I was watching television just earlier and had watched a couple episodes of Seinfeld. Then I decided that I didn't feel like watching that anymore, so I changed the channel and started watching CNN. It was just a minute or so before 7 pm, so Wolf Blitzer's show was finishing up, although as it turned out, Wolf was off today and none other than Jim Sciutto was filling in for him. So I was sort of disappointed that I had missed Jim Sciutto filling in for Wolf. I think maybe that's a sign that he might get his own show sooner or later, possibly. Chris Cuomo has a new prime time show, it seems, replacing Don Lemon, I believe. Anyways, the 7 pm show started and they had Anderson as well as a few other people out in Texas reporting on the hurricane. Anderson has traded in his trademark black t shirts for polo shirts, it seems. I wonder why he did that. Maybe Wolf will be away tomorrow also and they'll have Jim Sciutto fill in for him again. I wonder if anyone has ever mistakenly called him Jim Prosciutto, since I recently discovered the joy that is prosciutto (a lunch meat). One time in the past, Anderson (I think) mixed up Jim Sciutto and Jim Acosta. Anyways, I do like the semi change in pace that is hurricane coverage compared to coverage of the hot mess that is the government these days.
Secondly, this part of the post can aptly be titled "I can't believe I'm paying money for this!" It's been nearly a full week and I can safely say that I think my classes are on the boring side this semester. Unfortunately. It's a necessarily evil though; the classes are required classes so I don't really have much of a choice about taking them. One of them I dislike more than the other, although both aren't particularly interesting to me. So let me record today's atrocity for posterity. Firstly, I think I should mention that, earlier in the week, I developed an awful blister on my left foot because I wore some new shoes. As a requirement for the laboratory portion of the class, students must wear closed shoes. I'm a big fan of slip on sandals since I'm very lazy and like my feet to have ventilation during the warmer months. So usually I'm wearing whichever pair of flip flops are my preferred ones out of the different pairs I have. Anyways, on that day, I couldn't wear the sandals so I decided to wear the new shoes, since it was raining and my older (more comfortable) shoes have holes in them and my feet would get wet. In short order, the shoes were uncomfortable, and by the time I got to class, I already had a blister. The 30 minutes of walking it took to get there is a separate issue. Immediately after the class was over, I went to Walmart to find some cheap sandals that I could change into. Since it's nearly September, they didn't have a very good selection of sandals, so I had to make do with this pair of pink jelly sandals that didn't exactly fit. But at least they weren't rubbing my heels. They fell off my feet a couple of times when I was walking home, and after I got home, I threw them away. What's even more infuriating is that the only thing we did in the lab portion of the class that day was to do graphing, which does not involve chemicals and is completely safe to do when wearing sandals, or, hell, even barefoot (although it's sort of tacky to go barefoot in public, unless you're at the pool or beach). So I'm resentful over the blister, for one thing.
That was just the prelude to today. Today I wore sandals initially to get to campus and brought other shoes in a bag to change into later. Which was more tolerable but my heel blister still hurts, so even the comfortable shoes were sort of painful because they were touching it. Today's laboratory lesson was the inane task of designing an experiment to test the absorbency of various paper towel brands. Let me tell you, that was one of the most ridiculous things I've ever spent wasted an hour and a half of my life doing. I'm nearly 20 years old for god's sake!! And I'm being reduced to snipping paper towels into equal sizes and designing a stupid experiment that will most effectively test which brand is the most absorbent. That whole lesson is for the birds. I can't believe I'm paying money for this!!! It was most certainly a 9th grade level assignment. I'm too old for this shit! And to think that I'm paying tuition to do something like that in class!! Ridiculous! I'm not sure it's completely the professor's fault, as the curriculum is probably designed by other people, but I was absolutely infuriated by the end of class. What an inane waste of my time!! After which I decided to treat myself to some emotional eating and I had Chick fil A for lunch. For the record, from personal experience, I can tell you that Bounty brand paper towels are the best. I've noticed that other brands of paper towels take more sheets to clean up spills, and I'd have to go back multiple times to get a new sheet. I don't need to design a stupid fucking experiment to know that. For fuck's sake. Anyways, I really needed to get that out of my system. What's worse is now, for next week, I have to write up a report about the experiment, which I'm already loath to do. I wish I could drop the class because it's boring and inane, but it's required.
This is why I'm going to become a (future starving) linguist and/or copy editor/journalist. Some may debate about whether linguistics matters, although the question of whether journalism matters I think is more clear cut - it does. So I would like to do something with my life that matters, and wasting my time and brain power designing scientific experiments to test paper towels for some class is not under that category. What a ripoff! Once again, I can't believe I'm paying money for this!!
I think I will eschew doing my homework at this time and watch the news and/or a Peter Sarsgaard movie, or something. Bleh.
Thursday, August 31, 2017
Sunday, August 27, 2017
The big, scary future
(or, typical millennial musings, perhaps?? Even though I would say I just barely qualify as a so-called millennial)
Re: title - it refers to my personal future in general, not the future of this blog. This blog shall continue as long as I have the time, energy and ideas for it.
As it seems sort of fitting to do with the onset of a new semester upon us, I have ramped up fretting about what I'm going to do with my life in the actually not so far off future - I'm getting old and I gotta start thinking about careers and that kind of thing, as they say.. If I had really been on top of things, which I'm currently not (and sort of wasn't in the past, either), I would've thought about these things like... two years ago, probably, and I would've applied to and ideally gotten accepted into a fancy college and all that... Alas. Not that I exactly want to think about them now, because it's not super fun to consider what I perceive as the not-so-ripe prospects that are out there for me. Not that I've really looked, but I just don't have a lot of confidence in my future/long term success. Not because I'm unintelligent or that kind of thing, but because I don't think there are good/easy to get jobs in the areas that interest me. Future starving linguist here. If only I were interested in computer science and/or engineering! (this is one of the reasons why I would ideally like to date someone who values the humanities, so that we can commiserate about how all the good [as in, high paying and seemingly in high demand] jobs are technology/science related...) Sort of a tangent here, but last semester I had discussed the concept of how fewer women go into science/technology careers with one of my professors and I had said that I sort of feel.. not quite obligated, but like I ought to go into a career like that because there needs to be more women in those careers. Although those things don't really interest me and I don't think that I would enjoy it too much. The conclusion of that conversation was that it's fine and good for other women to have/pursue careers in those areas, but that us particular women (this professor is a sociology professor) don't have the desire to do that and that's fine too.
On top of the whole all-the-good-jobs-are-in-science-and-technology thing, I semi-non-seriously worry that I'm going to become a drug addict, which, although of course I don't plan on it, could still theoretically happen. Maybe my life will take various turns in the future that lead me to become a drug addict. I'll let you know if that happens. Although, I sort of feel like it would be difficult for me to become a drug addict, at least as far as injecting heroin goes, because the whole concept of shooting up sort of freaks me out. Although I guess I could still snort cocaine or something. I feel like the nonchalance with which I talk about theoretically becoming a drug addict probably would come across as weird to those who are unfamiliar with me and my fascination with drug addicts (or, as the Associated Press wants us to say, people who are addicted to drugs).
If I do indeed happen to become a drug addict, then so be it, but it will also mean that one of my other worries that I have will have also come true - worrying that other people will be more successful than me. Unless I'm a particularly high-functioning theoretical future drug addict, I would imagine that the various people I know of would be out there being more successful than me in that scenario. Which, even theoretical-becoming-a-drug addict aside, gives me more of a reason to avoid these people as much as possible because I'd rather not be potentially reminded of how other people are out there being more successful than me. So the less I see of/am around/think about them, the better. Which means, actually, that there's a semi-decent excuse to not transfer to [large in-state university] in the quite near future. Not that I'm going to just not go to college anymore, but that I think maybe it would be... more enjoyable/would give me more peace of mind/less stress to go to a different school where fewer of these various people who I assume are out there being more successful than me have gone. Just an idea. I'm not sure if my mother would see the worry about other people being more successful than me as a legitimate reason to not transfer to that particular school. Come to think of it, I sort of had my fill of these various people in high school, which is where I know of them from. Nothing against them (well, most of them), but it's not like I particularly have a large desire to see many of them again. If I were really interested in the particulars of their lives, I'd be on facebook or something.
I am trying really hard not to think too much about a particular person I know of (maybe I should make that an abbreviation? APPIKO, how's that?) who I'm aware is pursuing (and most definitely much more proactively than I am) the career of journalism. This grates at me even more specifically, because of the subject/career area being the same as something I may actually attempt to try and pursue more. So that stresses me out. Maybe it shouldn't, but it does, so I try not to think about it too much, but here I am, thinking about it. The success of other people in other fields that I don't really have an interest in bothers me less because those aren't things that I'm actively not being as successful as I wish in - I don't really have an interest in being a, say, biochemical engineer or whatever, so it doesn't matter how well other people are doing if they're studying that. This is all really depressing to think about. Maybe I need to be more outgoing and I'd be more successful.. Maybe that's the key.
