Your Definitive Online Dating Translator

Online dating is becoming more normal all the time. The transition has been swift. If you were on Yahoo Match way back when, it was only one step above calling a phone sex line. Not so today.

Though online dating has become more normal, women haven't, so their online dating profiles are a mess of contradictions that can be tough to navigate if you're a novice. Everyone already knows that "full figured" means fat, but there are lots of other important words and phrases to beware of:

I'm brash=I'm loud and dumb.

I'm really into sports=I'm going to memorize one player's name and pester you with irrelevant questions about him until you finally stop caring about the game.

I'm ambitious=I'm going to keep shoehorning my accomplishments into the conversation as though you were looking for a one night stand with my resume rather than me. I will probably also declare--unironically--that I hate arrogant men.

I'm a foodie=I'm going to drag you to lots of restaurants where we'll stand on line for food neither of us actually cares about, all because a Facebook review raved about a sandwich I wouldn't eat for free at home. And though all I do is brag about the burden of having a refined palate, if you blindfolded me I couldn't tell the difference between a bowl of SpaghettiOs and a pasta dish cooked in the Trevi Fountain.

Chivalry isn't dead=I have contrived a list of arbitrary things you must do only so I will have a handy list of things to complain about when I describe you to my equally nitckpicky friends. You might intently listen to me sit at a bar babbling about my theories on crocheting, but if you didn't open the door to said bar you're a inconsiderate guy. And by the way, if you looked like George Clooney, you could slam every door in my face and I would still beg you to let me blow you through the mail slot.

I care about social justice=I once vacationed for three days in a Third World country and forgot to get vaccinated for Buttinski Syndrome, so now I want to apply my tourist's knowledge of four square miles of Nicargua to society as a whole. And lest you think I wasn't fully immersed, did I mention I took high school Spanish?  

Must get along with my dog=My dog, the one who was tortured and abused and starved by humans for six years before I rescued him, the one who has the eyes of a Marine who did a tour of Vietnam AND Korea, is an excellent judge of strange men who come through the door at 3:00 in the morning.


One more thing: If women's online dating profiles are to be believed, all it takes to get laid is knowing the difference between "your" and you're," so a little extra editing will mean a lot more hookups.