Although I’ve been making myself too available as of late, I was reviewing Jdate profiles when a rather petite woman caught my eye (even though I prefer taller ones, since they are easier to find in a crowded market). She was in the right age range (46), doesn’t want to have children and lives in L.A.
I sent her a custom e-mail, introducing myself, telling her the things I liked about her profile and asked a simple question, with the hope that by doing so, she’d send me an answer.
I didn’t receive a reply for 2 weeks. But the day after the Oscar awards, she started to chat with me and said that she wanted to see Slumdog Millionaire.
I reviewed the various theaters and schedules and called her in order to ask which theater and show times she preferred. She said an afternoon show would suit her and that I should pick her up (which is extremely bizarre for a first date), and that we should get a bite to eat before the show.
Saying nothing and knowing my ego has no limits, I quickly rationalized the situation:
She’s already got confidence in me due to my ability to make clever conversation!
I picked her up the next day (turns out she lives 2 blocks from my house) and we were on our way. Arriving at a nearby kosher restaurant, I was parking the car when she told me we needed to hurry up and skip the lunch, because she said the movie would be starting very soon (1 hour and 30 minutes ?).
I didn’t want to contradict her sense of timing so I drove to the theater and asked if she’d mind eating a salad at place in the mall where the theatre is. It seems she eats strictly kosher so she said no to the salad idea. Instead, she decided to have some ice-cream.
I bought the tickets, having arrived at the theatre one hour before show-time and noticed that a “Pink Berry Creamery” ice-cream store was also in the mall. She tasted samples of the three, featured flavors of the day - she didn’t like any of them. Then we walked around a little and found another ice-cream shop.
She asked the employee how many more flavors she could sample. The employee was very surprised with her question, but said there was no limit.
She started sampling each ice-cream. After sample 15, she asked the employee if there were any she may have missed. He was very helpful and went to the back of the store to get some additional flavors. The sampling continued… after having tasted no less than 25 flavors she said that although she couldn’t remember the flavors, she was sure she liked the second and the fifth. Of course the employee didn’t remember, so she had to start the tasting process all over again.
After what seemed to be an eon of tasting, she actually made a decision. I ordered the same in order to make things “simpler”.
We sat down at a table and had the following dialog:
“In Jdate there are a lot of non-Jewish people,” she said.
“It’s true,” I replied. “But who can say with 100% certainty, who is a Jew or not?”
She curled up her lip in a slightly indignant way. “Some of them for sure are not Jewish.”
“Yes,” I said.
“Jdate is a Jewish site, why don’t these women look in another place, like E-Harmony or somewhere else?”
“I don’t really know, but why do you want Jdate to lose customers?” I said, hoping
to appease her.
“I’m a Jewish woman and I want a Jewish man. Other women are using Jdate, and they are getting the Jewish men – it’s not fair.”
Not wanting to offend her, I said, “You’re right,” but I was really thinking…what if the government let businesses do as they pleased?... monopoles would certainly be the order of the day.
“You know,” she said, “I dated a man whose profile said that he is ‘mixed ethnic’. He told me his mother was Jewish, but after a while I noted some anti-Semitic behavior.”
“Wooah!” I exclaimed.
“3 days ago, I called him and he told me…” her voice started to tremble.
“What did he tell you?” I said as I kind of cleared my throat.
She began to cry. I felt people were watching me - wondering to themselves – what did that man do to this little lady?
“I’m sorry I asked that question,” I told her simultaneously realizing that perhaps it would be best to say no more. My ego was rapidly deflating… for sure the reason she decided to give me her address was because she had become very desperate after her previous “anti-Semitic” date.
After 5 minutes of continuous crying she suddenly stopped herself, as though she hadn’t shed a tear. “Ok, let’s go see the movie,” she said.
Although the theatre was close by, I realized it was a good thing that we came to the mall early. Working up to a good cry can take quite a bit of preparation.
I thought I had suffered enough to last me at least one week, but soon after the movie started I knew I was wrong. Maybe I had some karma to work-off with the producers because …well, suffice to say, I can’t recommend this movie to anyone - it’s unnecessarily violent, the plot is ridiculous, and the characters are flat.
After ten minutes I decided that I had to find a way to leave, but of course, at the moment that I made that decision, she looked at me and whispered, “It’s Terrific No?”
Now I can’t go to anywhere. Even when I closed my eyes the actors were overacting, yelling and crying - impossible to leave.
I gave up trying to flee as the light from my conscious transcended my thoughts - This is the pain I have created and in fact need to move beyond, to move through the karma with the producers, through her.