Sort of along the lines of pursuing a career in journalism in the future, I've looked up which various internships are available, which at the moment I'm not going to apply for, but may in the future. Some of the places I've considered are: The New Republic (yes, that one), Slate, Washingtonian Magazine/Bethesda Magazine (both magazines focused on local matters), various others but those are the ones that come to mind the most. I liked the wording on Washingtonian's page where it talks about internships:
The aside aside, it really bothers me, the idea of people I know of being more (as in, decently more) successful than me. Or rather, you could look at it as being that the idea of me being a failure bothers me. But I like the phrasing of 'other people being more successful than me' better. That sort of conveys that, maybe I won't necessarily be a complete failure, but I won't necessarily be as successful as I think I should ideally be either (compared to other people). So there's a bit more nuance to that phrasing, I think. Although maybe we could broadly expand that idea to the concept of insecurity about myself. Maybe I shouldn't try to psychoanalyze myself, by the way. It's never particularly fun, I don't think.
And to top all of this off, I should probably try to meet people in person if I really want to date someone, because I've been online dating for over a year now and I haven't been on one single actual date in person. However, like I've thought on multiple occasions, if it's this difficult to find someone worthwhile to date, then maybe I'm just better off staying single and watching Peter Sarsgaard movies, and that kind of thing.
To close, a non sequitur (sort of - I would say that insecurity drove him to fabricate and me worrying about other people being more successful than me is sort of a facet of insecurity, although it won't cause me to fabricate): If Stephen Glass had a blog (now, or ~20 years ago, or both!), what would he write about? Or, to specify, if he had a blog that's sort of similar to mine in that it's about my various thoughts, what would his thoughts be that he'd write about on his blog??
Re: title - it refers to my personal future in general, not the future of this blog. This blog shall continue as long as I have the time, energy and ideas for it.
As it seems sort of fitting to do with the onset of a new semester upon us, I have ramped up fretting about what I'm going to do with my life in the actually not so far off future - I'm getting old and I gotta start thinking about careers and that kind of thing, as they say.. If I had really been on top of things, which I'm currently not (and sort of wasn't in the past, either), I would've thought about these things like... two years ago, probably, and I would've applied to and ideally gotten accepted into a fancy college and all that... Alas. Not that I exactly want to think about them now, because it's not super fun to consider what I perceive as the not-so-ripe prospects that are out there for me. Not that I've really looked, but I just don't have a lot of confidence in my future/long term success. Not because I'm unintelligent or that kind of thing, but because I don't think there are good/easy to get jobs in the areas that interest me. Future starving linguist here. If only I were interested in computer science and/or engineering! (this is one of the reasons why I would ideally like to date someone who values the humanities, so that we can commiserate about how all the good [as in, high paying and seemingly in high demand] jobs are technology/science related...) Sort of a tangent here, but last semester I had discussed the concept of how fewer women go into science/technology careers with one of my professors and I had said that I sort of feel.. not quite obligated, but like I ought to go into a career like that because there needs to be more women in those careers. Although those things don't really interest me and I don't think that I would enjoy it too much. The conclusion of that conversation was that it's fine and good for other women to have/pursue careers in those areas, but that us particular women (this professor is a sociology professor) don't have the desire to do that and that's fine too.
On top of the whole all-the-good-jobs-are-in-science-and-technology thing, I semi-non-seriously worry that I'm going to become a drug addict, which, although of course I don't plan on it, could still theoretically happen. Maybe my life will take various turns in the future that lead me to become a drug addict. I'll let you know if that happens. Although, I sort of feel like it would be difficult for me to become a drug addict, at least as far as injecting heroin goes, because the whole concept of shooting up sort of freaks me out. Although I guess I could still snort cocaine or something. I feel like the nonchalance with which I talk about theoretically becoming a drug addict probably would come across as weird to those who are unfamiliar with me and my fascination with drug addicts (or, as the Associated Press wants us to say, people who are addicted to drugs).
If I do indeed happen to become a drug addict, then so be it, but it will also mean that one of my other worries that I have will have also come true - worrying that other people will be more successful than me. Unless I'm a particularly high-functioning theoretical future drug addict, I would imagine that the various people I know of would be out there being more successful than me in that scenario. Which, even theoretical-becoming-a-drug addict aside, gives me more of a reason to avoid these people as much as possible because I'd rather not be potentially reminded of how other people are out there being more successful than me. So the less I see of/am around/think about them, the better. Which means, actually, that there's a semi-decent excuse to not transfer to [large in-state university] in the quite near future. Not that I'm going to just not go to college anymore, but that I think maybe it would be... more enjoyable/would give me more peace of mind/less stress to go to a different school where fewer of these various people who I assume are out there being more successful than me have gone. Just an idea. I'm not sure if my mother would see the worry about other people being more successful than me as a legitimate reason to not transfer to that particular school. Come to think of it, I sort of had my fill of these various people in high school, which is where I know of them from. Nothing against them (well, most of them), but it's not like I particularly have a large desire to see many of them again. If I were really interested in the particulars of their lives, I'd be on facebook or something.
I am trying really hard not to think too much about a particular person I know of (maybe I should make that an abbreviation? APPIKO, how's that?) who I'm aware is pursuing (and most definitely much more proactively than I am) the career of journalism. This grates at me even more specifically, because of the subject/career area being the same as something I may actually attempt to try and pursue more. So that stresses me out. Maybe it shouldn't, but it does, so I try not to think about it too much, but here I am, thinking about it. The success of other people in other fields that I don't really have an interest in bothers me less because those aren't things that I'm actively not being as successful as I wish in - I don't really have an interest in being a, say, biochemical engineer or whatever, so it doesn't matter how well other people are doing if they're studying that. This is all really depressing to think about. Maybe I need to be more outgoing and I'd be more successful.. Maybe that's the key.
Sort of along the lines of pursuing a career in journalism in the future, I've looked up which various internships are available, which at the moment I'm not going to apply for, but may in the future. Some of the places I've considered are: The New Republic (yes, that one), Slate, Washingtonian Magazine/Bethesda Magazine (both magazines focused on local matters), various others but those are the ones that come to mind the most. I liked the wording on Washingtonian's page where it talks about internships:
Jobs
Editorial Fellowship
Are you caught—or about to be caught—somewhere in that treacherous valley between freshly minted college graduate and full-time journalist, where clips at a magazine like ours are the climbing shoes you need to get up the mountain ahead of you? Or are you at least a rising college senior with a few solid clips and, ideally, previous media internship experience?
Are you looking for the chance to write and report in the nation’s capital? Do you want to be surrounded by professionals who take journalism seriously but also like to have fun and swap ideas?
Does incomprehensible-to-outsiders corporate-speak make your insides twirl as though Lloyd Blankfein himself is stirring them from his throne at Evil HQ? Can you get fired up every day about at least one of our coverage areas: Washington news and politics, dining, lifestyle, travel, etc.?
Are you willing to, some weeks, fact-check stories to the point of unequivocal accuracy and look dead into an editor’s eyes and say “all clear”? Are you willing to check your ego at the door and occasionally work shifts at the reception desk and help out at events, knowing that doing so is just another step on the ladder to greatness?
If this sounds like a fit, we offer an experience that’s low on grunt work and high on opportunity. Graduates of our program have gone on to publications such as Vanity Fair, Sports Illustrated, Entertainment Weekly, National Geographic, Allure, Smithsonian, and USA Today (and have landed full-time jobs at Washingtonian).
The positions are 40 hours a week for four months in the fall, five months in the spring, and three months in the summer, with possible extensions for standout fellows. The pay is $12.50 per hour.
Primary Duties
- Fact-checking and research.
- Enterprising fellows will find many opportunities to pitch and write for the magazine and the website.
- Will have the opportunity to meet with editors, writers, and heads of department over the course of the program to discuss their roles at the magazine and their careers in journalism.
- Position reports to Assistant Editor, Kim Olsen.
The aside aside, it really bothers me, the idea of people I know of being more (as in, decently more) successful than me. Or rather, you could look at it as being that the idea of me being a failure bothers me. But I like the phrasing of 'other people being more successful than me' better. That sort of conveys that, maybe I won't necessarily be a complete failure, but I won't necessarily be as successful as I think I should ideally be either (compared to other people). So there's a bit more nuance to that phrasing, I think. Although maybe we could broadly expand that idea to the concept of insecurity about myself. Maybe I shouldn't try to psychoanalyze myself, by the way. It's never particularly fun, I don't think.
And to top all of this off, I should probably try to meet people in person if I really want to date someone, because I've been online dating for over a year now and I haven't been on one single actual date in person. However, like I've thought on multiple occasions, if it's this difficult to find someone worthwhile to date, then maybe I'm just better off staying single and watching Peter Sarsgaard movies, and that kind of thing.
To close, a non sequitur (sort of - I would say that insecurity drove him to fabricate and me worrying about other people being more successful than me is sort of a facet of insecurity, although it won't cause me to fabricate): If Stephen Glass had a blog (now, or ~20 years ago, or both!), what would he write about? Or, to specify, if he had a blog that's sort of similar to mine in that it's about my various thoughts, what would his thoughts be that he'd write about on his blog??
Saturday, August 26, 2017
Postsecret review 11
Really late on this one, almost too late, but here it is. I think I'll cut myself some slack because I was suffering from a cold this week.
