I’ve been single, married, in a relationship and experienced just about every combination in between. So I’m aware that meeting someone who turns you into a ‘hunka-hunka burning love’ can sometimes be an exercise in futility! But lately, lots of my male friends here in LA have been moaning and groaning that it’s impossible to meet a nice, smart, cool and okay, yes, we’re talking men, so she has to be a sexy-hot woman, here in LA.
Not true! This place is teeming with available women! So in my humble ode to public service this week, I’m gonna share some tips on getting to know the single ladies of our luscious Los Angeles. And just so you know, I polled a bunch of single women for their suggestions, so it’s not just my clues.

First, the thing I heard a lot from my girlfriends is that part of the problem is that men who seem attracted to you don’t initiate. If you see her, go talk to her. Believe me, you will eventually hit the jackpot. Women like attention. So if there is a flicker, go make contact! It’s how my honey Dan lassoed me in. (That and his dazzling smile).
Yes, you will be rejected a lot…. not necessarily because she doesn’t like you; she might be married, in a relationship, recovering from losing a parent, who knows! But if she’s free and has that tingle too… It could be magic! Read the rest of this entry →

bored-now's Broken Heart photo used through Creative Commons license

As promised I am posting my lament about the horror that is dating in Los Angeles. Let me first say for years I defended L.A. in this regard. Having dated in Washington, D.C. and Madison, Wisconsin, I felt like I had enough boots-on-the-ground experience to say with some limited authority: no, it’s not L.A. per se that sucks so much as dating in general. It’s like a job interview except you have to eat dinner and feel bad that your tits aren’t big enough. Sadly my job history is about a thousand times more impressive than my dating history (unless you’re using impressive in a general but not necessarily positive sense). Regardless, I’ve always defended this town as not necessarily any better or worse than anywhere else for dating, but lately I have had a string of dates that make me reconsider. Maybe what they say is true and this town is particularly difficult.

Experiences I have had on dates over the past few months include, but are not limited to: someone showing up 40 minutes late for dinner on a first (and last) date, someone asking me out and then telling me he doesn’t date because he needs to be friends with someone for years before getting romantically involved, someone canceling a second date because during the one-short-week since the first date he launched into a serious relationship with someone else, and the pièce de résistance, someone who went awol mid-date. This last deserves special mention as the worst date I have ever been on, which is, I might add, a hard contest to win. He excused himself twice to go to the men’s room and when he got up a third time, purportedly to fetch a credit card from the front counter where he accidentally left it, he never came back. My theory: he was actually married and his wife or one of her friends was at the cafe at the time; an alternative theory: he was doing bumps in the bathroom; or perhaps both of these things were true. In any case, even if you suddenly determine that you are totally and completely not into someone, it’s not that hard to say to her that your stomach got upset or you forgot you left the oven on or the neighbor called and your condo is on fire or something. You don’t just leave the table never to return. This behavior is odd in the extreme.

The above list represents a sampling of the dates I’ve been on relatively recently. Not all have been that reprehensible and there are several I don’t mention simply because discretion is the better part of good manners. I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, Travis must look like a gorgon or have bad breath or be boorish or laugh like Elmer Fudd sitting on a juicer. Really though, my fellow b.la-ers can vouch for me when I say I am awesome-ish. Sure I have my issues–don’t we all–but come on, I’m a size 4 and I have a Ph.D. that should count for something.

And lest I come off like I’m trying to bust someone’s chops, I want to clarify that most of the guys I have been out with lately have been reasonably nice guys (except for the douchebag who left mid-meal–if you are out there db I hope your wife finds out you’re cheating on her). Some have been really cool, and I’ve become friends with a few of them. This town is filled with interesting great people, I’m really clear about that. But really dating here is frightful. I concede.

My friend Mitzi checked out CrazyBlindDate.com and wrote up this review. What follows was written by her, not me. -Sean

So I first read about CrazyBlindDate.com in the San Francisco Thrillist newsletter and I thought, “Wow, this sounds like a palm sweatingly fun adventure.” Unfortunately, it was only happening in a few select cities and Los Angeles was not one of them. A few weeks later I heard that they were trying it in new cities including L.A.  I was kind of on the fence about doing it but my friend (who also signed up) convinced me that anyone who would sign up for this kind of thing had to be fun, or at least interesting, like ourselves.

The registration process begins with logging into, or signing up for, an OKCupid.com account and filling in a profile for CrazyBlindDate. I supplied them with some basic information like my name, age, gender, height, body type, ethnicity. Then answered few open ended questions like what I look like, “things I’m good at talking about” and what I expect from a date. You have to upload a picture but they blur it so potential dates can only really see that you aren’t invisible. After you meet they reveal the photo to your date, you know, in case you got too drunk to remember what your date looked like at the beginning of the night.
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