Well, we all have profiles, so we can be contacted by people outside the forums and contact non-forumites ourselves. But it seems that most interactions do take place in the forums, at least on this site...

I have talked with three men here from different states and none of them are on these forums. So, I guess whatever works for a person. Forums are for friendships yes and longterm especially on a Free site .

Musica, since I've been on Mingle I've gotten, it must be hundreds of emails from men wanting to talk to me... but I ignore 99% of them because they don't make any kind of impression on first contact. There was one man that I felt comfortable with after meeting him on the forums and we talked on the phone, emailed, etc... we became long distance friends... but I've come to learn that long distance anything doesn't work, because we can't really connect on all levels with so much empty space between us... so I'm just a happy poster now... I hope you have better opportunities than I have had, and that things genuinely work out for you...

It's hard to know what to say to a lady in that first email. Sure, if you are getting hundreds of them and most of them are quite uninteresting you are probably not going to reply to most of them but why not give some of them a break? They can't all have dull "I'll tell you later" profiles with nothing on them that could interest you at all.

It's easy for the women to get dates on these sites as long as they don't live at the North Pole or something. You are spoilt for choice and then you all say that there are no decent men out there. It's frustrating but you only get out of something what you are prepared to put into it and if you just want to hang on the forums forever talking about love and romance when you are never going to even date anybody that's your call.

You have no idea what I've put up with, tawt.. the vulgar emails, the one word emails "hi"... as if the men expect me to pick up from there and start a conversation with them... That's not the way it works in my family, we women expect the men to make the moves, and to make them adequate enough to get and keep our attention... and if a man isn't willing to take time enough to start a decent dialog with me and make a good first impression, I'm not going to waste my time. Only the one man that I became friends with impressed me enough to get and keep my attention for a few months... off and on... and if it takes a month, a year, whatever, for another man to make the right first impression then I'm going to have to wait... and you're correct... that if I just want to hang on the forums forever talking about love and romance like everybody else here does too, that is my call...

Well, fair enough and yeah, I've heard the complaints about the vulgar emails and the one word ones from plenty of the women that I've chatted with.

It is just a weird thing this though. You know me and how I'm an open book and how I like to say a lot and I do that and then a lot of the time they just stop replying and I think that I said too much or the wrong thing or something. With the women that I have actually dated through this so far it did just start off slowly with me saying, "Hi, do you fancy a chat?" and mostly just small talk until I really got anywhere with them.

I think that from the sound of it you have had a disappointing experience with one guy and I did try to tell you what this is like and how it's a long slow process trying to get to know somebody like this when you could find out so much more by just having a face to face date. You said that you weren't in any hurry though and you wanted the internet friendship and the actual meeting was just for the "physical chemistry". Me, I just chat with them for a while and if they are within dating distance I just cut to the chase and ask them out. Yeah, I do the man thing and make the moves and I've talked to other ladies that said that the other men that they've talked to have been "pushy" as well. Actually, I'm probably less pushy than most but at the end of the day, it can be hard to try to keep a lady's interest and to keep interested in her when all you do is email because once you get their story then you aren't really sure where to go with it if they aren't prepared to just meet up for a proper date.

I think there's probably an art to this and when I started internet dating I was completely hopeless at it really and I didn't really know what I was supposed to say to the women. I'm not saying that I'm much better at it now but I've just got to the stage with it that I just type away and say whatever I'm feeling and what's on my mind and if I don't get anything much back I lose interest and it goes nowhere.

Musica, since I've been on Mingle I've gotten, it must be hundreds of emails from men wanting to talk to me... but I ignore 99% of them because they don't make any kind of impression on first contact. There was one man that I felt comfortable with after meeting him on the forums and we talked on the phone, emailed, etc... we became long distance friends... but I've come to learn that long distance anything doesn't work, because we can't really connect on all levels with so much empty space between us... so I'm just a happy poster now... I hope you have better opportunities than I have had, and that things genuinely work out for you...

Thanks. 99% of the messages I get here from people not on the forum I ignore too... not because they aren't on the forum but because they're just uninteresting to me. Then there was the one guy with whom I had nothing in common, and once I told him that he kept trying to convince me that "opposites are sposed to attrack" (that's a direct quote, spelling and all). He kept bugging me every five minutes (seriously!) until I finally blocked him. Time from first contact to blocking: approximately half an hour.

I have profiles on several sites, and in the past year or two I've only encountered four or five guys I'd be willing to meet, and I've only met two of them thus far (distance has been a factor with the others).

I totally get all the excellent qualities the 30 minute man had... I spose he thought his pursaveerants was going to win ur hand...

4 or 5 you say... that must average out to 1 or 2 a year then... I really appreciate you telling me this, because now I know it's not just me being too picky... I don't know how you feel about it, but when more than one man writes me and says darn near the same thing the last one said I think they're just players and ignore them... it just doesn't seem logical that so many men would use the same or similar lines if the aren't. Distance as the no go factor is a real drag sometimes, because the ones I'm attracted too don't live close enough to sweet home Alabama to make meeting plausible.