"I work from home for 'health reasons', but it's actually so I can go nude all the time." This one... sort of baffles me. Maybe it makes sense to people who live by themselves, or with their significant other. Otherwise it'd be pretty weird to wander around the house naked if you're living with other people.
"My BFF his his AIDS because he didn't want to be fired. He died on a 'sick day'" I think this is actually the first secret about AIDS that I can remember reading, so that's something..
"I cry whenever an argument isn't going my way (works every time)" That's sort of childish.
"I '[facebook like icon]' posts from super-conservative Facebook pages in the hopes that occasionally, one will appear in front of one of my many super-liberal 'Friends' just to annoy them." That's yet another passive aggressive thing to do, like a number of secrets have confessed in the past.
"Christians elected Trump. Now I no longer believe." Well, that's as good a reason as any to apostatize, I guess. (over a picture with the bible verse "Give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about you" underlined)
"[a secret seemingly written in the IPA characters, which I sort of know, but the handwriting isn't so good so I can only make out 'I contain' although there is another word, over a picture labeled Walt Whitman, who was possibly a transcendentalist? ... actually, on second glance, I think the third word is 'multitudes'...]"
"I'm so proud of you for beating this shit. You're better off without it." (over a picture of some kind of drug, it looks like. Crystal meth??)
"I think He is watching us slowly destroy the LIFE He gave us" I guess if you're religious, this is a thought that you might have. I personally can't recall ever having a thought like this, but some of the thoughts that I do have are along the lines of "What would it be like if I became a drug addict?" or "I wonder if I'll get murdered" or "It would be just awful to have one's legs blown off by a bomb" or "[location] is where you can get the cheapest Big Mac that I'm aware of"
"I'll never let go. Your hands and your heart are my home." I assume this person means it sort of more figuratively. Also, naturally, I thought of the movie Titanic...
"I am happily married but I, recently, googled my ex boyfriend. I found out he died. I am surprised by how much his death is bothering me." I think this is understandable. I also like the style of writing of this secret, even though it's only a few sentences. If, say, theoretically, I found out that a certain someone who I really don't know barely anything about, had died, I'd probably be fairly sad about it even though I only talked to him like once and that was to ask (weirdly, probably, to him at least) to touch his very blonde hair. So let's hope that he's alive and well, doing whatever it is that he's doing, which I don't know specifically because I don't know him personally, I just know of him.
"I wish I would get as sick as the patients on House [MD, a tv show about doctors] just to see who would visit me in the hospital." This is an interesting secret, although I'm not quite sure that I share this person's thoughts. I don't exactly think that I'd like to get as sick as the patients on House MD, even if I would get to find out who would visit me in the hospital.
"I steal the coupon section from your paper every Sunday before you get up." I really wonder about a) the motivations behind this and b) the relationship between the author and the person whose coupons are being stolen, since that would provide some much-needed context.
"I'm soooo afraid I've missed all my chances... and will end up alone & lonely" (with a chart showing a graph of age vs "chances of finding my true love & soulmate")
A) "alone & lonely" is pretty redundant. B) the graph drawn isn't labeled with any numbers on either axis, which to me seems like a glaring omission. That wouldn't get you a good grade at all in math class. Plus, age is put on the y axis and I think it should go on the x axis, as that axis is for time and age is a kind of time.. I don't even like math but I know some things about how graphs are supposed to made properly.
"I tell all the kids I babysit that I turn into a mermaid at night. They always believe me." That's kind of cute, actually, although I personally have no patience for taking care of small children, even if I were getting paid for it.
"I never thought I would be able to pin it down so precisely... ... but I've realized that today is the last day of my childhood." I wonder what particular thing made the writer decide that that particular day was the last day of their childhood. It could be any number of things.
"My wife spent our entire marriage wishing she had married someone else" I assume this was written by the husband (or possibly other wife, I guess), which made me think that it'd be kind of weird to tell your spouse "I wish I'd married someone else"... that seems like the kind of thing that you maybe wouldn't want them to be aware of. But what do I know, I've never been married.
"This is NOT my husband's foot. But - woops - that one sure does belong to me!" (over a picture of two feet) I'm going to assume this secret alludes to an affair going on. Some affairs are worse than other affairs, I'd say. I wrote a post about that somewhere in the past.
"I promised I would'nt tell." (over a picture of an outline of a body) I guess you could make a conjecture that this one alludes to murder, or something. What bothers me more is the incorrect apostrophe placement in "wouldn't"...
This week's secrets actually seemed fairly interesting, a nice mixed bag of different topics covered. I think these seemed to be slightly better than some in past weeks. It's good that I got to this before it was too late or I would've missed the second week in a row.
I decided to check the Postsecret twitter account as well, just to see if anything interesting had been tweeted, and the guy who runs Postsecret retweeted a tweet saying "Writing 20 minutes about a positive experience dramatically improves happiness. Your brain re-lives it while writing... and while reading it" which I thought was kind of interesting... I wonder what kinds of positive experiences I could spend time writing about for this blog. I think I already sort of covered one recently, about going to see the eclipse. And I guess this sort of reassures me that it's not too... weird to occasionally go back and read my own various blog posts. I hope that doesn't make me a narcissist. Also, I figure that if I'm going to put as much effort as I do into writing for this blog that very few people probably actually read, then maybe I should try to get a job as a real writer, meaning that I get paid for it, since I certainly seem to not really mind writing, at least the various stuff that I write for this blog. There might be stuff out there that I wouldn't exactly enjoy writing though. Like if I had to watch Johnny Depp movies and review them, I don't think I'd really enjoy that as much as I enjoy being able to decide completely on the topics I decide to blog about. Here, it's all up to me, and I like that. If I want to write half my posts about Peter Sarsgaard, then I can do that if I so desire. And so on.
"I work from home for 'health reasons', but it's actually so I can go nude all the time." This one... sort of baffles me. Maybe it makes sense to people who live by themselves, or with their significant other. Otherwise it'd be pretty weird to wander around the house naked if you're living with other people.
"My BFF his his AIDS because he didn't want to be fired. He died on a 'sick day'" I think this is actually the first secret about AIDS that I can remember reading, so that's something..
"I cry whenever an argument isn't going my way (works every time)" That's sort of childish.
"I '[facebook like icon]' posts from super-conservative Facebook pages in the hopes that occasionally, one will appear in front of one of my many super-liberal 'Friends' just to annoy them." That's yet another passive aggressive thing to do, like a number of secrets have confessed in the past.
"Christians elected Trump. Now I no longer believe." Well, that's as good a reason as any to apostatize, I guess. (over a picture with the bible verse "Give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about you" underlined)
"[a secret seemingly written in the IPA characters, which I sort of know, but the handwriting isn't so good so I can only make out 'I contain' although there is another word, over a picture labeled Walt Whitman, who was possibly a transcendentalist? ... actually, on second glance, I think the third word is 'multitudes'...]"
"I'm so proud of you for beating this shit. You're better off without it." (over a picture of some kind of drug, it looks like. Crystal meth??)
"I think He is watching us slowly destroy the LIFE He gave us" I guess if you're religious, this is a thought that you might have. I personally can't recall ever having a thought like this, but some of the thoughts that I do have are along the lines of "What would it be like if I became a drug addict?" or "I wonder if I'll get murdered" or "It would be just awful to have one's legs blown off by a bomb" or "[location] is where you can get the cheapest Big Mac that I'm aware of"
"I'll never let go. Your hands and your heart are my home." I assume this person means it sort of more figuratively. Also, naturally, I thought of the movie Titanic...
"I am happily married but I, recently, googled my ex boyfriend. I found out he died. I am surprised by how much his death is bothering me." I think this is understandable. I also like the style of writing of this secret, even though it's only a few sentences. If, say, theoretically, I found out that a certain someone who I really don't know barely anything about, had died, I'd probably be fairly sad about it even though I only talked to him like once and that was to ask (weirdly, probably, to him at least) to touch his very blonde hair. So let's hope that he's alive and well, doing whatever it is that he's doing, which I don't know specifically because I don't know him personally, I just know of him.
"I wish I would get as sick as the patients on House [MD, a tv show about doctors] just to see who would visit me in the hospital." This is an interesting secret, although I'm not quite sure that I share this person's thoughts. I don't exactly think that I'd like to get as sick as the patients on House MD, even if I would get to find out who would visit me in the hospital.
"I steal the coupon section from your paper every Sunday before you get up." I really wonder about a) the motivations behind this and b) the relationship between the author and the person whose coupons are being stolen, since that would provide some much-needed context.
"I'm soooo afraid I've missed all my chances... and will end up alone & lonely" (with a chart showing a graph of age vs "chances of finding my true love & soulmate")
A) "alone & lonely" is pretty redundant. B) the graph drawn isn't labeled with any numbers on either axis, which to me seems like a glaring omission. That wouldn't get you a good grade at all in math class. Plus, age is put on the y axis and I think it should go on the x axis, as that axis is for time and age is a kind of time.. I don't even like math but I know some things about how graphs are supposed to made properly.
