• “Dobby Has No Master, Dobby is a Free Elf” | Online Dating Chronicles: Part 8

    June 1, 2018

    Hi Everyone!

    Here’s the latest installment of my online dating chronicles. If you missed any of the previous installments, click below!

    Part 1: It Started One Night At A Bar Named ‘Darling’…

    Part 2: The One Where Jen Swiped Right

    Part 3: Play The Game, Playa

    Part 4: Dipping My Toe In The Water

    Part 5: How You Doin’?

    Part 6: There’s Something Fishy Going On…

    Part 7: Heeere, Fishy, Fishy, Fishy!!!

    Most messages that I got were nice messages; I even got a marriage proposal (probably a joke…I think). Out of the 1000 messages, less than 20 were gross, insulting or rude which I think is a pretty good record (98% were nice messages). This is part of what I wrote in my bio:

    Probably one of the few girls out there that doesn’t really like flowers…I’d rather be given food 🙂 I love burgers! I may only be 5’3″, but my usual dinner order from A&W (one of my fave fast food places) is a mama burger, teen burger and sweet potato fries (oh, and can’t forget the chipotle mayo!).

    One guy made me laugh and wrote, “You probably don’t share your burgers either.” That is correct, sir! Who shares burgers?? Unless you want to try two burgers and you share half of each. One time, after dinner, we went to Richtree Market for dessert and I said to my sister, “I’m too full for a crepe, wanna share two?” lol.

    Another guy wrote that there was no way I could eat all of that. If only he knew. Here’s my dinner from the other day. I got two mamas because there was a coupon, but this is all miiiiine!!

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    Here was an exchange between me and another guy, we’ll call him Mr. Double Oh Zero:

    • Him: You will likely be on pof for a long time. You read to be clinically insane. Chipotle mayo.
      • Lol, what’s he got against chipotle mayo?
    • Me: Excuse me?!
    • Him: You need to make your self description appealing rather than appalling. Just a suggestion

    Well, Mr. Double Oh Zero, 999 other men seemed to like my profile, so I don’t have time for people who think I should be locked up in a mental hospital. Byeeee! BLOCKED. (I do applaud him for using ‘than’ instead of ‘then’). In his bio, he wrote that he liked Judge Judy- does he mean the show or the woman? He also wrote that it should be easy to meet people so there’s obviously something wrong with him and likely something wrong with you too. If all of his openers are like that, then I’m guessing he’ll “likely be on POF for a long time.”

    For my profession, I put Blogger & Online Shop Owner. I rarely call someone this, but some asshole messaged me: What do you blog about? Being unemployed? What the actual eff? Was it supposed to be a joke? I see why, at 34, he’s divorced, and his longest relationship was under 1 year. I don’t really understand how he’s divorced and it was under a year. Who would have a whirlwind romance with this guy? He has a PhD which makes sense because he’s a Pretty Huge Dickhead.

    There were a few messages saying they’d let me dominate them or they wanted to be my slave boy, but there were more men looking for a submissive and some who “like Asian girls.” Is it because I’m Asian that they think I would be a submissive? Well, then let me tell you, “Dobby has no Master. Dobby is a free elf.”

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    I was talking to this one guy (cute from his one profile pic) and we exchanged a few messages about likes and dislikes. He mentioned that he’s been asked some weird things and he doesn’t get why “people don’t just have a normal conversation” and that some didn’t even say ‘hi’ or ‘hello.” We were hitting it off talking about movies and shows and then out of the blue, he said he’s more of a dominant man type- very respectful, but likes to take charge behind closed doors. Well…we were having a normal conversation until you sprung that on me. That’s not to say that a guy who likes to be dominant isn’t normal or anything (you do your thing and I’ll do mine), but he just kind of sprung that on me after he said Westworld was good. It would have been better if he just opened with that instead of me wasting about 2 hours (on and off) of exchanging messages. Was he using those 2 hours to see if I was normal? It may have been a bit immature of me, but I blocked him right after that message. Yes, I could’ve just messaged him saying, “that’s not my thing” and hopefully that would’ve been the end of the exchange, but it was just easier to block him. He seemed nice enough and I hope he finds a girl who’s into that.

    That concludes my fishing adventures, but come back for the next installment to read about my brief time on OKCupid and Coffee Meets Bagel.

    Click here for Part 9!

    Love,

    jen

    *This blog series is not affiliated or associated with any of the online dating sites/apps mentioned. It is also not meant to discourage any person from using these sites. This was just something I thought would be a fun topic to write about and let you know about my experiences with online dating.

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  • There’s Something Fishy Going On… | Online Dating Chronicles: Part 6

    May 25, 2018

    Hi Everyone!

    I’m back with another installment of my online dating chronicles. If you missed a previous installment, click below!