Two hours later the movie ended, the date almost finished. I was very happy to bring her home, to her apartment, where I had first picked her-up.
By the time I finally went to sleep – by myself (thank goodness), I realized that I’m really a very happy man to be as yet, unmarried to the wrong woman.
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
Monday, March 2, 2009
Date with Rain Check.
She: Russian, 42 years, pretty, a daughter in College.
Her profile said that she had a strong accent. She was very kind in the email exchange; then following internet dating protocol, she called me. I understood very little about the things that she told over the phone, but we were able to arranged a meeting on Coffee Beans near her house.
That day the traffic was very light and I arrived 30 minutes earlier. I went to the market to buy flowers. I thought: What flowers will I buy? Very expensive, are not good choice for first date, girl would think that I want to buy her quickly, and I need to show that I’m not searching for a buy and dispose woman, but for establish a long customer-vendor relationship. This is not a cash sale. How do you buy something that you don’t know what really is?
For sure she will think that you aren’t interested in the real person, (What is the real person? Please stop thinking and buy the flowers.)
Then I needed to make a nice down payment flowers, no expensive, but it will show that I will take care about my compromises. After a hard decision time, I choose one single dark red flower with a long stem.
I selected a table in the Coffee Beans. She arrived. Wow. She is pretty! She seated and starts talk, Wow. It’s very hard to understand (Why my grand mother didn’t talk me in Russian?) But she is pretty and how she speaks remembered me a secret KGB Russian agent from old 007 movie.
... then she is working on the space engineering field (with calculus of something that I didn’t understand), she studied on Russia engineering and there, at that time, they didn’t have computers available and she was very bad for drawing, then she exchanged french fries for drawing services, in Russia she needed to made french fries from scratch. Wow! She knows how to do French Fries.
She told me that she was interesting on me (she was really direct) and we arrange another date for the weekend. We exchanged some nice emails, and suddenly she stopped to reply. I called her and left a message.
Three days later I received an email that she kindly said that she started a relationship with a guy that she meet outside Jdate, and she was sorry but he gets she in her toes, she was now out of Jdate. I thought… bad news, she is pretty and has the knowledge how to do french fries, but after a while… how long this new relationship will be sustained. She is not 20 years old, she is exited, but she really doesn’t know the guy. My children will visit me for vacations for a month. What is the probability that her new relationship will be a medium-long term relationship? 10%? 5%? I thought that is less than 1%. Then I replied her with congratulations for be in a relationship and I wrote in the same email the following Rain Check coupon:
---------------------------------
Date: 12/15/08
Rain Check Coupon
For a Second Date
Valid from 01/25/09
to : 01/31/09
______________________
Explaining her that one month later she will know if this new relationship is stable or not, then she would use the coupon or discard it. She called back (she had deleted her Jdate account) thanked for the coupon. The month passed very quickly. On Jan/25 I send a note to her cell that the coupon is still valid. She replied that this day is his birthday. Ok. …, then It’s not a very short term relationship. It is interesting ...then we can get quickly and without effort good life things.
But after 2 weeks I saw her profile active again in Jdate site, I wrote her, but she wrote me back: she was hurt and she doesn’t want to get any serious relationship, because she is afraid to be hurt again. For sure, she thought about and I wasn’t viewed as good candidate for her, but she was sweet. Was a good first date after all.
Her profile said that she had a strong accent. She was very kind in the email exchange; then following internet dating protocol, she called me. I understood very little about the things that she told over the phone, but we were able to arranged a meeting on Coffee Beans near her house.
That day the traffic was very light and I arrived 30 minutes earlier. I went to the market to buy flowers. I thought: What flowers will I buy? Very expensive, are not good choice for first date, girl would think that I want to buy her quickly, and I need to show that I’m not searching for a buy and dispose woman, but for establish a long customer-vendor relationship. This is not a cash sale. How do you buy something that you don’t know what really is?
For sure she will think that you aren’t interested in the real person, (What is the real person? Please stop thinking and buy the flowers.)
Then I needed to make a nice down payment flowers, no expensive, but it will show that I will take care about my compromises. After a hard decision time, I choose one single dark red flower with a long stem.
I selected a table in the Coffee Beans. She arrived. Wow. She is pretty! She seated and starts talk, Wow. It’s very hard to understand (Why my grand mother didn’t talk me in Russian?) But she is pretty and how she speaks remembered me a secret KGB Russian agent from old 007 movie.