"I tell all the kids I babysit that I turn into a mermaid at night. They always believe me." That's kind of cute, actually, although I personally have no patience for taking care of small children, even if I were getting paid for it.
"I never thought I would be able to pin it down so precisely... ... but I've realized that today is the last day of my childhood." I wonder what particular thing made the writer decide that that particular day was the last day of their childhood. It could be any number of things.
"My wife spent our entire marriage wishing she had married someone else" I assume this was written by the husband (or possibly other wife, I guess), which made me think that it'd be kind of weird to tell your spouse "I wish I'd married someone else"... that seems like the kind of thing that you maybe wouldn't want them to be aware of. But what do I know, I've never been married.
"This is NOT my husband's foot. But - woops - that one sure does belong to me!" (over a picture of two feet) I'm going to assume this secret alludes to an affair going on. Some affairs are worse than other affairs, I'd say. I wrote a post about that somewhere in the past.
"I promised I would'nt tell." (over a picture of an outline of a body) I guess you could make a conjecture that this one alludes to murder, or something. What bothers me more is the incorrect apostrophe placement in "wouldn't"...
This week's secrets actually seemed fairly interesting, a nice mixed bag of different topics covered. I think these seemed to be slightly better than some in past weeks. It's good that I got to this before it was too late or I would've missed the second week in a row.
I decided to check the Postsecret twitter account as well, just to see if anything interesting had been tweeted, and the guy who runs Postsecret retweeted a tweet saying "Writing 20 minutes about a positive experience dramatically improves happiness. Your brain re-lives it while writing... and while reading it" which I thought was kind of interesting... I wonder what kinds of positive experiences I could spend time writing about for this blog. I think I already sort of covered one recently, about going to see the eclipse. And I guess this sort of reassures me that it's not too... weird to occasionally go back and read my own various blog posts. I hope that doesn't make me a narcissist. Also, I figure that if I'm going to put as much effort as I do into writing for this blog that very few people probably actually read, then maybe I should try to get a job as a real writer, meaning that I get paid for it, since I certainly seem to not really mind writing, at least the various stuff that I write for this blog. There might be stuff out there that I wouldn't exactly enjoy writing though. Like if I had to watch Johnny Depp movies and review them, I don't think I'd really enjoy that as much as I enjoy being able to decide completely on the topics I decide to blog about. Here, it's all up to me, and I like that. If I want to write half my posts about Peter Sarsgaard, then I can do that if I so desire. And so on.
Wednesday, August 23, 2017
Eclipse trip
I figured that this probably warranted a post about it, and I realized that I hadn't made a new post for over a week, which sort of surprised me. Plus I missed last week's Postsecret review. Oh well.
Anyways, the eclipse was going to happen shortly so I had the fortune to travel down to South Carolina to see it. The eclipse itself was strange. It was so weird. Something else. I would say that it was worth it to make the trip to see a complete eclipse, and not just 80% of an eclipse that I would've seen had I not traveled.
Traveling more into the south also reaffirmed my mindset that I'm happy to live where I do and I don't want to move to the south. Lots of rednecks compared to here, I would say. The roads are kind of bad but you can go really fast, so I guess it's a bit of a trade off. Thankfully, no car accidents or kidnappings occurred on the trip and it went pretty smoothly.
The trip was also really good for my Peter Sarsgaard dvd collection. I got: Garden State, Rendition, Flightplan, and Kinsey. Unfortunately I don't think I saw any copies of An Education or Boys Don't Cry, which are the movies I want to watch the most. I also got the Jason Bourne trilogy, and Dot the i which has James D'Arcy in it and which I had been wanting to watch. I didn't think to check and see if they had Requiem for a Dream. In addition to the dvds, I got a book that I wanted to have a copy of, and all this for only $10. Thrift stores are great, aren't they? I probably should go back to some of the local ones sooner or later and see if there are any more Peter Sarsgaard movies to be had, or other stuff that's a good deal and that I would like to have.
Although Big Macs are cheaper in the south, I don't think that it's quite worth moving down there for the ability to drive really fast on the highways and get Big Macs for under $6. Those kinds of things come along with hordes of rednecks and conservatives, compared to the amount of those kinds of people who live in the area where I currently live. Being down there made me wonder if perhaps I'm too cosmopolitan, although even if by whoever's standards, I am, I don't really care. If you're "too cosmopolitan" but live amongst people who are just as cosmopolitan as you are, it doesn't really matter.
For some reason I keep thinking about the upcoming movie where Jake Gyllenhaal plays a character whose legs get blown off by a bomb. It would be quite unfortunate for one's legs to get blown off or otherwise separated from the rest of your body. I'm betting that the movie is going to be sappy and inspirational (although I think what would be really interesting is a movie about the same subject matter, but that's not sappy and inspirational, and is instead depressing, like Requiem for a Dream, and maybe ends with the main character killing himself because he can't cope with having had his legs get blown off, maybe by a terrorist attack or maybe in a war as a soldier...), which isn't really my thing, plus the whole idea of legs getting blown off is... unsettling. I think it would be awful to have your legs get blown off, although I guess if it happens you'd just have to deal with it and get used to living without real legs, although maybe you'd get prosthetic legs. And if you really couldn't cope with it, I guess you could commit suicide like in my theoretical movie idea. So at the moment I'm thinking that I probably won't see it in theaters, but perhaps later I'll watch it on Netflix or online, or rent a dvd of it. I wonder what it was like for Jake Gyllenhaal to play that character and how he felt about the role.
One of the dvds I got has Peter Sarsgaard and Jake Gyllenhaal in it, so I might watch that one first. It might be interesting if they ever star in another movie together; right now they've only been in two together and both of them aren't particularly recent. I wish Peter Sarsgaard would lend his voice to a GPS company or something like that, so that you could set your digital device voices to his. That would be quite something! I just like to hear him say things.
Hopefully I get to this week's Postsecret review sometime before the week is over and I won't be able to do it. We'll see. Somehow I caught an illness so now I'm sick and coughing and spitting up stuff, which is better than just repeatedly swallowing it and having it continue to line the innards of your throat. And I'm listening to New Dawn Fades and wondering if it's too depressing to have as my song on Tinder. Not that it really matters too much. I think it's a better song choice than some of the crappy songs I've seen on other people's profiles.
Anyways, the eclipse was going to happen shortly so I had the fortune to travel down to South Carolina to see it. The eclipse itself was strange. It was so weird. Something else. I would say that it was worth it to make the trip to see a complete eclipse, and not just 80% of an eclipse that I would've seen had I not traveled.
Traveling more into the south also reaffirmed my mindset that I'm happy to live where I do and I don't want to move to the south. Lots of rednecks compared to here, I would say. The roads are kind of bad but you can go really fast, so I guess it's a bit of a trade off. Thankfully, no car accidents or kidnappings occurred on the trip and it went pretty smoothly.
The trip was also really good for my Peter Sarsgaard dvd collection. I got: Garden State, Rendition, Flightplan, and Kinsey. Unfortunately I don't think I saw any copies of An Education or Boys Don't Cry, which are the movies I want to watch the most. I also got the Jason Bourne trilogy, and Dot the i which has James D'Arcy in it and which I had been wanting to watch. I didn't think to check and see if they had Requiem for a Dream. In addition to the dvds, I got a book that I wanted to have a copy of, and all this for only $10. Thrift stores are great, aren't they? I probably should go back to some of the local ones sooner or later and see if there are any more Peter Sarsgaard movies to be had, or other stuff that's a good deal and that I would like to have.
Although Big Macs are cheaper in the south, I don't think that it's quite worth moving down there for the ability to drive really fast on the highways and get Big Macs for under $6. Those kinds of things come along with hordes of rednecks and conservatives, compared to the amount of those kinds of people who live in the area where I currently live. Being down there made me wonder if perhaps I'm too cosmopolitan, although even if by whoever's standards, I am, I don't really care. If you're "too cosmopolitan" but live amongst people who are just as cosmopolitan as you are, it doesn't really matter.
For some reason I keep thinking about the upcoming movie where Jake Gyllenhaal plays a character whose legs get blown off by a bomb. It would be quite unfortunate for one's legs to get blown off or otherwise separated from the rest of your body. I'm betting that the movie is going to be sappy and inspirational (although I think what would be really interesting is a movie about the same subject matter, but that's not sappy and inspirational, and is instead depressing, like Requiem for a Dream, and maybe ends with the main character killing himself because he can't cope with having had his legs get blown off, maybe by a terrorist attack or maybe in a war as a soldier...), which isn't really my thing, plus the whole idea of legs getting blown off is... unsettling. I think it would be awful to have your legs get blown off, although I guess if it happens you'd just have to deal with it and get used to living without real legs, although maybe you'd get prosthetic legs. And if you really couldn't cope with it, I guess you could commit suicide like in my theoretical movie idea. So at the moment I'm thinking that I probably won't see it in theaters, but perhaps later I'll watch it on Netflix or online, or rent a dvd of it. I wonder what it was like for Jake Gyllenhaal to play that character and how he felt about the role.
