Scientists and Dating Sites

Because my life doesn't contain sufficient trauma, I continue the on again, off again, dating thing, although to a lesser extent, knowing I'll be moving in the near future.  In any case, I've discovered another trend I think is worth reporting on.  I've only encountered this one on Plenty of Fish and it's a head scratcher.  Over the course of the past few weeks, I've noticed a number of women listing their occupation as cosmologist.  For those who may not be clear on what a cosmologist does (I was a bit vague, myself), they're scientists that study the universe; how it formed, how it's changed, and what exists within it.  What's odd is none of them have advanced degrees and all have pictures with their faces with impeccable makeup.

Yep, there are a bunch of women cosmetologists who can't even spell what they do for a living.

Out of Work Trophy Wife Encounter

Yes readers, one sneaked through my selection process and it didn't end well.  Our first interaction was through Match and she seemed intelligent, motivated, kind, and hot, but not OWTW hot.  Her profile and initial round of notes indicated she was a special needs teacher.  I'll fast forward through much of the intervening communication and provide the salient facts, since she's not really worth typing a great deal about.  We got onto the topic of sex, she wanted it, I'm a master at talking dirty and creating images, we were going to meet last night for dinner and she'd come over and begin to explore her submissive side.  I do love me some exploration.  We both seemed to want a genuine relationship and I parroted her desires, in that aspect of our communication.  I probably took it a bit further due to a combination of excitement over (seemingly) finding someone in Kansas worth dating. 

At this point, I'll mention recognizing a few red flags pointing to a potential OWTW, including how her successful, and apparently fuck nuts, attorney husband had traded her in on a younger model.

The day before our date, she went a bit dark, cutting email down to a single note.  I asked her if everything was okay, at which point she told me she thought I was pushing for something more serious than she wanted.  I responded that I had no interest in jumping into anything.  Her note made it clear she didn't accept what I'd told her.  Perhaps if I'd mentioned that there's no way in hell I want to establish anything remotely resembling roots in fucking Kansas. 

By the time our date rolled around, I knew there was no way she was coming home with me.  She arrived decked out in designer clothing and admittedly, looked quite delicious.  Dinner was full of vacuous conversation, where I learned she actually wasn't teaching, or working at all.  She was dabbling and not happy with any of her teaching options.  That one wasn't an immediate bell, because I was still determining whether I could get her in the sack.  Sorry, I'm a guy after all.  Dinner ended, with no conversation about her coming home with me, so I broached the topic.  As expected, she declined, sticking to her story of my wanting to move too quickly and how she didn't want to hurt me.  I commented that she had clearly made up her mind before coming to dinner, which she denied.  I'll come back to that.

I made the mistake of asking something to the effect of why she came to dinner, knowing she wasn't going home with me.  And she let me have it with everything she could think of: the rushing into a relationship, how she didn't like the phrasing I used in one of my notes, how I didn't apologize properly for something she felt I needed to apologize.  She was put off that I couldn't come up with any sexual fantasies, when she asked (sorry, they're not really fantasies after they've been fulfilled).  Then, she berated me for foisting fantasies onto her (except they weren't fantasies, but dirty things most other women enjoyed).  She took issue with things I'd said that I never said; those had to have come from some other guy.  On and on it went, with no end in sight.  I've had women I'd been dating for months tell me off in a shorter amount of time than this woman I'd just met.   She'd run through her list of transgressions, then circle back to the beginning, finding some new grievance to add for the next rotation.  I've never experienced anything like this!  I did everything I could think of to indicate the conversation was over, to gracefully make an exit.  I did this twice, but she wasn't losing any steam, so I wound up doing something I've never done before.  I got up and walked out on her, muttering something to the effect of 'have a nice life'.

It hit me later that all of these supposed transgressions occurred before we laid eyes on each other, so which only adds fuel to my previous query of why did she meet in the first place.  What a truly horrible encounter.

As I'm sure you can tell, I'm still angered by the whole episode, but was able to perform a post mortem on the date and finally uncover her motive for coming to dinner; the only possible motive.  She was still sexed up, from the dirty talk I'd been plying her with and was hoping I'd be more of a stud muffin than I appeared in my pictures.  At that point, she would have likely forgotten the whole 'hurting others' thing and gone home with me.  Transparent and shallow; not the things I look for in a woman.

And what pisses me off the most is I spent $30 on some fucking grapefruit flavored Absolut that she asked for me to have for her.  It's not the money, mind you, but the reminder of the bitch every time I open the freezer.  I sure as hell won't drink it.  Anyone want a bottle of nasty vodka?

