So. Nobody's dating.

They're all too busy dating to comment.

Most recent date evinced disturbing anti-Roma tendencies during last encounter ("They hypnotise people! They are born with these skills! I saw a television documentary about it on Youtube!") which are explained if not excused by her former USSR origin.

I recently went on a date via OKC. I thought we got on pretty well, similar interests and instincts, ending with a comradely hug and exchange of phone numbers, but when I texted to propose some follow-ons she delayed and then stopped responding. Could certainly have been a lack of physical connection (I think I ought on general principles lose some weight before I date again, although my weight was made clear in my profile). Or it could have been my expressed recent enjoyment of Columbo, which she associated with her grandmother's TV habits.

If she doesn't like Columbo, stay clear.

I went on a date-ish thing in the not too distant past. It was pleasant but there was no real connection. I'd hoped that if there was no connection there would at least be some moment or other of horrifying awkwardness that would make for a good story, but basically all I got from it was a sense that there are some nice but uninteresting people out there.

Do people still date, or just go in enormous groups to the mall and then make out randomly?

Recently a friend and I were talking about our respective relationships, both of which seem to be going pretty well. We both struggled to describe the difference between love as you feel it during, say, your twenties and love that you find later, and how difficult it can be to accept the latter as, for want of a better word, authentic, when you have grown up with an early love, however long ago, however failed, abandoned or painful to recall, that settled deep in the grain of your personality. (Yes, yes, like lead in imperial Roman bones. Happy?)

3: That's the one with Peter Falk where he pretends not to know anything, right? And then at the last minute catches people in their own lies! I hope you conducted the date along those lines. That would definitely charm any potential mate.

7 is why I think people ought to get married much much earlier. It'd be interesting to see how it all played out.

4: I want more relationship advice from Moby Hick, please! Perhaps an Ask the Moby option?

I'm just a Columbo fan.

I'm an academic in my 30s who recently got into an almost entirely sexual relationship with a 2nd year undergraduate (not one of my students, different university, we met in a bar). I ruined it by not being able to get it up and keep it up during our 3rd rendezvous.

I always thought on paper that that kind of arrangement would be awesome, but in practice I found it contrived and a bit weird. Live and learn!

8 is an interesting idea. Do your next date in the style of a well-known fictional detective!

Sherlock Holmes? Inspector Clouseau? Matlock?

Oh wait, better yet: Jessica Fletcher!

I respect John Yoo's honesty above. It doesn't make up for the torture memos, but I still respect it.

I've been seeing the woman from this thread, who lives around here this (academic) year. Next year she's moving far away and I assume the relationship will end, although we've avoided discussing it so far. I have no interesting or hilarious stories.

15: Is that the lady detective with the drinking problem?

I'm bitter that high-quality dating technology didn't come into being until a few years after I had been off the market. While I met my wonderful spouse in an old fashioned way that had nothing to do with the internet, I feel like, if OK Cupid had been around before that, maybe I would have gotten laid more in the interim.

or just go in enormous groups to the mall and then make out randomly?

The hookup culture is a famous example: it was founded by (mostly Democratic) teenagers who broke from courtship culture in shopping malls in the 1980s, forming little democratic circles of twenty to forty people with their tongues in each other's mouths.

I don't understand why adults who grew up doing that would stop doing that.

The whole blather about the "hookup culture" comes from 60-year-olds trying to forget about the "hookup culture" of the years 1968 through 1980. I mean, watch a movie like "Pinball Summer" someday. There's an attitude to casual sex that is about 50 times as casual as anything today.

17: FWIW the two best relationships I ever had both had firm end dates of which we were both aware and accepted. I am still close friends with both women and still love them both in a way that's not entirely platonic (not that there's nookie, just that there's something more to it than simple friendship). I wouldn't trade those two for anything.

Oh, sure. Remind me of my failure to have children and my nonexistent romantic prospects in consecutive posts. I'll expect a thread to talk incessantly about your pets in recompense.

17: Is it serious enough we should give her a hilarious name like Lunchy? (Lunchy is the best ever. Who came up with that? Heebie?)

You like talking about my pets? He is a great kitty, I'll grant you that.

19: I'm awfully grateful for OKCupid but still feel a bit abashed once in a while when asked "so where did you two meet?" A couple of times I tried arching an eyebrow and sighing "oh, where does anybody meet anybody these days?" but it seemed like it might be hinting at something far darker than online personal ads.

Anyway if what you regret is not getting laid in those years, I'm not sure OKCupid is great for just getting laid.

4 gets it exactly right.

The whole blather about the "hookup culture" comes from 60-year-olds trying to forget about the "hookup culture" of the years 1968 through 1980.

Or indeed 1938 through 1950. Imminent death plus lack of street lighting.

In your country, maybe.

24: Time to try the strategy proposed in 18.

27: Just make up a series of wildly improbable stories and rotate them at will. Gosh, I bet we could help you come up with some.

26: So we've gone from heebie's great ass to heebie's great kitty?

19/27: IME, craigslist was better for just getting laid. And I don't mean the casual encounters section, which I never used. I'm sure it depends on location, though.

In your country, maybe.

And, I should add, belated influx of overpaid, oversexed and over here GIs.

I'm happily, boringly (not with the relationship, just in the sense that there's not much to talk about here) engaged. I'm a bit worried, though, about a friend who seems to have given up on dating. As far as I know, she's only dated one guy in the time I've known her (~3 years), and it didn't last long or get serious at all. She's reasonably good-looking, has a hobby or two that gets her out and about, and has her share of personality flaws but not to the point of being completely intolerable. She also has expressed attraction to certain people and loneliness in general now and then, so I think there actually is a problem here, I'm not just trying to matchmake for the fun of it. I'd like to help her but aside from the general awkwardness of sticking my nose into her business, I'm not sure how. Both my fiancée and I have tried introducing her to single guys she might like, but I think we've run out of people she doesn't already know. (The time I did, she liked him, but by the second time I got them in the same room he wasn't single any more. Maybe she should have moved faster, but then again, maybe I could have tried harder to get them together. Who knows.)

So, ATM: advice?

Set her up with me.

So, ATM: advice?

Start commenting at unfogged?

sticking my nose into her business

I think that's supposed to be off-limits once you're engaged.

Both my fiancée and I have tried introducing her to single guys she might like, but I think we've run out of people she doesn't already know.

I don't think there's more you can do than this. And of course it doesn't have to be targeted, just including her in your social life, which may at some point in the future have new single men in it, is enough.

Try conversationally de-stigmatizing online dating. Really, she should be online dating, because it's the only way to access numbers of other people also interested in dating.

My parents met on a computer date, possibly the first one, in the 1960s. It's traditional!

I have no dating news, but our parents are slightly nutty about wedding plans. I would appreciate other such tales.

just including her in your social life, which may at some point in the future have new single men in it, is enough.

What I've found is that meeting new single people once you're past a certain age yourself is actually kind of hard--or maybe just have a critical mass of friends in LTRs, which may amount to the same thing.

Unless anyone has some ideas? Joining a knitting group didn't help, presumably because young single women (all of my single friends are hetero men) who are in search of a relationship with a man don't gravitate to the local yarn shop on Friday nights.

Nutty in what direction?

We were lucky enough not to have any parental nuttiness, especially from my mom, before our wedding. Boy was that a relief.

Yup.

43: For a straight man who knits, a Stitch&Bitch group in a bar might get a younger, singler crowd of women, and while I'd bet they wouldn't have come there looking for single men to date, that doesn't mean that a single man mightn't meet someone like that. Becks had a post lo these many years ago recommending random continuing ed classes (cooking or whatever) to men looking for women on similar grounds. Where women go to look for men, I have no idea.

blogs?

My sister has been married for fifteen years, has two kids, and still has yet to provide an account of how they met. Makes me damn curious.

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Jim DeMint is resigning from the Senate to go run the Heritage Foundation.
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My parents met on a computer date, possibly the first one, in the 1960s.