One of the dvds I got has Peter Sarsgaard and Jake Gyllenhaal in it, so I might watch that one first. It might be interesting if they ever star in another movie together; right now they've only been in two together and both of them aren't particularly recent. I wish Peter Sarsgaard would lend his voice to a GPS company or something like that, so that you could set your digital device voices to his. That would be quite something! I just like to hear him say things.
Hopefully I get to this week's Postsecret review sometime before the week is over and I won't be able to do it. We'll see. Somehow I caught an illness so now I'm sick and coughing and spitting up stuff, which is better than just repeatedly swallowing it and having it continue to line the innards of your throat. And I'm listening to New Dawn Fades and wondering if it's too depressing to have as my song on Tinder. Not that it really matters too much. I think it's a better song choice than some of the crappy songs I've seen on other people's profiles.
Monday, August 14, 2017
Good looking conservatives need not apply
Apparently Tinder has been fairly interesting for me to use/collect data/observations from in the last few days.
I would like to mention how relatively easy it can be to glean/root up additional information about the various people of Tinder than what they've put in their profiles. If the person has instagram connected, I usually go from there, or sometimes they'll mention their instagram username in their bio. So I take a bit of a look at that, if possible, to see if there are any red(neck) flags that maybe weren't apparent in the profile itself. Sometimes there are. If I'm even more curious for whatever reason (in a good way or a bad way), some people will have their full name on their instagram profile, so off to google that goes and I look at what comes up.
Today I came across two people who were decently good looking, although upon further research, one turned out to be a confirmed raging Trump supporter and conservative, so I ended up swiping left on him. Too bad. For the record, posing with an American flag is a marker of conservatism, for the most part. The second person I have suspicions that they might be a conservative. He doesn't necessarily seem to be a Trump supporter, but he does seem likely to at least be a conservative, and from there, perhaps he indeed is a Trump supporter. Apparently this guy is from Pennsylvania, and not one of the big cities which are probably a bit more liberal. I looked up the demographic information for the particular town/county he's from (yes, I was able to find that out with minimal googling) and it's not a diverse place at all, and 75% of the county voted for Trump. So I guess there's a small chance that he's not conservative, but more likely than not, he probably is. Although now apparently he lives in the liberal enclave that is the county where I live, so maybe he's been somewhat liberalized just by being immersed in the cultural/political demographics and diversity of this area. Who knows. Is that a thing that happens to people? And the big thing about this guy is that he's the closest thing, as far as I can tell from his pictures, to a Peter Sarsgaard lookalike that I've encountered while online dating. That is just something else... Too bad it seems like he's a conservative.
My personal standards regarding good looking conservatives are that I really don't think that I would date one. Maybe if they were otherwise very compatible and only very mildly/slightly conservative I would consider it, but I just don't want to get romantically involved with a conservative, thank you very much. Communists are apparently much more my speed. Eyelashes guy is more or less acceptable to me as a person because he seems decent/intelligent, and all I'm doing is watching his commentary on CNN and reading his columns and appreciating his eyelashes, and there's a big difference between watching someone's political commentary on tv and dating someone.
P.S.: I was pretty proud of the title for this post too and I didn't even realize that it was a combination of the first two lines I put in my profile bio. At first I just wanted to do a little play on the "No conservatives need apply" notice and extend it to even good looking conservatives. Then I realized that my other line was about "Good looking revolutionaries wanted" and the title of this post just happens to be a mix of the two.
I would like to mention how relatively easy it can be to glean/root up additional information about the various people of Tinder than what they've put in their profiles. If the person has instagram connected, I usually go from there, or sometimes they'll mention their instagram username in their bio. So I take a bit of a look at that, if possible, to see if there are any red(neck) flags that maybe weren't apparent in the profile itself. Sometimes there are. If I'm even more curious for whatever reason (in a good way or a bad way), some people will have their full name on their instagram profile, so off to google that goes and I look at what comes up.
Today I came across two people who were decently good looking, although upon further research, one turned out to be a confirmed raging Trump supporter and conservative, so I ended up swiping left on him. Too bad. For the record, posing with an American flag is a marker of conservatism, for the most part. The second person I have suspicions that they might be a conservative. He doesn't necessarily seem to be a Trump supporter, but he does seem likely to at least be a conservative, and from there, perhaps he indeed is a Trump supporter. Apparently this guy is from Pennsylvania, and not one of the big cities which are probably a bit more liberal. I looked up the demographic information for the particular town/county he's from (yes, I was able to find that out with minimal googling) and it's not a diverse place at all, and 75% of the county voted for Trump. So I guess there's a small chance that he's not conservative, but more likely than not, he probably is. Although now apparently he lives in the liberal enclave that is the county where I live, so maybe he's been somewhat liberalized just by being immersed in the cultural/political demographics and diversity of this area. Who knows. Is that a thing that happens to people? And the big thing about this guy is that he's the closest thing, as far as I can tell from his pictures, to a Peter Sarsgaard lookalike that I've encountered while online dating. That is just something else... Too bad it seems like he's a conservative.
My personal standards regarding good looking conservatives are that I really don't think that I would date one. Maybe if they were otherwise very compatible and only very mildly/slightly conservative I would consider it, but I just don't want to get romantically involved with a conservative, thank you very much. Communists are apparently much more my speed. Eyelashes guy is more or less acceptable to me as a person because he seems decent/intelligent, and all I'm doing is watching his commentary on CNN and reading his columns and appreciating his eyelashes, and there's a big difference between watching someone's political commentary on tv and dating someone.
P.S.: I was pretty proud of the title for this post too and I didn't even realize that it was a combination of the first two lines I put in my profile bio. At first I just wanted to do a little play on the "No conservatives need apply" notice and extend it to even good looking conservatives. Then I realized that my other line was about "Good looking revolutionaries wanted" and the title of this post just happens to be a mix of the two.
Adventures in Tinderland part 2: an analysis
In short order, here's another post about my online dating adventures! I'm going to be focusing on Tinder and doing a good bit of analysis about what I've observed/experienced... I wonder if there have been any interesting actual sociological/psychological/etc studies done recently about online dating.
Anyways, some of the things I'd like to analyze/comment on.
Names
Firstly, fairly soon after I started using the app, I decided to keep a list of the different names that I saw on profiles. This was sort of inspired by reading the names subreddit. I noted all of the names (well, most), not just people I decided to swipe right on/accept (I marked those with an asterisk). So far I have 343 names although accounting for names I forgot to record or wasn't near my list to record, that might be more like 375 or so? I'm not quite sure. There were definitely a good amount of Zacks/Zachs/other spellings, I noticed, as well as a good number of Alexs. (that's interesting, that two of the more common names I noticed are at opposite ends of the alphabet. I may have had a little bit of a familiarity bias going on regarding noticing the Zachs/Zacks/etc) Some of the rarer/more interesting names I came across were ones like Holden or Harrison. There was a decent amount of diverse names, that were Indian/Latino/etc. I'm going to chalk that up to the area being pretty diverse; I don't think I would have had that many if I were Tindering in say, Nebraska or something. So far, I think I've only noticed one person that I actually know of in person. I thought maybe I would've seen a few more, but I guess not (so far, at least). I don't really have much of an interest in matching/theoretically dating someone on there that I see and happen to actually know of in person; if I had wanted to date them I would've done it already is how I look at it. I would make an exception for one person, but I don't think that person uses this app. Or at least I haven't seen a profile of theirs yet. If I did, I'd probably scream a little bit internally. Although it's possible that my opinion regarding people I know of in person is shared by other people. Who knows.
Swipes
Out of the approximately 375 people I've swiped on, I swiped right on 24 of them, according to my list. I'll round up to 30 for those who I might not have recorded on the list. That makes about 30 out of 375, which is about 8 percent (did I do that math right??). I think in my recent readings about Tinder, somewhere I read that women tend to swipe right around 15 percent of the time (I'm not sure if that statistic is accurate/came from a reliable source), so if we're to believe that, I'm bit below average (ie, more selective. What can I say, I have standards!) in that department.
Swiping criteria
Here might be a good place to mention some of my criteria regarding which way I swipe.
Some things that make me swipe left (reject) are as follows (especially if there's a combination of these things):
- Clear evidence of redneck-ness/conservative ness (such as pictures that show pickup trucks, hunting, obvious mentions of conservatism in pictures or bio)
- Smoking (cigars, cigarettes, weed, etc)
- Not good looking
- Bad pictures (bad resolution and/or lighting, group pictures where it's hard to tell which one is the person whose profile it is, especially when there aren't any good, clear facial pictures. For the record, I took all of my profile pictures myself and I think they look pretty decent)
- Facial hair
- Tacky drinking pictures (usually also a group picture) or other tacky pictures
- Bio left empty
- Music taste (if they connected Spotify) that's vastly different from mine (basically, stuff that's pretty far out of the realm of rock, which is a fairly broad category that I'd say most of the stuff I listen to sort of fits into somehow)
Some things that make me more likely to swipe right (accept) are as follows:
- No facial hair and generally good looking
- Decent biography (as in, gives you some actual information about them) that's not just some stupid joke or something (for me, that's just not really attractive)
- More than one picture (at least 3 is probably a good amount - clear facial picture, one that shows more of their whole body, then other pictures to fill out the remaining slots. Ideally no more than 2 out of 6 should be group pictures - the person should be easily identifiable. The main picture should be of just them without other people, although animals/pets are acceptable)
- Overall they should come across as thoughtful and intellectual (as I'd like to think I am)
- Similar interests to mine (this would probably be something in the bio, although theoretically, maybe one of their pictures shows them reading a book about murders or something)
- Similar/not too vastly different music taste to mine
- Instagram connected so I can see their pictures and potentially get a little better of an idea of what they're like
I think that pretty much covers it; I can't really think of any other specific criteria at the moment.