Safety Is Important - Flotation Devices

Well, I've reached a point where I'm back to the online dating world and have noticed something new about women in Kansas.  Damn, there are a lot of them here with implants!  These enhanced blouse bunnies are easy to spot, because chests just don't match the rest of these women's bodies.  I'm sure there are plenty of women with implants who seek a more natural look, and you'd never know without a feel test, but these women have chosen the porn star big wahwahs route.  No way you could miss those pontoons.

Giving it some thought, this trend shouldn't be much of a surprise; one of the first observations I made, viewing dating profiles, was the rather robust trade in cosmetics, here in the KC area. 

And while finding time to pen this short 'holy shit, lots of fake sweater meat here' entry, I've also encountered a bunch of women who seemingly wear false eyelashes all the time. As with many of these things, I encountered one woman in particular who had fake lashes so large, they prevented her from wearing sunglasses and smeared her windshield, which heightened my awareness to them on other women.  But even in the most casual photo, there's full makeup and accoutrements. 

I'll resist the temptation to venture further into what the dedication to bolt on's and such say about someone.  It's a woman's body and she's free to do with it as she chooses.  Perhaps it's a thing, here in flyover states.  People sure as hell don't spend their money on travel or other enrichment, so they might as well have prodigious cans.  Some major league yabos, I tell ya. 

And yes, I enjoyed working in as many euphemisms as I could in the short entry; because like most men, I'm twelve and easily amused.

Concealed Carry Permits - Kansas Finds Yet Another Way To Suck

If I'm allowed to carry a concealed handgun in the state I live, I plan on doing so.  We'll skip the existential debate surrounding guns and such, because I won't go there.  This post is intended to be another in the series that never ends on why Kansas sucks; the concealed carry permit application process.  Since most of my readers have likely never applied for a concealed carry permit (CCW), I'll compare and contrast with the two other states in which I've held permits, Virginia and Pennsylvania.  All three are 'shall issue' states, which means they will issue anyone a carry permit, unless a legitimate reason exists to not do so.  In other words, the applicant need not justify the need for a permit (i.e. owns a jewelry store and carries large sums of cash) to receive one.

We'll begin with qualifications; what sort of bona fides does an applicant require to apply for a permit?  (We'll assume our applicant has a clean criminal record and no other disqualifying attributes.)

PA:  Nada
VA:  Essentially, if you've ever taken a handgun course, been in law enforcement, or shot competitively, you're good.
A fairly low bar; I submitted my scores from previous matches I've shot. 

KS:  Applicants must complete a 9 hour CCW class that reviews gun safety and self-defense laws, followed by a handgun proficiency test (that literally everyone passes; the instructors made sure of that) and a written exam (with the same level of difficulty as the shooting qual).
Everyone must take the class.  Doesn't matter if you're a former Navy SEAL, who practices defense law now.  You're taking the class.

I've held a CCW permit for 20+ years and always taken an active interest in understanding the relevant laws.  Plus, I shot competitively for a dozen years and even taught new shooter classes.  As you can imagine, the class was beyond painful for me.  I was a good boy though, and didn't call the instructor out on any of his bullshit, just sitting there and trying not to cringe.  I did laugh at the shooting qual, not because it was beyond remedial, but because of the range officer's reaction.  RO's were there for safety and to provide advice to the shooters, which they did by 'reading' targets (a way of identifying common mistakes based upon where the shots hit).  I used the same tactic when teaching new shooters.  The one in my area gets to my target, in which all the holes are neatly clustered in what would be the A zone if we were using a USPSA target (even though I'd not shot a gun in 9 years).  He had this befuddled look on his face and reluctantly admitted 'I'm not sure how much help I can give you'.  I chuckled and revealed my background.  Hell, just the gun I was shooting likely had more rounds through it than all the other students had shot, in their lives.

Back to the process...

PA and VA:  Take your paperwork (application and supporting documents) and a check to your local courthouse.  Submit, get fingerprinted, and receive your permit in the mail in 7-10 days.

KS:
Have passport photos taken.
Attach two of those to your application, then take all your shit (certificate from the mandatory class) to the local sheriff, along with two checks (one for the AG, the other to National Inbreeding Foundation, the fuck if I can remember). While they've got you bent over for the fees, they'll also fingerprint you.

In some period of time, you'll receive something in the mail that says you're approved.  You'll take that to your local drivers licence center, where they take your picture (what the hell happened to the photos I already submitted???), and mail your permit in another 7-10 days.  Quick and efficient!