    Part 1: It Started One Night At A Bar Named ‘Darling’…

    Part 2: The One Where Jen Swiped Right

    Part 3: Play The Game, Playa

    Part 4: Dipping My Toe In The Water

    Part 5: How You Doin’?

    I came across several catfish using pictures of a good looking model, a personal trainer, an actor, and a blogger. Some of the pictures, I have to admit, looked legit because they were blurry or it made sense based on their profession that they would have a professional picture. One guy messaged me and I actually thought his pics were real because he was a personal trainer (or that’s what it said in the Profession). It seemed plausible that the one professionally taken pic could be real and the other two pics he had were taken by him. I did a Google Reverse Image search as I was talking to him and a result came up on one of the pics. He had taken a personal trainer’s pics from his Instagram, I guess? The problem with Google Reverse Image is that Instagram pics don’t show up. I tried doing one of my Instagram pics that I’ve posted and nothing came up. He even mentioned that he wanted to take me out for dinner…what was his plan when I didn’t see the guy from the pics? Swoop in on a girl that’s just been stood up?

    I wonder what reasons lead someone to catfish people? I’ve read stories about women who have been catfished for YEARS. If I was investing that much time in an online relationship, I would make sure he’s who he says he is by asking him to send me an unusual pic, i.e. send me a pic of you holding an apple in your left hand or holding up a sign with a random combo of letters/numbers.

    These are the reasons I can think of that a person would catfish someone:

    • Trying to trick some poor girl that they have something real with who they think is a tall, gorgeous guy
    • Trying to get money
    • For entertainment purposes
    • Trying to get back at someone
    • Practising talking to girls online and getting more confidence
    • “Some men just want to watch the world burn” – haha, sorry, I had to put that quote from Alfred in The Dark Knight!
    • This next one is very unlikely, but I’m sure it’s a possibility- he’s a serial killer and he’s using some guys pics to lure a girl to a restaurant and then when she shows up, he can kidnap her…am I just being paranoid? I think I watch too many crime shows. Thanks a lot, Criminal Minds.

    I found an article saying that POF is the most dangerous dating site in Britain. It may be paranoid, but if you ever meet up with anyone in person, it’s always good to send his/her profile pics and bio to friends and let them know where you’re going and when you’re planning to be home. If the date is going well and you decide to stay out longer with him/her, send a text to your friend to let them know.

    Some of the catfish were quite smart using pics of guys who aren’t too famous. This one guy used Nick Bateman’s pics (actor/model), Serkan Cayoglu’s pics (Turkish actor) and another used Adam Gallagher’s pics (blogger: I AM GALLA). One guy’s pics confused me: he had 2-3 pics of himself (or some guy) and then one of Joe Jonas. The pics below are not necessarily the ones used in the profile pics, but this is what the guys look like:

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    From left: Nick Bateman, Serkan Cayoglu, Adam Gallagher

    I mean…why would any of them be on Plenty of Fish? Even if they were the shy, quiet type, tons of girls would be throwing themselves at them. If they’re looking for a hookup, I think Tinder would be a better app to use since you just swipe through the profiles. On POF, you’d have to go through the profiles and it’s a bit more time-consuming.

    Similar to the swiping dating apps, POF does have that “Meet Me” feature where it’s similar to Tinder and you swipe ‘yes’ or ‘no’ if you want to meet someone. There’s four options: No, Maybe, Yes and Super Yes. Super Yes is like the Superlike or Daily Extend. It’s dumb though because if you choose ‘maybe,’ you would think it puts those guys onto a list for you and you can review them later. It doesn’t. It counts it as a ‘yes,’ so if you said maybe and the guy said yes/maybe, you get matched up. Like Tinder, there’s a tab (Mutual Match) that has a list of the people you matched with. The only problem with it is that you need to have an upgraded account to see the people who do want to Meet You. In your notifications, you can see a small thumbnail of their profile pic so you can keep an eye out when you’re swiping, but it’s not the best.

    Another feature is the “Favorites” where someone can favourite your profile. It’s kind of funny because you can unfavourite yourself from their list. In a few guys’ bios, they wrote that if they ‘favourite’ you, it’s because he’s used his daily number of messages and can’t message you when he comes across your profile. I found out that there’s a daily limit to the number of first messages you can send in 24 hours. You can only send 55 first messages a day- if you’ve already messaged someone, there’s no limit. It’s only the first contact that is included in the 55.

    In no way am I trying to brag and say, “This many men want to meet me or I got messaged by this number.” I want to let you know as a reference (and I’m rounding the numbers). By the time the 1000 men messaged me, it said that 2600 wanted to Meet Me. Percentage-wise, a third of the guys messaged me and it’s unknown how many of the 2600 were ones who also messaged me. So, what I’m saying is if you are on POF and you are interested in someone, then message them! The worst that can happen is they don’t reply or maybe block you, but you can still message 54 other people and one of them is bound to reply!

