That is awful. But sounds like you're better off with the horses than with him

Lots of fun stuff shared. Some really good advice too. Thought it might be too negative a topic, but the community rallied with humor, side-stepped my limits, and we all get a grin or two.

This is a distant cousin to my posting regarding online etiquette. I'm new to the online dating experience and enjoy mingle's active community. As I read the profiles and postings, there are many new and veteran members who suggest that online dating can go from...who are you.. to... where have you been all my life...to...what a [pejoratively fill in the blank] in a few days, hours, maybe even minutes. So I thought it would be fun and informative to share some Hero/ine to Zero/ine online tales. I do hope responses will be fun and generalized to protect the online identities involved.

It's a good thing we do. I read somewhere that etiquette is the art of making people feel comfortable. Nothing does that better than a light-hearted comment

Of course I don't know what to make of that. I suspect there is a bit of levity in it. So Ha Ha.

I do like being a lawyer and my parents taught me to be polite. I hope they succeeded.

Embarrassed, but thanks

That is great advice and, yep, I have some many emails to read from adoring suitors that mingle has threatened to ban me. LOL javascript:add_smiley('tongue','post_text')

I see that my efforts to respond to each particular posting have been flung together at the bottom of this post. I don't expect each of you to try to find my response to your post. I expected the reply button on your post to provide a situtional link to your comment to my post. Oh well, sh--- happens!

Sorry I missed you online,

Thanks for your insight. Will respond in more detail later. Have to run.

I know. But it was my first post.

I think you're cute too!

I admit it was wordy but I'm not sure that there isn't some merit that comes from investigating the framework underlying the spontaneity. There are just some things that we all kind of agree on...kind of pre-conceived on a group level, then expressed/published for the benefit of others. My intent was communal and the bit about my past heroics was just to provide background and some credibility that I am not clueless about relationships, but curious about online ones.

Thanks for you thoughts.

Thanks

Thanks for the encouragement. What you described is what I initially expected from my initial online dating experience. There is always that tension between shameless self promotion, which we all are very tired of, and self-description, which we all seem to be very interested in here

Thanks for covering my back while I was offline. I assume that you are from Newark Ohio. There is something about being midwestern. California was always culture shock, though I love the place. I just use fancy words to color the thought. As a legal dude they are my stock in trade. I don't intend to cause discomfort, but if the word seems to fit and someone isn't sure about it, I think it is great when we learn a new words. I didn't swallow a thesaurus, but I did learn alot from authors who could, in my opinion, turn a phrase.

You seem to have developed the art of "email" flattery. I say art because you describe very satisfying outcomes from an online activity that can be labeled unwelcome. Will try some of this. Very interesting.

Thanks

Sorry about the delay but I was hoping that the posting would develop into a collage of hints/suggestions. Beyond the "be yourself" core idea, I think there were some genuine insights into this online dating thing. I will take some time to digest them.

Thanks to all for their k-strokes

In the real world, when I was general counsel for a large night club in the midwest and ran a backstage security company for entertainers, I ran into lots of folks trying to hook up. I eventually, and after a few, actually more than a few, bruises to the male ego, sat back and studied the situation.

It occurred to me that lots of guys preen and posture but hang back waiting for some gal to throw themselves at the fella. I didn't see that work too often, though occasionally, a dude had something that women wanted. These men normally came with entourage or solo with lots of bling and status markers.

The women were usually in safe clusters of friends and colleagues. They danced together and drank the drinks the guys bought for them.

Eventually, it was clear that a subtle body language was at work, cruising under the radar screen. Once I learned this vocabulary, it was a breeze to meet new people. I once walked into a crowd of guys, maybe a dozen or so, hovering around a beautiful lady, and ended up dating her for a while.

This is my first attempt at online dating. I call it online dating because you can do almost all the things you would do on a date, but it's time shifted and in cyberspace. But the basics are still there.

At the risk of being accused of bisexuality, I searched the men's profiles in mingle so see what guys my age were doing/saying. Sizing up the competition, if you will. My impression is that there is lots of male ego dripping from the pages. There also seems to be a caricature of the sensitive male persona that was hatched in the 80's and reiterated up to the present. I don't know many women who really understand, let alone appreciate the female side of men (aren't we genetically 49% female?) I wonder how much traffic those "gentlemen" garner from that technique. I suspect, not alot. We live in challenging times with lots of fear and uncertainty. I suspect women, despite their substantial prowess and sophistication in the work world, would prefer a solid, independent, reliable, healthy, responsible, attractive male mate. Not the NFL Megastar, but the local mover and shaker, who beats the odds and gets the job done right.

So how do we translate the maleness that is attractive into a few keystrokes and a jpg or two?

Are women blowing men off with crappy pics? Should guys really work at that snapshot technique? I suspect they should. There were lots of lousy guy pics, especially in my age bracket. And some stunningly rude, arrogant and offensive usernames and taglines.

I further suspect that women are seeking an exciting facet to their solid man preference. The trendsetting, unique, avante garde, exclusive aspects of a guy. Maybe these attributes should end up in usernames and taglines.

Once the profile is decent, I suspect the challenge is to refrain from emailing every jpg you find stimulating. Are online daters expecting some online "foreplay"? I suspect they are since I emailed a ton of potential paramours and got nada! Since I know I can do better than that, and in the interest of helping my male compatriots, who are stumbling around like me, I would ask the community to share what does work or what they think would help break the digital ice and get people past the crappy photos and corny soundbite taglines and into genuine considerations of a persons compatibility.

I know this is lengthy and the online dating scene is "hairtrigger" intent on not suffering fools and wasting any keystrokes on "undesirables" but I further suspect that once the rules of the road are better expressed and understood, even though they seem to be even more ephemeral than in the real world, many more of us will have a better experience with online dating and avoid the "loser" stigma of just takin up space.