Let's discuss fees.
VA and PA are both $35
Kansas continues to demonstrate how it excels in all aspects of sucking donkey dicks.  You'll be writing checks for $132.50.  No, that's not a typo.

To add one final dimension of suck to Kansas, their permit's only valid for four years, where VA and PA are good four five.  Fuck, for $132, Kansas' permit should be valid for a decade and include valet service!

I have to admit to being a bad boy, in class, when the instructor went through the required steps.  It was a completely involuntary uttering of 'you've got to be kidding, right?'

Let's wrap up with a quick recap.
PA and VA:
One stop at your local sheriff / circuit court
Cost $35
Your permit is valid for 5 years.

Kansas:
Four stops, including 9 hours lost in a class I didn't need. 
$132.50
Valid for 4 years.

And I know what you're thinking; 'He's just looking for things to bitch about, now.  Kansas can't suck that badly.'  You're wrong.  While it was with neither glee nor joy that I relocated here, I actually had the mindset that the only thing I'd be giving up was topography and the richness of Richmond itself, and having 2 hour access to the beach, mountains, and DC.  I figured 'how bad could it be?'  The fact is that Kansas has repeatedly beaten me about the head and neck, seemingly yelling 'you made such a mistake moving here; what the fuck were you thinking???'  Seriously, even removing the flatness and bad roads from the equation, every damned aspect of living here is worse than anywhere I've lived before.  I've racked my brain, attempting to identify one point of life, one little thing that's better here than the East Coast.  But there just aren't any.  Restaurants, grocery stores, things to do, cost of living, dating, ease of life, weather...they all suck here.  Perhaps my new hobby should become binge drinking.

Happy living, readers!

A Trip To The DMV - Kansas Finds More Ways To Suck

The DMV is never fun, regardless of where you live.  However, this week, Kansas took the experience to a new and painful level for me.  In this state, you must traverse a multi-stage process for titling / registering your vehicles, when you move from another state.  First, you must present the vehicle and title to the Kansas Highway Patrol for them to validate the VIN's match, then do the DMV purgatory.  I took both of my cars for the VIN check, a few weeks ago; each requiring over an hour of waiting and messing about with apathetic civil servants.  I didn't find time to complete the process until this past week.

Wednesday morning, I set out for the drivers license facility (different than the DMV) and managed to knock that out in about an hour.  Not bad for the typical government parade of sloths.  What made me chuckle is the temporary DL I received, which looks like a bar receipt; on thermal paper and everything.  This thing has to last 30-45 days; imagine trying to keep a receipt from Target that long (in your wallet).  Both PA and VA (the two other states in which I've lived) had facilities in which you walked out with a real license. 

Bar receipt in hand, I trekked to the DMV to finish the process.  After waiting the proper 25 minutes, I was called to window 12, where I presented my completed paperwork.  The drone behind the counter told me I must have handed her the wrong title, because the inspection sheet noted a KTM motorcycle.  I don't own a motorcycle which meant the damned inspection station screwed up.  Back in the car, I trudged to the KHP facility, where I was told to sign in and take a seat.   I responded 'I don't plan on being here long enough to need a seat.  You need to remedy this mixup and have me on my way.'  The woman manning the counter looked at me and, I swear on my grandmother's grave, said 'remedy?'  I stared at her and said 'fix'.  'Oh, okay; wait a minute.'  A few minutes later, I made the return trip back to the DMV.  I approached another counter, this time, and presented my now correct paperwork. 

'Do you have your VA registration?'
'Uh, no...it wasn't on the list of documents I was to provide, based upon your website.'
'Well, I need it to determine timing for your taxes.' 
It's obvious I had the registration for the vehicle I was driving, but the reg for my other car was, shocker, in my other car.

Thus, I found myself making another trek, still nowhere near completing my task.  After grabbing some lunch, kicking a few kittens, and otherwise releasing my frustrations, I returned to the DMV.  This time, I had everything I needed and was able to complete the full transaction.  Although, the final act was to pay KS property tax on my cars, which was 20% higher than what I paid in VA.  I pretty much said to the drone behind the counter 'you've got to be kidding! You charge more than a real state and still have shit roads and services.  How the hell do you charge this much?'  Not surprising I received no response on that one. 

In any case, I'm now legal in the state of...I can't even say it. 

How was your week?

Religion and Dating in Kansas

Having been here for seven months (holy fucking shit, that realization just made me a bit nauseous!), I should have already encountered someone I wanted to date more than a few times, or at least developed one or two 'special friends', with whom I could spend quality time.  However, I've only gone on multiple dates with one person.  It goes without saying that dating sucks, but seriously, this has been an incredible dry spell.  This lack of companionship can essentially be attributed to one factor, religion.

