Dating Games, Part 2
“Anye impietie may lawfully be committed in love, which is lawlesse.”
John Lyly, Euphues (1578)
[Some facts below may be fictitious, for the sake of the narrative! ;-)]
Previously, … I told you about Northern Beaches beauties and dingbats with dictaphones and how dating can bring one to parts of Sydney one never saw (Manly!). I also illustrated how difficult it can be to cut through the crap & deception, or at least economy with truth writ large, that seem to come with the territory. All that eye-candy on display is too often not what it seems to be once you inspect it more closely. In fact, there are some pretty damaged goods out there. Sometimes it’s just sad. Be kind.
It’s a funny game that matching game. Not surprisingly it has been researched a lot. My former colleagues Peter M. Todd and Geoffrey F. Miller for example had a chapter in Simple Heuristics That Make Us Smart where they analyzed through simulations how much sampling it takes under various satisficing assumptions in the kind of two-sided matching market that is dating. Mutual choice complicates the search problem and the fact that often there is no recall (i.e., going back to someone that you liked, kinda, who has since moved on) creates additional complications; did I mention that it is a funny game that matching game? Complicated, too.
I did have a couple of nice dates last week Friday and Saturday; we agreed that we were not ideally matched but that another outing was not out of the question. Then came Sunday; the Sunday — remember! — that was too far away for the Northern-Beaches dingbat with the dictaphone …
I worked away in my office on some assessment and found myself pleasantly surprised when out of nowhere I got a message around noon from someone that I had sent a message to a few weeks ago …
13 February 2023
5:38 am: You sent (Name) a smile
5:40 am: That got my attention right away: If (Name) had one wish, she would wish for: Parallel universes. Also, clever comedy. ;-) Would love to meet you.
7:53 am: Here is more about me, in case you are interested: [link]
5 March 2023
11:46 am (Name) sent you a smile
11:46 am Hi Andreas, it’s nice meeting you here.
11:47 am Wonderful to hear from you, (Name)!
11:48 am I would love to meet you, on your terms needless to say. What would be the most comfortable way for you?
11:48 am Cup of coffee?
And off we were. She offered kindly to meet me half-way in Chatswood (a part of Sydney I have been to once or maybe twice), my Tripadvisor and google skills came in handy, and about a couple of hours later we met at Cafe Markus.
She was quite nervous and it turns out the parallel universe she was thinking of did not have as reference point Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022) but we hit it off nonetheless … .
6 March 2023
7:03 pm Trusth you made it home safely, (Name)! Quite enjoyed our outing. You seemed very nervous at the start ;-) but I quite enjoyed chatting with you, felt very comfortable, and got the impression so were you as we went.
7:13 pm Hi Andreas, sorry for being a bit nervous at the beginning. It’s very nice meeting you too. Yes, would love to catch up with you again. Regards, (Name)
7:25 Done deal then, (Name)! Let me know about your availability next week.
Meanwhile … it was difficult to keep up with expressions of interest although the two-sided matching incidence took care of most right away. That undoubtedly goes the other direction, too.
Unfortunately, the Remove option of my preferred site is not much of a help since it does not remove EoIs that you want removed for good. At first I thought that was a bug but I now believe it is a feature of that particular site. Sigh.
One thing that the Chatswood episode taught me is — you can’t hurry love, or whatever it is you want to hurry. Everyone is busy with their lives and presumably other EoIs. You just gotta let the chips fall where they may.
I also had an interesting phone conversation — initiated by her — with someone in another city, someone who also responded weeks after I sent my EoI. I see some domestic traveling in the not-too-distant future …
Oh, and I had another of those communication breakdowns; to wit:
Me (quite a while ago): Please check out my profile; would love to hear from you …
She (32 minutes ago) Hi Andreas, lovely to connect here. I am wondering what you do. I am a psychologist.
Me: Lovely to hear from you, (Name). I was hoping you would get in touch. You can find out more about me here: [link]
She (21 minutes ago): I am not able to find that on LinkedIn. I keep getting that the page does not exist. You will have chat here about what you do.
This is what comes up https://www.linkedin.com/404/ which is an error message
Me (14 minutes ago): Strange.
She: I have had another look and its not coming up for me.
Me: The address seems correct, just checked: [link]
You can also check this: [another link]
There’s a couple of more pictures there ;-)
She: Pictures are fine but don’t tell me about you. So what is it that you do>
She (7 minutes ago, without me getting a chance to respond) You are getting me to chase up everything on the internet instead of chatting on here. The purpose of this site is to chat here which you don’t want to do. Sorry but you don’t want to talk on this site and you are making me work to find out about you. Good luck.
And that was that. Here I try to be open and transparent, and then that …
;-( Probably for the better though, no?
In closing, and on an amusing note, one of my Facey friend wrote me:
If you’re after dating advice, then from my vast experience gained by never having been to a dating website or app, I suggest going back to playing guitar with Golden Earring would be your best bet. If you sent me that story because you want to meet me IRL, then that could be arranged. (Initials)
Turns out, me friend had signed up for notifications from my medium blog … and mistook it for a message from me to her. Also turns out, we both live near the CBD, so we will now catch up IRL before long …
Consider making your opinion known by applauding, or commenting, or following me here, or on Facebook.
