Are blind dates dead? Is the matchmaking industry going the way of the American automakers?

I was doing Google girl searches for a long time before it became acceptable to admit this. Back before Google became an official verb, I would do this, but it had to be kept secret. The one time I assumed the girl was relaxed enough to hear that I found her profile on Onlysimchas.com but was disappointed to find no picture she demanded to know how I had found the profile. I told her that I Googled her and she went berserk, like I was some freak for wanting to know more than what our mutual friend had told me, because everyone who wants you to go out with their friend switches to "sales mode" when talking about their friend's attributes.

Around the same time that Facebook opened its doors to tweens and preteens it became acceptable to conduct extensive back round checks on the internet of potential dates. Facebook is basically inviting you to look for dirt and thanks to my favorite feature - tagged pictures - the girl you are researching can't just hide her true figure behind a well placed column and a thinning black skirt. You would be surprised to see how different people look in their profile pictures versus their tagged pictures.

Blind dating has its virtues. For me it was a rush of sorts, kind of like playing the lottery: you never knew what was going to happen, although I mostly assumed it be crappy until I would win once in a while. I do wonder if I will miss the joy of haggling with the neighborhood shadchan and finding subtle ways to reject the dating offerings from my Charedi cousins in Monsey?

Although Googling and Facebooking potential dates can be a lot of fun and informative, one should keep an open mind. People are too quick to judge folks based on their friends, half-naked drunken pictures taken from their spring break in Cancun and whether or not they are a Yankees fan. There is more to people than what they put on their Facebook profiles, although if you find their blog you can pretty much assume it is describing their alter ego and what they wish they were but never will be.

I recently became single. Yeah, sad, I know. But it happens.

So even though I'm looking forward to being Mr. Man On The Town during the 2009 CAN!!CAN/PunkTorah Tour, I thought it might be fun to check out JDate* and see what it is all about. Plus, Tu B'Av (Jewish Valentine's Day) is coming up, and it would be nice to not feel like a loser.

I don't know about you, but after ten minutes of being on the Golden-Calf-of-Cyber-Yentas, I can safely say that JDate is the epitome of boring ass, gaywad Jewish crap.

JDate exists in the same realm that suburban JCCs, "young professionals groups" and Temple Singles Clubs inhabit: "we're trying to be hip and edgy, but it takes gallons of fruit-flavored flourescent martinis, the latest Crackberry and shopping trips to Banana Republic to get us there."

To top it off, JDate costs a shit ton of money. Sure, it's free to get a profile. But that's like someone giving you a brand new Iphone...only without a screen. No self respecting bohemian Jew would do JDate because $40.00 to look at pictures of people you went to summer camp with is just not worth it. You can buy weed for that!

I decided that JDate needed to be hacked. I needed to see if it was possible to get around paying a billion dollars a month to talk to twenty-nine year old corporate paper pushers who enjoy jalapeno poppers at Chili's and going to the outlet mall on Sundays.

Here's what I tried:

Test #1: Simply put your email address in the profile (duh!)

Conclusion: Fail! The second you put a Yahoo, Gmail or whatever, the darn robots get ya! Try as you might with Y.A.H.OOs or gee-mail, but they'll find you out.

Test #2: Browse the photos of your Hebrew Hotties. Once you find a potential love/lust interest, you just remember what they look like and find them on the Facebook Jewster ap.

Conclusion: Moderate fail! The theory works. You can look at someone's age/location/Jewish background and use that criteria to search for them on Jewster. Problem is, Jewster just isn't that popular. I did have luck finding one girl who lives near me, but there's thousands of Jews in my area so one-out-of-a-billion is not a success ratio worth getting excited over.

Test #3: Make your profile name on the site the same as your Twitter name. Then, write your ad in all lowercase letters, except the letters that spell out the secret message "FIND ME ON TWITTER @".

Conclusion: After a few days, it looked like the JDate robots hadn't discovered my little technique. So I tried rewriting my profile and making it more obvious. Another day later, and it's still up!

I deserve some kind of award for figuring that out. If they catch me (which they will if they see this article), then I'll just find a new way.

 

*Full Disclosure: I'm not a virgin to the JDate thing. I actually asked the parent company of JDate to sponsor my band's tour. They respectfully declined and said, "maybe in the future". I think the Moshiach will come before then.

With all the talk about dating Jewish men, it certainly makes one wonder about the Jewish dating pool. One would think that, in Manhattan of all places, there would be an endless supply of nice Jewish boys for a nice Jewish girl (with a little Shiksa flare).