That is extremely interesting. More details!

43, 46: Lee and I met because the restaurant that hosted my weekly knitting group was right down the street from her house and let her run a tab, so she ate there every Friday. And apparently I have a charming smile, so the rest is history.

Since Fleur has gotten serious about her riding again, I have gotten some exposure to the whole equestrian scene, and I've become convinced that this is the ideal hobby for a single hetero guy of any age to meet girls/women. The gender imbalance is easily 10:1, and yet it's coded as sufficiently masculine that no one will think you girly for doing it (unlike, say, going to the knitting club), nor will they suspect what you're up to (yoga classes). The only downside: she'll always love the horse more than you.*

*Yes, Stanley, this includes you. I'm sorry.

Shut up about kids and parenting, Heebie
And for balance, how's your dating life going?

Was the thread two threads ago on spouse selection?

I tend to assume that unless I've heard a different story, literally everyone I know who met in the last decade did it online. It's not always true, but it's the way to bet.

I never did it online, that I know of. Is there such a thing as a singles bookstore? If not, why not?

My sister has been married for fifteen years, has two kids, and still has yet to provide an account of how they met. Makes me damn curious.

Years ago my local alternative weekly paper (or maybe it was just Savage Love) had a contest which invited readers who were married or in multi-year serious relationships to send in their wildest "how we met" stories. The best was the simplest.

After a party with much drinking two people woke up in bed together with no memory of most of the previous evening. They didn't start dating right away, but eventually they did. Once they were in an LTR, they got curious and started asking friends at the party about what happened but no one could remember seeing them together.

"So, how did you and your wife meet?"

"Well, I woke up one day and there she was."

Well, ok, the last time I remember being self-conscious was when we were asked by friends of my parents who are 70ish.

Hmm, maybe I should start my own knitting group at a bar or restaurant or something. I could make it closer to my house for one thing.

FWIW, the online meeting story is pretty common in my social group, which trends geeky (hence the gender imbalance, I think). By the same token, though, the remaining singles are really, really bad at traditional dating, being on the shy and awkward side. Their self-presentation is just SO much better in casual social settings with friends that I really do feel like I'm failing them by not having a more girlfriends around.

52: it's not exactly cheap though is it.

*Yes, Stanley, this includes you. I'm sorry.

[Fistbump]

59: You could probably get a part-time gig as a farmhand and leverage that into riding for free. How are you at mending fences and mucking horseshit?

+ in.

My fellow and I met 'cause he answered my CL ad. Took us a long time to meet, though, even though in retrospect we frequented all the same places.

Riding instructors must get so much tail.

These are not dating stories, but recently I had some unexpected encounters with people I was not already accustomed to encounter that went surprisingly non-terribly. Might they, then, serve as a precursor to dating stories? Unlikely—I'm extremely attractive, but lazy, which is why my curriculum vitae sexualis is so spo^H^H^Hgappy.

1. Whilst at a concert in which each of four local jazz/"creative music" groups covered the compositions of four other such groups, and seated, as is my custom, at a table at the venue, a young woman asked me whether the other seats of the table were occupied, and, since they weren't, I informed her that they weren't. She then sat down at the table. At, let me emphasize, the same table.

I did not pay a whole lot of attention during the first set since I was busy composing verse about Alexander, and as it drew to a close she asked me such things as who was I there to see, what do I do, etc. I was there to see, as it happens, the band her boyfriend plays the guitar in! (The Ho//y Mart/ns, really excellent group, A+++ would listen to again.) She also asked me if I ever attended a reading series hosted at the same venue, the next iteration of which I now plan out of transparent motives to attend.

2. I am known to the baristas at the cafe nearest my office sufficiently well that they know my order and occasionally engage in brief chitchat with me. The forthcomingest one of them apparently lives in my neighborhood, as we each discovered when we passed each other on the street a couple of nights ago and conversed awkwardly.

You could probably get a part-time gig as a farmhand and leverage that into riding for free. How are you at mending fences and mucking horseshit?

This also opens up the possibility of casual hayloft sex with the married equestriennes.

31: Is pretending to be a lady detective with a drinking problem going to help with the childlessness or the datelessness?

I have to believe that a roll in the hay is highly overrated.

I think Jilly Cooper has built an entire publishing career on 52 & 64.

The Dwarf Lord and I met at a dinner party given by childhood friends (my high-school nemesis was housemates with someone from his boy choir). We seem to have not been on the same BBS, newsgroups, channels, or websites beforehand, and anyway I wasn't female online then so it might not have turned into flirtation.

My *parents*, answering ajay: he was at a tech university and she was in nursing school in the same city, and there was a joint EE/psych project between the two schools inventing (as I'm told) computer dating. (It occurs to me that they may be data-points in a research paper.) Beyond that, normal tales of awkwardness and attraction.

Jeez.

This article about websites making fun of people's responses to dating profiles is depressing.

I'm looking at the pics of the guys being mocked, and I'm thinking, oh, poor guy. Like the chubby guy drinking beer at a game? Or they guy witht he star wars shirt? Does he deserve to be shot down like this?

And the whole issue with dudes sending shirtless pics of themselves seems so fraught. Does this appeal to more women than it horrifies? One of my FB friends said dudes to this because they foolishly think women like the same things they like. But AWB suggested that superficial people are attracted to each other by these sorts of pics, so dudes sending shirtless pics meet more of their kind.

Also, why does looking good, and displaying the fact that you look good, have to exclude you from the society of the non-superficial? I admit right off that I'm a out of shape slob. But I don't take that as a badge of honor. If I had pecs like some of those guys, I'd want to show them off too. I don't see why that automatically makes me superficial, or a macho douchebag or anything like that.

I have to believe that a roll in the hay is highly overrated.

It's a euphemism.

I think alfalfa hay smells really, really, really good.

70: MMmmmmmbut. I agree with you that making fun of pictures for being either physically attractive or not physically attractive is unfair (and something I hoped would stop for women, rather than start for men). However, there's a lot of creepy conversation that should get marked as creepy pretty damn fast, and not only in the interest of the speaker getting a clue and then a date. How else does we mark norms but in a social group that develops a consensus on what's acceptable?

I went on a datish thing the other night. The lucky lady and I went down to the river for this festival of lights thing they have here. We bought a floating flower arrangement, lit the candle and incense placed thereon, and floated it down the river with all the others. We watched folks releasing hot air balloon lantern things followed by fireworks and further lanterns. Naturally, during the course of a hot night spent sitting together by the river, nothing happened whatsoever. How humanity managed to perpetuate itself long enough to discover alcohol is beyond me.

Alfalfa fields in bloom also smell incredibly good.

You know what's a good book that I haven't read in a while? Wolf Solent. Maybe some of you would like it!

And the whole issue with dudes sending shirtless pics of themselves seems so fraught. Does this appeal to more women than it horrifies? One of my FB friends said dudes to this because they foolishly think women like the same things they like. But AWB suggested that superficial people are attracted to each other by these sorts of pics, so dudes sending shirtless pics meet more of their kind.

It seems to work pretty well for me.

I recently hired a babysitter for the first time ever. This isn't fundamentally relevant to dating, but the process for finding a babysitter online was disturbingly reminiscent of dating sites. Profiles, photos, concealed contact information, making arrangements to meet up, etc. I found it very weird.

You're in undergradsville, aren't you? Shouldn't there be university-mediated means of hiring broke students?

Robin Williams had that issue.

80 to 78.

Possibly there are. This was the path of least resistance because my employer picks up the membership cost for the online site as a perk. (Which would be creepier if it were a dating site, so I'm glad they don't....)

my employer picks up the membership cost for the online site as a perk. (Which would be creepier if it were a dating site, so I'm glad they don't....)

It's pretty unusual for employers to cover the costs of online dating sites as a perk.

