Well...how strongly do you desire real female companionship?
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- Thread starter ddrueding
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Well...how strongly do you desire real female companionship?
ddrueding
Fixture
I disagree. People who consider themselves "wholesome" are about as unattractive as it gets; usually religious or otherwise simple minded. What you want is functionally weird. I'm not saying that strippers are it, but that is a lot closer than "wholesome".
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
Here is the problem with looking for functionally weird: The women who are geeky/weird tend to be a lot younger than me - think like 20 year old anime and xbox fiends - and they tend to live in places where they already have craploads of options for finding guys like Chicago or Urbana or Madison. Around here, if they're age-appropriate and single, they're probably divorced, uneducated and looking for a wallet for their kids.
Stereodude
Not really a
:skepo: The extreme irony of this post was not lost on me.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
It might be noted that I'm actually a pretty wholesome guy. Not religious or simple minded, but other than my enjoyment of naked ladies I really don't have any vices to speak of.
Wholesome is one trait of many and everyone has their own definition for it. You've mentioned on several occasions that there is little to nothing there in the area you're in. If there is truly nothing there and that's truly the thing blocking you from being happier and even finding a lady friend who isn't best friends with the pole...move somewhere else. Work a few months or a year and save a ton of cash to hold you over until you find a job in a new area. Sell off shit you don't need and take a chance and go somewhere else. If it doesn't work out, move back.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
There is little to nothing here, but I have absolutely no evidence that moving anywhere else would improve my fortunes.
I'd also like to say that sex work is a job, not a personal indictment. People can be manipulative pieces of crap whether or not they take off their clothes for money. Most of the women I know who strip would say they're just being more honest about it.
ddrueding
Fixture
I can assure you that moving into the Silicon Valley, particularly around Palo Alto/Los Altos would increase your chances of finding someone tenfold. There are geeky graduate students and others more our age. I could introduce you to an entire house full of them.
timwhit
Hairy Aussie
I can assure he he doesn't need to move 2200 miles to find someone. 50 - 60 miles to the northwest would do it.
What would it hurt to try? You won't confirm your theory without verification/validation. Timwhit is right, you may not need to move 2000+ miles, it may just take a local move.
Not a personal indictment? Every time you reference your friend, remind me how you refer to her as? If you were not in support of said indictment, then why do you continue to label her as anything other than a friend or by her name? Every time you feel the need to bring up a situation with her, it revolves strongly about her job. You've identified her specifically to her job, and her job to her identity. It may very well be a job, but her job involves selling off a piece of her dignity in return for money. That kind of work comes from individuals who often times (not all cases) come from some kind of sexual abuse and in cases it's from child abuse specifically from parents. She doesn't need to be honest about being manipulative, she needs to be honest about what put her in that job in the first place.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
The harm would be the loss of a stable full time job that I actually do like.
The short answer there is that, in the short cast of characters in my life, her job often dictates the circumstances surrounding our interactions; her actual name isn't terribly meaningful and using it would probably create confusion.
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jtr1962
Storage? I am Storage!
For what it's worth here I pretty much gave up on ever having a significant other when I was younger than Merc. It's not that I couldn't get someone if I tried, especially in a place like NYC. It's just that what I could probably easily get I personally wouldn't find all that appealing or worth spending time/money on. Of course, taking my path means learning to enjoy your own company and just accepting being alone much of the time. I don't doubt that there's someone out there with whom I'd be absolutely enamoured with. I nearly had a shot at such a person when I was 20. But I'm not going to devote most of my life at this point looking for a proverbial needle in a haystack because that's what a search for another person like that would be like.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
I sort of see it as a failure of my basic humanity that I'm not appealing enough to be worthy of a relationship. That sort of mindset is the result of spending years and years and years of doing the needle in a haystack thing, but try spending four or five hours a week trying to make a connection on a dating site and see if you don't come away feeling like a complete piece of shit.