There is an overload of dog pictures on people's profiles; apparently guys think that improves their chances. A dog (or cat) picture, for me, does not guarantee a swipe right, but it's not necessarily a negative thing either, as long as it's not somehow a dog/cat picture as well as a tacky (drinking or otherwise) picture.
Matches
Currently, as of late Sunday evening, I have 24 matches in total, which is nearly the majority of the people I swiped right on, at least my approximation of how many people I swiped right on. Again, I can't speak for these people being discerning or indiscriminate in their swiping. I think two people unmatched me, which I only noticed because I remember messaging them. So it's possible there have been some other people who unmatched me, but because I wasn't messaging them, I didn't notice.
Messages
I think it should be up to the person with the less informative bio to message first, for the most part. I think that's fair. I've given these people a decent amount of information to work with that they could comment on/about (ISTJ/INTP, linguist, copy editor, set decorator, good looking revolutionaries wanted, no conservatives need apply, 60 wpm, etymology, crochet, reading about murders/etc, making a pinata with precious documents [that's a reference to something in a David Sedaris book; I'm not sure if anyone would notice]). Plus I guess if they wanted to be shallow they could compliment my appearance.
Out of 24 matches, I have 11 message conversations, so about half of my matches either messaged me or I messaged them. Here's a little bit of analysis on that. 8 of them had at least one back and forth message. 6 guys messaged me first. I messaged 5 guys first. So about half and half so far, which isn't so bad, I think. Pretty equal there. One guy's message I didn't respond to because it was really boring and didn't give me a good impression. I'm looking for thoughtful, intellectual people here, you know. 2 guys I messaged first but they haven't responded yet, aside from the guys who unmatched me. Both of the messages I sent were things that, given that the person is interesting/capable of conversation enough, could be given a decent response to, rather than some boring message like "hey there" which doesn't give the recipient much to work with.
The first conversation I had after downloading the app was with a guy who wasn't exactly that interesting and, upon a bit of messaging, didn't seem particularly compatible to me. So I've stopped conversation with him but haven't unmatched - maybe I should. He also came across as a bit desperate, which isn't so attractive. Maybe he wouldn't have had to act so desperate if he were actually/more interesting. Quality score: 2/5 (vaguely entertaining, but in the end, not that interesting/compatible)
4 conversations, aside from the one mentioned above, haven't really gone very far. 3 of them have (at the time of publication) been left with my response (I guess the other people could technically still respond at a later date, but I'll take it as that they're not that interested for now), but another one is one that I haven't responded to the guy. So that's about a third of the people I've matched with and have conversed with; they've been less than impressive. Too bad. It's probably their loss (does me saying this mean I have good self esteem??). Or maybe both of us just wouldn't have ended up being that compatible.
3 conversations (including one with a guy who unmatched me because I hadn't responded quick enough for him... I left him hanging like... overnight and some? I feel like a day and some is a perfectly decent amount of time to allow, but apparently this guy doesn't. The other commie was more interesting anyways..) have actually gotten somewhere more or less interesting. I'll count those, as far as conversation goes, as wins in my book. Maybe only 2 because the one guy unmatched me.
So, out of these two conversations that are still going (as in, the guy is responsive and hasn't unmatched and I'm feeling compelled to keep the conversation going), one is with one of the self proclaimed communists I matched with and another is with a guy who is the copy editor of his college's newspaper (the "future starving linguist/copy editor/set decorator" line actually netted something!). The communist seems a bit more interesting/better at conversation, but the copy editor guy isn't too horribly bad. Although he hasn't been quite as responsive, I'd say; I've exchanged more/longer messages with the communists. Maybe, instead of delicate, semi-preferably blonde guys, my type is actually communists?? That's news to me!
Both of these guys messaged me first about something in my bio - the communist mentioned my "no conservatives need apply" notice and "Good looking revolutionaries wanted" and the copy editor mentioned about him being a copy editor at his school's paper. The conversation with the communist started off being about politics, basically, which we both noted was a pretty depressing, dark and grim topic although we exchanged some nice meaty messages about it, which I like. It's good that we're not drastically opposed, politics-wise. Then we moved on to food, which is generally a positive topic, unless you're talking about it in the context of "I eat too much and I'm getting fat" or "I think I have food poisoning"... Currently I've left that conversation on a question about what he spends his time doing (so basically, hobbies/interests, that kind of thing) and what he's studying. Given the content of his previous messages, I'm pretty confident that he'll give me a decent response to this question.
As for the copy editor, I asked him a bit about working at his school's paper and does he plan on becoming a journalist after college, as well as his opinion on the AP Stylebook rules, and along with that I mentioned their recent changes regarding terminology referring to drug addicts (a phrasing they don't want you to use). The messages from this guy are a bit shorter, but still not too bad. Although I feel like I'm doing a little more of the work in this conversation and he could be a little more engaged, or something. But still, not horrible. I sort of feel like I'm interviewing him, trying to get some good (or maybe I mean better; he's been decent so far) answers/conversation out of him which is... good? bad? I'm still willing to give him a bit more of a chance; he's giving me a little bit to work with, at least, but maybe not quite as much as I'd prefer. I asked him about what he thought about the media's performance regarding their coverage of current politics, and he maybe could've given me a longer answer there. I asked him to elaborate a little on that and that's where that conversation stands so far. So we'll see where this goes. He seems pretty decent as far as I can tell, and it's cool that he's a bit involved with journalism, but he could be a little better at/more engaged in conversation, I'd say. I can't really say if I should take this small-ish shortcoming as a sign of lack of interest, or if I should just take it as in maybe there isn't as much going on in his head as there is in mine. Not to say that he's dumb or anything, but maybe he just isn't quite at the level of thoughtfulness as far as personality goes that I ideally prefer in someone I'm going to be conversing at length with.
One conversation could possibly go somewhere but it's only 2 messages long so far, so I can't really say. I'm pleased that the guy messaged me about one of the things I had written about in my bio, the part about me reading about murders/unsolved crimes. So we'll have to see where this one goes; I think it has potential, at the very least.
Photos
When I first downloaded the app, I only had one photo that I didn't think was really good, although I still got some matches. Pretty quickly I made it a point to get some better pictures of myself to add to my profile, as well as work on a bio. So, I put up the following 5 photos and removed the one I originally had:
For my main photo, I used one of me that's taken pretty much from the side although my head isn't completely turned away from the camera. It's definitely from an angle though, so it doesn't give the absolute best view of my facial features. I'm wearing this red shirt, and I'm actually at a pretty similar angle/pose like the model in this photo. On the side closest to the camera, I slipped the shirt a little bit off my shoulder and posed like I was adjusting it, pulling it back up. It's not a full profile view of my face, but again, definitely at an angle. I guess I sort of wanted to replicate the feeling of that one picture of Peter Sarsgaard, where the shirt is partially on him and you can see his back and he's looking over his shoulder. To balance the angle of this one out, I have other pictures where I'm looking more straight on at the camera.
My second picture is of me in a striped t shirt looking at the camera with my head tilted slightly. It's just a regular t shirt; it shows a bit of collarbone at the neckline. The third picture I used was one I took in the mirror of a fitting room where I was trying on a bright floral dress; it shows a bit more of my whole body although not really my figure because the dress wasn't super form fitting or low cut. The fourth picture I used was one of me in a crop top, which was sort of revealing (compared to my other pictures) but certainly not scandalously so. Tinder crops pictures to square, so maybe an inch or two of my torso/ribcage area skin was showing. Collarbones, arms, and upper chest area (there really isn't that much to see there, plus the crop top was black which I think has a minimizing effect) visible in this picture. Again, this picture is nowhere close to scandalous, nothing's hanging out all trashily or anything. It was pretty much like this picture cropped to slightly above where this model's waist is, although I just stood there and didn't really pose/smile as much as the model here is doing. For my last picture, I put one of a crochet project although it isn't of me working on the crochet project. I think it's alright in context of my bio mentioning crochet.
All of my pictures I took myself and I don't have any group pictures/pet pictures, which might not be the best, but I think I'm doing alright. I want to convey with my profile that I'm a thoughtful, intellectual (and maybe kind of artsy?) individual and I hope that's what comes across. So that means no tacky group photos where maybe I look like I'm a fun and "interesting" (by what I assume other people's standards for that might be, I guess) person, but in my mind I just come across as tacky. Although I'm sure there are guys out there who like/don't mind what I consider to be tacky. Somewhere I read that it's better to wear brighter colors in profile pictures because they're more eye catching than neutrals, so I tried to keep that into mind a little bit - hence the red shirt and the striped shirt, instead of one of my many gray shirts.