At Hallowe'en I was out with my brother and sister-in-law at a gig (in a big marquee thing) and among other people we met a former colleague of my brother's and that colleague's wife. She decided to introduce me in a very pointed fashion to her brother-in-law. We made slightly awkward conversation for quite some time aware of several sets of eyes upon us. I thought he was quite nice and there might be some potential there. At one stage I had to bop off to the loos and for reasons I won't go into I knew beforehand I would be gone a long time. So that he wouldn't think I was escaping I asked him to mind my coat. Anyway he was still there on my return but then when someone dragged me out to dance he had drifted off. He was in the vicinity when we were leaving so I made a point of going over and saying goodbye and doing all those bloody things they tell you to do in the "tips" - I laid my hand on his arm to get his attention, I made eye contact big time and when he said he had enjoyed meeting me I said something similar with great enthusiasm. He said it would be nice to meet up with me back in Dublin. I expected that would be that since Irish guys usually just leave it to the fates to bring people back in contact but no, he wanted to actually arrange something. He didn't have his phone with him so I took his number. He was quite emphatic that he wasn't putting the obligation on me to ring him, that I was to send him my number and he would ring me. So I did and he didn't.

My sister-in-law was nearly more disappointed than I was at this outcome. The other day, casting around for hopeful prospects, she asked me, "What about that guy in (government office)?"
Backstory: someone I have never met in person but who our law clerk says often asks about me, being impressed with my ability to do my own translations into Irish of government forms, and who is apparently single, and looking, and attractive. He was wistful about having gone to some Irish-language event but it being full of married couples. I had had a vague intention of passing on via our clerk, details of a livelier event at which I myself would be in attendance, just as soon as some such occasion would present itself, and had mentioned this at some point to sil.
"Oh", I told her, "I just heard that he had a bad accident, broke his leg in some complicated way and is going to be off work for five months". So she gave up.
tl;dr No luck lately.

finding a babysitter online was disturbingly reminiscent of dating sites

You're not the first person I've heard say this!

84.4: Add something charming in Irish on a note send by legal secretary. If his response is anything but terrifying, drop by with grapes.

Steel yourself beforehand to briefly resist the debonair charm of a limp. (Hi, Von Wafer!)

Trying to find a puppy playmate at the river for our new puppy strikes me as similar to what I imagine pre-Grindr going to a casual sex spot for a hook-up might have been like.

We go to two known locations to find other dogs or just walk along the river.
We use the parking lot to guess at the number of other attendees.
We arrive on the beach and immediately check out the other dogs. Are they players? Are they (boring) fetchers? Will they have the same play style as our dog?
Sometimes a great play session happens, in which case I eye the other owners and wish it weren't awkward to get their personal information. It'd help a lot to have regular appointments, but the ethos seems to be that we'd have to both be there coincidentally.
Lots of times we go home pleased to have visited the river, but not satiated by a good puppy play session.

I haven't gone to an old-style, hook-up in a park type place myself, but it seems to me that the hit-or-miss aspect (based entirely on personality) must be somewhat similar.

he had a bad accident, broke his leg in some complicated way and is going to be off work for five months

A perfect opportunity to go bond with him by keeping him company and nursing him back to health! A friend of mine began a relationship with someone in this fashion (he was the convalescent). Mind you, she forced the issue by donning a thong and painting a red cross on one of her bum cheeks, then hiking up the skirt for him to see. You might not want to be quite so forward, depending on your personality.

Chatting the other owners up with "This is great -- our dog really needs active dogs to get all that energy out. Are you guys here regularly around this time?" doesn't work? It's short of actually making friends or exchanging contact information, but still lets you make a date to meet up again.

Clearly somebody needs to write a Grindr-style app to solve this problem. Call it Buttsniffr, maybe.

Since Fleur has gotten serious about her riding again

Fleur is Ann Romney?

Dude, I hint as much as a person could. I probably border on creepy. I don't even like half those people, but if their dog plays well with mine, I'd arrange to see them regularly.

I've now talked most to a lovely woman with a great white pitbull named Pig. I'd hit on them more but the last time we saw them, there was a new handsome fellow with them and the owner and the new fellow were gazing at each other in a New Relationship kindof way. We figured the last thing she was interested in was more of our conversation, so we stood a ways down the beach while Pig and our puppy played. Pig will be a better playmate when our puppy puts on another twenty pounds, but that'll happen soon enough.

See because then you could just ask the person if they were on Buttsniffr. You wouldn't even need to have your dog with you! Lurk around the bushes until you spot likely candidates and just ask 'em.

I probably border on creepy.

Don't sell yourself short.

"I just really don't get your jokes." ~The Last Guy I Went on a Date With.

55: You mean like this?

If I had pecs like some of those guys, I'd want to show them off too. I don't see why that automatically makes me superficial,

Yes, exactly. I send shirtless pics of myself to declare my dedication to furthering human rights and ending world hunger. No one ever seems to pick up on this though. People really need to open their minds.

95: Knock knock jokes aren't for everyone.

Nothing interesting to report, I'm afraid. Meeting up with someone to check out art galleries this weekend, but in a group with her friends, and so hardly a date; more importantly, I haven't gotten any clear signs of sexual interest from her any of the previous (four or five) times we've interacted, always in (loud, not great for conversing) group situations. Ah well. Another sort-of-dating-but-not-really thing ended almost two months ago, but fraught emails/texts/calls have continued. One of these days I'll turn my OKC profile back on, but at the moment I can't imagine what I'd write on it (I turned it off when I realized I couldn't think of any story to tell with the profile that wasn't depressing as fuck, e.g., "I'd like to have a hope- rather than fear-driven life, but it's a struggle.").

I send shirtless pics of myself to declare my dedication to furthering human rights and ending world hunger because I'm a feminist, laydeez.

"I just really don't get your jokes." ~The Last Guy I Went on a Date With. --Half of the people I'm facebook friends with.

88: What did the red cross signify?

86/88: Good ideas, but he is not at work for me to send sympathies, charming notes or myself rolled up in a carpet (I think my butt cheeks are best reserved for a slightly later stage). I have searched for his name on Facebook (to send a sympathetic/ charming message) but he doesn't seem to be on there. So no avenue for contact. I do intend to broach the subject again with our clerk just in case.

90 made me laugh. Or call it Rovr.

My poor dog has gone from enthusiastically greeting every dog regardless of its body language to preemptively barking and growling after having been bitten several times. His exceptions are dogs he knew before this started, dogs that are with someone he likes, dogs that jump immediately to play, and puppies. With his friends he's as happy to be wrestle and be beat up as ever.

Back in my pre-married days, possibly the hottest sex I ever had was with an equestrienne. All that clutching the saddle gave her thighs and a butt like you would not believe. 17 years later and I still pull that one out of the spank bank occasionally.

106: The customary visuals at the barn are highly suggestive.

101: Seriously? You're definitely one of the funniest people in my FB feed. (I know that wasn't a request for compliments, I'm just sincerely surprised.)

one of the funniest people in my FB feed

Talk about a back-handed compliment.

108: Hey, thanks. I've gotten the comment a number of times. I don't really mind. Sometimes my references are kind of snooty/specific.

My wife and I met online, but I admit that I was perplexed for a while. She kept mentioning that we'd met on the onion personals... but evidently, it's just that her site and mine were linked, shared people, or whatever.

For our first date, we met at a play that I'd researched; it appealed to us both. But she'd only been able to commit at the last minute, so I got us tickets at the door. The very nice ticket seller said, "We're almost sold out, so we might not be able to seat you together." We persevered, did find seats together, and had a very nice night.

Moo-seeking is what cow-orkers do, right?

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I spent part of the afternoon on aggravated phone calls with my health insurer, who's angling to deny mental-health-care coverage unless I can prove that it's a preëxisting condition (which it is, and I can prove that I was seeing the same damn doctor before I signed up with them, but still, fuck them for making people jump through hoops). Health insurance companies are fucking evil.

|>

112 was great, Natilo.

Unless anyone has some ideas?