... then she is working on the space engineering field (with calculus of something that I didn’t understand), she studied on Russia engineering and there, at that time, they didn’t have computers available and she was very bad for drawing, then she exchanged french fries for drawing services, in Russia she needed to made french fries from scratch. Wow! She knows how to do French Fries.
She told me that she was interesting on me (she was really direct) and we arrange another date for the weekend. We exchanged some nice emails, and suddenly she stopped to reply. I called her and left a message.
Three days later I received an email that she kindly said that she started a relationship with a guy that she meet outside Jdate, and she was sorry but he gets she in her toes, she was now out of Jdate. I thought… bad news, she is pretty and has the knowledge how to do french fries, but after a while… how long this new relationship will be sustained. She is not 20 years old, she is exited, but she really doesn’t know the guy. My children will visit me for vacations for a month. What is the probability that her new relationship will be a medium-long term relationship? 10%? 5%? I thought that is less than 1%. Then I replied her with congratulations for be in a relationship and I wrote in the same email the following Rain Check coupon:
---------------------------------
Date: 12/15/08
Rain Check Coupon
For a Second Date
Valid from 01/25/09
to : 01/31/09
______________________
Explaining her that one month later she will know if this new relationship is stable or not, then she would use the coupon or discard it. She called back (she had deleted her Jdate account) thanked for the coupon. The month passed very quickly. On Jan/25 I send a note to her cell that the coupon is still valid. She replied that this day is his birthday. Ok. …, then It’s not a very short term relationship. It is interesting ...then we can get quickly and without effort good life things.
But after 2 weeks I saw her profile active again in Jdate site, I wrote her, but she wrote me back: she was hurt and she doesn’t want to get any serious relationship, because she is afraid to be hurt again. For sure, she thought about and I wasn’t viewed as good candidate for her, but she was sweet. Was a good first date after all.
Sunday, March 1, 2009
Why design a dating campaign is different than design a collection campaign and why I hate Tools Bars for Internet Explorer
Part of my job is related with collection's operations, helping with the design and the technology. Actually Collection has a sophisticated set of procedures that includes an intensive use of dialers, computers, searching engines and trained people.
The dialer calls each delinquent customer with a personalized voice of the collector in charge of that account. Collectors have their days off, but the computer hasn’t, it’s programmed to call whenever the collectors are or aren’t working. Sometimes it’s pretty difficult for customer distinguish when he is called for a real human being or a machine. When customer return the call, collectors don’t tell him that he was called by a machine. People feel little compromise to pay when they know that a machine/system is worry about their debts. Maybe this is the reason that the most of the religions need to have a live G-d, the most sucessful ones have G-d with a direct involvement with human life, probably a religion witch postulate that G-d created the perfect Universe System and then He toke eternal vacation in some exotic place wouldn’t has too much people interested.
Then with all this experience, I thought: How Can I apply it to get a real good relationship?
Call people … not very good, first I don’t have their numbers… What things do Jdate’s members when they logon on the Jdate site?
First they check their email… The idea to send personalized emails every week, or every 2 weeks, isn’t very attractive. People have bad feelings with the SPAM, these activities will get bad responses.
What other thing a typical woman do when she enter to Jdate site?... She check who was looking her profile. (Note: Every time that a Jdate member read the profile of other member this activity is register and in this way every member can know who was looking his/her profile. This option can be disabled but very few people do that).
People that was looking her profile appears ordered by date, then the most recent is in the top of the list; if a man look a woman profile three days ago, and she it's pretty probably she never knows that he was looking her;
Why? because others men look after him her profile and he will not appear in her first page. But if after the three days he looks her profile again he will be the first place and his previous viewing history will be discarded. (Then if he review her profile 20 times, he will appear only once in the her list).
People pay a lot to Google for be in the first page...
How can I position my profile always in the first place on her list?
One method is a manual method, click the profile every 5 minutes, but It’s boring and I want to do others things in my life. Then I need some program that enter to Jdate site with my account and password search the desired woman profile, look into it and then search another look into her profile, and then another… and repeat the process from the the first. The program was easy to make. And I had a unused PC in my house, for dedicate it do this process all day long.
I selected 50 woman profiles (for get some result we need to work on relative large population), and I wrote their accounts numbers in a list, and the process started.
