Have any of you done online dating? And are you a Baby Boomer?

Then you know that this is a totally accepted method for meeting someone of our certain age … who don’t want to hang in bars or be fixed up on blind dates from friends.

And I know many people of my age who have met friends and partners online.

According to Avoid online “dating” … “less than a 10 percent chance of an American woman even responding to a man on an online dating site and I’ve seen anecdotal reports of the response rate being under one percent for some men. Average response rate from women of the same age is about 4 percent.  That means that you would have to get cold-shouldered 25 times in real life to have the same rate of failure that you can expect in the online world.”

Their conclusion?

” online dating is a massive waste of time for anyone who isn’t already successful with women. What’s worse about the failure rate is that in the real world, the more you approach, the better you get at it. By the time the average man gets shot down 25 times, he’s going to significantly improve his game; if nothing else, he will have lost most of his fear of approaching and that alone will tend to inspire more positive reactions.”

I disagree.

I have met some splendid men online so far. And although I’m not waltzing off into the sunset with anyone … yet … in all honesty that’s not exactly what I was looking for.

And personally, I can’t imagine how many first dates I’d have to go on in order to find out the things that I can discover in a matter of minutes online.

For example, there was a man who was very interested. He said he made $100,000 to $250,000 a year, that he had a Master’s Degree, that he was 6′ 1″ tall and spoke Latin.

Very impressive.

But he hasn’t mastered English. His profile went something like this:

HELLO LADYS. IM A CAREING MAN. HERE TO SEE
WHAT IS OUT THERE. So hit me up
ON HERE YET!!! SO IF YOU WANT TO KNOW MORE ABOUT ME.JUST ASK!!!
And I know we will have a great time.

This was followed by this:

Ones you Get to know me. You will like me!!! I just want to
find one woman. Who know what she wants!!!
So lets talk and See where it gos!!!

What does he say people notice about him?

M m m.I’m l LL say. He looks great!!!!!

Note: He doesn’t. At least not to me.

But see? I don’t have to go out with him. All I do is write him … thanking him for his kind note. Then I lie. Then I wish him the best in his search.

In his case I pretended not to see the tons of misspellings and the bad grammar. I cited some point on which we differ … told him it’s a deal-breaker. And then I said that I was sure with his credentials he would have no trouble finding someone more suited to his tastes.

Maybe she will have a thing for exclamation points too.

Good lies include “Oh I see you are a bit far away. Otherwise it would have been possible.” or “Oh gosh I’ve just started seeing someone from here. But thanks for the note.” or in the case of the really young ones, I’ve been known to tell them I have garter belts older than them.

That’s not a lie.

Truth?

It takes a lot of looking to find a winner. It helps if you have a great profile and they reach out to you. Rumor has it mine is. At least that’s what I’ve been told. Several times. And they do. Reach out. A lot.

Reality is that the profiles break down a bit like this chart I made here.

But you know, it only takes a few good ones to make my social calendar more interesting. Whether I am chatting online, or on the phone, or meeting in person, or what … it’s better than sitting around doing nothing.

Hey, when I get to the end of my life, I’d rather have memories than dreams.

Suggestions? Put out pictures of yourself smiling. Relax and let your personality come through. Run spell / grammar check on your profile. And show a little humor. Everyone likes to laugh. Always answer when folks take the time to reach out to you. They took a risk. And accept “no thank you” as a complete statement.

Me? I went out to online dating because a friend suggested I meet a friend of hers. He had just updated his profile. It basically said we were 99% compatible. And whether or not anything ever comes of that, I feel like I’ve met a stellar person.

I’ve also met several other wonderful men. Some are out of reach, some are great fun, all are worth the time it takes to chat. Or have coffee. Or have lunch. Or have dinner. Or whatever.

So I’m not sure what the deal is with the article writer. But I’ve been having great fun with it all.

I did get an email just now suggesting I go out and check out the folks online.

We noticed it’s raining tonight in [my town]. Our statistics show that more people sign in when there is bad weather. It’s the perfect time to message that special someone!

So I went out there.

I guess all the special someones for me must live where it’s not raining.

Oh well. Tomorrow is another day.