Outdoors-y activities are an easy way to meet people, if you're into that sort of thing. It's very easy to chat up people while climbing (especially bouldering), pretty easy during breaks in some field sport (ultimate, rugby, soccer, etc.), and I know people who have met through running groups.

I don't know if this is because Austin is a tech magnet, or something that's generally true, but most of the male friends I've met doing these things are dorky technical people. For whatever reason, women who do these things seem to have a wider variety of backgrounds. That also seems to be true for dance, whether it's something technical like ballet or modern dance, or something social, like swing or blues.

Not a date.

I did however manage to create an excuse to have dinner with a woman I've been hopelessly in love with more than half my life.

I don't get joining activities in order to meet people. IME it was a terrible way to meet people. You join a soccer team (say) and you meet twenty nice people, half the wrong gender and many not looking to date, and then you socialize with them and maybe meet their friends, and you've exhausted that outlet, and it monopolized three months, and maybe wasn't even an activity you love, because those activities had terrible exposure to prospects.

Just do activities you love, and seek love online. There are tons and tons of profiles, and at worst you extend your radius in order to access more.

(That said, Jammies and I met on playing soccer. But I was in the middle of dating online, and had been for about a year, and was only playing soccer because I wanted to.)

Cooked by her husband, a really sweet guy.

116, 118: Oh dear. She have any nice friends?

huh. I thought RP was someone who had previously presidentially described being hopelessly in love with someone else, who was not married to a really sweet guy. So I guess there are two of you. IIRC, that unobtainable love object was pregnant by a terrible ex and was trying to make it work or something.

118: This sounds like the novel I was going to write in high school, when I found out the girl I loved had a crush on my best friend.

That's fair, I certainly wouldn't do it just to meet someone. But, when I was single, climbing seemed like an easy way to meet people doing something I'd do anyway. Unless I was going at some bizzare time, I'd meet a few new people every time I went out. Ditto for social dancing (I certainly don't recommend taking up ballet to meet people). Same for pickup games of ultimate, too. Even league games weren't all bad for that, since you meet all the folks from the other team and there's time to chat afterwards.

Per unit time, online dating is certainly more efficient, and it's how I met my current gf, but the process itself is less fun, at least for me.

online dating is certainly more efficient...but the process itself is less fun

True. And generally getting out and forcing yourself to be sociable can make wheels start turning in your favor, if you otherwise truly want to hunker down at home with the windows shut.

This goes under the 'obvious realizations' heading, but I'm been a little surprised but how profoundly different being in a long-term committed relationship is than dating. As in, doing lots of dating is not a good preparation for long term relationships, the mentality is different and the rewards and burdens are in some ways opposite.

The internet makes being single an infinite parade of sexual variety if you want it to be, though.

Almost everyone I've ever dated, I met through being friends with them--which is to say, we got to know each other through shared interests--or by being friends of friends. If you're having trouble finding folks, it's often because you've exhausted the friends-of-friends pool, or because that pool is very small (perhaps you've moved to a new city). In that case, organized activities can be great, because they can expand that pool significantly.

I'm not saying that it's *better* than focused online dating, but it's good for somewhat different reasons, I think.

Or maybe not. I don't know. I've always been too shy to be proactive at online dating in the way that seems to be required.

The internet makes being single an infinite parade of sexual variety if you want it to be, though.

There are a lot of intermediate steps between the wanting and the having, I'm afraid.

I found it was very odd, in online dating, to have literally no real life connection with someone. It made them seem unusually unreal or random or something. And then you have sex.

Yes, that sounds just awful.

127: Appalling!

generally getting out and forcing yourself to be sociable can make wheels start turning in your favor

When I was online dating I would feel this way in short bursts, but then it would get me down.

Here is a dating technique you can use if you live in San Diego, and have money.

127: Yes, sometimes the talking leads to touching, and the touching leads to sex. But then there is no mystery left!

And then that leads to dancing!

I don't recall much dancing in the video. Oh, wait, I get it.

We had a math candidate a few years ago who was intending to communicate that she wasn't too conservative for Heebie U. What she said was "I thought it was unnecessary for them to ban dancing at my undergraduate institution." I don't think I kept my poker face with that one.

she wasn't too conservative for Heebie U.

I have to admit I've had the impression that, as universities go, Heebie U. is pretty far out on the conservative tail.

Yeah, nothing like that. After half a lifetime, she still totally lights up the room. But a lot of life's been had, on both sides, in that time period, and the experience of being together now is still a nearly unalloyed positive.

Blah, dating. Someone said something in another thread about how, when it's time for you to get married, you just find someone who checks all the important boxes, and that's that. Well, that's been more or less my attitude to finding a job, but somehow I can't do that for finding a partner. Even though I feel lonely fairly often, and would like to be in a serious relationship, I have a hard time being pragmatic about it; I keep hoping I'll meet someone awesome, instead of trying to date people who might actually plausibly want to date someone like me. (Actually, my notion of "awesome" is basically set by the two or three most brilliant people I've known over the last ten years or so. So it's not some imaginary ideal, but it is an unrealistic target.)

Oh well. My best recent date-like experience was actually hitting it off with the stranger sitting next to me on a 14-hour plane flight. Not actually romantic, because she was married, and let me know that at the beginning, but it was weirdly intimate; it had that "you are so interesting!" feeling that I want to have during a date (but rarely do nowadays).

There are generally slightly more straight and single women than men out social-dancing (and I'm told the imbalance is much stronger in the rest of the country, except Alaska) (except tango, which is often male-heavy. And not particularly into role-switching, either). Good reasons not to try dancing: you hate the music, you can't walk briskly for ten minutes, you're against embracing people you don't know, you smell bad. Bad ones: you don't know how to dance yet, you don't know anyone, you're afraid of looking dumb, you think it would be a waste of time to dance with people older or less good-looking than you are.

Think how useful for various secret personae: tux-and-SCUBA agent, woods elf, horny-handed cowboy, manic pixie dreamboy.

As a Public Service Announcement purely out of the goodness of my lecherous old lady matchmaking little heart, if there's any noncompetitive class near you with good music, give it a try.

(I think it's a year since I went on about this last. I try to space it out.)

I don't have a whole lot to report on this front from my own life. I've had some dates via OkCupid lately that have generally gone well.

YK: some highly mileage-variable advice that was given to me, regarding your last sentence sorta, is that you have to go to a first date thinking "I am spending an hour or two with a new person, and hopefully it'll be fun" because if you go in thinking "if this person is really interesting, it could be the start of something!" there's too much riding on it and it's a weird place to start. I don't know how good I was at implementing this. Expectations are hard to steer. I think once in a while it helped with the maintaining of sanity.

I second the advice in 141. Not that I'm really the best person to be giving advice on this stuff.

you smell bad

Define bad?

139 is what I would have said if I were smarter and more articulate. Maybe I shouldn't have boxed when I was younger. It's a terrible way to meet people, and you get hit in the head until you become slow and inarticulate.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: if the choice is weirdo square dancing or celibacy, a man of dignity and honor chooses celibacy. Fortunately, that's a false choice.

Halford is a square dancer and he's angling to keep all the sweet, sweet wimmenz to himself.

Oh, hey, actually I am currently in the midst of a dating-related situation that might be worth discussing here. I've had several dates over the past few months with various girls who have messaged me on OkCupid. One in particular, let's call her A, I've had three or four dates with, starting in the early summer and most recently a couple weeks ago, with a long hiatus for various reasons before the latest date. We get along pretty well; she's an archaeologist, so we have similar interests and so forth. We have very different personalities, though, and I don't really see any serious romantic potential here. Also I'm not really looking for anything serious anyway. It sounds like she maybe is, though, and in any case she seems to be much more into me than I'm into her. I do still want to stay friends with her, and I'm increasingly thinking "just friends" is probably where this is going, but I'm not sure how she feels about that, and she hasn't said much about how she feels about any of this.

I'm not really asking for advice here, just sort of thinking through the situation and what to do about it. But people are of course going to offer advice anyway, I realize.