Self-reflection can be a brutal thing some times, but have you asked yourself why the female population may not find you appealing enough? Can you see things in yourself that you may not think are appealing (and I'm not talking about physically)? I obviously don't know you in person or know what you're like to interact with in real life but from all the years on this forum it's certainly evident that your attitude can be somewhat abrasive in discussions when you want your opinion known or you want to correct someone for doing or saying something that you wouldn't do or don't believe in. In situations where you vehemently don't like something you will continue to make sure people know this (WD, Sony, iThings, religion, having kids, etc) even to the point where interacting with you on the subjects just isn't worth it any more. Are you the same way with the women you interact with? I'm not saying your opinions on these various matters aren't valid. You're a very smart guy, but I do sometimes tire of even bothering to have an argument about any of these subjects because it's unproductive at best. If you apply these same traits in discussions with the various females in your online dating, perhaps similar things are happening? It's ok to not prove your point sometimes.
For those who love geeky things, this video was really neat. My buddy sent it to me and I really appreciated seeing and hearing how different sorting algorithms work. Bubble sort looks to be incredibly slow.
[video=youtube;t8g-iYGHpEA]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8g-iYGHpEA&feature=youtu.be[/video]
[video=youtube;t8g-iYGHpEA]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8g-iYGHpEA&feature=youtu.be[/video]
jtr1962
Storage? I am Storage!
Of course I would feel like shit if I put in a huge amount of effort trying for a relationship but coming up empty. In fact, a friend of mine was in exactly that position a few years back. It's only human to feel that way. I spent much of my early to late 20s walking aimlessly around NYC, or riding the subways, looking for someone whom might have instilled the desire in me to do something totally uncharacteristic-namely just start chatting with a total stranger and see where it leads. I figured this was the only thing which might work because the usual channels where I might meet someone weren't options. The club/bar scene wouldn't have worked for me. School was a great way to meet girls, but I was long done with it. The online world didn't exist. Well, I never found anyone. After being depressed as hell about it for a long time, I figured searching for something like that is bound to end in failure. Maybe the problem was in me because I was/am really particular about what I find appealing physically/personally, but if I sought anything less I would be doing a disservice both to them and myself. I would be settling, for lack of a better word. Many people you know who might be in relationships are only in relationships because they settled. That's why 50% of marriages end in divorce, and probably 75% of the other 50% suck. People just stop looking because they reason that this is the best they're going to find.
On some personal info, my sister just filed for divorce after 19 years of marriage. He left her last summer to hook up with someone he had met online. I was pretty upset about all this for a long time and mostly absent from here as a result. My brother never married or even had serious relationships as far as I could determine. Now with my sister on her own, we're 0 for 3. Don't feel so bad. I look on the bright side of things. Had I married in my 20s, chances are good I would be divorced now, alone like I already am, but also stuck paying alimony and child support. I haven't put the idea of ever having a relationship out of my mind, but I'm not looking at all any more. If in the course of my life it happens, then wonderful. If not, I'm sure I'll survive.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
You are missing something fundamental: There are no discussions. On sites that allow users to track visitors to a personal profile (I know that you're familiar with OKCupid, for example), it's actually incredibly unusual that a message, regardless of how formal, casual, conversational, florid, terse, witty or un-invested I might craft a message, even get a profile visit in return, let along a reply to a message. Now, you can think I'm a specific sort of unapologetic asshole and I do not disagree with you, but at the same time you have to acknowledge that writing is something that plays to my strengths. I would not care to guess what percentage of messages I've sent have resulted in replies; I'm sure it's best expressed as a fraction of 1%.
It's also true that almost every human will at some point form an intimate relationship for at least some time in their life. It is not pleasant to be part of the minority that have not done so as I approach middle age.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
Dan Savage is a Sex & Relationship advice columnist who whose work mostly appears in alternative weekly newspapers. He has a different way of describing the same phenomenon. He says that there is no one "The One" perfect person for everyone. Instead, there are tons and tons and tons of people who are .63 of the one, or a smaller number of .78s, and relationships work when people are willing to "round up" the imperfect fraction of a particular partner to one that they can actually live with.
Another aspect of this is that it's useful to judge the success of a relationship not by whether or not it is life-long, but how fulfilling it was for each party over the relationship's life.
