Archive for the ‘JBloggers’ Category

How do you feel about plastic surgery? If it’s done well, no one should ever know you had anything done. But when it’s obvious, will it turn you off from dating that person? It’s an age old joke that Jews get a nose job (rhinoplasty, deviated septum, whatever you want to call it) for their 16th birthday instead of a party… a quick glance at old family photos and you can confirm if the shnauz was shaved. More men are having plastic surgery than ever before, but it’s still not the norm and is not immediately accepted. Johnny Drama pined for calf implants on “Entourage” but what if a guy had changed his face? Would that weird you out? Would you want to date a guy who had work done? Women’s elective surgeries tend to be a little more obvious — breast augmentation, butt lift, tummy tuck, lip implant — and those are also tweaks that are considered “sexy” (if done right) but not everyone likes fake, false, plastic and silicone. Some people want a woman the way G-D made her. Have your preference, but don’t judge a book by its cover. The person had their reasons for getting the nip/tuck and that shouldn’t define them.

This is what happens when one loses internet. For the first thirty minutes, you frantically repeatedly connect and disconnect from your network, with the faint hope that turning it on and off again at a frenetic pace will suddenly make internet for that which there is no internet. After a half hour, you start looking for other wireless networks that are not secure. By ‘not secure’, I, of course, mean not password protected, because if you’re going to steal somebody else’s internet, you’re damn sure not going to try to guess somebody’s password using only the name of the network as a clue. After ten minutes of not finding any other non-secure networks, you restart your computer exactly seven times, using the same ‘on and off’ theory you first used when repetitively disconnecting and connecting from your network.

After an hour of no internet, it’s time to break out the reserves. You start looking through all of the photos on your computer. If you are a photographer, like me, then you have a lot of pictures to look through while waiting in vain for your key that can unlock the world (wide web).

After about two hours, you go to the bathroom because you have been frantically drinking ice water because the a/c has also been broken, but you haven’t spent any time trying to get it fixed because the internet is also broken, and that always takes priority. On top of that, your water bill, cable bill, electricity bill, rent payment, and taxes all have to be done, but again, the internet. On top of that, it is also your father’s birthday, your aunt and uncle’s anniversary, and the day for your scheduled colonoscopy.

So the 24-hour period that I had no internet directly coincided with the time I was supposed to write a new, hilarious JBlog post. Instead, I sat in an OCD-induced stupor waiting for the internet to come back. Now that it’s back, I still have nothing to write about.

I have finally decided that I have exhausted all options and have run out of women to date/marry/mother a child for me in the metropolitan area in and around Houston, TX. Though it is (arguably) the fourth largest city in America and has potentially (kinetically) millions of women, I have met all of them, and they all hate me. Granted, the hookup population is considerably less populous. However, I have broadened my options because I am in survival mode.

Because of this horrible realization, I am officially holding the first official (this is not official) Operation: Procreation. Of course, the goal here is not to procreate per se, it just sounded like a funny title. If you read this, and that’s a bit of a stretch, let me know by sending a message to me (member name: JeremySpoke). Let me know if you would be willing to come visit Houston to see me/pay for my flight to your city. This does not exclude international participants. However, the logistics are inherently more difficult and an international plane ticket is obviously more money. If, however, you are normal and would never fly across the country to see someone based on a joke blog post, just say, “Hi”. I love getting messages, in any format. I never cancel spam or take myself off of mailing lists I don’t belong to anymore just because I love getting messages. You can send me a message that just reads, “I hate you.” On second thought, please do not send me a message that says, “I hate you.”

If you can not message me because you are not a member of 100hookup, it shouldn’t be too difficult to reach me. I am one of only three ‘Jeremy Balkin’s in the world. One is a young man in Australia, and the other is a movie producer in Los Angeles. Sending a message to any one of us should be sufficient.

This weekend, I’m going to be the first person on the planet (there’s no way that’s true) to Tweet my date. Everything from the awkward first greet to the awkwarder inevitable silence that accompanies any nervous conversation to the awkwardest goodbye-should-I-go-in-for-a-kiss hug will accompany clever lines written for the world to see.

First, I will start a new Twitter account, because my current one, which was supposed to accompany my oh so original blog, is as unread and unused as that blog is today. I will try my best to use a clever moniker like ‘ThisiswhyIwilldiealone’ or ‘Mymotherneedsagrandchild’.

