Creepsters Need Not Apply

I have taken the terrifying plunge back into the world of internet dating.

I say "back into" because maybe a year or so ago I tried it out, only to wind up terrified after some guy friended me on the dating site, facebooked me, and IMed me all within five minutes of finding my profile - despite the fact that the dating site I was using didn't list my last name, e-mail address, or screen name. It didn't help that it was midnight. And I was sitting alone in my room. In the dark.

When I told him I was no longer interested in online dating (a decision made the second I got his IM) and refused to answer any of his questions he basically responded with the internet equivalent of stomping his foot, pouting, and running off in a huff. It was something along the lines of "Well, good luck finding anyone decent any other way," but in a funny color font and without as much punctuation.

I finally decided to give it another try after realizing just how long my dating dry spell has been going on and how I really don't meet anyone out in the real world. I don't go to bars, I've never randomly struck up a conversation with a cute guy in a coffee shop, and no one has attempted to hit on me while I'm choosing between melons at the grocery store (though that could be because I've never bought a melon in my life). Most of the time I find guys who try to talk to me out of nowhere to be kind of creepy. I'd say I was just being paranoid or picky, but I genuinely think these guys are creepy! And friends who've been with me at the time tend to agree!

A lot of the creepy come-ons came while I was working as a barista. There was the homeless guy who gave me a Pez dispenser the day after Halloween (literally - a stranger giving me candy). The guy who thought that acting like he was kind of stupid would get him girls - first he asked me if I could help figure out the SD card he'd just bought for his phone. Then he started coming up to the counter any time a cute girl was ordering a drink and asking her if she knew how to spell a certain word. By the third time he'd come up to ask how to spell "hippopotamus" or something like that, I was on to his game and started running into the back room pretending I had something important to take care of. One older guy in a bad toupee once told me I had beautiful skin. Skin?! My skin?! That has go to be one of the creepiest parts of the anatomy you could possibly choose to compliment someone on. Saying "You have beautiful skin," to a total stranger just sounds like it's about to be followed by "I think I'd like to wear it some day."

I guess there are creepy guys no matter where you look. Which is why tonight when two hours after I posted my dating profile I received a message from a man in his fifties wearing sunglasses and impossibly bad toupee in his photo and commenting on how near each other we lived, I had to simply fight my gag reflex, make sure the door was securely locked, and move on to the next.