I've already shared my views on religion and faith here.  With the exception I noted in that entry, I'd previously not encountered much friction on the topic of religion in the context of dating.  That is until I moved here...to the Bible Belt.  You see, the majority of people I've come across here are practicing Christians and most women want the same quality in their partner.  Beyond it narrowing the dating pool quite a bit, no foul, right?  Wrong.

You see, many of these so called devout Christians take quite a bit of license with the 'no sex before marriage' rule.  That's the one good thing about OKCupid; it's easy to see by how a woman answers the sex questions what's important to her.  It's fairly common to find a woman who responds she'll sleep with a guy on their first date, but God is very important to her.

My position is if you're going to be a Christian, be a Christian.  If you consider the Bible to be the word of God, follow it.  You're either in or you're out.  'I like these rules, but not those, so I'll ignore them' serves only to highlight your hypocrisy.   His word is either sacrosanct or it's not, and if it's not, then stop calling yourself a person of faith.

To those I've questioned on the topic, the typical response has been 'I have a special relationship with God'.  So, you and your sky daddy sat down and he said 'fuck all the guys you want, I got your back'?  You'll forgive me if I'm a bit skeptical about that one.

It all boils down to this:  This is your god, the one you worship, and profess to follow.  If you can't be faithful to Him, then how can I expect you will be to some schmuck you're dating?

The cherry on the top is these women (and I'm sure men, but I don't date them), will be the first to judge you for not being a Christian.  They look down their noses at you as though you're some sort of ignorant, evil creature.  Hypocrisy elevated to a very high standard.

And this has nothing to do with slut shaming.  Those who read my blog know I wholeheartedly celebrate sluts.  A woman can fuck her way through the NFC east, for all I care, and I'd have not one unkind word to say about her.  However, if she's espousing to worship her sky daddy while doing it, she's a waste of oxygen.

For example, the girl who owned nothing would scream with delight as I pounded her ass, and called her a whore, but still gave me shit for not believing in God.

In another case, I'd been chatting with a woman (here in the Flat Lands) who seemed to be a good fit; smart, funny, cute, blah, blah.  We'd discussed sex and she became rather excited about becoming my dirty girl, even being owned by me.  We planned to meet for dinner, then she would come to my house, the next night, to get laid, no pretense of anything else.  Fast forward to dinner and the food arrives.  Before she tears into her steak, she bows her head.  Holy shit, this chick is saying grace!  The chick I had just met, who wanted me to fuck her like a slut the following night, was saying grace!

My rant toward these people:  You fuckers are the worst kind of hypocrites and numb skulls.  You make the rest of us suffer through you wearing your supposed faith on your sleeve, looking down your nose at those who don't share your beliefs, yet you don't live it yourself.  Exactly what do you plan to say to St. Peter at the pearly gates, when he points out more men had gone down on you than on the Titanic?

No one should be shocked that I absolutely won't date a Christian.  If she truly believes, I'm not waiting until marriage or a 'serious' relationship before we get naughty (and potentially discover she's horrible in the sack).  If she does fuck, she's a hypocrite.

And that's life in Kansas...how's your love life?

Dating In Kansas

In a word, it sucks.  But don't just take my word for it.  Empirical data exists!

I rest my case...

2018 So Far

We're a little over a month into 2018 and not much has changed here in Flat City.

I remain single and am not engaging with anyone, much less meeting; I'm just not interested.  Beyond the way too typical problem of meeting my criteria, having something to say, etc. incompatibility when it comes to faith continues to rear its ugly head, here in the Bible belt.  Regular readers know of my issue with someone claiming to be a devout Christian, but openly wanting to fuck, and soon.  Flat out hypocrisy.  Anyway, Kansas is thick with women who fall into this category.

This is a temporary situation and the most I want, while I'm here, is a superficial dalliance.

To that end, a few weeks ago, I decided to put my religious hypocrisy issues aside and meet a woman who was both active in her church and thought she may have wanted some first date sex.  Yes, I was in need of some (naked) human touch.  Unfortunately, she had already proven to be quite the bumpkin, having moved from middle of nowhere Nebraska (I know, redundant description) to the big city (hah!) of KC, and hadn't been much of anywhere else.  She was intelligent, for sure, but worldly, she was not.  When we met, I just wasn't feeling it, nor was I feeling well, because of the flu someone gave me on a plane somewhere.  I somewhat blew my chances for a quick fuck when I responded to her question of 'So, how do you like it here, so far?' with 'I fucking hate the Midwest'.  Did I mention I sort of lose the ability to simulate charming, when I'm sick?  And I'm still wondering why she didn't want to go home with me...