So if while reading this I got hungry for a bologna sandwich and mentioned it on here, would that be off topic?

Hang on, got to go make the sandwich.

I think it makes sense to be picky. You and I, we're at a point in life where we know from experience what we do and don't want in a man. We know what works for us and what doesn't. We've both been married to people we've loved deeply but where there was just some basic incompatibility in some particular area that eventually just made our marriages run out of steam. Heck, based on what I've read we're both still friends with our ex-husbands and have maintained caring relationships with them.

Through all of this, we've analyzed ourselves, and figured out our own needs and desires. So we know what we're looking for, or at least we know that we'll know it when we find it. It takes more than just a Y chromosome and the appropriate anatomy to float our boats, and that's okay. If we're picky, it's because we've earned the right to be.

Both of the guys I've met thus far... well, one of them I only had one date with, and decided I'd rather have him as a friend than as a dating partner (nice guy, just no romantic 'spark' between us). We keep in touch and have some great conversations about shared interests, but it isn't and won't be a romance.

The other one... I actually dated him for about six or eight weeks (he's the 'poor man' I've mentioned in the "Money and Love" thread). It started out in a romantic vein, but as we got to know each other better I think we both realized on some level that we'd probably drive each other crazy in a long-term relationship due to differences in temperament and various personal preferences. The romantic element kind of fizzled at that point for that reason and others, but we genuinely liked and cared about each other enough to continue spending a LOT of time together building a friendship in its stead. I treasure his friendship to this day, and we still share a hug and a kiss when we see each other. I truly believe it is possible to love someone without being IN love with them, and he is on the list of people that I love as dearly as if they were my family. (My ex-husband and my closest friends populate that list and I'm glad to have them, as I have hardly any close biological family. I'm an only child, both parents gone, no kids of my own, etc. Family-of-choice is an important concept in my life.)

Mg, I don't have a problem with people going I do it myself all the time, and it's the diverse opinions that rule the conversations and makes them fun. What I do find strange is if people never post on the original topic, but instead break into the middle of threads and spin the conversation onto completely different topics. Once in a while is okay, but I find this kind of "chronic" behavior to be rude and uncalled for when people can just as easily create their own threads to play on. Thank goodness one of the mods recently explained what is allowed and what is not, so now I have a better understanding about why things have been done the way they are here on the boards. I like to have fun too, but on my own time, not on others. all this talking has really made me hungry... I hope you have a sandwich for me too... but I'll take turkey and swizz on rye, plzzz..

There are long-term regulars on the forums that we get to know through our daily conversations. Sometimes controversial subjects come up, and tensions mount while diverse ideas are bantered about. It’s during these intense discussions that we can learn even more about each other as we let our critical thinking sides show.

If you are attracted to another member and have been interacting to get to know them better before reaching out to make a personal connection, can what you learn about their views, and how they handle themselves on the boards, turn you off from getting any closer? Or do you remain determined to make your move because even if their particular views may be outside the box, they turn you on no matter what?

Now for my reasoning in posting this.

When I first joined many moons ago I use to see people who I thought were maybe drifting off topic or joking when I didn't think they should (according to my world) or making points about things that I thought were offencive. I made my rules in my mind of how this thing worked and how I would get to know others. I thought I knew how to get to know people, but as time went on I started to see the madness in looking at this through my eyes. When I did see mingle through my eyes I would get arrrggg-ed (still do till I catch myself) at some of the not so much topics, but the way people came in and out of them. It took me a long time till I started seeing mingle as a big living room and while someone is having a say so with someone else others come and go throughout the room on their way to doing something different from what I am, but did want to take the time to drop by. In my living room when this happens some times the topic actually does change for a moment or may head in another direction till all of a sudden someone says "what is it we were talking about" and it gets right back on track. Also in my own living room it's nice if someone is getting a little intense to have someone crack a joke. Doesn't have to be a funny one (in my case rarely are), but just enough to shift gears up a little.

Off topic to me means a deliberate derailing and not so much someone stopping in to say hi or even add a twist. For example, look at what I just posted and see how it is really a part of the topic itself. Reactions on here and how people make them happen and react to them is very much on topic. By seeing different sides to the same person allows us to see deeper into who they really are and if we really are compatible with them. Doesn't have to be an answer on how we look at something, in fact I sometimes learn more about them by their mannerisms. For example again, I like a serious person but even more when that person can crack out with this sideways joke to lighten the mood. To me that says tons.

We are on the internet, but even on here it is easy to see someones personality when you are here a while and if that person writes from different angles or is more of a straight line. And I would say that we all change on mingle after a few months or years as to the way we let our hair down. These are the things I am attracted to at least as I interact, or should I say mingle. I find myself looking at when they joined and gauge that along with their comments.

just some thoughts while on the topic