Another year in life of

[DonH]

I think it's pretty simple. The people who have success with it like it and the people who haven't don't.

Very true. However, how do you define success? I guess clearly Dawns experience could be termed a success. And I know there are others. I have a good friend who also has a success with 3 kids coming up on married 15 years through OLD. I went into OLD some, what, 12 or more years ago, with a hopeful attitude. And back then the chances at success and the ratio of honest and real to scammer and broken seemed much better. But like many things in life, over time OLD has gotten worse and worse. As Dawn asserts, the dynamic has gotten worse over time because the quality people see what’s there and run away after a few bad experiences while the bottom fishers see an opportunity and are attracted to the fray. Then there are the scammers, the liars, the broken and yes all the misfit toys. Quality attracts quality and broken and misfit attracts more of the same. Nothing in life is ever absolute. Some people can make it work but for everyone of the success stories there are at least a 1:10 ratio of disappointment - and 1:10 may be very generous.

I just don't like how Don always has to take every opportunity to squash it.

Im a very data driven person. I just gather the intel, and form my opinion. If it were simply my own experience that would be one thing but LH says himself how it takes maybe 100 messages to get one response. That’s how you define success? I guess I have a different definition. Dawn is a success story but Ginger is clearly not. Sadly there are far less Mary Anne’s (Dawn [Wells]) than there are Ginger’s. Stretching to make that joke work. If dating 2 or 3 women for a few months after a year or two of trying which included countless hours of effort and dozens of single dates and likely far more ghostings, well more power to you. I’ve likely dated the same amount but without all the online effort and disappointment. Likely going out this weekend with someone I met Saturday. She may not be a match (she’s more shy and introverted than I’m typically attracted to) but who knows. At least it’s a level playing field and I see first hand who I’m about to spend some time with on a date and so does she. Neither of us are hiding behind a keyboard.

Bottom line, there are clearly more frustrating failure stories than there are true success stories OLD. At least when using my definition of success. There are just far more people saying, nope, I’m out, this is a good idea that has been too corrupted. Im much happier and far less frustrated offline. I’ve pursued dates or meetups perhaps with 2 women this year (remember we’re on,yb5 weeks in) and 1 is in the que, while the other somewhat flaked but I also then lost interested and didn’t try again. It still could happen as I know our paths will cross again. I’m still 1 for 2 - which would never happen OLD. That doesn’t mean it does not work for others - just many to most of the others. I may have a shot at less women but my frustration, and I suspect Gingers and many others as well, is far lower while still getting the same number if quality dates.

So if it works for you - great. I’d say play the lotto as well since you are beating the odds. Just dint go in thinking OLD is going to be the magic ticket. It just clearly is not. But hey someone has to be like Dawn or my friend. There are just far more like Ginger and myself. And remember Ginger went in with a positive attitude and gave it a huge and long try. And for the record I don’t consider a FB hiking group to be OLD.