The odds are good but the goods are odd...

As my sister would say whenever her three year old starts pulling on a cat's tail: "this is not going to end well." In fact, I suspect if all goes as planned I will find the perfect person on match.com (I know, I know, perfect doesn't exist), he will fall in love with me and everything will be fantastic until he finds out about this blog.

He is going to find out that in a horrible breach of privacy I posted his messages to me on my blog and analyzed them in front of the millions of people who theoretically have access to this blog but don't care enough about my lackluster love life to ever read about it.

There is definitely the long and the story story about how I wound up on match.com. The short story is: hurt my knee surfing, couldn't ride my bike, wanted to fill free time with something that could be done while icing and elevating and here I am. The long story probably starts with my relationship with my father(don't they all?), turns to my later proclivity towards emotionally unavailable, brilliant men and leaves me here wondering just what I'm looking for in this life time and how to articulate it in 4000 characters and 24 photos.

So there is the long and the short story to who I am too but for now I suppose it's enough to know that I love math, teach Calculus, adore learning, will ride my bike as far as I can and am looking to find dirty hot sex in the context of a respectful honest relationship. I'd be worried about love and family and all of the things that are likely the keys to a lifetime of happiness and fulfillment but I'm running across the country to go to grad school in 7 months so I'm not quite sure falling in love is the best plan.

So, enough introductions...girl's eye view of internet dating. First some facts and figures. Based on a few quick searches there are over 2000 men on match in my town and 500 women in the 25-34 age group. This fact, coupled with a profile about math, no less, resulted in 1144 views and 93 emails received. And I am not the type of girl who gets hit on in a bar. If I was, what would I be doing on match?

This is my tag line:

"Math is beautiful because of its unexpected relationships. Is life beautiful for the same reason?"

And I added this question to the profile to force men to do a little math to figure out what I liked talking about.

My student tricked me in class the other day by putting the following question on the board and challenging me to solve it:

Currently a woman is 21 years older than her son. In 6 years she will be five times his age at that time. What is happening in the mother's life currently?

If you think the math and the answer are fun topics of conversation then we'll get along long enough to enjoy getting together.

Since you are not trying to win my love, I'll save you setting up a system of linear equations and tell you that the child is negative nine months old in the problem. You do the math.

This problem got added to my profile after I realized I kept ending up on dates with men with math degrees from MIT and no chemistry. And I'm not talking about the chemistry that involves bunsen burners.

So this seems to be the question: "How do you spark chemistry with someone in 2 emails and a coffee date?" My friend Caley who I convinced to join with me thinks that you shouldn't email anyone back "unless you can imagine having them on top pounding you." And these are the types of things that I can't add to my profile because no one is going to understand that I'm not actually a promiscuous slut. I just like sex a lot.

Frankly, I feel a bit guilty that this blog even exists. So far, I've interacted in person with 5 really legitimately nice men who deserve a fair shot at true love. Not someone who is only good for another blog post and a cup of free coffee. And I'm just a silly 25 year old trying to decide where to live for the next five years and what I'm really looking for in a man and a relationship. It's not wrong if there is a disclaimer on my profile, right? It's not my fault if they are looking for children and waste time on the self-proclaimed wanderer: "I'm looking for an experience more than a long-term relationship. I mean if we fall madly in love and you want to move to wherever my grad school is going to be (East Lansing, Athens, Tempe, San Fran anyone?) I'll be happy to let you share my apartment, but I'm not going to look for one with a his and her's sink just yet. "

In any case, here I am, and planning to chronicle my adventures on match.com.

First date ideas anyone?