Date Movies?

This morning while I was just laying there I turned on the TV, because usually that helps get me out of bed. It was on AMC (American Movie Classics) and Three Amigos was showing. I must say, this movie has aged fairly well. It's still funny. Also, I happened to turn it on right in time for my favorite scene in the whole thing:

The Amigos are supposed to summon the Invisible Swordsman by saying a chant and firing a shot into the air. Steve Martin and Martin Short, do it, but Chevy Chase fires his gun more off to the side than straight up. We immediately hear someone yell "Oooh!" and a person-shaped cloud of dusts poofs up off of the ground. Woo! To which Martin Short says "You killed the Invisible Swordsman!" Maybe you have to see it, but when I was 10 years old that was about the funniest thing I had seen in my life. Seriously, that was a new level of humor.

In any case, eventually it went to commercial, and there was an add for a show on AMC called "blind date movie" or some such thing. Apparently the concept is that they take (presumably single) applicants, pair them off by what kind of movies they like, and film them while they watch one of their favorites. So when they go to commercial, we get to see a little of the blind-daters discussing what they like about the movie. My question is, how do I apply?

Seriously- no more of this eHarmony crap! I feel this is the way for me to meet women. When I'm surfing eHarmony profiles, hidden movie quotes totally make the difference between someone I would or wouldn't write to. Actually, one profile I saw this morning said "you better like Family Guy." So yeah, I automatically sent the first questions to that girl.

And you know, it's not that eHarmony is bad. I still believe in the system. I think it's just that I've been at it long enough that there just aren't that many more good matches, and it's starting to reach a little. I did just have a black Friday, by which I mean like 5 people all closed me in one day. And here's something else I don't get: at least 95% of the matches I get are from the DC area (DC, Alexandria, Arlington) and that's just statistics. There's way more people up there. I close some that I'm not interested in (like if they misspell more than 7 words, type all their answer in capital letters or answer every question with something about horses), and some of them close me. But I've done the guided communication with many of them, and even made it all the way to open communication with several. Now, about 1 out of 20 are from St. Mary's county. Here's the weird part: almost all local matches close me instantly. For real! The cross section is about the same as the DC area matches, but if 1 out of 10 DC matches close me instantly, then 9 out of 10 local matches close me before there's any communication. What's that about?

You'd think single people down here would be thrilled to get a match that's less than an hour away (hell, I would be). There's a couple theories about why this happens: One is that maybe girls down here are looking for a guy up in DC because they want to get the fudge out of here (and I can relate (the getting out of here part, not the guy part)). Kate pointed out that right in my header block it says "Marc, Engineer, Lexington Park" and she thinks maybe the single girls down here are completely sick of engineers that work on the base. I could understand that too- we must make up a significant portion of the eligible men down here. Anyway, it's starting to tick me off.

While we're at it, here's a semi-related story. I was down in the weight room at the drill hall several months ago, and I wanted to stretch out. There was a girl already stretching on the one and only mat, so I said to her "Do you mind if I grab this corner of the mat?" indicating the unused side. She said "No, go ahead" so I sat down. She then said "I'm waiting for my boyfriend." I looked up and said "Oh...uh, okay." Now, this was right about the time I had decided to start dating again, so in a few minutes the full revelation hit me: I just got shot down by a girl I hadn't even considered hitting on. Is there another way to interpret that? She thought I was sitting on the mat to talk to her and she totally launched a pre-emptive strike. This became more ego-damaging over my next several trips when I noticed that she is always talking to guys down there- almost as though it's her main reason for using the weight room. Of course, I was less offended when I realized that she gravitates the most heavily towards the total hair gel using, abercrombie wearing, sideways hat tools.

There was one group of tools that she really liked one day- it was three college age wankers who proceed to regall her with stories of last night's party, each of them siting with great detail what they drank and how much. I never understood why people did that, but hey, I'm not a tool. I mention them because the whole time I was working out, I couldn't believe what huge tools they were. Everything they said was more typical than the last. For instance, they kept discussing one girl who was giving one of the tools "drama." Apparently he couldn't decide what to do about her- he wanted to show his displeasure at her actions at the party last night (but without ruining his chances of sleeping with her in the future). One of his buddies said "Dude, you should totally take her out of your top 8." If you're over 25 and don't get the reference, just know that these guys were most definitely tools.

I sort of went off on a tangent, but in conclusion, I think Three Amigos has aged so well because it was set in the past, so it doesn't seem dated. And if that girl actually has a boyfriend (which I doubt) he's be pretty ticked off to see her behavior in the weight room.