100 Emails, 20 Dates An SF girl's systematic quest to end her singlehood

Email 22: Time often flies too fast

OKCupid has a feature called "QuickMatch," where you scroll through people's pictures and summaries of their profiles, then you rate each person however many stars out of 5. If someone rates you 4 or 5 stars, OKCupid sends you an email showing 9 photos and says, "One of these guys just rated you 4 or 5 stars." You login to QuickMatch, and that person will appear in your queue. If you rate that person 4 or 5 stars, OKCupid sends you both an email.

I've gotten pretty good at telling who rated me: the oldest guy of the 9. But for one email I got in late January, there was a photo of a super cute guy. I thought, "Ooh. I wonder..." The hot guy had picked me! After we found out we were mutual matches, he sent me an email.

Date: Jan. 25, 2010
Subject: between becauses

Cute pics and mutual 4-star stuff aside, somewhere between Stevie Wonder, The Big Lebowski, the mandolin and wicked smahht, there is a good reason to at least say a real hello. Yes? Good times/places for you? I work for myself, so I'm flexible. You?

Hi

I love first emails like this. Friendly, casual, inviting, and--the thing I like most--he avoids the extensive emailing b.s. and cuts straight to the "let's meet up." His profile was the same way. He mentioned that he had a teenager, which sort of shocked me, but he seemed like a good, grounded, interesting person. I wrote him back the next day.

Date: Jan. 26, 2010
Subject: between becauses

I'm in. Thursday at 7 (or after) or Saturday afternoon work for me. I've been wanting to try the Rosamunde's on Mission. Though coffee or a drink would be fun, too.

The Stevie Wonder thing stuck out to me, too. He's so ridiculously good.

To be fair, I actually left off the last period. And that last line reads really awkward to me now. Eh.

He wrote back two days later, Friday, to say he was heading out of town that weekend and suggested we could get together the following week. I generally only suggest an actual date once, then if that doesn't work for the guy, I let him step up. If he's not interested, he won't suggest a date. I could have written back something short, like, "Have a great weekend. Next week sounds fine," just to show that I was still interested. But I didn't.

J. wrote me back a little over a week later:

Date: Feb. 5, 2010
Subject: between becauses

Geez, this life goes fast.
Okay, for reals.
You around tomorrow (Sat) daytime at all? Nice little walk and hello?
If not then, what's next week for you? Pretty much any day works for me up until 6ish. Open eves as of now are Tues and Thurs.
Let's just see.

I still liked the friendly, casual tone. The scheduling thing seemed a bit of a challenge, though. I find it a bit perplexing that people who work from home don't realize that we office workers can't just skip out early to meet someone for a date. Also, my phone had been stolen, and it had been a few weeks since I synced my phone calendar with my computer. I knew there were two appointments I was missing, but I wasn't sure how many others there would be.

Date: Feb. 7, 2010
Subject: between becauses

Hey, J.--

Seriously. This week and weekend flew by.

I love the idea of a walk. I think I'm free Thursday after work. (I don't mean to be flaky, but my phone--which has my calendar--was stolen a few weeks ago, and I just realized I have a couple of appointments that I never synced to my computer...)

Lunch might be a safer bet, though. Would you be up for meeting at the Ferry Building? I could do any day but Thursday.

I never heard back. He might have read my lack of response after he said he was going away as a lack of interest. Maybe next time that happens I'll write a quick, short, and sweet response.