Boy, did I underestimate the power of pets.
If anyone plans on signing up for a dating service, for the love of God declare your love for cats and/or dogs. Even if you don't mean it.
After receiving enough feedback on the subject, it's evidently clear I erred in this area. People love animals. It's not that I necessarily hate pets. Two cats roam my apartment (my roommate's), so there is an ability to tolerate them. However, I don't like the fact that cats need constant attention to keep them happy. Taking care of a pet requires more work than I'm willing to put in. It's probably because I'm lazy.
And maybe I'm the same way when it comes to relationships. They require a lot of work as well. I've never been one that has felt the need to call constantly just to let my significant other know what I'm doing. And that's part of being in a relationship, something I have never fully accepted.
Sending properly worded e-mails has become a tricky process in itself. You have to be creative and say something that's going to get someone's attention. Being a college journalist, you'd think I'd be pretty good at this. That doesn't appear to be the case.
I originally tried playing it straight, just introducing myself and making a few comments about profiles, letting them know what interests we share and what not. After that didn't work, it was time to try something radical.
I encountered a profile of someone who seemed pretty interesting. She loved sports. However, she was a fan of the Chicago White Sox, Chicago Bears and Notre Dame-three teams I absolutely despise; not as much as the Colts, but they're up there. So I opened up with the fact I hated those teams to get her attention. No response.
The next step was to redo my profile. Maybe I wrote too much or jumped around more than necessary in describing my interests. Anyway, I called in my friend Leah for assistance because she's a female and could probably tell me what women want to see in profiles, as well as make it stand out from the others.
The first thing she mentioned: pets. Of course. I get it. I LOVE PETS! I hope you read that just fine.
Not surprisingly, the headline had to go. It's currently a play off the opening lines of Journey's classic song, "Don't Stop Believin,'" the greatest song in the history of the world. It's a fact. Look it up. I also adjusted the part about how often I smoke. It now says occasionally, which isn't a lie as I've cut back immensely in the past month.
We also took out the part where I used the word "scrumtralescent" to describe myself. It was designed to attract fans of Will Ferrell or "Saturday Night Live," but that may have been too much of a stretch.
As I was finishing this up at midnight Tuesday, I was about to write that the profile change had not helped at all and to tell people using online dating and conventional courtship to keep your head up.
However, I decided to check my e-mail - for whatever reason - before writing the final paragraph. In my inbox was an e-mail from "Michelle," a 26-year-old high school teacher I had e-mailed about a week after I signed up for Match.com.
Michelle wrote back and said she was only using Match.com on a trial basis. I assume most people are because they hate to admit they're using such a site. You can count me in on that also.
But anyway, she wrote me back with her AOL Instant Messenger screen name and e-mail address and a few other lines.
Of course, now how long do I wait before I instant message her? Do I wait a day? "Swingers," the greatest movie of all time, suggests I wait two, three or six days, depending on which character you listen to. Considering I have a few scant hours to turn the column in, I wait all of ten minutes.
The conversation went fairly well and we talked for about a half hour. Turns out she got her undergrad and master's degrees at Indiana University and moved to Muncie for her job. We seem to have a lot in common so we'll see what happens - if anything - in the future.
Oh yeah, and she loves pets. As do I.
Phil Friend is a journalism graduate student and writes "'Phil'osophy" for the Daily News. His views do not necessarily agree with those of the newspaper.
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