    That’s all I have for today’s post. Thanks for reading and be sure to check out Part 7 on Tuesday!

    Love,

    jen

    *This blog series is not affiliated or associated with any of the online dating sites/apps mentioned. It is also not meant to discourage any person from using these sites. This was just something I thought would be a fun topic to write about and let you know about my experiences with online dating.

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  • Dipping My Toe in the Water | Online Dating Chronicles: Part 4

    May 18, 2018

    Hi Everyone!

    Have you missed previous installments of my online dating chronicles?

    Part 1: It Started One Night At A Bar Named ‘Darling’…

    Part 2: The One Where Jen Swiped Right

    Part 3: Play The Game, Playa

    Moving on from Tinder and Bumble, this post is mostly talking about the process of setting up a POF profile. I didn’t really talk about the process for Tinder and Bumble because it’s easy. You set it up with your Facebook account or email and then add pics, write a bio and you start swiping. On Plenty of Fish, it’s straightforward, but requires a bit more time setting it up. You don’t match with people and anyone can message you (unless your mail settings are restrictive). I set the mail settings so that only Men in Canada aged 23-35 could message me.

    By the one week mark, I was on three dating sites and I came across several guys on multiple ones. I have a good memory, so I remembered their pictures. One guy said he was a surgeon on Bumble and was a Stock Trader on POF…hmmm, wonder which job is his actual occupation. Obviously, he was only on Bumble for hookups because then it’d be like in Sex and the City when Miranda said she was a flight attendant and she dated the ‘ER Doctor’ (played by Clark Gregg aka Agent Phil Coulson) and he was squeamish around the sight of her bleeding finger.

    On Plenty of Fish, there’s a different process. Instead of just adding profile pics and a bio, you also fill in other things:

    • hair colour, height, body type
    • education, profession
    • if you want children
    • if you smoke, drink or do drugs
    • religion
    • if you have pets
    • longest relationship you’ve had (under 1 year, over 1 year, over 2 years and so on)

    The list goes on, but those are some of the things that are listed. Some of them had the option to choose “Prefer Not to Say.” I found this interesting especially when it was Prefer Not to Say Body Type or Children: Prefer Not to Say. These are kind of obvious because no one would choose “prefer not to say” if they didn’t have kids, so obviously a ‘prefer not to say’ has kids. As for body type, ‘prefer not to say’ probably means they have a few extra pounds. Or maybe it’s someone who’s actually ripped, but doesn’t want that to be the reason a guy/girl likes them. I found the ‘body type’ option kind of dumb to be honest because it’s subjective. A guy could list himself as ‘athletic,’ but there’s different types of athletic; think Ryan Gosling vs. Chris Hemsworth vs. The Rock. Also, depends on their height too. Personally, I prefer lean athletic because I’m a tiny, little woman and if a guy’s arm is bigger than my head that scares me. It was hard for me to choose a body type for myself because I’m petite, but it’s not like I’m in awesome shape- there are days where I’ve got a food baby and other days where the tummy is flat. I chose ‘Thin’ because athletic or average wouldn’t really be accurate.

    It also asks you to choose your personality in one word from a drop-down list. There’s a lot of options including: Chef, adventurer, athletic, gamer, geek, homebody, hopeless romantic, fashionista, film/tv junkie, professional, night owl. I chose Film/TV junkie for myself.

    It also asked you to choose your intent and these were the options:

    • I want to date, but nothing serious
    • I want a relationship
    • I am putting serious effort into finding someone
    • I am serious and want to find someone to marry

    I wasn’t sure about the last option. I mean, it’s similar to putting in serious effort to find someone because you’d want to find someone to date which would lead to marriage. I mean, it’d be a good to date a few people before I find the person I end up with to see what’s out there, but I would be ready to get married if I found the right guy.

    It was interesting because it also asked you to fill in other things that wouldn’t show up on your profile, but it would help you find people who you’d be a good fit. For example, it asked for your income and birth order (if you’re the oldest or youngest). It also asked if your birth parents are married, divorced, not together, one passed away or both passed away. It asked if you would date someone with kids or not and if you’d date someone who has a few extra pounds.

    You also fill out a 70+ question personality test that measures your Self-Confidence, Family Orientation, Self-Control, Openness and Easygoingness. You can fill out other ones that measure your Relationship needs and other things.

    Come back for the next installment to read some of the funny messages I got on POF.

    Love,

    *This blog series is not affiliated or associated with any of the online dating sites/apps mentioned. It is also not meant to discourage any person from using these sites. This was just something I thought would be a fun topic to write about and let you know about my experiences with online dating.

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