You are working under the assumption that the women in this event are motivated. Since they are spending time and money doing this that they will actually circle names of guys they would like to meet.
I know 3 women, not unnattractive who have tried speed dating. The theme, among this low sample size ;), is that they check few names…many times none or one. They are looking for the big hit, the hunk who’ll sweep them off their feet. They feel uncomfortable checking more and certainly wouldn’t check 6. Of course, the guys they do check do not check them back. You might have cites on your hotness, but it isn’t the sweep-em-off-their-feet one they will circle.
I think what happens on these things is that everyone overestimates their ‘value’. Guys are circling the six most attractive but they are circling few if any. Not many matches get set.
Another problem for guys is that some women are naturally friendly and talkative. Many women will not be friendly/talkative because they do not want to give out interest signals. My wife is very friendly and talkative. Guys see this and interpret it as interest. Even after she tells them she is married and not interested the guy comes back because, well, she was friendly and talkative…she must be interested! It drives her nuts.
This is probably what is happening. The hot lawyer chick and the woman you had the great conversation with are just friendly which you interpreted as interest. In reality, you weren’t the hot hunk sweeping them off their feet. I’ve been around the block and my belief is that speed dating is worth pursuing but realize that people evaluate other people in this order:
Hotness
Attractiveness
Is she/he cute?
Is he/she hot?
Does he/she seem emotionally stable?
Is he/she good looking?
How attractive is he/she?
.
.
.
.
somewhere way down the list is personality/conversation. That comes later after you pass the 7 items above.
As long as you’re being suspicious, you could consider the possibility that the hotties are ringers brought in by the speed-dating company to give the impression that the male/female ratio and/or the hottie/nottie ratio is better than it actually is.
I was wondering if the male/female ratio of applicants (and re-applicants) is equal or about equal. Cos if not they’d have to incentivise one side somehow (more freebies, cheaper deals). There’s also the possibility that people (both men and women) attend in pairs with one not really looking but there for moral support or a second opinion for the other.
Anyroads, since I’m posting, I’d like to ask what happened immediately after these events ? Everyone went their seperate ways ? What’s to stop interested people hanging around the bar, or meeting up outside and going to dinner or whatever ?
SpaceDog,
I don’t know about the ratio of actual applicants, but they won’t schedule an event unless they can get an equal number of men and women. I have noticed that the women do seem to come in pairs, so I suppose that it’s possible that one of a pair isn’t really interested.
As far as afterwards, they encourage you to hang around and socialize if you’d like. I suspect they do this for the venues, who are hoping to sell more drinks. My experience is that everybody tends to head for the door and home. As a WAG I’d say that once they’ve handed in their choices/rejections, the women want to avoid the uncomfortable situation of being hit on by a guy they’ve already rejected.
Thank you. I’m enjoying writing it.
Just in case it’s unclear to anyone at this point, this is not fiction. I may be using some exaggeration and hyperbole but these are essentially true experiences.
At this point I’m waiting to receive my explanation regarding the anomalous “Badge 3 Joan”. I’ve received an email explaining that they’ve forwarded my query to a local coordinator for investigation.
I’d just like to give davidm props for doing the speed dating thing. I’m really bad with meeting new people and am horrendeous at making small talk. Speed dating is something I could never do.
Actually, I’m not all that skilled at small talk myself. If you could have sat in on each of the 8 minute sessions you would have heard, to a large extent, the exact same conversation. I’ve now told at least half a dozen women about the black leather jacket I bought in Tijuana which fell apart a week later. It varies somewhat depending on the responses I get but I’m becoming very skilled at spending eight minutes querying and talking about career, travel, and movies with the occasional mention of reading, family, or where she or I went to college. It always starts out with “So, what do you do?” and I’m actually finding myself running out of steam and searching for something to say right before the bell rings! It’s like I’m becoming conditioned to do whatever I can to carry on a conversation for exactly eight minutes. I’m not so sure that’s a good thing.
I guess I’ll never hear the end of this.
One night a week I’m repeatedly doing my spiel about career, travel, etc. Two or three nights a week I’m on the phone convincing people to vote for Kerry[sup][/sup]. I just hope that I don’t get the two spiels mixed up at some point!
[sup][/sup]Please don’t make this into a political thread, take it elsewhere.
I’m sorry about that, and I can relate, esp about there not being many good dating options out there. Maybe those two women just didn’t feel comfortable with a man who wasn’t as educated or financially well off as them. Many/most women greatly prefer a man who makes as much money or has as much if not more education as she does. A lawyer and physician will be damn hard to top or keep up with. That is just a guess though, and I have no idea what education level or financial level you have, but if that were me that would be my first guess about why people I had gotten along with so well hadn’t picked me as someone they’d like to know further.
But yeah that sounds fishy, how you got no positives from any of them. I wouldn’t worry though, the fact that 6 women may not have chosen ‘yes’ doesn’t mean the end. Hopefully you will find other people who respond positively to you.
Geez, I’m totally teasing you – I’m with lezlers on this, I wouldn’t have the nerve to do the speed-dating thing. I prefer to have the guy fall under the spell of my wit and charm via email, IM, and phone before risking the in-person meeting.
Besides, you’re still trying – I’m getting ready to go on hiatus from dating, I’m tired of the whole process right now.
I got home tonight to find a voicemail waiting for me from the local coordinator. He said that the badge number was wrong but the name Joan was correct and that the email and phone I’d gotten were hers. Apparently, because of the shortage of people last night, they had to renumber everyone right there at the bar and there was some confusion when it was all entered into the computer later. He said that he was going to have to call everyone to straighten out the confusion.
So, I got a match and it was my favorite! Of course, it was only a “friends” match but that’s a start. She’s a psychology grad student so I’m going to have to get past my paranoia that she’s psychoanalyzing everything I say. And I’ll have to find something to talk about other than my defective leather jacket.
I guess my next step is to compose a nice email and send it to her. Such a simple task and yet so difficult!
Of course, it wouldn’t be proper for me to give a blow by blow (no pun intended) description of what happens with her from here on out. If I go to another of the speed date things I probably will write about that.
I’m not sure about keeping you all updated on how things go with this woman. I don’t think that she would appreciate it if someone she was dating was posting all about it for all the world to see on some message board. I know that I wouldn’t like someone doing that to me. But I’ll try to keep you posted on any further speed dating adventures.