(This isn't the same girl that I mentioned having a date with recently, btw; that was a different one who messaged me on OKC more recently. I think there's more romantic potential there, but we'll see how it goes.)

"Might be worth discussing" and "not asking for advice" ... oh! Right!

How do you feel about this, teo?

Conflicted, obviously. Otherwise I wouldn't be worrying about it.

What do you feel conflicted about? I don't quite see the dilemma. Do you worry that declaring "just friends" would cost you the friendship, but not declaring it isn't fair?

I guess I'm still not totally sure how I feel about her and what I want out of this.

But I'm also not sure there actually is a dilemma here, which is why I didn't say anything about it before.

Ah, ok. No need to make your mind up. My advice is that I was practicing rapping with my improv group last night and I set a guy up to rhyme "archaeology" and he choked.

One of the best things anyone ever said to me was "you don't have to make your mind up tonight," which was just eloquent code for "I really want to have my way with you, so I'm OK with your chickenshit you-can't-count-on-me signals."

I was practicing rapping with my improv group

Also, I'm a horrible person.

Yeah, I dunno. On further reflection, I guess the issue is that if we keep going on the current trajectory I think I would mostly be in it for the sex, which is fine if she feels the same way but kind of unfair to her if she actually wants something more serious. I also feel like I need to try to avoid getting into situations where the other person likes me more than I like them, because I've gotten in trouble that way before. I'm not totally certain that's the case this time, but there are some indications that it is.

I'm not sure it's possible to avoid getting into those situations. All you can do is be clear and respectful once you're in them. I do think it's probably a tactical error to sleep with her if you want to keep her as a friend, though.

I'm not sure it's possible to avoid getting into those situations. All you can do is be clear and respectful once you're in them.

Yeah, I suppose so. I just don't want to keep leading someone on.

I do think it's probably a tactical error to sleep with her if you want to keep her as a friend, though.

Probably, but in this case that ship has sailed(-ish), so we are where we are.

Re 77, the OKCupid data blog, when that was a thing, ran the numbers and concluded that shirtless works:

http://blog.okcupid.com/index.php/the-4-big-myths-of-profile-pictures/

(see also their photography advice: http://blog.okcupid.com/index.php/dont-be-ugly-by-accident/ and my all time favourite in which they independently rediscover my Band-Pass algorithm for processing the SXSW MP3 dumps, applied to hotness: http://blog.okcupid.com/index.php/the-mathematics-of-beauty/)

re: 158.last

Hah. The camera nerd in me loves the graph of attractiveness by camera brand and by camera aperture.

It'd be interesting [to me, if not to anyone else] to see what results you'd get if you added in medium format cameras, digital or film.

I don't intend to keep the blog fully abreast of all Holly developments, but I wanted to share a couple of things because they are cute and funny, respectively.

The other is that the last time we went to the theater together (to which she also invited along someone else, and after which she had made plans), as we got into the subway and she saw the downtown sign she sang the word "downtown" to the tune of the Petula Clark song, and then I started singing, "Where can you go when life is making you lonely ...", and she started singing, and we sang the whole first verse together. I stopped then because the other woman didn't know the words and it felt exclusive. But there is just something really in sync about the two of us -- I mean, there aren't that many thirty-somethings who love and can sing all the words to that song. We should have sung the last verse: "And you may find somebody kind/To help and understand you/Someone who is just like you/And needs a gentle hand to/Guide them along."

The final part is that I was feeling somewhat dubious about the whole thing since she also had plans after the cooking club meeting. But I invited her to another play this weekend, and she responded, "I'm going to say yes. Yes!" (Is she Holly Bloom?) and then: "Also I had a dream about you where you rescued me from the bed of a snoring man." It is hard to escape the conclusion that that is flirtatious.

Also I had a dream about you where you rescued me from the bed of a snoring man

I love that.

I too need Holly.

163: Is something wrong, heebie?

I'm a bit sensitive to sounds in general, and have an unrealistic wish for one's spouse, when sick and with allergies, to not make gross noises in their sleep.

Also I feel totally guilty and disloyal admitting all this.

Not because it's that bad, but just because we've stumbled upon a big area where I'm often suppressing outsized emotions.

Stuff a sock in his mouth. He'll quiet down.

Also I have ten minutes to think of a post, and then I have to go do phone interviews for four hours, and I don't have any post ideas off the top of my head.

And I need coffee.

Positive airflow devices to help sleep apnea might be a good idea for a post if we want to just give up and admit we're old.

165: I thought that might be what you meant, but it's PINY that rescued Holly from the snoring man.

My wife has that problem with me too.

Oh right. I need a PINY.

A PINY for your thoughts.

I've heard that a PINY eel gland can help if you are feeling sleepless, Moby.

I mean, there aren't that many thirty-somethings who love and can sing all the words to that song.

I can. I'm PINY's soulmate!

Or I can sing all the words anyway. I don't particularly love the song.

Getting my spouse to accept that my occasionally needing to go sleep on the couch when his snoring gets particularly raucous does not mean that I am angry at him or don't love him anymore has been one of my biggest accomplishments in this marriage, I think.

How I envy the Victorians their separate bedrooms. I think a lot of people find co-sleeping pretty annoying but nobody can admit it because it seems so unloving and unsexy.

I am not dating anyone, but everyone seems to think I am, and they are acting really weird around us all the time, which is very frustrating and anxiety-provoking, and I spend way too much energy insisting to everyone that we do not need to be pointedly saved seats together or discreetly disappeared from at the end of the night or whatever. It feels very third grade. I don't even know what I want to happen other than that I want this particular phase of our relationship to end immediately. Absolutely nothing has happened, and absolutely everyone is giving hella eyebrows about us. It makes me act all weird and defensive.

My parents needed to replace their bed around the fifteen year mark, and they just looked at each other and said, "Twin beds!" They couldn't afford separate rooms though. But little luxuries like having a duvet when your partner prefers sheets and blankets and vice versa are not to be underestimated.

If this is the snoring thread I will go ahead and admit something ridiculous but possibly funny-at-my-expense which is that I tried one of these sorta...nose clip things that are supposed to fucking prop your nose open. No dice. Next things to try are the straps that hold your jaw in place and retraining myself to sleep on my side, which for some unknowable reason* makes me feel slightly nauseated. I was signed up for a sleep study but some people told me it's basically a commercial for CPAP machines and I want to treat that as a very last resort.

Oh actually the second-to-last resort is going back on OTC nasal spray, which I finally badgered a doctor into saying is only harmful if you keep increasing the dose, which I never did.

*meaning I googled to no avail. The only possible answer I could find was that, as Moby said, things come in threes, and two people recently have fessed up to having a bun in the oven but...I'm relatively confident that is not the answer.

If this is not the snoring thread, carry on!

Separate bedrooms are inhuman. Probably downright unmammalian. Sleeping alone is the saddest part of being single; why would anyone want to recreate that in relationship?

Probably downright unmammalian.

Plenty of mammals sleep alone.

Mice sleep in a great big pile. But bears sleep alone and bears are cooler because of the mauling potential.

Mammals should sleep in a pile.

A sufficiently big mammal is it's own pile.

I bet it would be cool to sleep in a pile with bears.

I had no idea my husband was posting here as urple.

Sleeping alone is the saddest part of being single; why would anyone want to recreate that in relationship?

So you're the heavier sleeper in your marriage, eh?

So you're the heavier sleeper in your marriage, eh?

As a matter of fact, I am.

I didn't know that about bears. That's probably why they're so grumpy and prone to mauling people.

Someone should run an experiment where they force a family of bears to sleep in a big pile, and see if they aren't more cheerful than the control group.

I think bears might be experiencing the high rates of single motherhood that you so often see in the animal kingdom.

(There an exception if it's hot, of course. If it's hot, I don't want anyone anywhere near me. Maybe this explains bears, because of all the fat and fur.)

With one exception, mammals of all species sleep with any children who are unable to fend for themselves. So urple ...