I really do buy in to both those ideas. I think we make life difficult for ourselves by having the expectation of utter perfection, or that our needs in a partner at age 30 will still be the same as our needs at age 60. Put that way, perhaps your sister's 19 year relationship merely represents a certain period in her life. Clearly, she was content enough to stay with her husband for 19 years, and that should have at least some value on its own.
Your writing is certainly a strength, but it can also be a weakness if you always use it to its highest level. If you always show up to a casual lunch with a 3-piece suite on you might intimidate 99% percent of the people you're interacting with since they may not be at your level. If you only want to find someone who is at your level, then you'll have to wait longer for the 1% to show up. I never had an easy time with OKCupid or the likes. I know exactly what you mentioned earlier with feeling off after spending time browsing through those sites and not getting any kind of interaction. I was on and off those sites are various times with limited success. I refined profiles and focused on spending time away from it and with friends/family. Things eventually worked out, but maybe the area I live in has more available women?
Chewy509
Wotty wot wot.
Bubble sort is really slow compared to most others. Typically it depends on the underlying data structure of the list/vector, but most go with either a merge sort or a quick sort. Or the bright programmers use a binary search tree like a AVL or Red-Black tree where items are naturally sorted and insertions/deletions are typically O(log n) in performance (which is better than most list or vector structures).
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
Generally speaking, I try to match the tone in the profile. I write messages that are intended to start conversations and indicate that I have read the other person's available profile.
I can cast a nation-wide net on multiple sites, including several that require paid membership, including people who are plus or minus 10 years of my age, and have no better luck on any one than any other.
My family has all moved away. I have few real-life friends. There's a real dearth of social options here. So far as I can tell, my choices are sports or biker bars (or, yeah, strip clubs - I live within walking distance of four), churches or high school athletics. So online is my best bet and like I said, it's utterly dehumanizing to put time into something like that for weeks and months and years and have nothing to show for it. Unfortunately, the drive to find companionship does appear to be fundamental. No matter how much I'd like to withdraw completely into my very pleasant apartment and ignore every other human on Earth, I don't seem psychologically equipped to do so.
So anyway, this is a thing that sucks and if anyone were looking for a reason that I might seem pissed off all the time, well, there you go.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
I had that class when I was in my second year CS program, too.
From an audio standpoint, that video reminded me quite a lot of present-day minimalist composer Steve Reich's tape loop or synthesizer compositions.
[video=youtube;hXY_ML3oMwI]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hXY_ML3oMwI&feature=BFa&list=AL94UKMTqg-9AOmHp-ioQW7kqRYDHkVbPo[/video]
(Yes, that's something I'd listen to for challenge/enjoyment. Sometimes art is made for the masses, and sometimes it's made to impress other artists. Generally the less approachable something is, the more it's meant to speak to a sub-culture of artists and critics. In this case, there's a technical challenge to the musicians, who are each performing a distinct part on a keyboard, each with very subtle differences in rhythm, while maintaining perfect meter with each other.)
ddrueding
Fixture
I don't think I would draw any interest on social websites or speed dating, either. I'm not much to look at and I can't help but denegrate myself or slip into some really geeky minutia about something very quickly.
Every relationship I have been in was not their idea to start with. In fact, if we hadn't been effectively forced to remain near each other for extended periods, none of them would have gone anywhere. My wife and I were in dance class together (4 hours a week) for more than a month before she noticed me at all, and she didn't even like me for the first three months (apparently I talked too much). She wasn't interested in hanging out socially with just me for six months and we didn't start dating for nearly a year.
This is an extreme, but in the past it hasn't been unusual for me to build an acquaintance into a relationship over the course of 4-6 3-hour+ barbeques or (in one case) a full weekend worth of wedding rehearsals/associated events. You are complex, and willing to adapt for the right person. Both of those take time to appreciate.
That music reminds me quite a bit of some of the electronic/dub-step things I've been listening to lately. They all agree somehow, but the joy is identifying the individual threads and following one for a while.
Every relationship I have been in was not their idea to start with. In fact, if we hadn't been effectively forced to remain near each other for extended periods, none of them would have gone anywhere. My wife and I were in dance class together (4 hours a week) for more than a month before she noticed me at all, and she didn't even like me for the first three months (apparently I talked too much). She wasn't interested in hanging out socially with just me for six months and we didn't start dating for nearly a year.
