For the most part, I have been a loner my entire life. My dog, Domino, was my best friend for nearly two decades. Most other humans bore, bother, or anger me too much, so I try to keep my distance. The general populous feels the same way about me, so it works out in mutual benefit.
Needless to say, this kind of behavior makes it hard to find a girlfriend, and once one is ensnared they are more trouble than they are worth. My friends all managed to get married but I am too wrapped up into my own schemes and intrigues to care much for that, or remember birthdays. Don't get me wrong, I am not complaining, I am happy with this life of solitude. I became comfortable with it once I realized that love, companionship, and all that gunk is just chemical processes in the brain to begin with. It all boils down to our need to breed and the world would be better off if I didn't spread my genes. In that light I am kind of a hero. You are welcome.
Still, though, it is fun to sometimes take a peek from the outside in through the eye slits of a costumed masque.
Whilst recently checking my e-mail I was struck by an ad for a online dating website, e-harmony.com. The advertisement boasted of a free trial account for AOL users, like me, and guaranteed a match for everyone who signs up. Ha! Yeah, right...
I signed up, took a one million question personality evaluation, and was ready to eat my eyeballs after a half hour of that trite. Really, I wasn't looking for a date, I just wanted to test that guarantee, but it was more taxing than I expected. While answering questions, taking surveys, and wasting time I was pummeled by waves of photos of happy smiling couples who all found their soul mates on that website. With each picture came a frothing testimonial proclaiming e-harmony as heaven's first website. Were I a normal being, and having not already realized I was in trouble by needing to turn to the internet to find love, the first (or second) clue to my dismal future, thanks to those pics, would be in seeing that only the sexiest people on the planet find matches through e-harmony. Cupids shoot the sexy through keyboards now, I guess. The rest of us ugly folks are just screwed.
Anyway, once the sign up procedure was completed I was ready to search for my soul mate. Since this was a free trial account they wouldn't provide any photos of my matches, just basic profile information. To actually see my prey I would have to pay twenty bucks a month, which is nineteen more than I make. I just wanted to see how many "soul mates" lived in my town.
I entered the search criteria and clicked away.
The first result came back with: zero. There are no matches within 10 miles of my residence. You don't say...
I widened the search radius to 100 miles. Zero matches.
E-harmony then suggested that I change some of my search criteria. It even made some recommendations for me. The three big reasons why my searches failed: smoking, drinking, and religion. I searched for a mate that did not smoke, drink, or practice religion. Not that I have a problem with anyone who does any of those activities, but the system asked and I answered.
I didn't want to budge on those three points, so I decided to expand the search radius to 300 miles of my location. Still zero matches, and still e-harmony suggested I change my stance on smoking, drinking, and religion.
I expanded my search to the U.S.A.. Zero results.
World? Zero.
I decided to change my search criteria. I adjusted some sliders, gauges, and meters but kept smoking, drinking, and religion at "no." My new search included fat chicks, mothers of twelve, ladies from the ages of 18 to 60, all races, all languages, all nationalities, all political affiliations, and all incomes but I stayed with my original stance on smoking, drinking, and religion.
I searched the world and came back with zero again.
This time not only did e-harmony recommend re-evaluating smoking, drinking, and religion, but it also suggested that I remove video games from my hobbies and put myself into a higher wage bracket. Really? Who's soul mate are we looking for here? Why not just save folks like me the trouble and provide a link to e-paperbagoveryourhead.com? What a joke.
I fully expected zero results going in and found it quite amusing, but I wasn't expecting the website to suggest that my views on smoking, drinking, and religion are wrong, and I wasn't expecting the website to ask me to lie about how much money I make.
Ever since then I get regular e-mails from e-harmony informing me that they still haven't found any matches. Lol! Why would they bother to tell anyone that!? I wonder how many lonely people consider those weekly reminders their "e-suicide." Terrible.
What a zero match world.