Sleeping with other people is a big disincentive to pursue relationships for me. I like the waking up and having breakfast part of relationships, and maybe about five minutes of snuggling at the beginning of the night, but I am woken by all of a partner's sounds and movements. It can be sweet as a novelty, but I wouldn't be able to endure it on a nightly basis.

Maybe the secret is the Swedish memory foam mattress and ear plugs?

First the no-carb diet, then toe shoes and hemispheric sleeping. What could go wrong?

I find the key is a large enough bed that you can snuggle or evade as the weather or mood requires; but mostly I'm with Urple. Having someone to literally sleep with is half the point of being married at all.

(I'd feel differently if Buck snored, probably. And I'm a fairly heavy sleeper -- when I have trouble sleeping, which I do occasionally, it's not that something woke me up, it's that I woke up spontaneously.)

Come to think, though, this is going to sound really sappy, but I don't think I did like sleeping with people before Buck; to the extent that I remember anything clearly that far back, I remember getting woken up all the time as being a problem. It's not like it got better over time with Buck, though, it was comfortable from the beginning.

And so you married him.

What size is the standard American double bed? Here, if you're not careful, you get 4' 6" by default, which is really hard for two people to sleep in. An additional six inches can save your sanity and your relationship.

An additional six inches can save your sanity and your relationship.

I keep getting spam messages about that.

I wake up all the goddamn time, and insomnia is worse for me with pregnancy, and our bedroom is tiny so our queen bed barely fits, and we are not super tiny people.

Also being caressed directly wakes me up, and I really resent being caressed 15 minutes before the alarm goes off, and no, it's a weekday morning and there is not going to be any nookie, just a cranky Heebie.

I was barely able not to gloat when we were in a hotel recently and they gave us a room with two twin beds.

I'm kind of a pill.

200: The width difference between a full (54 inches) and a queen (60) is big if there are going to be two people there, yes.

198 is sort of how I feel too, though the current system is that I generally go to bed by myself, have Lee show up when she's ready, have Mara show up when she decides she's had enough of her bed, eventually have Lee head to Mara's bed because Mara's favorite way to sleep involves kicking me a lot, and then I wake up and get dressed and wake Nia, who complains because Mara is allowed in our bed and she isn't. I really miss having a bed to ourselves for soothing rather than (purely) sexy reasons, but I don't think Lee feels the same way and she certainly likes having Mara around. I'm not sure whether urple's family has a similar setup.

200: I think that's a standard double, but most people have a queen, which is 5" wide. We've got a king, which is kind of huge for the room, but Buck is tall with limbs like a gibbon so we need the space.

5" wide

What you do is the first person carefully balances with their arms out to the side and then the second person carefully lays down on top of them.

WMYBSALB, Sifu?

it's a weekday morning and there is not going to be any nookie, just a cranky Heebie

So typical.

Maybe the secret is the Swedish memory foam mattress

They come with their own issues.

Fixed by velcro lingerie?

I don't think I understand the complaint. Traction?

We haven't found it to be a problem, but I think it'd be characterized as a lack of, um, bounciness. If what you're doing relies heavily on rebound from a springy mattress, you'd have to readjust.

Lack of bounciness is a complaint I could understand.

re: 200

Yeah, we are moving, and since J' got pregnant, the 4ft 6 we have has been almost impossible. We have a second bed, so I slope off there at least a few times a week. So, at the new house, we've ordered a bigger one.

Without prejudice to whatever decisions you guys are making w/r/t breastfeeding, cosleeping, or whatever, one bit of advice I didn't get before having a baby was to have a waterproof mattress-pad/cover on our bed. In retrospect, this would have been an excellent idea, particularly if you're getting a new mattress.

Assuming you don't like the smell of stale urine.

re: 214

Yeah. I have read that somewhere in one of our parenting books, I think. Thanks for the tip!

Or spit-up milk.

208-212: Covered in TFA, but perhaps overlooked because of what else was going on in that thread.

215: What a crazy assumption! Don't all mammals love the smell of stale urine?

218: That thread also illustrates another good reason for a waterproof mattress cover.

Have a huge fish scrabbling out of the river to eat pigeons.

I hate memory foam with a passion.

205: What does the second person lay on the first?

222: Proving yet again that we are polar opposites in nearly every regard. I have never slept better in my life.

I'm ambivalent. At this point it's been years and I'm clearly used to it, but I wasn't keen on the memory foam when we got it, although I can't quite remember why.

223: Down, of course. What could be more comfy?

224: It's possible she just hates the idea of you being well rested.

I felt like I didn't toss and turn all night, and was subtly locked into a single position for longer than I would have otherwise been, and I woke up stiff and aching all over. Horrible.

It has been a long time, though.

Oh, that is it -- it does kind of hold you in position. But that doesn't seem to be a problem any more.

It may be a coincidence, but the brief period I spent sleeping on memory foam I would tend to wake up in a puddle of sweat.

Jammies and I are both exceedingly restless fidgeters. Jammies is the only person I've ever heard of who bounces their leg fidgeting-like in his sleep. (The first time I was laying next to him, I had the thought "Is he really jerking off right next to me? We just started dating.")

As hard as I find it to sleep next to someone, I rather like the sensation of Jammies fidgeting in his sleep. It somehow helps address my need to fidget rhythmically.

230: It is definitely warmer than regular mattresses.

Is he really jerking off right next to me? We just started dating

Man, Heebie really is uptight.

I slept on memory foam when I was house-sitting a couple of years ago and it was some of the worst sleep I've ever had. I suspect it would be better if the foam remembered me instead of the people who lived there.

Ugh. We are (or should be) in the market for a new mattress, but I dread the process, because they're expensive and awkward to get into the house and yet I don't feel like know very much about what I'd like to sleep on (etc.) night after night.

4'6" is really too small for two decent sized people; we had one even slightly smaller than that at first and while it was sort of cozy, long term it would have driven me mad. I also don't recommend memory foam at all if you tend to run hot while sleeping; it really increases the temperature.

Like LB, I hated sharing a bed before I met my husband. I thought I was destined to separate beds or even separate bedrooms until, voila, I finally met the person I could share a bed with! (He has many other fine traits, of course. But this one is important.)

218: Wait, what? That has definitely not been a problem with my memory foam mattress. The guy who doesn't get my jokes gushes* about the memory foam, too, so anecdata of two.

* low-hanging sugarplum, just for the holidays

Shared bed is fine. I want my own bathroom.

shiv started sleeping on the couch a few months ago when I was having very bad insomnia and he had a head cold that made him sound like a lawn mower. Turns out, he really likes sleeping on the couch, because he can watch TV until he falls asleep. And we're both sleeping better. So now he sleeps in our bed only if I have nowhere to be the next day.

Mutual showering is something I always enjoyed, but which seems to occur less with age.

I apparently, according to my wife, have some kind of sleep apnea that keeps her up worrying if I'm going to stop breathing. I keep putting off going to a doctor about it because I really don't want to get a CPAP or whatever.

I definitely prefer sleeping alone, although I hate falling asleep and waking up alone, if that makes sense.

241.2: It makes sense, but asking your wife to accommodate that seems a bit unreasonable.

I would hate the memory foam for temperature and fidgeting reasons. I toss and turn, which is now a problem because my dog likes to press up against me and is nearly immovable when I'm lying down, so any ground I give is never regained. We go to sleep each comfortably on our pillows and I wake up perched on the edge clinging to a corner of blanket with his face resting on my cheek. He is a nice heat source, though.

I very much prefer sleeping with someone else, as long as that person is my partner, and not some bratty kid who at her age should be able to spend the night her her own bed.

I also am the half of the couple that sleeps more soundly, so that may affect my preferences.

Mutual showering is something I always enjoyed, but which seems to occur less with age kids.

you mean your parents didn't shower together while you brushed your teeth?

I used to toss and turn, but that stopped altogether once I began sleeping on memory foam. Here's the thing: tossing and turning means you aren't sleeping deeply, but are waking (or nearly waking) because your body is sore from lying on the same pressure points and needs to move. Also, my back is in much, much better shape now because I can sleep on my side instead of on my stomach.

