psychology of a profile picture, aka TELL ME I'M PRETTY

No.

Everyone knows that you're not going to have any success on a dating site without a profile photo.  But what exactly makes up the "perfect" profile photo?

I have tried many, MANY photos and it honestly blows my mind at what gets the most responses.  For my new 2012 profile I took what I thought was one of the better pics I'd taken in my lifetime, did some enhancing (not of my boobs, I have SOME dignity left.), and thought damn, I didn't even look this good on prom night circa 2004.  It's gonna be rainin' men on me!

Also no.

Sadly, no.  Maybe TWO dudes a day were looking at my profile.  TWO?!  This was far less than my raging narcissism could handle so I changed it up.  I put in a new year's eve photo where I am wearing a particularly fetching dress.  I thought it would zero in on my face that was ever so coyly tipped toward the camera and voila, the boys would come running.

Well, unfortunately the dating site compressed my entire (very tall) body into one tiny thumbnail and I resembled....heck I can't even think of a metaphor to explain what I resembled because I was essentially shapeless.  And wouldn't you know it, I got 38 views in AN HOUR.

This lends itself to my wholly unscientific opinion that men want what they can't have.  I mean, they couldn't even SEE me and I was seeing more profile action than Whitney Houston has seen drug dealers.

Yet the photos men choose boggle my mind and again just illustrates the differences between the sexes.  Lots of blurry shots, iphone mirror shots, and, my particular favorite (or lack thereof, as I'm too afraid to click on his profile) is a guy who's dressed as Hellboy, with horns and all.  The only acceptable reason for choosing that picture is because you're in witness protection and I don't think the FBI (or whoever runs that program) would let you sign up for online dating.

OKCupid has posted a much more scientific study of the phenomenon of the profile picture, if you're interested.  I may stick with my anonymous blob picture because compared to that mess all of my additional pictures make me look like Cindy Crawford.

You know, men and women are a lot alike in certain situations. Like when they’re both on fire – they’re exactly alike,
LL

New Year, new dude.

I discovered my new dating bible (see here ) about 3/4 of the way through 2011, but it was not until almost 2012 that I actually practiced what it preached.

Enter, The Aficionado.

The Aficionado is a big fan of wine, hence the nickname.  In online dating profile, he's probably the usual type I go after: attractive, tall, older, rich.  But in person he was much different and while this would usually cause me to write him off after date 2, I decided to stick around.

Our first date was rather unremarkable, but perfectly pleasant.  It was for lunch, which I preferred because my schedule is hard enough to navigate as it is.  It was very typical first date conversation which I find somewhat tiresome and lackluster.  We went our separate ways and I figured I'd never hear from him again.

So I was somewhat shocked to get a text from him the next day saying what a nice time he had and he would call me later.  Huh.  OK sure.  True to his word he called, we spoke, and he asked me out for the following weekend.  Manners make my heart grow fonder.

We had a lovely second date and he was a gentleman in every sense of the word.  I ended up seeing him 4 times in the following seven days and spent the night with him twice.

I know what you're thinking: dance off, pants off.

But NO!  I somehow have grown an ounce of self control and wisdom, and here I am 2 months later and STILL haven't slept with him.  If the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result, then suddenly I'm proving to be more sane than Britney Spears pre-head shaving meltdown.

Things have been moving at a nice slow clip since.  He is not the funniest or most charismatic guy I've ever met; not the most entertaining or opinionated, but the BIG things that matter: respectful, consistent, and nice, he is.  While normally this lack of a "oh my god I like him so much I think I'm going to die if I don't see him this weekend," would cause me to create a phantom business trip so that I didn't have to see him again, this time I've stuck it out and so far so good.

Much like AA, I'm taking it one day at a time.

If we take marriage at it's lowest, we find that it's friendship recognized by the police,
LL

This is why I'm single....

Got in the car tonight after a long day of work and what comes blasting from my speakers?

No, not Drake.  Lil Wayne?  Hell, even Kelly Clarkson?

Nope.

Bette motherfuckin' Midler, bitches.

Your move, grandma.