On a similar note to the above (the middle of nowhere portion), I was chatting with a guy on a flight 'home' the week before last.  I mentioned just moving here and he responded that he and his wife had never been happier about relocating to KC.  I asked where he had moved from to which he noted a small town in Iowa.  It literally took all of my restraint to not blurt out 'no shit KC's better if you've been living in fucking nowhere all your life!'  But I didn't.

The other major contributing factor to my not wanting to date right now has to do with Kansas itself.  I've already documented all the ways in which this state sucks humongous hirsute equus asinus genitals and it's truly sunken in that coming here was a mistake.  Yes, I enjoy my job; I've gotten to meet real rocket scientists at NASA and a big chunk of my product guarantees every SpaceX rocket functions.  But work's only 10 hours a day and leaves a lot of free time to fill.  Ultimately, I think I'm avoiding emotional involvement in order to prevent putting down roots here.  The same goes for exploring the city; why bother learning about a shitty town when you plan on getting the hell out in the next few years?

While my employment contract has a small escape clause, 'because Kansas sucks' isn't in there; I checked.

As I sit in a place that will struggle to reach freezing today, while Richmond might hit 70 degrees, I ponder another topic that makes me less than jovial.  My Porsche is finally in transit from Richmond to here.  Ordinarily, being reunited with it after 6 months would excite me, but the roads here, even if they weren't covered in salt, are flat, straight, boring, and in shit condition.  The car may very well be sold, since it likely won't exit my garage more than three or four times per year.

I promise to put more effort into refraining from the 'woe is me; Kansas sucks' entries, unless I discover a new way it does so. 

Now, get off my flat lawn...

They Lie About Meat Here!

As regular readers already know, one of the pleasures I cherish most in life is dry aged, prime beef.  Back in Richmond, I had a butcher who regularly carried such a delicacy, in addition to pasture raised, and Midwest grain fed beef.  They knew me by name, so I may have spent a little time there.  Back to KC, I've already documented my first carnivorous outing as a complete disaster, but I still had a few spots to check.  One is only about ten minutes from my office, so I popped by on Friday, after work.  As I traversed the constantly worsening neighborhoods, not finding prime beef became a secondary concern, behind just getting out alive.

I arrived safely, but quickly became discouraged once I walked through the front door.  The cases were filled with a lot of not so awe inspiring meat.  Oh well, I'll just get a few things, since I'm here.  Once I'd made my choices, the guy who waited on me led me to the register, where another older gentleman was running the machine.  Although I surely knew the answer, I still posed the question 'do you ever get prime beef here?'  The older gentleman cast a look to the younger guy and said 'show him'.

Long story short, I was taken to a huge walk in cooler, with dozens of sides of beef hanging in it, and told most of that was prime.  And the angels sang.  They didn't keep it in the front case, because that was the high volume operation.  Next time, I should call ahead and they'd cut anything I wanted.

So, this past weekend, I did just that.  I'll skip to the part that matters, which is what the butcher told me -  'uh yeah, we don't have USDA graders, so it's technically not prime.  If we paid to have graders, our best meat would be prime, though.'    Wait, last time I was there, I was shown all this meat that was supposed to be prime.  Eh, fuck it; just give me a super thick ribeye with a ton of cap.  When I picked my meat up, my fears were justified.  What they sold me would have never passed for prime in the first place.

For those who've never experienced prime beef, perhaps a visual comparison would help.  The top photo shows genuine USDA prime beef, that's been dry aged 30 plus days.  Note the copious amounts of intramuscular fat (aka marbling) and that the steaks look dense and big for what they are.  The almost dry look of these steaks are evidence they've been dry aged.  These steaks were the best I've ever had (which I'd say about every prime steak I purchased from my butcher in Richmond).

If we compare with the meat in the photo below, which is what I purchased this weekend, you'll see none of those attributes are apparent.  It's not that this steak was bad; it was fairly good.  But it sure as fuck wasn't prime or anything close to it.  Hell, I've had choice grade beef that was closer to prime than this.

To summarize, even the damned Bible Belt dwellers lie like rugs.  Oh, and the wind hasn't stopped blowing since I arrived in September.  Someone get me out of here!

For those interested in more detail about how beef is graded, take a look at this: