Did I mention that I met my first wife on match.com? . . . true story. . . .Hey! you're still reading, thank you.
If you can see the black humor in opening with that, that's a good sign! Admittedly, one person's optimism and perseverance is another's bone-headed foolishness. We'll see.
I'm 37 years old, divorced and gingerly reintroducing myself to the idea of dating. I have lived in Erie for about six years after having spent eight years in Scotland for grad-school. That was a long time to spend abroad but I was in no hurry to leave. I still miss the castle ruins, the publicly subsidized cheap concerts, the Indian restaurants and of course all those trashy tabloids.
While there, I did become nearly "bilingual" but, fear not, I derive less pleasure than Mike Myers does from putting on funny Scottish voices. However, if you play your cards right, I might well divulge the ingredients of the local sheepy delicacy, "haggis." Just as a bait, it contains a generous amount of something called "offal".
In short, while I'm not really new to Erie, I'm not all that well established here either.
I have a militant and encyclopedic apathy to professional sports, and am utterly unable to feign interest on that topic. Umberto Ecco once wrote an essay entitled "how to avoid talking about soccer with taxi drivers" that I wish I had read much earlier in life. That apathy reaches a fever pitch on the subject of NASCAR; if I were interested in celebrating the working class turning left I would read up on the history of the British Labour Movement. My exercise routine, such as it is, is entirely the spawn of vanity, envy and hypochondria.
My trump card is that I'm a pretty decent cook, or more to the point that all my favorite power tools are produced by Kitchen-aid and that I'm a despotic tyrant in the kitchen. I would also like to think that I'm a good listener. As the professor who talks all day in often vain hope of teasing out the odd, grudging response, reciprocal conversation is always a diverting change of pace.