I will begin Tweeting two hours before the date starts. This is the exact time I freak out and ponder spending the evening in my room by myself. I start obsessing over how I will present myself until all I’m left to present myself with is a shaky, sweaty ball that used to compose the pieces of a man. Every twenty minutes, I will muster the courage to concentrate and say something that will fully illustrate just how miserable I feel.

During the date, I will comment on everything both she and I say. Every sentence will be deconstructed until the point when the dinner conversation will consist of me laughing awkwardly while trying to hide the fact that I’m typing things into my cell phone after every sentence she mutters. I will also be sure to cover the moment she storms out of the restaurant because I refuse to talk to her and instead hide under the table with my phone. I will Tweet about eating the rest of the dinner by myself and will be sure to cover my driving home by myself and the following week of loneliness and despair.

Of course, I’m not actually doing this. Although, if you really want to read a minute-by-minute deterioration of a man’s soul, let me know. You will have to pay me a considerable amount of money to cover all of the therapy and drugs that will be needed afterwards.

I have been on a cold streak (10 years) when it comes to dating. I am really good at meeting my date. I say, “Hello.” and listen to her answer. Then, I conduct myself as a normal human being interacting in a way that employs both my verbal and physical abilities. I listen to her talk and answer accordingly. I laugh when she says something clever and cast sympathetic eyes when she tells me something sad. I sit and hold back my conversation in order to let her speak more about herself. I also offer to pay if we are patronizing a place of business. If she insists, I let her pay for because a.) I have almost no money, and b.) I want to show her that I’m progressive, too. I am so progressive that I’ll let her pay for my entire meal.

Though I think I am handling myself well and carefully, I don’t think that I look and sound like what I think I look and sound like. What, to me, seems like genuine laughter at one of her anecdotes may, in fact, look like a crazy person punching the table and kicking wildly while laughing two octaves higher than most humans can speak. What, to me, seems like pensive thought while she shares something somber, instead, looks like utter confusion and profuse sweating. As I sit and try to listen, I seem to laugh intermittently at just the right moments and at just the right volume. Though, in reality, this looks like a manic seizure that years of therapy and Xanax have not fixed. Though I think that I am being progressive by letting her pay, I am in fact regressing the date back to 1955 when the woman was in charge of feeding her man.

I am now at a point where I feel a strong compulsion to text the girl immediately after every date because I am so afraid that she will never want to see me again. I know I shouldn’t do it, but I feel such a strong urge to do so. Tonight, after another first date that I thought went relatively well, I texted her about twenty minutes after the date. This time, she said she’d like to go out again. I wonder what a second date is like.

Most people who know me often ask, “What is it you love so much about online dating?”  If you are so knowledgeable about the female mind and how to pick up women, why not just do it in person?

Well, here are my answers.  The following are reasons why I will always prefer online dating to any other form of meeting women:

1.  I’m lazy.

2.  What’s better than being able to pick up women while sitting in your pajamas scratching your stomach?

3. I can meet women any time of day or night.

4.  I get to shop for the perfect woman.

5.  Did I mention I’m lazy?

6.  There is less pressure.

7.  I’m sorry, did I mention I was lazy?

There you have it. 7 reasons I love online dating.  Okay technically five. But five good reasons!

The science teacher called on me even though I totally did not have my hand up to volunteer. I got up in front of my whole kindergarten class as the teacher introduced me to the peers I already knew. Today, we were talking about differences (i.e. the differences between shapes, colors, etc.)

There were two circles drawn on the board. The teacher put a yellow square inside one and a red rectangle inside the other. Then she said, “Jeremy, how are these two objects categorized?” I answered, “By shape.” “Nope,” she answers. “Okay, by color?” “No” “What is it, Jeremy?” “I can’t think of anything,” I said. Then the whole class started laughing and pointing at me. I felt mortified. Not because I was being laughed at by a large group of people, but because this happened yesterday. I, a TA, was laughed at by a group of kindergarteners for being stupid.

