Cupcaketron offered to write up a piece about geek dating in honor of Valentine’s Day. Without further ado:
Hello! Cupcaketron here, writing articles instead of sprucing up for a date on this holiday. It’s a strange one, isn’t it? My Facebook is filling up with depressing lonely/desperate/vindictive posts and I’ve blocked my OkCupid messages for the day.
I really don’t feel like my “single” relationship status should give me a red mark on this day. In fact, dating people is half the fun. To celebrate Valentine’s Day, I’d like to reflect on geek dating.
I met a guy on the bus awhile back. He had just moved to Salt Lake from Chicago, just starting at a local hospital as a surgical doctor. He was attractive, funny, and certainly interested in having me show him around town. That was, until he happened to notice my entertainment magazines and comic books stashed into my bag. He hadn’t seen a movie in about a year. Our incompatibility was painfully obvious.
So where does a geek girl meet someone with similar interests? Where does a geek guy find someone to appreciate his toy collection? These are some places that my friends have found love, or even I have had moderate success in myself.
-OK Cupid:
It’s just a generic dating site, but it’s free and you search/meet people based on interests. OkCupid can run through people’s profiles who have “Firefly” listed as a favorite t.v. show and suggest a conversation based on this keyword. At the very least, some of the best arguments and geek rage moments I’ve experienced is replying to some of these messages. Usually when I do the first coffee date, there are no misunderstandings when you blather on about the latest Wii game.
-Novelty band performances/karaoke:
Locally, we have a Spazmatics band that plays once a week with 80s songs while dressed as hideous nerds. Simply attending this event shows that you have enough of a sense of humor to enjoy this type of activity. If you karaoke the theme to Highlander, you can easliy pick out that one person who’ll shout “hell yeah!” and suddenly, at both of these places, you might have a dance partner.
-LARP events:
There’s nothing like getting past the awkward stage of meeting someone like meeting them while wearing skimpy outfits and beating your enemy senseless with a foam sword. Compared to this, your first date should be relatively relaxed and considerably comfortable. Also, you’ll have a 100% success rate of meeting someone with imagination and romance.
-Pub Quizzes:
This isn’t meant to plug Big Shiny Geek Show Pub Quiz, but as a regular participant I can say it’s certainly a good example. Intelligence is usually a requirement when meeting a geeky better half, and what better place to search than a battle of the wits? Plus, you can flex your geek muscle by expanding over some of the answers over a beer later.
-GameCrush/WOW:
World of Warcraft destroys marriages, but the couple that WOWs together, stays together. Most romantic conversations happen over Vent by happenstance, usually in the spirit of competition. This completely eliminates the need to have to fill out the specific details, and instead just work on the pleasure of each other’s company.
Also, if you’d like to browse someone’s profile before meeting them on a game, you can do so at GameCrush. It IS a paid site, but that doesn’t mean that after a “date” that sparks couldn’t fly. WOW is now a game you can “date” over, among other XBL, PS3, and PC games. If fact, if you are looking to do something tonight but don’t have anyone to do it with, give GameCrush a try. And yes, I get bonus points if you do it through this link.