"Plan B" - Moving From Thought To Action

Well, after the first split with Sally a few weeks ago and the formalization of my separation from Sandy, I decided that it was now time to kick things into high gear.

It was time to meet new women who might be interested in me.

I brushed up the profile on the site where I first met Sally. I changed the text, the picture, the username, updated the biographical information (as needed) and then hit publish. So far I've probably sent introductory messages to at least 100 different women. Yup. You got that number write. I've no idea how many actually have seen it, so your guess is as good as mine. All of that work has resulted in a handful of introductions... probably around 5. The bright side is that it's a better response rate than direct mail campaigns! :-)

Well, on this online dating site, I met someone yesterday and had a brief IM exchange with her. She seemed very nice. We exchanged face pictures and chatted for a bit. Of course, I don't know that she's a real person yet. These online dating sites are full of what I call "profile spammers", who create bogus profiles to suck people in and try to get them to buy stuff. Though I am cautiously optimistic about this one.

She sent me two face shots of herself and I was just taken by surprise, because she has such a beautiful face. I even wrote back and said "oh my. You are a very beautiful woman". I found it hard to believe that she wasn't finding someone to be with or hadn't been married already. Turns out that she's a mere five years younger than I am.

It was very fun to chat with her and gives me hope that there are normal women out there who are looking for normal guys (if I can even classify as "normal", whatever the hell that means). As a matter of fact, that's one of the things that she commented on. She said "well, you seem normal enough". One could listen to that comment and think that this was a put down, but given the nature of online dating, I think it was intended as a compliment.

I think this is true, because of what I perceive to be the sheer number of maladjusted people (specifically, men) who troll these sites. I have no doubt that women have to be very careful that they don't meet some kind of stalker/rapist/serial killer type online. A little caution goes a LONG way, it seems. For that, I am happy to play along and help whoever I start talking to feel safe.

This online dating thing is a bit curious too. Women seem to be finding their way to my profile, which is nice. There are also a lot of lines being thrown in by these "profile spammers" I mentioned before.

I am also seeing a lot of the other male fish in the sea. There are guys with these incredible photos of their bodies and anatomical parts (need I say more?) and I'm just this normal (yes, in both of those senses) guy. Some of the things that these guys do/say/write just make me cringe. I think to myself "would you say this to someone you just met on the street?". 98% of the time, I'd say no. I wouldn't. So I don't.

I hope to hear from this lady again. I guess we'll see how this plays out. Only time will tell and there are no guarantees. Regardless of the outcome, I'm giving it my best shot and I am optimistic overall... I just need to extract my head from my ice cream and hot fudge every now and then. LOL

I will learn some lessons from this experiment. If nothing else, it will help inform and shape my next set of actions.

Right now, that's too far into the future. I've no idea what those may be.

The best thing for me to do right now is to take it one day and one step at a time.