Thursday, May 17, 2007

Internet Love

So I have a new tip for everybody that I think, I hope, will help you in some way in your lifetime. I am here to tell you that it is possible to meet a nice guy in a bar. It is possible to meet a nice guy at a party. It is possible to meet a nice guy in a car park, a dentist’s office, maybe even an ER waiting room – but never, never ever be deceived into thinking that you’ve met a good, decent, date-able guy online.

I am a member of hi5.com, just because once upon a time people actually did that and I never got around to closing down my account. Every once in a while, I get a message or a friend request or a photo comment from some guy thinking he’s It, telling me how hot he thinks I am and how badly do I want it (the answer is almost always not at all, ever, even if you were the last breathing creature on earth)?

Okay now, I’ll be the first to admit, there are plenty of cool people to be met over the internet, as sleazy as it does sound. I’ve met, or gotten to know quite a lot of people over the net and I don’t regret it or discourage it at all. What I do not recommend is accepting a friend request on the basis that he looks good in his photos and then giving him your msn instantly so that you can get to know each other. That’s never a good idea. Have you seen those t-shirts that say “You Looked Hotter on MySpace”? If only I had been more on the ball, I would have thought of those first. Unfortunately for me, I found all this out the hard way – and, regretfully, it took more than once to teach me my lesson.

The first time this happened, it was with a guy who I actually met first in a bar - so, strictly speaking, I didn’t meet him over the internet. Still, I had only met him once and he added me on myspace and I accepted, on the grounds that his profile picture was very flattering; and let’s just say that when I had met him out, my vision had been slightly distorted. So I accepted his friend request and we started messaging each other about 15 trillion times a day, and after a week or so we agreed to meet up and go party together.

Over the following few months, this guy and I got rather too attached, and I found myself spending way too much time with him. Then one night, we were out partying and I discovered my at-the-time boyfriends little secret - a daughter. Consequently, I then proceeded to get utterly inebriated and ended up sleeping at this guys’ house on account of he had to carry me home. I feel that it’s integral to let you all know that nothing, absolutely nothing happened that hadn’t already happened between us, and he’d seen me fairly wasted plenty of times before, and we spent the next day together watching movies and just hanging out and everything was fine. However, after that, he pretty much never spoke to me again. We went out for dinner once, my intention being to try and fathom what had gone wrong, but he shut up like a clam and wouldn’t say a word. So, end of friendship.

My most recent, and probably my favorite so far, internet encounter happened when a guy living in the States sent me a hi5.com friend request. What the heck, I figured; we’ll probably never meet anyway. So I went ahead and approved his request. Little did I know that after a couple of months of silence, and with me on the verge of deleting him on account of him being a seemingly pointless contact, this guy would message me requesting a meeting. “I’ve just moved to Hong Kong from NYC, you look cute, hit me up sometime and we can chat”. Without really thinking about it, I messaged him back with my MSN address and we started talking.

Now, I realize that this could possibly all be making me sound a bit desperate and weird, talking to random people I meet on the net, so I want to take a moment to assure you all that I am neither desperate nor weird, but I do enjoy meeting random people from faraway places so that I can hear more about the world. Then again, maybe that does make me a little weird, but no matter.

So, Internet Man (who, for the sake of his privacy, will remain nameless) and I started talking, and I found out some pretty cool things about him and vice versa (even if I do say so myself), and then he started talking about taking me out some time. I’ll admit that for a while, I contemplated accepting, but decided to back out at the last minute on account of two things.
It worried me a little that someone could want to take me out on a date without ever having met me in person. For all he knew, I was a lesbian ex-convict waiting to rape and murder him. Come to think of it, for all I knew, he was the rapist and the ex-convict (although less likely a lesbian), so we won’t even go there. When I voiced my concerns to one of my best friends, Adriel, he wisely advised me not to go if I had any qualms about it.

When I asked Internet Man to send me a real photo of him – after all, everyone knows you only put grainy and / or distant shots of yourself up on sites like hi5, because grainy and distant makes Darth Vader look like sex on legs - and then forwarded his picture to my wonderfully yet brutally honest friend Leonard, his response was: “Dear God, where did you pick up that fug?” I’m not gonna lie, that probably made my decision easier and faster to make than the lesbian thing.

I didn’t stand Internet Man up, or anything. I merely told him that I needed more time to consider it, to which he replied, “You’re having second thoughts? Why?! I’ll give you the best sex you ever had”, which only confirmed my misgivings about him and led me to vow never to answer a random hi5 message ever again.

So, ladies and gentlemen, there’s the truth of it. If anyone has actually met a truly date-able person online that didn’t turn out to be a sex-starved maniac or worse, please let me know, I would love to hear about them. I have heard of people meeting their wives and girlfriends and so on, on sites like myspace and facebook, I just don’t know how much I believe them. The way I see it, based on my own experiences, it’s just not going to happen.

I guess it’s time to delete that hi5 account now.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

HAHAHA good one leonard can be the new leno lol
where did you pick up this fug hahahaha
and "i'll give you the best sex you ever had"
what were you supposd to do? go running into his arms saying "ohh yes please"

Unknown said...

hahah omg this post reminds me of this guy who added me on myspace and then out of boredom i added him on msn and he was the biggest sleaze ever!

his display picture was of his penis and he tried to get me to tell him all my measurements. needless to say he was promtly blocked and deleted ahh the things boredom makes us do!

btw love these blogs ive read them all and there really entertaining halz you definately have a talent xx you dont try to write about things you dont care about or havent experienced adn thats when i find blogs annoying
so yay!

Unknown said...

hey hayley nice work. again the writing is getting better. I would say the length is just about right. One thing I would say is perhaps if you leave the analysing bit in the end rather than blasting them all out in the front can make this piece end on a high note?

Loisel said...

LOL this line was hilarious
"Come to think of it, for all I knew, he was the rapist and the ex-convict (although less likely a lesbian), so we won’t even go there"

I've actually met loads of guys online... and I never think of them as boyfriend material/date-able or anything. They're usally older guys who live in Europe/Australia so I think of them as just friends. I go to them for brotherly advice. Like there's this guy James, who I've known since I was 14 and we still talk :D I don't think I'd ever meet up with them just because I know them only as a screen name with a picture... never as a person. Plus I'd probably totally awkward.

but anough about me!! HAHA love your language and your humour Hayls :)