Tinder has a "smart photos' feature that's supposed to show you which photos are most effective. They switch out your various photos and calculate which ones result in the most right swipes, I think is how it works. I turned that feature on to see what the results would show. The results were that my original main photo was the top photo, second was that of my crochet, and third was of me in the crop top, fourth was me in the t shirt, and last was the fitting room mirror picture of me in the floral dress. I wonder why that one was the least popular; I don't think that it's a horrible picture or anything. The reason for the crochet picture being second might possibly be that because I had it last originally, and for people who looked at all my pictures, they just ended on that one and that's when they swiped right. As for the crop top picture coming in third, perhaps that was because showing a bit more skin sealed the deal for some people? I don't know, I'm just speculating here. I probably won't remove the fitting room picture for now, but if I end up taking a better one in the future to replace it, maybe it'll get replaced. I wonder if the order of the pictures is going to change again.
All of this and I've only been using the app for a couple of days! Anyways, that's it for now although I'm pretty sure I'll have more to say on all of this fairly soon. Particularly updates on how some of the conversations are going. I don't think I've noticed any Peter Sarsgaard lookalikes yet, although there have been people who are otherwise good looking.
Anyways, some of the things I'd like to analyze/comment on.
Names
Firstly, fairly soon after I started using the app, I decided to keep a list of the different names that I saw on profiles. This was sort of inspired by reading the names subreddit. I noted all of the names (well, most), not just people I decided to swipe right on/accept (I marked those with an asterisk). So far I have 343 names although accounting for names I forgot to record or wasn't near my list to record, that might be more like 375 or so? I'm not quite sure. There were definitely a good amount of Zacks/Zachs/other spellings, I noticed, as well as a good number of Alexs. (that's interesting, that two of the more common names I noticed are at opposite ends of the alphabet. I may have had a little bit of a familiarity bias going on regarding noticing the Zachs/Zacks/etc) Some of the rarer/more interesting names I came across were ones like Holden or Harrison. There was a decent amount of diverse names, that were Indian/Latino/etc. I'm going to chalk that up to the area being pretty diverse; I don't think I would have had that many if I were Tindering in say, Nebraska or something. So far, I think I've only noticed one person that I actually know of in person. I thought maybe I would've seen a few more, but I guess not (so far, at least). I don't really have much of an interest in matching/theoretically dating someone on there that I see and happen to actually know of in person; if I had wanted to date them I would've done it already is how I look at it. I would make an exception for one person, but I don't think that person uses this app. Or at least I haven't seen a profile of theirs yet. If I did, I'd probably scream a little bit internally. Although it's possible that my opinion regarding people I know of in person is shared by other people. Who knows.
Swipes
Out of the approximately 375 people I've swiped on, I swiped right on 24 of them, according to my list. I'll round up to 30 for those who I might not have recorded on the list. That makes about 30 out of 375, which is about 8 percent (did I do that math right??). I think in my recent readings about Tinder, somewhere I read that women tend to swipe right around 15 percent of the time (I'm not sure if that statistic is accurate/came from a reliable source), so if we're to believe that, I'm bit below average (ie, more selective. What can I say, I have standards!) in that department.
Swiping criteria
Here might be a good place to mention some of my criteria regarding which way I swipe.
Some things that make me swipe left (reject) are as follows (especially if there's a combination of these things):
- Clear evidence of redneck-ness/conservative ness (such as pictures that show pickup trucks, hunting, obvious mentions of conservatism in pictures or bio)
- Smoking (cigars, cigarettes, weed, etc)
- Not good looking
- Bad pictures (bad resolution and/or lighting, group pictures where it's hard to tell which one is the person whose profile it is, especially when there aren't any good, clear facial pictures. For the record, I took all of my profile pictures myself and I think they look pretty decent)
- Facial hair
- Tacky drinking pictures (usually also a group picture) or other tacky pictures
- Bio left empty
- Music taste (if they connected Spotify) that's vastly different from mine (basically, stuff that's pretty far out of the realm of rock, which is a fairly broad category that I'd say most of the stuff I listen to sort of fits into somehow)
Some things that make me more likely to swipe right (accept) are as follows:
- No facial hair and generally good looking
- Decent biography (as in, gives you some actual information about them) that's not just some stupid joke or something (for me, that's just not really attractive)
- More than one picture (at least 3 is probably a good amount - clear facial picture, one that shows more of their whole body, then other pictures to fill out the remaining slots. Ideally no more than 2 out of 6 should be group pictures - the person should be easily identifiable. The main picture should be of just them without other people, although animals/pets are acceptable)
- Overall they should come across as thoughtful and intellectual (as I'd like to think I am)
- Similar interests to mine (this would probably be something in the bio, although theoretically, maybe one of their pictures shows them reading a book about murders or something)
- Similar/not too vastly different music taste to mine
- Instagram connected so I can see their pictures and potentially get a little better of an idea of what they're like
I think that pretty much covers it; I can't really think of any other specific criteria at the moment.
There is an overload of dog pictures on people's profiles; apparently guys think that improves their chances. A dog (or cat) picture, for me, does not guarantee a swipe right, but it's not necessarily a negative thing either, as long as it's not somehow a dog/cat picture as well as a tacky (drinking or otherwise) picture.
Matches
Currently, as of late Sunday evening, I have 24 matches in total, which is nearly the majority of the people I swiped right on, at least my approximation of how many people I swiped right on. Again, I can't speak for these people being discerning or indiscriminate in their swiping. I think two people unmatched me, which I only noticed because I remember messaging them. So it's possible there have been some other people who unmatched me, but because I wasn't messaging them, I didn't notice.
Messages
I think it should be up to the person with the less informative bio to message first, for the most part. I think that's fair. I've given these people a decent amount of information to work with that they could comment on/about (ISTJ/INTP, linguist, copy editor, set decorator, good looking revolutionaries wanted, no conservatives need apply, 60 wpm, etymology, crochet, reading about murders/etc, making a pinata with precious documents [that's a reference to something in a David Sedaris book; I'm not sure if anyone would notice]). Plus I guess if they wanted to be shallow they could compliment my appearance.
Out of 24 matches, I have 11 message conversations, so about half of my matches either messaged me or I messaged them. Here's a little bit of analysis on that. 8 of them had at least one back and forth message. 6 guys messaged me first. I messaged 5 guys first. So about half and half so far, which isn't so bad, I think. Pretty equal there. One guy's message I didn't respond to because it was really boring and didn't give me a good impression. I'm looking for thoughtful, intellectual people here, you know. 2 guys I messaged first but they haven't responded yet, aside from the guys who unmatched me. Both of the messages I sent were things that, given that the person is interesting/capable of conversation enough, could be given a decent response to, rather than some boring message like "hey there" which doesn't give the recipient much to work with.
The first conversation I had after downloading the app was with a guy who wasn't exactly that interesting and, upon a bit of messaging, didn't seem particularly compatible to me. So I've stopped conversation with him but haven't unmatched - maybe I should. He also came across as a bit desperate, which isn't so attractive. Maybe he wouldn't have had to act so desperate if he were actually/more interesting. Quality score: 2/5 (vaguely entertaining, but in the end, not that interesting/compatible)
4 conversations, aside from the one mentioned above, haven't really gone very far. 3 of them have (at the time of publication) been left with my response (I guess the other people could technically still respond at a later date, but I'll take it as that they're not that interested for now), but another one is one that I haven't responded to the guy. So that's about a third of the people I've matched with and have conversed with; they've been less than impressive. Too bad. It's probably their loss (does me saying this mean I have good self esteem??). Or maybe both of us just wouldn't have ended up being that compatible.
3 conversations (including one with a guy who unmatched me because I hadn't responded quick enough for him... I left him hanging like... overnight and some? I feel like a day and some is a perfectly decent amount of time to allow, but apparently this guy doesn't. The other commie was more interesting anyways..) have actually gotten somewhere more or less interesting. I'll count those, as far as conversation goes, as wins in my book. Maybe only 2 because the one guy unmatched me.
So, out of these two conversations that are still going (as in, the guy is responsive and hasn't unmatched and I'm feeling compelled to keep the conversation going), one is with one of the self proclaimed communists I matched with and another is with a guy who is the copy editor of his college's newspaper (the "future starving linguist/copy editor/set decorator" line actually netted something!). The communist seems a bit more interesting/better at conversation, but the copy editor guy isn't too horribly bad. Although he hasn't been quite as responsive, I'd say; I've exchanged more/longer messages with the communists. Maybe, instead of delicate, semi-preferably blonde guys, my type is actually communists?? That's news to me!
Both of these guys messaged me first about something in my bio - the communist mentioned my "no conservatives need apply" notice and "Good looking revolutionaries wanted" and the copy editor mentioned about him being a copy editor at his school's paper. The conversation with the communist started off being about politics, basically, which we both noted was a pretty depressing, dark and grim topic although we exchanged some nice meaty messages about it, which I like. It's good that we're not drastically opposed, politics-wise. Then we moved on to food, which is generally a positive topic, unless you're talking about it in the context of "I eat too much and I'm getting fat" or "I think I have food poisoning"... Currently I've left that conversation on a question about what he spends his time doing (so basically, hobbies/interests, that kind of thing) and what he's studying. Given the content of his previous messages, I'm pretty confident that he'll give me a decent response to this question.