Yeah, Jammies and I used to shower together way more often before we had to start designating someone to listen for a baby.

Now that Hokey Pokey has turned 2, we've started ignoring them for long enough that we could start showering together again, but I guess we're about to wreck that. Again.

Showering together is madness, unless you have one of those fancy showers with multiple streams.

I very much prefer sleeping with someone else, as long as that person is my partner, and not some bratty kid who at her age should be able to spend the night her her own bed.

That's no way to talk about your students, rob.

How many people here have ever been in a relationship where mutual showering happened often enough that it wasn't an explicitly sexual activity?

244.1 So, SO true.

It's not really clear to me what the boundary is between "explicitly sexual" and not is in circumstances where you're by definition naked and touching each other.

in almost all of mine it wasn't exclusively sexual. Sometimes it's just more efficient.

221: have a fish that (apparently) burrows into the ground to prey on moles (YEP. IT'S MOLE.)

Here's the thing: tossing and turning means you aren't sleeping deeply, but are waking (or nearly waking) because your body is sore from lying on the same pressure points and needs to move.

The first part is probably true, but I don't think the second part is the only cause.

253: You shower naked? Pervert.

My best mattress-buying story: I went to the furniture store with this girl to help her buy a futon-on-frame type thing. She sort of knew I was hot for her, and prevailed upon me to take her to the store because I had a car and she didn't. When she spotted a an item she liked, the salesperson indicated that we should test out the bed to make sure it was adequate for our needs. She got a mischievous look in her eyes and hopped onto the bed on her hands and knees. I spontaneously hopped on behind her, and we pantomimed a vigorous doggie-style for a few seconds, after which she declared the futon suitable. The sales guy was so unperturbed by our little show that I suspect it wasn't the first time he got that reaction.

255: That's the creepiest thing I've seen in a while.

251: We used to be non-active-sex showerers. One person gets in, the other person hops in 5-10 minutes later of their own accord, the first person gets out 5-10 minutes before the second person. Especially if we were both coming back from exercising or something. Jammies' sister was super scandalized when we did that at their parents' house.

253: There's definitely a difference between sexual touching and non-sexual touching.

261: You're talking about parenting, right?

238 is the truth.

There's definitely a difference between sexual touching and non-sexual touching.

Mr. Dash, I've decided it's best that I don't put you on the stand to testify in your own defense. I need you to trust me on this.

4'6" is really too small for two decent sized people

Ahem, sizeist.

I've always suspected the heat issue with memory foam, so I'm glad to have it anecdotally confirmed. I'm a furnace in bed, apparently (...laydeez), so it wouldn't do.

People have asked whether or not I can tell the girl pregnancies from the boy pregnancy. There's one major difference between Hokey Pokey and these other two: I was boiling hot with him. My stomach was hot to the touch. Jammies commented all the time that I was like a hot stone in bed. (STONE FOX!)

Hokey Pokey as a kid is the sweatiest one I've ever known. I feel kind of sorry for him, growing up in Texas. Obviously maybe it's just him, but it sure did distinguish that pregnancy.

http://www.overstock.com/guides/how-to-keep-cool-with-a-memory-foam-topper

Putting a cover over ours made it a non-issue (and with small children climbing into bed with us, the cover was a necessity anyhow).

YMMV, of course.

265, others: The heat thing would be my undoing. It is bad enough with a water resistant pad (backup for when children end up coming into our bed in the night). I roast like a pig too often.

I don't understand how women shower on their own. Every woman I've ever showered with has required lots of help getting her breasts clean.

One person gets in, the other person hops in 5-10 minutes later of their own accord, the first person gets out 5-10 minutes before the second person.

JESUS CHRIST HOW LONG ARE YOUR SHOWERS??!?

Most people feel safe in their bathrooms, Urple. But we all understand that you don't.

Seven minutes.

251: Me, although 253 -- and because 271, and don't want to get into that loop of `shower, have nookie, need shower, rinse, repeat'. And 273 isn't enough. I have needslong hair.

You must all be smaller than I am, or have bigger showers. The idea of just sharing a shower to get clean sounds impossibly annoying -- if there are two people in the shower, IME one of them is standing there, chilly, with no water hitting them.

I really really want a latex mattress. I find them springier and less hot than memory foam, but more supportive than springs. This is unfortunate for me because decent ones cost a fortune. But our current mattress is getting old and shitty and BOY do I want latex for the next one.

Obligatory thread title reference.

JESUS CHRIST HOW LONG ARE YOUR SHOWERS??!?

Verily I say unto thee, the smell of death does not wash off easily three days after the fact.

if there are two people in the shower, IME one of them is standing there, chilly, with no water hitting them.

Yeah, this is how it went. One person soaping up away from the spray, one person in the spray.

Contra Urple's implied accusation, it was actually just a quick, efficient way to run two people through the wash and rinse cycle. With a touch of intimacy and chatting throughout.

I've mostly lived with elderly converted tubs, LB (with flow reducers on, yet). It just inspires a body to be more snuggly in the water. With some mutual rotating and washing of each other, all clean and warm.

redfoxtailshrub, can you try out Keetsa? one of their cheaper ones feels to me much like latex did.

Also, Irish Spring is hella difficult to find in Golgotha.

Oh, honey.

Latex mattresses are probably not as awful as the name sounds.

one of their cheaper ones feels to me much like latex did.

Keetsa is a brand of lambskin condom?

I love my Ikea mattress (I'm sure it's called an Yggdrasill or something) but mostly I sleep on my couch.

Can I do something passive aggressive to these last two identical twin students, who have annoyed me all semester, and are now 30 minutes past the last other kid turning in a final exam, and look intent to sit here for the next hour staring unproductively at their exams? JUST TURN THE FUCKING THING IN ALREADY.

I made the stupid thing short, too. That never, ever actually means that I'll get to leave before the full time is up.

I'm sure it's called an Yggdrasill or something

The Gutvik, perhaps?

but mostly I sleep on my couch

The story of my marriage.

That looks more pitiful than it was meant to.

I have figured out that part of the reason I sleep on the couch is that I can put the murphy bed up and pretend I live in a slightly larger apartment. I recognize that this is not entirely sane. But also isn't there something decadent-feeling about sleeping on the couch? Oh I'm not even going to get in bed. I'll just sleep on the couch. No, ok, I don't really know why I do it so much of the time.

Flying out to New York to sleep on Smearcase's couch does sound bad.

I don't know, it was a nice break from bickering with the wife.

I want a Chesterfield sofa to decadently sleep on. I'm pretty sure this is because of _Black Books_, and who would want to actually *be* them?, but still.

can you try out Keetsa?

Oh yeah. I have a Keetsa mattress and love it.

did yours come in the box with built-in wheels? Loved that. Kept the wheels; think they may have made it into a solar power system. And the nonwoven it was wrapped in was several muslins.

296: It did! Given that they don't do delivery, I appreciated how easy they made it to transport.

But also isn't there something decadent-feeling about sleeping on the couch? Oh I'm not even going to get in bed. I'll just sleep on the couch.

Yes! I do this sometimes on weekends when I'm feeling decadent.

I did it all the time when I lived alone. I loved it. Now it feels disloyal or something, but I'd do it when Jammies is out of town, except I'd be enjoying having the regular bed to myself way too much to spend a night on the couch.

I'm kind of in love with my sofa, but I haven't tried sleeping on it yet.

Have you at least made out with it?

276: IKEA's fancy (relatively speaking, of course) latex mattress is not insanely expensive and is terrifically comfortable. If you want it to be a bit squishier, IKEA sells a latex mattress topper that is also quite nice.

You will probably never see this comment, though, so this was a waste of time and pixels.

301: It comes from kind of a 50s cultural milieu, so we're taking it slow.

Since this is the bed thread, and I'm pondering buying a new one soon-ish: does anyone have an opinion on whether a platform bed is fine with just a mattress, or if it still needs a box spring?

