Speaking of Operation: Yearly Rejection…

…I finally cleaned up the formatting inconsistencies of it’s status page. The new, cleaned-up version (featuring the current year!) is located where the old hyperlink on the Operations page used to be.

Operation: Yearly Rejection on Hiatus

Well, Sts Cyril and Methodius Day is upon us with no suggested dating targets (of any quality), so I guess Operation: Yearly Rejection is on hiatus. It will not technically be classified a failure until 31 December 2009 (assuming I do not get rejected by then), as it is a once-a-calendar-year affair. Ergo vita est.

A little bit of wisdom to be gleaned from my lack of progress so far: the need to interact on a more casual basis before a relationship can begin (nobody likes a blind date) probably would have made my blog appeal futile. Even if one of you readers had suggested a suitable candidate, my work schedule (6 nights a week, with Sundays off) would not have easily allowed for that casual group interaction. I mean, who has time to “hang out” at 3 in the afternoon? Well, I guess high school kids do, but that is a little creepy (or pedophilic).

Got Standards?

As promised, my standards (as they stand) are below. I think part of my dating problem is that my standards were vague and, since I am socially incompetent, were never used properly to figure out if a girl was date-able. Since I am not currently trying to initially measure these girls myself, I need to clearly explain what my standards are, so that people that do not scare small children with his presence can help me out.

Let’s get the easy ones out of the way first. Some of these are a little self-explanatory, but explanations will be given as I think are necessary:

• Female: no duh (and it is a shame that people actually have to specify this)
• Single: not currently in any romantic relationship and never been married. I do not want to be a home-wrecker.
• Aged 20 to 24 years: self-explanatory. I do not particularly want to date someone older than me, but I also probably do not have the patience for college freshmen.
• We are mutually aware of each others existence: we already know each other well enough that we are on a first name basis. I don’t want to date a stranger. I get squirrelly and aloof around them (and that is not exactly a good first impression).
• She lives in or around Denton: While it is one thing if a relationship has to undergo a long-distance spat, it is silly to intentionally start one. And, yes, I think having to drive to a different county is long distance.

Now for the harder stuff. All of the above (except for the female, obviously) can be “fixed” with no real sacrifice on her part; people move, break up, meet other people for things more temporary things than a serious relationship. The things below, on the other hand, are things I cannot fairly ask someone to change to. These changes need to come either divinely or mature introspection. Explanations are given below:

• Reasonably Mature Christian: I’m going to allow two routes to figure this out at a glance. The easy one is being a devout member in good standing at a credobaptist Christian denomination. For praedobaptists, it gets a little harder to define, because of the false-positive effect (id est, non-believers being considered members in full standing, exemplia gratia, those “cultural Catholics” who have not made any overt excommunication worthy offense) praedobaptism creates. Not to get into a complicated explanation, but being a devout member in good standing AND having some kind of real conversion experience to point to (being “born again” to use the evangelical term) would be what I would consider to be valid for those in praedobaptist denominations.
• Politically Conservative:Now, I do not mean a Republican partisan hack that believes the GOP cannot do wrong; I mean someone that ascribes conservative principles in how a people should be governed (you know, small government, strong national defense, laissez faire economics, Christian ethic the basis of law, et cetera)
• Anti-Drug: a person that does not intake tobacco and alcohol based products (outside of Communion, if their particular Christian denomination uses wine for the symbolic blood of Christ). She also is not using illicit drugs and not abusing drugs that are legal (exemplia gratia, glue sniffing or prescription drug abuse).
• Adheres to Christian Sexual Ethics: against abortion, fornication, and whatnot. No using “The Pill” other than for legitimate medical reasons (and, mild acne is not a legitimate medical reason); I have no plans to fornicate and do not want to be dating someone whose body thinks is constantly pregnant. The mood swings created by “The Pill” are something no one should have to willingly tolerate.

I think that is it. Anything else will be added as updates. Those that care to help this crazy guy out, there you go. Happy matchmaking.

Operation: Yearly Rejection is Overdue…

So, February is upon us like a short-tailed lemur, looming o’er head. Most people’s thoughts start to turn to love around this time of year. Me, being the awkward social pessimist that I am, start to think about how I am going to be rejected again.

Operation: Yearly Rejection is my yearly attempt to see if the girls my age are ready to settle on me. I started this when I was in graduate school; I figured I need to sort of start to try dating before I am completely blind and bald. The idea is that, once a year, I ask someone out. When I get rejected, I know that the typical date-able girl is still pining over the much overrated “jock/jerk” demographic so I can go another year of perpetual bachelorhood content that boring, relatively stable me has no chance on the dating scene. If, on the infinitesimally small chance that the girl says yes, it would show that a statistically significant portion of the date-able female population is ready to tolerate my glaring flaws and, if that relationship fails, I should put forth some effort.

This is how Operation: Yearly Rejection has historically gone:

Years 1 and 2:

Develop a crush on a girl. Let it fester for 6 months or so. Mean to ask her out for 3 months or so, chickening out every time. Stay up all night drinking Jones soda. Ask her out in a sleep-deprived state. Get rejected. Mope for 2 to 3 months.

Year 2, I slightly modified the above rouitine by throwing in grand romantic gestures (fish discs out of a pond, tulips).

Year 3:

Unintentionally rescue girl I had no interest in from old roommate, who was sitting on her (I sat on them both, which is not exactly the right way to do it if the goal was to get her to like me; the old roommate said we were all too afraid to help the girl out. I showed him). Get ragged on by old roommate for months. Come up with quite possibly the worst pick up line in the history of cheesy pick up lines (“Are you going to repent of your wicked, liberal ways, or is your secret love for me going to remain unrequited?”). Use line. Get rejected. Freed myself from roommate harassment.

This is now Year 4, and I feel so behind. I blame my utter lack of a social life. I am not around girls consistantly enough to actually develop a festering crush or rescue them from “jock/jerk” gents who sit on them.

So I turn to you, my mostly imaginary blog audience, to help me out. I will release standards sometime soon; if you happen to know somebody that fits these standards and the person behind the nom–de-plume, let me know. Or set me up for a blind (lunch) date. It’ll be fun to get the first date and the rejection done all at once.

Sts. Cyril and Methodius Day (14 February) is my deadline; for some odd reason, women associate a holiday about a couple of guys known for Christianizing the Ukraine and inventing the Cyrillic alphabet with romance. If I do not have a target by then, I’ll just shrug Operation: Yearly Rejection off until I have a social life again. I’d rather be a pathetic 25 year old who has not had a date in 25 years not bothering to try than a pathetic 25 year old who has not had a date in 25 years waiting for someone else to find me one.