Online dating during quarantine!

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Anyone else trying to find companionship during “these uncertain times” when we’re all supposed to stay the hell away from each other?

Me? I uprooted my entire life to move across the country … about three minutes before the pandemic hit. So now I’m in an unfamiliar place with minimal support network, and the only people I’ve met are co-workers at my retail (essential business) job.

I’m an introvert and something of a loner, but even I have my limits. I haven’t had a proper hug in months.

I’m also not dead yet. (This is how to delicately phrase the fact that I’d very much like to get laid.)

Recently, I stuck my profile onto PlentyOfFish and Tinder. Minimal description, but several nice selfies. Of course, sticking your arm out to photograph your own face doesn’t show the full-body length that’s, ah, rather important to many folks.
(Note To Self: ask sympathetic co-worker to take a few photos.)

So far, prospects are … minimal. I’m not terribly surprised, as this isn’t a highly populated region, and - to be frank - I just rolled over my odometer and turned 40. I know many men (even men in their 50s and 60s) list their cut-off point at a solid 39.
I refuse to lie about my age, even though shaving a mere four months off would burst my profile in front of thousands more guys.

It also occurs to me that I have literally no guest seating in my home. I have my papasan chair, but two can’t squash into it, and … well, there’s a swivel Herman Miller chair I’m unwilling to part with.
Any gentleman caller can sit across the room from me in the office chair, which doesn’t AT ALL amplify the “job interview” aspect of dating that I particularly loathe.

But that’s jumping the gun, since we’re definitely not there yet.

So, Dopers, who else is attempting to find, if not true wuuuuvvvv, then at least some suitable person to spend a little time with?

2

I don’t qualify to participate, but if user icon quality is any indication of dating catchability, you’ve got a leg up.

3

An online relationship just ended for me a month ago. It was brief; March-August. One of the biggest reasons it ended was because the pandemic made travel risky. We actually never ended up meeting in person at all, which was a huge hampering factor on the relationship.

In hindsight, I regret not having just gotten on the plane to fly and visit her anyway. I was probably over-cautious when the actual risk of contracting Covid from air travel wasn’t that high. But at the time, it seemed very dangerous.

4

I am also trying online dating, with precious little to show for it. Although I had little show for it before the pandemic, so I can’t exactly blame the virus.[sup]*[/sup] I’ve found Tinder to be rife with fake accounts recently; don’t know why that would be happening now.

Online Dating 101 says not to invite someone from the internet to your home right away. First meeting should be someplace public. You should get to know someone well before letting him know where you live. Find the guy first, then you can start worrying about furniture.

[size=1]

  • Actually, there was someone I was interested in a while ago. I had tickets to a concert and was all set to ask her to come with me. That was on March 11. I don’t believe in curses, but I sure know what one looks like.
    [/size]

P.S. How the hell do you do a proper footnote with this new software?

5

Oh, man, right there with you. In a lot of ways!

I too, am introverted and a bit of a loner, but I’m of the type that needs a +1, and it has been too long.

I live somewhere where I will not likely find anybody that I can likely even stand to be around- I REALLY don’t fit in here. My prospects of a person that I’m likely to even be able to meet in person are almost void. And of course, I just also rolled over on 40 myself, two weeks ago, and am thus far unsure how I feel about it.

I’m using PoF and OKCupid (actually, so far OKC has seemed “better” to me than PoF), but I do find that fake accounts are also the norm on EVERY service I’ve looked at. I’ve found one interesting person, and we get along great, can text for hours, have even driven the few hundred miles to hang out, but… I think I found just a friend. Good in its own way, but there is zero chemistry. So that doesn’t help with the fact that I’m also not dead yet, as you say…

For now, I am just muddling through. My kids are almost done with high school, then I will likely jump ship and try life somewhere else, and maybe lose that “single dad” label!

6

This footnote works!

This <sub>footnote</sub> works!

@Robot_Arm

Apologies to @purplehorseshoe…

7

Best of luck to you @purplehorseshoe. I did a fair amount of online dating before I met my husband, and I was a big believer in meeting face to face as soon as possible and sleeping together soon after. Probably not such a good strategy now.

8

I’m pretty happy being forty! I feel quite a bit more confident, and infinitely less tolerant of other people’s bullshit. It’s like a switch flipped in my brain (“I’m too old for this nonsense!”) and the angst of youngsters in their 20s seems utterly alien to me, now.

About the only thing I don’t like about it is that I’m filtered out of a lot of other people’s age requirements.
I try to tell myself that anyone in their sixties who thinks my two-decades-younger ass is “too old” isn’t someone I’d probably find compatible anyway for other reasons, and think of it as an asshole filter.

Also, I somehow forgot about OKC. Might as well get set up with them, too.

9

I joined match a couple of months ago and I’ve had a few first dates, but nothing that has worked out. I find it funny that you think you’re too old for a lot of guys as I’m in my late 50s and you would be excluded from my search because you’re far too young. Sometimes I think I’m pretty bad at understanding how to be a guy; maybe that’s why most of my messages are ignored.

Also, I agree with Robot_Arm, first meetings should always be someplace public.

10

Probably the best way to look at it!

I found shortly after wading in that I had to adjust the bottom end up of my age range up… reading the profiles of 29-year-olds just made me think “I don’t need another kid to raise…”!

11

+1 on the asshole filter. Back when I was using Match.com in my early 20s, I used to scrutinize the section where the guy said what he was looking for. I was open to dating a guy who was maybe 10 years older, but not if I was already at or near the upper end of his acceptable age range.

12

Agreed. I wouldn’t date a child. < braces for a well-deserved pummeling >
:wink:

13

That’s right. 40 is the new 18*.

*…on SDMB. :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

14

“You are not 40; you are 18 with 22 years of experience.”

15

Luckily I’m about 18 months into a relationship so I don’t have to worry about apocalypse dating. Speaking generically about online dating my personal experience was that with the free services you get what you pay for. Plenty of Fish was garbage. Tinder seemed to be skewed more younger and towards hook ups. Also more suited for densely populated areas. I had much more success paying for Match. Bumble also seems to be better for women who want more control of the situation.

16

I haven’t dated since the Eighties so all this online dating stuff is (almost) Greek to me. I wish you well, though, and hope you find your true love just as I found mine long ago.

Now get the hell off my lawn!

17

Simmer down gramps. You’ve wondered off again. It’s his lawn.

18

You don’t just have to write a profile and hope it shows up in some guy’s search. Some sites let you search for the kind of guy you’re looking for, and you can contact him first.

19

So how does OLD work during the Age of COVID? I seem to recall reading that some people exchange negative COVID tests before agreeing to meet? Would that mean getting tested within a few days of meeting? I mean a COVID test from two weeks ago wouldn’t mean much. If you meet more than once before having sex, would you have a repeat test?

Or are people just saying, “Screw COVID and to hell with Gramma! I’m gettin’ laid!” and taking their chances?

Geez. Dating was complicated enough with just STD’s and catfishing to worry about.

20

I haven’t done any COVID testing, I don’t even know where to get a test done. With the women I’ve met, we’ve discussed our approaches to safety and I’ve felt they were taking appropriate precautions, and apparently they felt the same, so I’ve been meeting at restaurants and following the guidelines. The one woman I met with more than once, we just trusted each other to stay safe.