You will probably never see this comment, though, so this was a waste of time and pixels.

I did, I did see it!

I don't mind that our bed is a platform bed.

I did tawt a Vonny Wafe!

No need for a box spring.

The whole glorious point of a platform bed is no need for a stupid box spring, in my opinion.

or if it still needs a box spring

Definitely doesn't need a box spring. If you're buying a new mattress at the same time, they may try to bully you into getting a box spring by telling you that you'll void the mattress on the bed if you don't use it with the matching box spring. Which, who the fuck cares, when was the last time you made use of the warranty on your mattress?

The warranty. You'll void the warranty on the bed.

Don't void on the mattress.

309: the IKEA latex mattress is compatible with platform beds. Now, acknowledging that mattresses are probably the ultimate ymmv item, we REALLY love ours. Until the era of the limp began, it made my back feel much better. And it's not hot like those horrid memory foam numbers.

On second thought, maybe cars are the ultimate ymmv item.

308-310: Ah, good. That's what I thought. But then I googled it and found a comment thread at some random place where people were saying otherwise. Other hiveminds are confused, I guess.

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So, speaking of beds. We'll be moving ours soon, to the townhouse we bought yesterday!
|>

Happy house owning and may your move not suck for avoidable reasons.

317: Well, we are moving in the middle of December. Fortunately it has been unseasonably warm.

I hope you didn't get one of those memory foam townhouses.

They do well in earthquakes.

Sweaty in Northern Virginia summers though.

We're planning to buy a new mattress and I didn't even know about latex mattresses, which sound like a good option for us. Y'all are so helpful! (Though now this means a trip to IKEA, which is dreadful.)

We are moving tomorrow. It fucking sucks. I feel like I've been seconds away from a toddler style tantrum meltdown for weeks. Not helped by having a pair of new landlords, one of whom is a total arsehole. We've currently settled on a system where he and I never speak.

Wise idea. I never speak to your landlord either. Good luck moving.

I'm moving too! And not through Megan's spare room after all, though that would have been a liveblog for the ages ("STILL NAKED. MEAT.") Splitting up our stuff to minimize the stress of the *next* move without setting myself up for misery is a trick.

Glad I'm not moving today! Snyeg is edyoting like crazy out there. Supposed to get 6 inches, which is like 5.8 inches more than we got all last winter.

'Twas brillig and the snyeg toves did gyre and edyot in the wabe.

You have a pair of new landlords at your old or new place?

WHY DID I MARRY A WOMAN?

The people of California voted "yes" on Proposition 8, which clearly states that "marriage is between a man and a woman, yet this vote could soon be overturned by the United State Supreme Court. This boggles my mind. How can the federal government reverse what the citizens voted for on three separate occasions? This is criminal in my mind. I am married to a woman who is the light of my life. We have wonderful children. I would not have it any other way. Why did I marry a woman? Because God ordained marriage between a man and a woman in the Garden of Eden. The institution is as old as time. How can 12 individuals question God's judgment? I say, "five thumbs up for marriage between a man and a woman!" God knew what He was doing.

"five thumbs up for marriage between a man and a woman!"

"My husband is all thumbs. IYKWIMAITYD."

Because God ordained marriage between a man and a woman in the Garden of Eden

??

oh sorry that's from my fb feed. I thought it was funny. I guess it's not.

It's funny in a depressing way.

We're not psychic like the Welsh.

I just moved into a new place. It is amazing how many new things one needs to buy when a split occurs. We divided things up nicely and amicably, but I do miss my coffee table that hid stuff so nicely.

I need to buy another bed and another dresser. Ug. Too much money spent at target buying lamps and stuff. Just stuff.

And I have too many books. I cannot believe I even said that, but I need to give books away. Anyone want books??

when a split occurs

!

That is a thing I didn't know about.

Is that a thing other people knew about?

Indeed -- I'm sorry to hear it.

Ah, sorry Will.

Sorry to hear about it, Will.

335: So sorry to hear it. Best of luck and a friendly future to you.

If you feel like sending the books media mail, a friend just FB'd a request to mail books to her grandmother. She'll pay you back the postage.

Thanks. It is friendly, but still hard. We've been under the same roof but apart for a while, but the actual moving into two places was only recently able to take place.

The dog went with her. But I had dog visitation last weekend. My daughter LOVES the dog.

k-sky:

isnt it insanely expensive to ship books? What kind does she want?

Isn't there a special book rate? There used to be -- was it called Fourth Class?

Alternatively, I wonder where the best place to donate books might be.

I'm sorry, too, will. I blame the homosexuals.

Sorry, Will.

"Media mail" is the special USPS book rate (also includes papers, dvds, cds, videos) and it's cheap but slow.

343: There was 15 years ago. The office I was in then had a stamp for it.

Media mail. $3 for one hardback, $2.50 for a paperback, rate list. Biggest obstacle is having to go to a USPS during their limited hours and wait in line there.

huh maybe it doesn't include dvds etc any more. It used to. Anyway it definitely includes books.

https://www.usps.com/ship/media-mail.htm

Ah, will, I'm sorry to hear that.

Hope you have a gentle transition, will.

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Can anyone tell me how many adults can fit on the bench seat of a 1976 Ford F-100?

Thanks.

|>

You're the engineer. Where is your math God now????

(Sorry to hear that, Will)

345:

They surrounded me with their happy homosexual partnerships. Really, I was doomed.

Thanks again, people.

351|||>: Intact or in pieces?

Um, whole people in a restored F-100 with a bench seat.

My sympathies, will.

About books: Ask MeFi on 'How can I part with my precious books? No, really.'

Dammit, sorry, will. That sucks.

351: Three comfortably. Four if not. Assumes standard transmission.

Comfortably in terms of width. Those seats were not great.

...and I was hoping it would be a F-100 Super Sabre.

Thanks, Moby.

Sorry, I meant assumes automatic transmission.

Sorry about that Will. That really sucks.

Sorry, will. I saw you mentioned moving (and concerns about your daughter and new neighbors). I didn't know why. Sucks.

Media mail, but don't sweat it.

Sorry, will, I'd wondered what prompted the move and am sorry to hear about this.

I am very sorry to hear it, will, and wish you the most amicable possible relationship.

Damn, Will, I'm sorry about the split.

I wish you the very best in your new place!

It is amazing how many new things one needs to buy when a split occurs.

Oh good lord yes. So sorry, will.

Fuck, will, sorry. Come on out, and we'll commiserate and cry in our wine. We could do an updated "Odd Couple" kind of thing. Are you a slob?

i am somewhat. Are you going to be fastidious and skinny?

Once we finalize our own split, I will be fastidious, because I've been living with someone's clutter for years, and I will definitely be skinnier, since I'll be poor. I sense comedy gold here!

I will definitely be skinnier, since I'll be poor

I have some bad news about social trends in that area.

lets do it!

You guys just made the theme song play in my head. It isn't a bad song, at least the twenty second I've heard of it.

My husband is all thumbs.

Dude, I found a thumb last night. I went to a call where it came in as a thumb had gotten lopped off and usually there's some exaggeration on that kind of thing because they're hysterical on the phone. But sure enough, we went walking in and this four year old boy sitting on the couch with mom holds up his hand and holy shit there buddy you are definitely missing your thumb. The thumb was in the next room on mom's bed. AFAICT he was jumping on the bed and was playing with the blinds cord and it must have been wrapped around his thumb when he fell and yanked it off. Surprisingly little blood.

Great, now I'm worried about my blinds. Did they put it back on?

I can find you a thumb, no problem.

The ambulance guys took it with them in a baggie when they left with him so I assume they were going to try. It was towards the end of my shift so I don't know for sure.

378: Fresh?

344

Alternatively, I wonder where the best place to donate books might be.

Around here public libraries accept book donations (which they try to sell cheaply).

and holy shit there buddy you are definitely missing your thumb

Yipe!