Superfriends Inverted

OK. Sometimes I experience things that I can't just launch into straightaway. I mean, I could tell exactly what I experienced and what was said and how many people thought I may be homosexual, but that's only part of the fun. The fun for some stories is how I can spin them to be even more odd or more meaningful. At least that's fun for me. You need to make your own fun with my blog.

The danger, of course, is that a reader will lack context if I don't give a lengthy preface. And the spider that one swallows to catch the fly of that danger is that the explanation of the context might be so involved and/or longwinded (I like to call it "verbose"... you can look it up) that it dwarfs the actual point of the blog. Like learning Japanese to be able to read and understand a single haiku.

I'm going to ignore those risks and challenges because, to be honest, I think that many of you who bother to read this have one of the following attributes:

1. A long attention span
2. Some masochistic quality where you force yourself to read shit you don't want to, or
3. A strong ability to skim for entertaining bits and pieces

If this doesn't apply to you: tough beans. Here we go.

In order to tell this tale, you need to have some general awareness of two things. One of these things is about me and the second is a more general pop culture phenomenon.

So about me. I've participated in online dating. I've made profiles on several online dating sites over the past couple of years, including Match.com, Yahoo personals, and a few others. Although I rarely check them now, I'm sure that I've received all sorts of unsolicited messages from women I am not at all attracted to but feel compelled to respond to since they took the time to send me a message telling me I have nice teeth or that they like lawyers or that I'm funny.

My online dating experiences have been generally positive, in spite of that last long-ass sentence, but I'm already on enough tangents and so it will have to suffice to say that I have participated in online dating. I've also done speed dating. It's not in my nature to look down at people for trying to meet others through unconventional means.

OK. So that's point one. The second thing that you need to be thinking about is superheroes.

Specifically, groups of superheroes. You know... the Avengers. The Fantastic Four. Power Pack.

And, of course, the Super Friends.

You know how each member of the group had his or her own powers? Batman was smart and had gadgets. Wonder Woman has the invisible jet and the bracelets. Aquaman had the relatively worthless powers of ability to breath underwater and telepathy (but only with aquatic creatures).

Then there's Superman. Let's face it, Superman has pretty much every power. He can fly in outer space. He can spin the Earth backwards to turn back time. He can breath cold AND has heat vision.

Why would he need someone that can turn into a bucket of ice?

So. Take all of this into consideration.

Now... the purpose of this blog.

Last weekend I worked as a karaoke host for a private party. Private parties can range from fund-raising events to birthday parties to coming out anniversaries.

When I hosted this past time, it was for a dating service. The service is to allow single people to meet other single people. It's great, in theory. If someone is past "bar age" (emotionally and/or biologically) it is difficult to meet other people. Friends/parties/grocery stores all offer some outlet, but ... there are few guarantees.

And where there are few guarantees, one is often best served to increase the options.

The dating service puts together social events for singles to mingle. I'm not going to mention it by name, because I'm not going to paint this particular social event in a positive light.

I was told there were supposed to be thirty people attending, with a few employees. That's fine. The space I work in can handle double or even triple that number. Lots of people is not a problem.

Very few people? That's a problem.

The event started at 7:00 and I was going to have two hours to host before I was relieved. At 7:20 there were five people there, including two employees.

I noticed a few things, as others started to roll in. First of all, before the event began I had thought there was a chance that it was going to be populated by people who are. Um. Ugly. Boring. Poor spellers. Whatever. I knew that this was ridiculous and judgmental and unfair to people that (a) I had not even met, and (b) who probably were much less "bad" than I was contemplating.

Since I had built up the doomsday scenario in my mind, the reality was markedly better. The people seemed nice and genuine and I appreciated their courage. I had attended speed dating with a pair of friends, and that was challenging enough... it would be tough to come to a singles event on my own and just ... get to know people.

They weren't beautiful. They weren't an underground society of supermodels who had trouble finding dates because people of the opposite sex were too intimidated. They just seemed to be ... normal.

The thing, though, and there is almost always a thing, is that they were like the Super Friends. But not in a good way.

Just like every member of the Super Friends had his/her superpower, each person attending the event seemed to have one or more things wrong with them.

I don't expect perfection by ANY means, and I know we all have our foibles. But these were, like, superfoibles.

One guy was old and tremendously overdressed. One woman had a thick Russian accent and although she kept dancing, she kept shooting down guys who tried to dance with her. Another chick took the time to complain to me that the lights were shining in her eyes from across the room, so I had to turn off some of the lights to get her to shut up.

I could go on and on... the one young-ish guy was really scrawny and was wearing a terrible t-shirt.

So they were like Hawkman. Apache Chief. Rima the Jungle Girl. (OK... I had to look that last one up.)

But... there was a Superman among them. Oh, was there.

This guy was what I feared they ALL were going to be like. I feel bad even relating this, but it's too late now. I'm on a deadline. (No it's not and no I am not, but whatever.)

He was the first to arrive. He was wearing very thick glasses that had unfashionable frames. The glasses were presumably to combat both the extreme nearsightedness (which he exhibited when he was unable to read the words from the computer screen) and the stigmatism in his left eye. He was also wearing sandals with socks underneath. He had a grating/screechy voice and talked on and on about how he's spent time in the OTHER part of the neighborhood, but hadn't been to this part in years. He had a bluetooth headset in his left ear that inexplicably never left that spot all night.

Dude had it all.

The two hours I spent with these folks was actually fun once I acclimated to the overall awkwardness of the group and the situation. A lot of people sang, some people danced, and I was only asked once, "I thought there were supposed to be more people here...?"

Thank goodness.