Read this first: (I guess it’s natural, since it’s the first paragraph and all, but still). The following entry was written last evening, during a two hour self-therapy session. It might stir things up a bit and some people might find it offensive, or maybe even take the contents somewhat personal. Bear with me, read through the whole text before you start the flaming. And remember that I’ve got an active disclaimer on my site. But if you got something to say, and it’s at least a little constructive and not just something like “I’m gonna kick you in the nuts!”, feel free to post a comment or contact me directly. After long consideration, I decided to use actual names of actual, living, breathing people in this rant, mostly to illustrate my points better. If you see yourself mentioned and don’t like it, you can either pretend that it’s not you - but it’ll probably be a little hard - or you can give me a call and I’ll have you removed immediately. Maybe I should have asked for permission, but that would probably have taken days to do.

Here we go:

In the middle of March this year I did something I really though I’d never do. I made myself a profile at SprayDate. The name of the site says it all. It’s a Norwegian online dating service-like thing. They don’t actually mix and match directly, but they present each user with a profile they can fill in - name, age, location, things you like, things you don’t like, a description of yourself, an optional picture and some other options. You can then search through other profiles, send messages and so on. There are probably hundreds of sites like this on the Internet.

Why did I think I would never do it? I used to look at sites like this like I still look at personal ads: A pure act of desperation. People who use a service like SprayDate have tried everything. They’ve been dating their co-workers, family that are far enough away in the family tree to make sure that their kids are not born with an extra limb, friends, their friend’s friends, their friend’s friend’s friends (you probably see where I’m going so I’ll stop here). But they are still unable to find the one, or not even a half one. So they are joining other desperate people in the personal ads, online and offline dating services or other places where desperate people gather. When you get to this level, you’re probably able to see through most of the other persons faults and mental disabilities - you’re looking for the safety it is to have someone there with you, and it might as well be this just-out-of-prison homicidal lunatic sitting in front of you at the cafe where you just met for the first time. Desperation does make you do the most incredible things. Or so I’ve heard.

To my defence, I would like to say that I wasn’t desperate. At least not in the way the term is used above. I joined it based on the success of Klas and Kine. Klas joined a couple of months before me, Kine a few days after Klas. That they joined SprayDate was not something they did out of desperation. Klas did it, at least to my knowledge, to have some fun. To meet new people. And he succeeded. I’m not sure what Kine’s intentions were when she joined, but I know that Klas wrote her profile, a very good one, too, I might add. My best guess is that she needed something to pass the time. With the help of her profile - which at some point emphasises the shape of her behind, a smart move by Klas, as it attracts guys to her profile like kids to a burning bakery - she met new people, made some new friends, and are generally enjoying her stay on SprayDate, as far as I know. The bottom line is that they both succeeded in whatever they were trying to do.

So, I thought; “what the hell”. What did I have to lose? My last scrap of dignity? There was no dignity to lose. It wasn’t that I was all out, it’s just that if you don’t think you’re losing any of it yourself, you won’t be losing any. So I made myself believe that I wouldn’t lose any dignity. Besides, my friends were having fun and they didn’t seem to have taken any noticeable psychical damage. And this act of self-convincing worked to some degree. Still, meeting someone on the Internet is not a thought I’m comfortable with. And by “meeting someone” I mean finding a girlfriend, or - in the most extreme of situations - the one, Your soul mate. Your astral twin. Add more clichés here if you want to, you know what I’m talking about. But what if I wasn’t looking for the one? Let’s just say that I’m looking for “new friends” or “someone to talk to”, which are options you can select on SprayDate.

Stop talking crap. Of course I’m looking for someone to spend the rest of my life with. It’s in my genes. You could of course argue that it’s in a man’s genes to get laid with as many girls as possible, but that’s another discussion entirely. I am looking for the one, I’ve come to the point where I can admit that. But I’m not desperate, not yet. I think I’m still able to see when a relationship have no real future, that it’s most likely not going to work out. In this process I will hurt people. I’ve already done that, and it makes me feel bad, but there is nothing I can do about it. If there is no chemistry or no spark, there is nothing one can do about it. And I will most likely get hurt myself. I’ve been lucky enough not to experience that - at least not to a great degree - so far.

Using SprayDate has changed me. I’ve become slightly more paranoid. I don’t want people to know that I’m using it. They have over three hundred thousand registered users, that’s not that far from ten percent of the total population in Norway. Remove a bunch of fake profiles and people who are only hanging around for a few days and you’ll probably end up with about two hundred thousand users, but that’s still a large figure. In spite of that, I don’t want people to know that I’m using it. I can talk about it to people I know very well, because they are aware of it anyway, but I don’t want people I work with or friends of my friends to know. Why? I’m not sure, it’s probably that I don’t want to look desperate. If you don’t know anyone who is using SprayDate and who’s not desperate, I guess you look at all the people using it as desperate. At least that was what I did, I don’t know why. It’s probably a bit narrow-minded, but I did anyway. Shame on me.

Don’t ask me why I’m writing and publishing this rant. I don’t know that either.

A few weeks ago I was at a party here in Oslo. We were at Terje’s place and I was in his room checking out how to set up my cellular properly. Probably not the best thing to do at a party, but he had an Internet connection and I wanted to check the information when I had the chance. Sitting in his room, I could hear most of what they were saying in the living room. After a while, Hege wanted to know where I was. “He’s in Terje’s room”, Ola said. “calling Camilla.”. “Who’s that?” someone asked. “Someone he met on SprayDate”. “Oooh…”, was the answer. How Ola knew about Camilla in the first place, I don’t know. Maybe I told him. Maybe someone who knew told him. It doesn’t matter, and it doesn’t matter that he said it. But it made me feel…hmmm…embarrassed. For a while I just sat in Terje’s room, not wanting to go back into the living room. To look them in the eyes. Because in my mind, they are now seeing me as the desperate one.

So I guess I wasn’t able to totally convince myself that I wouldn’t lose any dignity when joining SprayDate.

What have come out of my adventure with SprayDate so far? I’ve met new people, one of them even in person, Camilla, as mentioned above. She is a great girl, and I don’t regret for a second that I decided to meet with her. Too bad it didn’t work out to become something more than “friends”. And there you go again. I have to admit that I met Camilla with the possibility in mind that she could be the one. Am I looking at every girl I stumble across as a potential girlfriend? Kick me hard, because I think I am. Is it just me, or do all single guys at my age do the same? Either way, it’s probably not a good thing.

Hi, my name is Vegard, and I’m a nice guy.