The first two days were good. I get a much more women interested in my profile than before. The first signal of problems arises three days later. One pretty woman was asking why I viewing her profile so frequently. I remember the collection rule, never said that is a machine. I told that I was interested in her (that is also true). A day later the same woman asked again the same. I was in my office and I told her that from tomorrow I will not review her profile again… (It's like the Do No Call List allowed 24 hours for be deleted from the list). But 10 minutes later she wrote me very angry…Please stop to view my profile. What happen? Why she was so angry? I realized this is a technical matter: she installed the Jdate Tool Bar for Internet Explorer. This Tool Bar send an alert every time that one is looking your profile, and the dedicated computer in my house was looking her profile every five minutes, she was receiving alert every five minutes! I apologized and removed her from the list. But after that I got a lot of complains for the same reason. Is incredible how many people installed the Jdate Tool Bar. I turned off the dedicated PC.
Conclusion, if the technical thing doesn’t work, the commercial thing has really a little opportunity.
The dialer calls each delinquent customer with a personalized voice of the collector in charge of that account. Collectors have their days off, but the computer hasn’t, it’s programmed to call whenever the collectors are or aren’t working. Sometimes it’s pretty difficult for customer distinguish when he is called for a real human being or a machine. When customer return the call, collectors don’t tell him that he was called by a machine. People feel little compromise to pay when they know that a machine/system is worry about their debts. Maybe this is the reason that the most of the religions need to have a live G-d, the most sucessful ones have G-d with a direct involvement with human life, probably a religion witch postulate that G-d created the perfect Universe System and then He toke eternal vacation in some exotic place wouldn’t has too much people interested.
Then with all this experience, I thought: How Can I apply it to get a real good relationship?
Call people … not very good, first I don’t have their numbers… What things do Jdate’s members when they logon on the Jdate site?
First they check their email… The idea to send personalized emails every week, or every 2 weeks, isn’t very attractive. People have bad feelings with the SPAM, these activities will get bad responses.
What other thing a typical woman do when she enter to Jdate site?... She check who was looking her profile. (Note: Every time that a Jdate member read the profile of other member this activity is register and in this way every member can know who was looking his/her profile. This option can be disabled but very few people do that).
People that was looking her profile appears ordered by date, then the most recent is in the top of the list; if a man look a woman profile three days ago, and she it's pretty probably she never knows that he was looking her;
Why? because others men look after him her profile and he will not appear in her first page. But if after the three days he looks her profile again he will be the first place and his previous viewing history will be discarded. (Then if he review her profile 20 times, he will appear only once in the her list).
People pay a lot to Google for be in the first page...
How can I position my profile always in the first place on her list?
One method is a manual method, click the profile every 5 minutes, but It’s boring and I want to do others things in my life. Then I need some program that enter to Jdate site with my account and password search the desired woman profile, look into it and then search another look into her profile, and then another… and repeat the process from the the first. The program was easy to make. And I had a unused PC in my house, for dedicate it do this process all day long.
I selected 50 woman profiles (for get some result we need to work on relative large population), and I wrote their accounts numbers in a list, and the process started.
The first two days were good. I get a much more women interested in my profile than before. The first signal of problems arises three days later. One pretty woman was asking why I viewing her profile so frequently. I remember the collection rule, never said that is a machine. I told that I was interested in her (that is also true). A day later the same woman asked again the same. I was in my office and I told her that from tomorrow I will not review her profile again… (It's like the Do No Call List allowed 24 hours for be deleted from the list). But 10 minutes later she wrote me very angry…Please stop to view my profile. What happen? Why she was so angry? I realized this is a technical matter: she installed the Jdate Tool Bar for Internet Explorer. This Tool Bar send an alert every time that one is looking your profile, and the dedicated computer in my house was looking her profile every five minutes, she was receiving alert every five minutes! I apologized and removed her from the list. But after that I got a lot of complains for the same reason. Is incredible how many people installed the Jdate Tool Bar. I turned off the dedicated PC.
Conclusion, if the technical thing doesn’t work, the commercial thing has really a little opportunity.
Dating a married woman.
She: Russian, no picture, in the right age range, with 2 kids.
We met at Cheese Cake Factory. She was a blond-hair, 48 year- old woman who looked nice.
We sat at one of the tables and she asked me why I had divorced my ex wife. (Ouch she was not too polite) … I told her that through the years we had changed, developed different interest and grown apart… I also told her we were not longer happy together. and we both thought it was the time for change.
She reacted to my explanation as if were from another planet.
Then, the following dialog was exchanged:
She: I’m separated because my husband found a younger woman.
I: Yes this is a valid reason for you to want to separate.
She: I did trusted my husband so when he told me he was going out with some friends I believed him.
I: sure.
She: But he was lying. I asked his parents for help. But they didn’t help me. They said that was all my fault because I have realized the infidelity issue too late.
I: mmm..
She: And she is a non Jewish 29-year old woman.