I stood there, while kindergarteners laughed right at my face. I tried my best to think of how else those two objects could have been categorized. Have my past four years with no formal education made me stupider than someone who can’t tie hisown shoes without either crying or vomiting? No, this would not stand. “Excuse me. Sorry to interrupt in the middle of your lesson. I just…I cannot see how else those two objects are different from one another. I said ‘shape’ and by gosh, I will not back down.” “Oh. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have used a rectangle when I meant to use a square. I’m sorry.” Despite her apology, I don’t feel like I received emotional compensation for the gravitational strain that this will have had on my afternoon. “Can you please tell the children that I’m not stupid, and that when Michael Friedman told me, in 1989, that I have never been to Disney World® , he was wrong?” “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said.

Oh! This week, I also joined another dating site. So far it’s not very effective.

I am currently on a diet, and just recently hit the benchmark of sixty pounds. Is that a benchmark? I don’t know, because I’ve never lost any amount of weight ever before. People say that weight loss often accompanies more energy and less depression. I have experienced neither so far. I am just as sluggish and sad as ever.

The other night, I had to walk up and down a set of stairs twice, and was completely winded by the time I got up the second time. The all too familiar scent of watered-down over-perspiration from years of malnutrition and the body akin to an out-of-shape werewolf came back to me like I was obese all over again. I had flashbacks of horrible dates and Big Macs® which came flooding back in an instant, and I instinctively got in my car and drove to the neighborhood McDonald’s®. I was halfway through the drive-thru when reality kicked in and my sweat-induced hallucination came to a very quick stop as I crashed into the car ahead of me.

Now, not only will my insurance premiums go up, but either one of my parents or one of my siblings will have to know that I was at a McDonald’s®. It is a very good thing that none of this actually happened (after losing 60 pounds) and I just made it up because my life is empty.

In a related story, I am about to go to a wedding this weekend where I will be reunited with a very nice girl that didn’t want more than one date with me after I ruined it by being myself. She is in charge of the food at this wedding, and it’s kind of a coincidence and it might be glorious.

I have decided to implement a new rule henceforth. Here it is: Never tell a girl whom you’re on a date with that you’re a blogger for 100hookup. This rule applies pretty much only to me, as I am sure the expert bloggers are already happily married. As I ate my non-Subway^® fajitas on another date that was destined to end in sadness, I mentioned, in the smoothest way possible, that not only does 100hookup have a blog, but that I am a writer for the blog. Though reactions are usually positive, I never really thought that they may be completely fake.

Imagine hearing, while on a date, that the person you’re on a date with writes regularly about dating. The first question that should pop-up into any normal brain would fall along the lines of “Why isn’t this guy married?” The answer to that is simple: I know nothing about dating. So after I told her that I’m a 100hookup blogger, everything went downhill and climaxed in an awkward text I will have received the next day saying that she’d love to be friends with me.

So what if the guy you’re currently on a date with tells you that he’s a 100hookup blogger? Do not let him go! He is lonely and sad and needs companionship. He feels weird writing about dating while simultaneously drowning in mediocrity. He has good qualities that might take more than a date for you to realize. He was once on the cover of an international magazine! He did well on the SAT!

I actually am quite happy. I  just would like the camaraderie of a nice girl. Don’t cry for me, I recently received a free computer!

It isn’t easy being a JBlogger.  On average, JBloggers should go out on about two dates per week in order to assess enough material to write two posts per week.  This comes out to 104 dates a year, which would technically make me a prostitute.  Except it would be worse than a prostitute.  It would make me a prostitute who doesn’t get paid.  I don’t even know what that is.  Actually, aside from the fact that I would quickly run out of the money that I never had in the first place, going on two dates per week would be nice.  I would, though, have to figure out how to date on a budget à la Dave Chappelle in Half Baked.  By the second week, I would not be above stealing from blind homeless people.

I haven’t made up dates that never happened in order to have material for the blog.  Instead, I go off topic and talk about politics or my childhood, which are equally inane.  If you would like for me to stop talking about my own childhood, I suggest you volunteer yourself to go out on a date with me.  I will pay for your dinner, and we can split a dessert.  I also promise to contribute one hour of relevant conversation.  After an hour, I usually go off on a tangent which usually ends with me crying.  You must be willing to nurse me while I cry uncontrollably.  I suggest you start watching Dr. Phil or Dr. Oz in order to learn how to quell somebody else’s overflowing emotions.  Really, any program whose title begins with ‘Dr.” would work.

After that, be prepared for me to propose marriage to you.