Rules rule, okay?

Okay you guys, time to help me meet the rules.

So, online dating. I have an OK Cupid profile that I feel like I could actually meet decent people through (I’ve met two boys from it, both of whom I’ve slept with more than once), I had an NZdating profile but all I get from that is lots of (sometimes amazing) sex, and I have a findsomeone profile that I’ve never got a single message from. Clearly, we need to work on that. So let’s look at what The Rules has to say about personal ads. If you have downloaded the PDF, turn to page 102. Now here’s what I currently have as my Find Someone profile. 

About me… 

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Basics

31 year old bi-sexual female from Central Wellington

Appearance

1.81 metres tall (5’11”) with brown eyes and brown hair

Ethnicity

NZ European

Religion

No religion

Marital status

Never married

Education

University degree

Smoker

No

Alcohol

Active drinker

Star sign

Gemini

Last updated

Saturday, 10 September 2011

I’m extroverted and in search of new adventures so I will always have stories to tell. I like organising parties and events, wining and dining (there wasn’t a space to list myself as fat, so I might as well do it here instead), and watching torrented television shows. I get obsessive about apostrophes, listen to indie rock and am a big believer in hanging out, rather than having any specific hobbies apart from yelling at newspaper columnists.

I’m looking for… 

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Males and Females aged between 28 and 45.

I keep myself pretty busy so I’m looking for someone who’s got their own life too. I like people who are passionate about something (anything!), are left-leaning and who also like food and drink. I’m generally very open-minded, but bad grammar makes me dry like a cruskit.

 

ProfileLifestyleThoughtsDo we match? Edit My Lifestyle

Sports and Exercise 

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Watching sport

I never watch sport

Foods 

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Eating out

I eat out all the time

Cooking

I regularly cook

Travel and Holidays 

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Travel

I regularly travel
Some Pacific island (Rarotonga is probably my favourite but I’m trying to get to them all), sunshine and laziness.

Dream holiday

Roadtripping across the USA

Memorable holiday

New York and San Francisco in 2006

Going out 

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My ideal night out

Drinks, then dinner, then either a good bar or a party where there’ll be lots of interesting people to talk to, and some dancing

Drinking

I drink with meals, when I go out, on weekends, after work

Movies 

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Watching movies

I prefer to watch at home

Television 

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Watching TV

I watch TV up to 10 hours a week

Favourites

Community, Parks & Recreation, Mad Men, Twin Peaks, Veronica Mars, anything by Joss Whedon

Music 

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Latest album

The Suburbs by Arcade Fire My rating: 

Favourites

Arcade Fire, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Cat Power, Bloc Party, The Cure

How I like music

Home, Car

Books and Magazines 

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Favourites

I like BUST magazine, Douglas Coupland, Margaret Atwood, Gideon Dafoe

 ProfileLifestyleThoughtsDo we match? Edit My Thoughts

Children

I don’t have a lot of thoughts about children. Maybe I’ll have them one day, maybe I won’t.

Commitment

I think it’s important that all the people in the relationship have the same level of commitment or not.

Communication

I have a degree in it.

Drugs

Been there, done that, don’t do anything except alcohol now. I don’t mind what others get up to though, as long as it’s not so much as to be boring.

Work

It’s nice to have a job I love.

Religion

I don’t have religion.

So here’s your challenge: rewrite my profile for me! Hopefully comments work, or tweet me, or email me or whatever you gotta do. But make me better, okay?

Y’know, it doesn’t seem fair that I am the only one experiencing the full horror of The Rules. Luckily, it’s a PDF so you can download it too! Then you can read while you’re t work too. Remember to tweet me or leave comments about the bits you find most offensive, or if you stumble across anything that actually makes sense! 