This is an extreme, but in the past it hasn't been unusual for me to build an acquaintance into a relationship over the course of 4-6 3-hour+ barbeques or (in one case) a full weekend worth of wedding rehearsals/associated events. You are complex, and willing to adapt for the right person. Both of those take time to appreciate.
That music reminds me quite a bit of some of the electronic/dub-step things I've been listening to lately. They all agree somehow, but the joy is identifying the individual threads and following one for a while.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
I don't have the sort of social circle that works for that. I've never even been to a wedding. My in-person friends are all women. Nearly all of them are part of a couple, which means that there are a minimal number of occasions when it's acceptable to socialize without being disruptive to a more important relationship.
I was screwing around with Pandora in a class a while back and I was somewhat amazed at how many different styles and genres cross over with movie soundtrack composer Clint Mansell. Just a suggestion for you.
ddrueding
Fixture
There is quite a bit of Clint Mansell in my Pandora lists already, so thanks for that.
I would say that 80% of my friends are already in a relationship, and that they are the regulars at these events. But someone always brings a friend or two along, and sometimes it works. I would say I have a 2% success rate at getting a date after a brief conversation to confirm availability. Same as photography, you need to take a lot of pictures
I would say that 80% of my friends are already in a relationship, and that they are the regulars at these events. But someone always brings a friend or two along, and sometimes it works. I would say I have a 2% success rate at getting a date after a brief conversation to confirm availability. Same as photography, you need to take a lot of pictures
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
... yeah. I just don't have friends that I do stuff with.
jtr1962
Storage? I am Storage!
Same problem here. I have friends, but none of them really do things where you might meet females, and none have lots of unattached female friends.
You can find other interest groups (not specifically dating) here: www.meetup.com
And...after posting the URL and logging in for the first time in months, I found (and joined) a local geek group who play board games and sci-fi related stuff in my local area. Next week I can partake in these events. I'm sure they must have things in New York that can meet similar interests for you jtr? There has to be a biking group, or even an electronics group.
jtr1962
Storage? I am Storage!
This is why school for me was a great way to meet females. You're forced to share space in the classroom, so the time is there to appreciate people you might otherwise quickly dismiss. And you always meet others through your friends. I had lots of friendships of varying levels with females through high school. I fell in love a few times. Once I even had that love returned. Unfortunately all that stopped in college because college was a mix of people from all over the country, versus high school being all people from NYC. There's some truth to the fact that you get along best with those who have similar experiences to yourself. For me, my social life, such as it was, reached a high point in high school and it's been all down hill since other than the first semester when I commuted to college (the second semester of my sophomore year). I rode the subway with the girl I had fallen for two years earlier. She got off the train a few stops before me. This was in 1982. She was a high school senior at the time. It was nice for the short time it lasted. I wish I would have found a way to take things to the next level but I honestly felt we were both way too young to get really serious. Also, not having much experience with what was out there, there was the lingering doubt that maybe love blinded me, and there was something better out there. After 30 years and seeing what others I know hooked up with, I can unequivocally say for me there wouldn't have been anyone better out there. I have few regrets in life. Not having at least a long term relationship with this girl is my deepest regret.
jtr1962
Storage? I am Storage!
There's loads of things like that in NYC but the big problem is my hobby interests mean these groups would be 99% male (except maybe for biking, which can be mixed company). Also, running my own business with its crazy schedule pretty much precludes being able to do anything with regular meetings. And lately with my mom not being able to do as much I'm taking on most of the chores associated with running the household. Like I said earlier, if I meet someone it'll be just in the course of living my life. I went through the entire looking around stage with zero results and I don't want to go through that again. The one time in my life I was in love it just dropped into my lap, so to speak. I think that's telling me not to look too hard, but rather to just be patient.
