Typically, when I go on, as my manager likes to call them – “the apps,” I swipe in every which direction because I want to be reassured that men I find attractive also find me attractive. That’s all I want. Then come the conversation starters: “Hi, Melissa! How are you today?”; “What music do you listen to?”; “Tell me about your family.”; “What’s your favorite color?” This is why I don’t date. I don’t like having the same conversations over and over again with different people. I hate small talk. I hate the basics. And then these guys want to meet in-person. I could potentially get a free dinner out of this, sure (an exercise my bestie, Cynthia, immorally suggests I abuse), but this means I have to throw on a bra and put on some make-up when I’d rather not do either of these things. I could meet you after work when I still have both these things on, but I’m drained after a long day, and I just don’t want to deal with the egregious chatter. The effort, oh god, the effort. Almost every guy I’ve ever dated I’ve dated because I was tricked into it. We’d start off discussing things related to work, news, politics, life, philosophy, poetry, etc. Small talk is more third-date material. This is why I prefer to meet people IRL – you don’t have to stick to a societal script.

Anyway, a few years back, a man I met through work (not at work, through work…he was covering the same story at a competing station) and I started a fling.