I: mmm
She: How he could choose a non Jewish woman.
I: I don’t know.
She: I have two sons; a 22 years old and the other 8 years old. I don’t allow them to visit his father. I wouldn't like him to introduce her into the family.
The waitress finally came over and we ordered lunch (I ordered the same salad she ordered).
I: (Thinking this break was great).
She: But he gets this non Jewish girl.
I: (…Thinking: Something is going wrong with this date…) Please tell me how long have you been separated?
She: 2 months.. I warned him: If you leave the house I will find someone else.
I: (… thinking: then I’m that " someone else"…). Why did you come to the States?
She: For better opportunities, but now my husband is gone.
I: I’m sorry about that. (Then I noticed she is wearing her wedding ring..). Why are you still wearing your wedding ring?
She: Because I’m married, If he would ask me again I would accept him back home now.
We finished our lunch.
I: (… then I’m that someone else …only a temporary replacement, for the time being ). I’m very sorry but I wouldn’t feel comfortable dating a woman who would still accept her ex- husband coming back to her.
She: I will get a new lover before 8 months.
I: (… she is pretty… but I can’t …) Why do you take your time? Who is rushing you ? It’s very easy to make the wrong choice when the situation isn’t clear.
She: How will I tell my 22 year old son old to find a Jewish girlfriend, if his own father did such a crazy thing?
I: (thinking: How would her children react if they got a father replacement so quickly?) Sometimes children learn to do the right thing once they realize the mistakes made by their parents. Then they say: “I will never proceed like my father” (just wishful thinking: because most of the times they will end up doing exactly what their fathers did).
She: Thanks for the date.
We said good bye and the date was over. Unfortunately, I don’t have Ulysses ropes to tie myself to the boat’s mast and don’t want to throw myself and along with her to a sure disaster. Therefore a few days later, when she wanted to start a chat with me again , I told her that she was pretty but I simply could not date a married woman.
We met at Cheese Cake Factory. She was a blond-hair, 48 year- old woman who looked nice.
We sat at one of the tables and she asked me why I had divorced my ex wife. (Ouch she was not too polite) … I told her that through the years we had changed, developed different interest and grown apart… I also told her we were not longer happy together. and we both thought it was the time for change.
She reacted to my explanation as if were from another planet.
Then, the following dialog was exchanged:
She: I’m separated because my husband found a younger woman.
I: Yes this is a valid reason for you to want to separate.
She: I did trusted my husband so when he told me he was going out with some friends I believed him.
I: sure.
She: But he was lying. I asked his parents for help. But they didn’t help me. They said that was all my fault because I have realized the infidelity issue too late.
I: mmm..
She: And she is a non Jewish 29-year old woman.
I: mmm
She: How he could choose a non Jewish woman.
I: I don’t know.
She: I have two sons; a 22 years old and the other 8 years old. I don’t allow them to visit his father. I wouldn't like him to introduce her into the family.
The waitress finally came over and we ordered lunch (I ordered the same salad she ordered).
I: (Thinking this break was great).
She: But he gets this non Jewish girl.
I: (…Thinking: Something is going wrong with this date…) Please tell me how long have you been separated?
She: 2 months.. I warned him: If you leave the house I will find someone else.
I: (… thinking: then I’m that " someone else"…). Why did you come to the States?
She: For better opportunities, but now my husband is gone.
I: I’m sorry about that. (Then I noticed she is wearing her wedding ring..). Why are you still wearing your wedding ring?
She: Because I’m married, If he would ask me again I would accept him back home now.
We finished our lunch.
I: (… then I’m that someone else …only a temporary replacement, for the time being ). I’m very sorry but I wouldn’t feel comfortable dating a woman who would still accept her ex- husband coming back to her.
She: I will get a new lover before 8 months.
I: (… she is pretty… but I can’t …) Why do you take your time? Who is rushing you ? It’s very easy to make the wrong choice when the situation isn’t clear.
She: How will I tell my 22 year old son old to find a Jewish girlfriend, if his own father did such a crazy thing?
I: (thinking: How would her children react if they got a father replacement so quickly?) Sometimes children learn to do the right thing once they realize the mistakes made by their parents. Then they say: “I will never proceed like my father” (just wishful thinking: because most of the times they will end up doing exactly what their fathers did).
She: Thanks for the date.
We said good bye and the date was over. Unfortunately, I don’t have Ulysses ropes to tie myself to the boat’s mast and don’t want to throw myself and along with her to a sure disaster. Therefore a few days later, when she wanted to start a chat with me again , I told her that she was pretty but I simply could not date a married woman.
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