Wrong.

First of all, I go to a Catholic, Jesuit university. The closest thing I can find to a nice Jewish boy here is a guy who doesn’t throw his Bible at me and say, “Hey, read the second half, it’s good.” (No joke, this happened once at a party.) So I (though not for the purpose of dating) started getting involved in Jewish groups in the city. There are dozens of groups that coordinate events for Jewish “young professionals,” and even though I’m still a student, I thought getting involved would be a great way to feel a sense of community. And I have, for sure.

After a handful of bizarre encounters, though, I’ve begun towonder if “20’s and 30’s” is code for “singles on the prowl.” I would be the last person to call myself an expert on dating, but here’s a few examples of what not to do if you’re limiting yourself to the, say, Upper West Side Jewish community for dating:

I went to a huge Shabbat dinner a few weeks ago, knowing nobody but the host, who had 150 other people to entertain. And given that a good many of those 150 found themselves in the same position, there was a lot of forced small-talk going on. Which is fine, of course—until the unwanted advances start coming. A doctor introduced himself to me by remarking on just how cold I looked when I walked in (15 blocks in 25 degree weather is not, I’ve learned, “walking distance”). But within 45 seconds, after I mentioned that I was an undergrad, he said something along the lines of, “Oh, God—you’re 20, aren’t you? I shouldn’t even be talking to you—I’m old enough be your father.”Good, make it clear that you’re only here to scope out prospects. Not long after, I smiled sweetly and ducked to make conversation with someone a little more age-appropriate. I brushed off the guy who hit on me as the token 40-year-old and moved on. Until the following Saturday.

I went to morning Shabbat services at a completely different place. And the same doctor was hanging around. When he came over to say hello, I figured he remembered me from the week prior and planned to pick up where we left off. Not so much. He recited his entire shpiel again, verbatim. Moral of the story? If you’re so old that you don’t remember trying to pick me up seven days prior (and sober, nonetheless),you’re too old to be trying to pick up a 20-year-old.

The same goes for those two characters who have friended me on Facebook—not once, but twice. Especially the one who, both times, included a note trying to convince me to accept his request by complimenting my photo and name-dropping people who claim to have never exchanged more than two words with him. If it happens again, you better believe I’ll drop a note saying, “I’ve always wanted to be Facebook friends with somebody who finished his MBA when I was in middle school!”

Let's face it: Valentine's Day-the day which supposedly celebrates romance, and love and cupid's delights--is a scam.

February 14 - an arbitrary date - has morphed from a debatable legend about Saint Valentine's martyrdom into a gluttonous, competitive, commercialized day whose focus has nothing to do with true romance. Rather, V-Day promotes the purchase of an image: of fancy chocolates, overpriced roses, silly teddy bears, mylar balloon, and "special" dinners.

Silly may it be, like everything American and commercial, the "holiday's" (and I use that term lightly) potency is tangible. There's been "backlash" by singles--those who feel empowered by their own singledom, and party promoters looking to capitalize off of other people's manufactured loneliness to throw bashes and bar crawls. And apparently, according to some skilled googling, the day has also become SAD-Singles Awareness Day. As if, as a single person, you weren't aware of this every other day of the year.

Now personally--and I like chocolate, teddy bears and flowers--I've always been confused by the "holiday." On the one hand, while my nieces send me little love notes, and offices have secret valentines, Victoria's Secret also showcases a ridiculous number of red and heart-printed borderline-skanky lingerie for the holiday.

Valentine's Day, to me, just doesn't jive. In fact, it sorta gives me the heebie jeebies.

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"SINGLE women DO cook!"

Why is it that so many people ask me, "You cook?" But you're single, right?"

WOW, I guess single women don't EAT, or they only order takeout. Why else would they need to cook WHOLESOME, HEALTHY meals, from SCRATCH!?? I guess it doesn't really matter what you cook when you are single. Meals are only made for two. Yeah, right.

Not my meals, baby. Although I can sometimes eat for two or three people, I most certainly enjoy cooking my own meals. Lunch, dinner, snacks...whatever.

Why do you think companies make "single" serving dishes? I guess, to the contrary, "couples" can't eat single serving dishes?

Either way, people are quick to judge and should just worry about their own kitchens.

Unless their kitchens are made from glass, they should not throw stones, or pasta.

As a matter of fact, even many men I date ask me the same thing or they are surprised that I know how to prepare more than a stack of takeout menus.

