Sunday, January 28, 2007

Hmmm, Let Me Get Out My Grading Key

Some of you may be happy to hear that I turned my eHarmony account back on and have been doing the do. So far (just a few days) it's like it used to be; I get a bunch of possibles, many of them so ugly that they could scare buzzards off a carcass. But lo and behold, this time I've gotten some good cards in the form of some cuties that aren't Scientologists or some other brand of mental illness. In fact, out of the top four likely candidates for the position of future Mrs. Scootypuff jr., there are three lawyers and a doctor. Score!

Now, as I mentioned so many moons ago, the process of eHarmony is you read a bio and hopefully see a picture. If the bio doesn't contain phrases such as "I blame the Jews" or the picture doesn't look like someone's snapshots from a day at the zoo, I send them five multiple choice questions and wait for a response. My battery of questions are:

1. Which of the following marriage issues do you fear most?

A) fear of growing apart
B) fear of marrying the wrong person
C) fear of becoming "your parents"
D) fear of being hurt

2. What best describes your parents' relationship towards each other:

A) married and loving
B) married but distant
C) divorced and civil
D) divorced and abusive

3. On Saturday night, would you rather go to:

A) ballet/theater/symphony
B) a professional sporting event
C) a popular new movie
D) the latest dance club
E) any of the above except for b

4. What style of dress do you prefer?

A) I like to get dressed up
B) I like to dress casual
C) I dress for the occasion
D) I wear whatever is clean

5. Do you consider yourself physically affectionate when involved in a relationship?

A) Sure, I love to hold hands, hug and give casual kisses.
B) I'm moderately affectionate. I like to hold hands and exchange hugs.
C) I do like a small amount of physical affection.
D) I don't consider myself a very physically affectionate person.


Now the correct answers - meaning the ones I most want to hear - are as follows:

1. Which of the following marriage issues do you fear most?

A) fear of growing apart
B) fear of marrying the wrong person
C) fear of becoming "your parents"
D) fear of being hurt

Why B you might ask? Because that's the mistake I made. I can accept C, although I don't really understand it. For anyone who answers A, they obviously don't understand that is something that people have complete control over if they married well. Anyone answering D gets closed. Go back to your Tiger Beat magazine, girly. I have no time for you.

2. What best describes your parents' relationship towards each other:

A) married and loving
B) married but distant
C) divorced and civil
D) divorced and abusive

The answer I hope to receive is of course A, though only D gives me pause.

3. On Saturday night, would you rather go to:

A) ballet/theater/symphony
B) a professional sporting event
C) a popular new movie
D) the latest dance club

I get B way too often. This isn’t a deal breaker, but it makes me knit my brow. Of the four choices presented, C is the best response, but with all questions one can write in an answer. This becomes important later in my report.

4. What style of dress do you prefer?

A) I like to get dressed up
B) I like to dress casual
C) I dress for the occasion
D) I wear whatever is clean

The only correct answer here is C. I make gas face at women who have to get all dolled up just to go out and get the mail, just as I do with women who wear sweat pants everywhere they go.

5. Do you consider yourself physically affectionate when involved in a relationship?

A) Sure, I love to hold hands, hug and give casual kisses.
B) I'm moderately affectionate. I like to hold hands and exchange hugs.
C) I do like a small amount of physical affection.
D) I don't consider myself a very physically affectionate person.

Again, the only correct answer here is A. Love me, rub me, kiss me, tickle me, and I’ll do the same to you. We won’t be making out at funerals, but if you flip out because we’re holding hands in public, I have no time for you.

So, having developed a well defined answer key, I was happy to receive this response from the cutest of the cute that I am currently e-wooing.

1. Which of the following marriage issues do you fear most?
B) fear of marrying the wrong person

2. What best describes your parents' relationship towards each other:
B) married but distant

3. On Saturday night, would you rather go to:
E) any of the above except for b

4. What style of dress do you prefer?
C) I dress for the occasion

5. Do you consider yourself physically affectionate when involved in a relationship?
A) Sure, I love to hold hands, hug and give casual kisses.


SCORE! Four out of five, and the one "wrong" answer was the least important. And even though I identified C) a popular new movie as the correct answer for question 3, the real answer is to write-in E) any of the above except for b. Holy cats! She answered the trick question correctly! Scootypuff jr. is pleased. Yes, very pleased indeed.

Watch this space for further updates.

9 comments:

W.M. Scratch said...

Winner, Winner, chicken dinner!

Anonymous said...

Doctors and Lawyers and such. That is much better than her being a cowgirl.

The movie answer kind of surprises me a little, especially knowing how good you are at conversations.

Movies are only good for ditching dates. Garlic and onion sandwhich anyone?

Swany said...

What's wrong with Scientologists? Kidding.

Funny, I get these posts sent directly to my email, so I know when there's a new one. What did Gmail's Adsense program come up with for appropriate ads for this post? Potty Training. Maybe I missed it, but I didn't see any mention of poop.

Did you come up with these questions yourself, or stock questions from eHarmony?

Swany said...

Yeah, that's more like "Gaaaaaaaaaarlic and oooooooooohhnion..."

Dutch said...

GARLIC AND ONION! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
And people wonder why I'm using a webserivce to screen for dates/mates.

Potty Training? I think Gmail is just stating the obvious - I'm infantile.

And to answer your question, Pimp, the questions come canned from eHarmony, but I get to choose them from a list. The second round of questions your get to write yerself.

Wander said...

Man, I was so close on all of those... I'll make you mine yet Scooty!

Jan said...

Okay, I'm going to chime in on this one. Granted, I'm married already and I'm related to Wild Willie so I realize this may not hold much weight. However, if I answered these questions...I would not answer #1 with B only b/c I would hope and expect to know the person well enough to be able to see red flags before getting to the point of marriage. I would never walk down the aisle if I had any fear that person wasn't the right one. Scooty, would you consider other answers if you knew that was someone's rationale?

On #3, what's wrong with choosing a sporting event? That's like a rare treat for me since I'm so budgeted. It's so much more fun to attend a game in person than sitting on the couch watching it on TV. So in this case, I might pick sporting event over the movie but who knows. Do you assume that girls might answer that question only to impress a man? Of course you are 100% entitled to have your grading key. I'm only curious as to why it makes you knit your brow.

Swany said...

Don't worry, we don't hold your relation to Wild Willie against you.

Dutch said...

Wait minute, are you asking me out? :D

Well, I answered your first question already.
Why B you might ask? Because that's the mistake I made.
My reasoning reflects your answer, in a way. I'm not concerned with getting tired of my spouse, of getting hurt, or of becoming my parents (whatever that means). If I marry the right person, all of the above are manageable. If I were hasty or untrue to myself and married the wrong person, then no amount of good deeds or self-improvement on my part can save the marriage. You can only change yourself, and then only so much. If the marriage needs both to change to survive, and the other is unwilling or unable to change to the degree that is necessary, then you just can't fix that.

And this of course is not to say that if you marry the right person, then marriage is a breeze. I believe all marriages require frequent hard work to succeed. It's just that with a compatible partner, your hard work will bear fruit, unlike my marriage where it just gave me emotional and physical health problems.

I certainly wanted to marry the right person the first time, but remember, some of us are stupid.

As for your second question, Sports is the wrong answer because watching sports bores me to tears. I like playing sports. I don't like watching sports.