On Friday after work, I headed home to feed my cats and hide my prozac & copy of The Rules make myself look pretty before going out on the town. I did actually think about trying to go for something really feminine, and I did put on makeup, and I’d dyed my hair to cover the greys, and given myself a manicure in BRIGHT GREEN since men like bright colours and all, but I ended up wearing pale gold and shorts. I didn’t look particularly feminine, I looked like a hot mess. But I made sure that I didn’t take along a pen so that I couldn’t help boys take my number (if they really like me, they’d make an effort to get a pen from someone!), and that I took along lip gloss instead of chapstick. But we didn’t end up going out anyway, I just sat and drank whiskey at my friends’ house until 3am. Which was great.

So on Saturday afternoon, I knew I’d see a boy that I had one date with last year, so I made sure to dress feminine, and to break off conversations before he could, and to leave before he did. He didn’t ask me out, which according to The Rules means that it’s not meant to be. That or I emasculated him last year when I asked him out, and it was only a pity date and doomed to failure anyway. If only I’d known about the rules then!

I broke the rules on Sunday by texting him to ask for something workish, and then saw him again, and acted like I didn’t like him, like you are supposed to act on dates - “think about how you would act with someone you weren’t interested in, and act that way” is the advice for what to do on dates. . That was easy to do cos I was in a grumpy mood anyway.  

Today I am not wearing any lipgloss and I haven’t brushed my hair, and I’m not wearing bright clothes. I am sucking at the Rules pretty hard core. But at least I can go home and study up rather than go out and break the rules anyway. Phew! Also, thanks so much to Tom for sending me Total Flirt by Violet Blue. I suspect February will be a lot more fun.

Finally some sensible-ish advice on page 50. After going on for ages about
how you need to have an egg timer next to your phone so you always keep
phonecalls short so he wants more, and how you should never call him, and
how you must always say you’re busy, they do say that of course you’re
busy, that your life doesn’t revolve around a man, that you need to do your
work and see your friends and fold your laundry. So that’s nice, even if it
contradicts all the makeup wearing you will be doing every day because men
like to see women feminine.

Oh, except then it goes on about how you need to have your own life because
after you’re married, he won’t be your entertainment director because he
will still want to go out with the boys. So not quite so empowering then.

As I’ve been reading through The Rules, I’ve been tweeting some of the lines that have made me harrumph the most .

I suppose it’s time to start finding ways that I can actually adopt some of its ‘rules’ into my life. So these are the things I pledge to do for January.

• “Don’t leave the house without wearing makeup. Put lipstick on even when you go jogging!”. I solemnly swear every time I go jogging, I will put on lipstick. So, never then. But I will swap chapstick for lipgloss for the month of January. Luckily it isn’t asking me to comb my hair.
• “Color gray hair, grow your hair long. Men prefer long hair, something to play with and caress”. Okay, I will dye my hair tonight if I’m not too drunk after dinner with my family.
• “It will be easier to feel like an intoxicating creature unlike any other (my bolding - this is one of your main goals, you see) if you follow good grooming. Manicures, pedicures, periodic facials and massages should become part of your routine. And don’t forget to spray on an intoxicating perfume before you leave the house - just don’t overdo it”. Does anyone have any chloroform I can borrow? Okay, I might have to skip the perfume bit unless I can find one that doesn’t make my nose angry, but the other bits I’m happy to get behind, in the spirit of TreatYo’Self! 
• And now we get to the hard bit.
  “Now that you look the part, you must act the part. Don’t act like a man, even if you are the head of your own company. Let him open the door. Be feminine. Don’t tell sarcastic jokes. Don’t be a loud, knee-slapping, hysterically funny girl. This is okay when you’re alone with your girlfriends. But when you’re with a man you like, be quiet and mysterious, act ladylike, cross your legs and smile. Don’t talk so much.” Fine, I will be totally not like myself then when I’m around a man I like. During January.

Let’s do this, yo!

So for January, I will be following the rules of The Rules, a copy of which
has handily landed in my inbox. No, I will not be paying for this drivel.
It’s 184 pages long, so let me just share with you the actual rules
themselves, courtesy of Wikipedia:

The Rules
>
> 1. Be a “Creature” Unlike Any Other
> 2. Don’t Talk to a Man First (and Don’t Ask Him to Dance)
> 3. Don’t Stare at Men or Talk Too Much
> 4. Don’t Meet Him Halfway or Go Dutch on a Date
> 5. Don’t Call Him & Rarely Return His Calls
> 6. Always End Phone Calls and dates First
> 7. Don’t Accept a Saturday Night Date after Wednesday.
> 8. Fill Up Your Time before the Date
> 9. How to Act on Dates 1,2, and 3
> 10. How to Act on Dates 4 through Commitment Time
> 11. ALWAYS end the date first
> 12. Stop Dating Him if He Doesn’t Buy You a Romantic Gift for Your
> Birthday or Valentine’s Day
> 13. Don’t See Him More than Once or Twice a Week
> 14. No More than Casual Kissing on the First Date
> 15. Don’t Rush into Sex, Wait at Least Three Dates
> 16. Don’t Tell Him What to Do
> 17. Let Him Take the Lead
> 18. Don’t Expect a Man to Change or Try to Change Him
> 19. Don’t Open Up Too Fast
> 20. Be Honest but Mysterious
> 21. Accentuate the Positive & Other Rules for Personal Ads
> 22. Don’t Live with a Man (or Leave Your Things in His Apartment)
> 23. Don’t Date a Married Man
> 24. Slowly Involve Him in Your Family & Other Rules for Women with
> Children
> 25. Practice, Practice, Practice! (or, Getting Good at The Rules)
> 26. Even if You’re Engaged or Married, You Still Need The Rules
> 27. Do The Rules, Even when Your Friends & Parents Think It’s Nuts
> 28. Be Smart and Other Rules for Dating in High School
> 29. Take Care of Yourself and Other Rules for Dating in College
> 30. NEXT! & Other Rules for Dealing with Rejection
> 31. Don’t Discuss The Rules with Your Therapist.
> 32. Don’t Break The Rules!
> 33. Do The Rules and You’ll Live Happily Ever After!
> 34. Love Only Those Who Love You
> 35. Be Easy to Live With
>
> I look forward to romantic gifts! Except Valentine’s Day falls in
February, and I think I will be following a polyamory guidebook then, and
my birthday is in June, so who knows what I’ll be up to then?

Right after I hit publish on this site, I got a message on OK Cupid. 

Do you have a loud voice because you want to drown your thoughts or drown others voices? I am curious. 

Can you handle curious?

Normally, that terrible grammar would have made me ignore the person straight away. But instead, I will check out his profile and wait until I have received my copy of The Rules to see what to do next… 

Update: oh man, I hope The Rules will want me to ignore him. Check this out:

My self-summary I am.
What I’m doing with my life Everything. Every possible thing.
I’m really good at nothing.
The first things people usually notice about me Me.

Not a whole lot of opportunity for sparkage there…

So during a rather drunken dinner, I was talking about some guy, and there was some group analysis, and I was like “well maybe he just wasn’t that in to me” and then cringed a lot for using such a cliche. And we talked about what we wanted to achieve in 2012, and I said I wanted to date, and then somehow I came up with this , which of course I had to tweet: 

Just come up with best/worst idea EVAH: find 12 dating advice books and follow each one for a month.

Dare me to?

Of course, Twitter being what it is, I got dared straight away. So yes, I’m going to do this. 

A few caveats: 

1. As I followed up with on Twitter, my kind of ‘dating’ is usually “having anonymous sex with people from the internet”. I will do my best to follow advice from books about how to do things differently, but I can’t promise you results. 
2. I’ll be as honest and as open as I can possibly be when I update this blog, therefore it’s probably for the best if I use pseudonames for other people. 
3. I reserve the right to totally drop this whole premise if the guy mentioned in the first paragraph decides that actually he is into me. 

I know it’s January 11 already, so clearly Jan will be a short month. Tomorrow I’m going to hit the library and hopefully will find a copy of The Rules to get started. Hit me up with other suggestions about terrible dating books whose advice I should follow!