I understand your schedule and family situation doesn't really allow for it. My point of the interest group was more aligned with your statement of being patient and not looking too hard, but at least getting out there and making yourself visible. Your interest groups may presumably seem 99% male, but you won't know without checking one out. You can also try expanding your horizon and pick something you wouldn't normally do just to experience it. I realize you have a lot on your plate, but it's worth giving yourself some time in life to experience new things.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
Trends among the groups near my ZIP code: Libertarianism, Conversativism, RON PAULism (seriously? Two different Ron Paul groups), African-American Empowerment, Single Mother Support (somehow this is not stripper related? I guess?), Entrepreneurship , "Leadership Development", Horse-Ownership. My personal favorite is the sex addicts recovery group with one member. Obviously there's more stuff in Chicago, but like a lot of things, that stuff is IN CHICAGO; geographically close but not necessarily convenient to get to.
I've looked at Meetups before. I think it's another one of those things that works better in more populated areas.
The other thing people always suggest is taking adult ed classes. Except that already I already teach adult ed classes (mine meet at the same time as everyone else's) and I don't actually have a set schedule from week to week because of my other professional obligations.
All of which puts me back at the online thing.
ddrueding
Fixture
Yeah...I can think of many places that would be worse than where you are, but I can only speak to those I know to be better.
Damn, it's like Merc is in the twiarlight zone. Are you sure the area is contaminated, or are there other reasons for the pauity of desirable females? Maybe you can find she someplace inbetween as fourth cascade compromise.
Mercutio
Fatwah on Western Digital
I do live in a weird place. My town is the convergence point for I80, I65, I90 and I94, all because of the steel mills. Everyone works in industries that support the mills or the people who work there. People who are educated and don't work for the mills pretty much leave. There's also some weird economic stratification going on. The mill guys are pretty much the middle class people around here. They don't want to actually LIVE here, because the area around the mills is pretty nasty because of pollution and either urban or trailer park ghetto, so these guys all make 30 or 40 mile commutes from places that are nicer than the immediate area. They're also an older population.
What's kind of missing here is any sort of population of young professionals. It just doesn't exist.
What's kind of missing here is any sort of population of young professionals. It just doesn't exist.
I just inherited a new 2U server. My buddy said his company was junking their previous generation systems. He brought it home and gave it to me to play with. So far this is what I got:
Intel SR2500 (S5000PAL motherboard)
16GB RAM DDR2 PC2 5300 ECC (8x 2GB)
2x Intel Xeon E5345 (2.33 GHz 4 cores, 8MB cache)
6 x 136GB 3.5" Seagate 15KRPM SAS in RAID 50 (configurable)
2 x 750W power supplies (redundant)
2x 1Gb NICs
Oh my hell is this thing loud when first powering it up. Both my cats were in the room at the time and ran out of there like it was nobody's business! Once it POSTed, the fans slowed down a bunch, but it's still mega-loud. This one will have to go in the basement for sure!
Looks like ESXi 5.1 is supported on this system. I may give that a try or play around with Server 2012. If I can find some reasonably priced memory, I might consider upgrading it, but the little checking I've done shows it's still rather expensive. I'm trying to find what kind of drives I can put in this thing. It might make for a nice file server if I can put some 1TB drives in it.
Intel SR2500 (S5000PAL motherboard)
16GB RAM DDR2 PC2 5300 ECC (8x 2GB)
2x Intel Xeon E5345 (2.33 GHz 4 cores, 8MB cache)
6 x 136GB 3.5" Seagate 15KRPM SAS in RAID 50 (configurable)
2 x 750W power supplies (redundant)
2x 1Gb NICs
Oh my hell is this thing loud when first powering it up. Both my cats were in the room at the time and ran out of there like it was nobody's business! Once it POSTed, the fans slowed down a bunch, but it's still mega-loud. This one will have to go in the basement for sure!
Looks like ESXi 5.1 is supported on this system. I may give that a try or play around with Server 2012. If I can find some reasonably priced memory, I might consider upgrading it, but the little checking I've done shows it's still rather expensive. I'm trying to find what kind of drives I can put in this thing. It might make for a nice file server if I can put some 1TB drives in it.
ddrueding
Fixture
For the record, "Work" (see sig) idles at 140W. Not exactly efficient.