As for the copy editor, I asked him a bit about working at his school's paper and does he plan on becoming a journalist after college, as well as his opinion on the AP Stylebook rules, and along with that I mentioned their recent changes regarding terminology referring to drug addicts (a phrasing they don't want you to use). The messages from this guy are a bit shorter, but still not too bad. Although I feel like I'm doing a little more of the work in this conversation and he could be a little more engaged, or something. But still, not horrible. I sort of feel like I'm interviewing him, trying to get some good (or maybe I mean better; he's been decent so far) answers/conversation out of him which is... good? bad? I'm still willing to give him a bit more of a chance; he's giving me a little bit to work with, at least, but maybe not quite as much as I'd prefer. I asked him about what he thought about the media's performance regarding their coverage of current politics, and he maybe could've given me a longer answer there. I asked him to elaborate a little on that and that's where that conversation stands so far. So we'll see where this goes. He seems pretty decent as far as I can tell, and it's cool that he's a bit involved with journalism, but he could be a little better at/more engaged in conversation, I'd say. I can't really say if I should take this small-ish shortcoming as a sign of lack of interest, or if I should just take it as in maybe there isn't as much going on in his head as there is in mine. Not to say that he's dumb or anything, but maybe he just isn't quite at the level of thoughtfulness as far as personality goes that I ideally prefer in someone I'm going to be conversing at length with.
One conversation could possibly go somewhere but it's only 2 messages long so far, so I can't really say. I'm pleased that the guy messaged me about one of the things I had written about in my bio, the part about me reading about murders/unsolved crimes. So we'll have to see where this one goes; I think it has potential, at the very least.
Photos
When I first downloaded the app, I only had one photo that I didn't think was really good, although I still got some matches. Pretty quickly I made it a point to get some better pictures of myself to add to my profile, as well as work on a bio. So, I put up the following 5 photos and removed the one I originally had:
For my main photo, I used one of me that's taken pretty much from the side although my head isn't completely turned away from the camera. It's definitely from an angle though, so it doesn't give the absolute best view of my facial features. I'm wearing this red shirt, and I'm actually at a pretty similar angle/pose like the model in this photo. On the side closest to the camera, I slipped the shirt a little bit off my shoulder and posed like I was adjusting it, pulling it back up. It's not a full profile view of my face, but again, definitely at an angle. I guess I sort of wanted to replicate the feeling of that one picture of Peter Sarsgaard, where the shirt is partially on him and you can see his back and he's looking over his shoulder. To balance the angle of this one out, I have other pictures where I'm looking more straight on at the camera.
My second picture is of me in a striped t shirt looking at the camera with my head tilted slightly. It's just a regular t shirt; it shows a bit of collarbone at the neckline. The third picture I used was one I took in the mirror of a fitting room where I was trying on a bright floral dress; it shows a bit more of my whole body although not really my figure because the dress wasn't super form fitting or low cut. The fourth picture I used was one of me in a crop top, which was sort of revealing (compared to my other pictures) but certainly not scandalously so. Tinder crops pictures to square, so maybe an inch or two of my torso/ribcage area skin was showing. Collarbones, arms, and upper chest area (there really isn't that much to see there, plus the crop top was black which I think has a minimizing effect) visible in this picture. Again, this picture is nowhere close to scandalous, nothing's hanging out all trashily or anything. It was pretty much like this picture cropped to slightly above where this model's waist is, although I just stood there and didn't really pose/smile as much as the model here is doing. For my last picture, I put one of a crochet project although it isn't of me working on the crochet project. I think it's alright in context of my bio mentioning crochet.
All of my pictures I took myself and I don't have any group pictures/pet pictures, which might not be the best, but I think I'm doing alright. I want to convey with my profile that I'm a thoughtful, intellectual (and maybe kind of artsy?) individual and I hope that's what comes across. So that means no tacky group photos where maybe I look like I'm a fun and "interesting" (by what I assume other people's standards for that might be, I guess) person, but in my mind I just come across as tacky. Although I'm sure there are guys out there who like/don't mind what I consider to be tacky. Somewhere I read that it's better to wear brighter colors in profile pictures because they're more eye catching than neutrals, so I tried to keep that into mind a little bit - hence the red shirt and the striped shirt, instead of one of my many gray shirts.
Tinder has a "smart photos' feature that's supposed to show you which photos are most effective. They switch out your various photos and calculate which ones result in the most right swipes, I think is how it works. I turned that feature on to see what the results would show. The results were that my original main photo was the top photo, second was that of my crochet, and third was of me in the crop top, fourth was me in the t shirt, and last was the fitting room mirror picture of me in the floral dress. I wonder why that one was the least popular; I don't think that it's a horrible picture or anything. The reason for the crochet picture being second might possibly be that because I had it last originally, and for people who looked at all my pictures, they just ended on that one and that's when they swiped right. As for the crop top picture coming in third, perhaps that was because showing a bit more skin sealed the deal for some people? I don't know, I'm just speculating here. I probably won't remove the fitting room picture for now, but if I end up taking a better one in the future to replace it, maybe it'll get replaced. I wonder if the order of the pictures is going to change again.
All of this and I've only been using the app for a couple of days! Anyways, that's it for now although I'm pretty sure I'll have more to say on all of this fairly soon. Particularly updates on how some of the conversations are going. I don't think I've noticed any Peter Sarsgaard lookalikes yet, although there have been people who are otherwise good looking.
Sunday, August 13, 2017
Adventures in Tinderland
(clever title, eh? I think it's one of my better ones)
I've been using the app for what, two days? One and a half days? Definitely not that long. There is certainly a large userbase of people in what I've set my age and distance range to. The way that it works means that one has to take a different sort of approach than on OKC. Mainly, there's less information to go on when deciding whether you'd like to accept or reject someone as a potential match, which you do by swiping right or left (but you probably already knew that). The interface is fairly pleasing albeit the features are rather minimalistic compared to the potential depth you can go to on OKC. Partly why I decided to scrap the "PETER SARSGAARD LOOKALIKES WELCOME" notice for this profile, since there's less room for other stuff to balance the... oddness of that out/give it a bit more context. You get up to 6 pictures to put in your profile, and, as mentioned previously, 500 characters to fill out a short bio if you so desire. You can also connect your Instagram account and it'll show recent posts but no captions in your profile. Although it does show the username so if one were really curious, you could just go and look up the username in Instagram and read the captions. Then there's a section where you can choose an "anthem," which I'm not exactly sure the best manner of utilization is (in that I'm probably overthinking what I imagine various song choices would convey about me - for the record, I currently have New Dawn Fades by Joy Division - too depressing and moody?), but that's a feature as well. In addition to the anthem, you can connect Spotify and it'll show your top artists (tracks?) from that. I don't use Spotify so I can't utilize that feature, but if I did, I guess things like Muse and the Killers and such would come up. Most of the people I've seen who have that section on their profile filled out have vastly different music tastes than me, for what it's worth.
Anyways, of the... copious (even in only two days!) amounts of people whose profiles I've seen and made decisions on, a decent amount of them came across as jerks and/or rednecks/conservatives, neither of which I want to date. There have been actually a fairly decent (compared to OKC) number of people who I thought were actually pretty good looking, although I can't say how good or bad their personalities are. There have been a few repeats so I'm not really sure what's up with that, but whatever. Tinder is certainly a good app for instant gratification, I would say. I am curious as to what portion of the people who matched with me were actually discerning (as I am) in their swiping choices or did they just indiscriminately swipe right on everyone, as apparently some (many?) people do? Also, how many of them might turn out to be conservatives (assuming they didn't take the time to read my "No conservatives need apply" notice, or anything else in my bio for that matter) and it wasn't immediately apparent from their profile (pictures, bio, Instagram)?
Scorecard of my matches, if we're going to keep track... 2 communists (!), 1 copy editor at a college newspaper, some other boring-ish people... The "Good looking revolutionaries wanted" line actually worked on one guy! Fun, right?! Although maybe that makes me a commie magnet or something... I'm actually... at the moment, I guess, fairly open to theoretically dating a self proclaimed communist. Which seems weird to write out, but... Maybe if I get to know them better I'll object more strongly to their communist leanings, possibly. I do think that socialism has some things to offer, however. Although maybe not full blown communism. My not-that-informed perspective on communism is that in practice it doesn't work (but apparently, at the moment, I'm open to dating commies... go figure).
In other matters, meaning real life matters, I may possibly try meeting someone to date (assuming nothing pans out with the online dating) in person as the fall semester is upon us. And maybe I'll actually get involved in something and be in charge of something (I would like to be in charge of something) - one tiny step closer to potentially becoming a real writer (meaning, like I've said in the past, that you have a sizable audience and that you get paid). We'll see, regarding both of those things.
Toodles! That's going to be it for this blog post, but rest assured, I'll probably be back with some new online dating updates in the near future. And the next Postsecret review. And possibly a movie review if I happen to watch any (An Education, perhaps?).
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