This specific situation was vain and selfish. I guess I was overly broad there.

When people talk about age as a number they usually mean place in life. I, for instance, have no kids and no mortgage and have never been married. My life experiences in that area are more akin to your average 20 year old. I have a coworker in their early 30's that's had 4 kids, 2 marriages and a double mortgage. Clearly their place in life has no bearing on the raw numbers between us.

I'd like to keep this discussion to similar experiences. I'd be happy to discuss our differences in a separate topic.

It's nice to hear from someone who even knows what a DOS based game is :)

I'm in even worse luck than the guy who wanted someone to play Zelda with.. I'm all about the Atari 2600 :)

Ccleaner is mainly to reign in temporary files that could be a privacy concern. Whatever you do - do not use the registry "cleaning" functions as it can rip out important parts of programs and Windows itself.

Wiping the free space *just* removes traces of old files and does not directly effect performance. So, wiping free space only gives thieves less chance to steal personal information. Whatever performance gain you obtained was not directly related.

There are two main ways of speeding up your old computer:

A. Back up your stuff and give it a clean install of Windows. Over time Windows and programs slowly unravel. The more programs you have installed the worse it gets.

B. Have a technician copy your hard drive over to an SSD and install that into your old PC. They have convertors to go from the old style IDE to the SSD thingies.

A salad topped with salmon.

If I'm going to be lonely I may as well get fit to enjoy my own good looks :)

I think pure evil is an overstatement. I also think innocent is as well.

Everyone is vain and selfish. Everyone is horny. If you play the game you degrade both yourself and your fling. If you put them to a higher standard they may very well hurt you.

Everyone deserves a case by case basis.

Blondey111 has the right idea here. She did get the free attention. I got a lesson not to spend my emotional energy so unwisely. I came out with a better deal.

And, yeah. Unfortunately I have found the boyfriend to be a factor at times. I've chatted with a few people who eventually let slip the situation is "complicated" instead of single. That's when *I* get the cold feet and make my egress.

That sounds short but sufficient. I'm not sure if it's that guys don't like to read: just they type of person you want to appeal to.

Don't know how I feel about the personal information warnings at the bottom. Scammers aren't fazed by that. Real people might get paranoid vibes from you. Either way it's fine.

I like open world or "sandbox" games fo sho. I actually don't like GTA missions but LOVE pulling off stunts and exploring. In buggy, broken Bethesda games like Skyrim and Oblivion I really dig exploring out of bounds areas and glitches.

I'm sure we're agreeing with each-other here.

Age is just a number. If someone isn't mature enough to realise that then they'll have to move along. In this case I was blindsided. Up until her "discovery" we had similar interests and tastes. I'm not so much angry as puzzled at the petty vanity involved. *shrugs*

Sometimes it's the case where the generation that gets you considers you too old and the generation older too young.

Unfortunately, some people are slow to realise age is just a number. It doesn't reflect your interests or maturity. If someone younger rejects you they still have to learn some life lessons and don't deserve your companionship. Sucks to be them.

My new profile write up. Sounds a little more grumpy than I usually am so I'll let it sit for a spell. See what impressions it makes.

You know, it never came up. The video chat site also has my age listed so all she had to do was click on my profile there.

I personally have never given a thought to age by numbers so honestly it never occurred to me. I've seen people in their 20's with the emotional maturity of a 60 year old and vice versa.

Thanks Leigh2154 and messi_is_a_tim_1888! Yep, maybe it was the wrong person who gifted me with an easy egress due to their vanity. Should have expected new petty challenges to dating since I've been out of the game for nearly 2 decades.

So, this hasn't happened too often to me but it does happen.

A gal (not a scammer) in a video chat room decided to switch to a different venue. By this time she had plenty of opportunities to see my physique and enjoy my personality.

Alas, the different venue had my age information posted more prominently and she promptly got cold feet. Kind of ironic considering the chemistry worked JUST BEFORE noticing two digits.

Anyway one experience this puzzling behavior?

I hope people are looking at the profiles first before responding. If the only description they give is:

Hi..

Then it's a fake account.

I've stumbled upon communities where almost the entire site has been taken over by people who enjoy cybering and erp (erotic role playing)

These people aren't freaks. It's not abnormal to combine loneliness with fantasy. They can and will switch modes and be very nice people if you make it clear that you're not into it.

So, I wouldn't worry about someone who has done it in the past. It can be a healthy outlet when no other viable option exists.

It seems all the fake messages I get try to lure me onto either a Russian website or Yahoo Messenger.. anyone know why? Is it easier to infect computers via Yahoo?

I guess one fun game is to spot the fake account. It's a little easy since most of them have zero information and their description states "Hi.." and nothing else.

Ostravaganza has the real answer here. I mean, even after you hear them out I doubt if the situation could justify continuing to be friends.

Finding someone local does seem a bit more challenging then it should. I can find someone with practically the same interests in the same town and never get a response.

Sadly, I've found that %99 percent of the people who message me from out of state are scammers trying to lead me off site.