Don't get me wrong, takeout is great on occasion, as long as you aware of the chemicals and high salt content found in many of these dishes. And salad? Ok ladies, how much salad can a single person eat? Yes I know it appears to the self, that you are watching your diet, when you order a "salad." Do you really think everyone washes their hands thoroughly before preparing your RAW salad?

Ok, back to single women and cooking.

Most women today are professionals, meaning they work full time and have several after-work responsibilities. This can inhibit their cooking time. The answer to this is to prepare a few dishes for the week on Sunday or early in the week. They don't have to be elaborate. Light sandwiches for work, egg salad, dips, chicken cutlets with brown rice, almonds for snacking and some chocolate for decadent snacking.

Single women (or men, for that matter) should not deprive themselves or ever think they don't have "time" or "know how" to cook.

Take a basic cooking class or a more specialized one- i.e. baking, sushi-making etc. These classes are not only tons of fun, they are great ways to meet friends and mates.

We all know how sexy cooking together can be! Cooking solo, while may not sound sexy, is definitely self motivating and rewarding. You feel accomplished and satiated at the same time.

So get out there (or in there-to the kitchen), single ladies AND gents. Be proud of all of your accomplishments and just be proud of who YOU ARE!

Remember, "there are no such things as failures, only unwanted results!"

Add a little "seasoning" to your life and start cooking, you single gourmets!

• Jewish singles are more Jewishly engaged than people think (but does the word ‘engaged’ in that sentence make any other singles nervous?). Jewish single: plenty Jew-y A new report by sociologists Steven Cohen and Ari Kelman has found that unmarried Jews in their twenties and thirties are plenty involved in Jewish life, with 42% of singles saying more than half of their friends are Jewish, and 51% saying they talk to their friends about “Jewish matters.” JTA
  

• Josh Martin, an American Jew who went to help rebuild in Israel after the Lebanon war in 2006, made a second trip to help rebuild in Lebanon.  He brought along a group of Christians, Jews, and Muslims to do service projects across the country, including an art project in a Palestinian refugee camp. JTA
  

• A small library of rare and valuable Jewish books and manuscripts has been smuggled out of Iraq and into Israel. Some of the books are more than 600 years old, and had to be spirited out of Baghdad by Iraqi-born book dealer Mordechai Ben-Porat and his emissaries. Many of the books were being held in the Library of Congress in Washington DC, but they’ve all been returned to Israel.  Jewschool
  

• A Orthodox Jewish man at the center of a life support controversy died this week in Winnipeg. Samuel Golubchuk, 84, had been on life support for months, but his family did not want life support to be removed despite doctor’s recommendation to the contrary. Three doctors at Grace Hospital resigned as a result of the case, saying that keeping Golubchuk alive was akin to torture. Golubchuk’s children argues that halachically they were not allowed to do anything that might hasten their father’s death. Golubchuk died while on life support.  Chronicle Herald

• A Lebanese-born man being charged with supporting a terrorist group has asked that the Jewish judge assigned to his case recuse himself. Since Fawzi Mustapha Assi, 48, has already plead guilty to the charges, Judge Gerald E. Rosen refused the request, saying that Assi was “a little late.”  Mercury News
  

• An Israeli-Arab who lectures about the Holocaust at Palestinian refugee camps teaches that instead of denying the atrocities of World War II, Palestinians should recognize the loss of millions of Jews. If the Jewish people could survive losing 6 million, he explains, it will easily survive terrorist bombings and other attacks that kill 20-25. Instead of violent attacks, Palestinians should find other tactics.  Haaretz
  

• In Israel, an American Idol type competition is underway for the Haredi world. This one is called “Upcoming Voice,” only features men, restricts the judges from saying anything mean or embarrassing to the contestants, and is not shown on TV, since the Haredi world frowns on television. Instead, it’s distributed on CDs that members of the ultra-Orthodox world can watch on their home computers.  Haaretz

• In Tajikistan, the only synagogue is being demolished against the will of the community, to make way for the new presidential residence. Officials were going to let the Jewish community dismantle the synagogue themselves so as to maintain as much dignity for the space as possible, but when they weren’t progressing quickly enough, the Chief Engineer had the remaining wall bulldozed.  Religious Intelligence

JDate modelSee the guy smirking at you over on the right? The one that looks like he's maybe sixteen years old? Say hello to JDate's current model (and please, don't tell me you're one of the suckers who thought that singles sites don't use models to advertise their product). He's been around for long enough to make me want to either smack him or make him my boytoy.

Maybe I'll just flip a coin.

Or maybe JDate can change their model before I track this one down and, uh, flip a coin. Yeah. Flip a coin.