Hello Readers! I am not able to divulge my real name, for fear my mother may stumble upon this one day. For now, just call me Zyzenthia Raspberry.
I was so inspired by Lauren’s gutsy efforts with online dating that I decided to give it a whirl. I am honored to be invited to share my tale below. I should first note that I recently moved to a part of the country where the suitor pickins are frighteningly slim. After a girlfriend and I had a few glasses of wine, we decided to join OkCupid “just to see what is out there.” Well, as expected, I was thoroughly disgusted to find out that my potential suitors are comprised of nasty young boys who wear only underpants in their pictures, God-fearing dads who love football, and complete backwoods hicks who can’t write.
Imagine my delight when I came across the profile of a man who I shall refer to as “Sneeze-Socket,” which rhymes with his actual profile name, but otherwise has nothing to do with anything. He had a candidly lengthy profile, which seemed to flow with ease as he described his drive to work, midday car nap, addiction to gum, musical preferences, contemplation on how to best solve some severe traffic issues in the tunnel, best places to shop for booze and sushi on the way home from work, and his passion for making music. I’m kind of a sucker for guys who can write, especially those who do not confuse “your” and “you’re.” Anyway, his words were endearing and hilarious to me for some reason, so naturally I saved his profile as a word document on my computer desktop.*
After much contemplation, I decided to write him a message because he specifically stated the he does not like sports or hunting, which means I found the ONE dude within a 250 mile radius who does not like sports or hunting. JACKPOT! We are obviously meant for one another. And as a bonus, he can grow a beard and cross his eyes.
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He replied to my message and for about 3 weeks we exchanged daily tidbits, which were always entertaining. I noted that my pictures do not adequately display my third ear, and he responded that his photos did not do justice to his extra toe. And then I asked him to meet me. We made a tentative plan for one Saturday, which neither of us prioritized since it was Mardi Gras weekend. We then made firm plans for the following weekend, but he canceled the night before because he was “in the hospital for two nights with an ELBOW infection.” WTF, right? I obviously started to doubt his interest…until he sent me a picture of himself in the hospital bed with the caption, “Just so you don’t think I’m bullshittin ya.” Since he looked really cute in the picture and there were some hospitaly-type things in the background, I decided he was honest. He suggested we go out the following weekend, and I suggested we not wait. If you’ve ever done online dating before, then you know that it is most often the case that you have this awesome email banter with someone and then you convince yourself that they are the perfect mix of masculinity and nerd, wit and sincerity, and also very hot. Then you meet them and they are ALL nerd, or have an abnormally giant face, or talk in a weird voice, or live with their mom or something awful. Well, I didn’t want to wait any longer to see how screwed up my expectations were. And I told him.
Mr. Sneeze obliged, and met me at the local brewery the following Wednesday. We had beers, great conversation, lots of laughs. We even smashed our heads into each other as we were looking for the purse hook under the bar. How perfectly awkward we are! When the night was over and we exited the establishment, I reached out my hand to give his a shake. He mumbled something about how we should hug, and I agreed. He then accidentally rammed his shoulder into my chin, which induced my crush on him. I shot him a text when I got home, he text me back. We were both giddy (or buzzed). We decided to hang out the following Saturday.
The plan was to have a picnic followed by some hiking around this nice park, but it was raining. Backup plan: Picnic at Zyzenthia’s house! Since wine was always part of the plan, we started drinking at the commencement of our picnic, 1pm. I continued to drink until I became absolutely disgusting and out of control. I’m not quite sure what happened. I think my already low tolerance, mixed with my nerves and the fact that the most substantial thing on our picnic menu was stale crackers, did not work for me…but my behavior was truly inexcusable. I was repulsive. I couldn’t see right, I couldn’t walk right. I was saying the stupidest shit. I spilled wine multiple times and then called attention to the fact that I had saved his profile as a word document on my desktop. (GASP!!) I forgot about dinner, I didn’t see it get dark. We watched a couple movies that I have no recollection of. We made this giant tower puzzle, which was news to me. I barfed, and only at that point decided I was “too drunk.” I told him that I needed to go to bed, and realizing that he could possibly be a fraction as intoxicated as I was, I told him he could stay over.
Next thing I know, I’m practically raping him in my bed, barf breath and all. While I don’t know how it all ended, I woke up the next morning needing to hurl (no surprise), but too scared to move for fear that I would wake him with my barf noises through the paper thin wall. I have never been so mortified or careless in my whole life. He surprisingly seemed to be dreaming away and would occasionally put his arms around me, which I had to keep tossing off because I had the nauseous sweats and needed to be able to easily make a run for the toilet. Eventually, he jumped up and announced, “I have to go.” I told him I couldn’t get up because I was going to barf as soon as I did. It was awkward, so I got up anyway and tried to pretend like I had a little class. He tried to hug me and give me a smooch as I turned my head away, apologized, and ran for the bathroom. While I was vomiting, he drove away.
Well, I expected he would not want to see me again, but I was wrong. He was extremely understanding and kind about it all, and invited me to come watch a movie at his place the following Wednesday (I was easy after all!). I suggested we do dinner first, so he met me at the sushi restaurant, where I treated him to dinner as a small attempt at redeeming myself. After dinner, I followed him to his place. We walked in the front door, right into his roommate’s “band practice.” We drifted through the marijuana haze to the kitchen. I tried not to look around too much and followed him back to his bedroom.
Okay.
He’s 37 years old. His bed is a piece of memory foam mattress on the floor. He’s also got an incredibly uncomfortable futon, atop which he watches movies on his enormous computer monitor with some crazy speaker system. I didn’t know what to say. I wanted to shout, “WHAT THE FUCK! YOU’RE 37, WHAT THE FUCK!??” But instead I said, “Hmmm, you’re such a duuude.” Needless to say, this was all so disappointing. We watched the movie, and I immediately got my shoes on to leave. He kissed me, I wasn’t sure how I felt about it. I kissed him back. It was OK. I was unimpressed and I felt like I was in a dorm room.
For some reason I decided to give him another chance. I figured it might be like on The Bachelor when you think you want to get rid of the crazy drunk in the wedding dress and then you get to know her and you find out she is very sweet and worth keeping around. That, or I could just use him. So he came over the following Saturday night to hang. Long story short, I really liked him this time and I wanted to make out with him. So we did and it was awesome. Awesome awesome awesome. He was real, I was real and neither of us were intoxicated. Laying around in the dark, we talked about some real non small-talky things, which was great. I asked him why he doesn’t have a bed frame, and although his rationale was not acceptable, I still liked him. I couldn't believe it. I'm a little concerned that I could allow myself to fall for a 37 year old dude without a bed frame, and I'm looking forward to your reader advice. But you should know one more thing: Towards the end of the night, I asked him to tell me something I didn’t know about him, and he had me reach down and feel his extra toe. He really fucking has one people. It is small, but it is there. And it has a tiny little toenail.
*Editors note: This is a trick Zyzenthia taught me when I first tried online dating. Every time you click on a person's OKCupid profile, they can see that. So, instead of constantly clicking and appearing as a stalker, Zyzenthia thought of the genius plan of copying and saving the profile offline. Brilliant lass, she is.
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