5 Tips for Pandemic Dating on Tinder

Anyone who has ever picked up a copy of Genesis — the biblical text with the story of Joseph that was made into a Tony Award-nominated musical — knows about Joseph’s interpretation of the pharaoh’s dream.

In the story, the pharaoh tells Joseph of a dream in which he sees seven sleek, fat cows grazing among the reeds. During the dream, the pharaoh says, seven other cows — ugly and gaunt — come out of the Nile and gobble up the fat cows.

According to Joseph, the seven sleek, fat cows represent seven good years of harvest — years of plenty. The seven ugly and gaunt cows, on the other hand, Joseph said, represented seven lean years — years of hunger.

The solution, Joseph told the pharaoh, was to prepare and collect food during the seven good years, so that Egypt would be ready for the seven lean years without facing starvation.

We’re In The ‘Lean Years’ Of App Dating

If only dating before, during and after a pandemic worked the same way as crop rotation does.

That way, you could stock up on potential partners the same way those creepy aliens did in “V,” the 1983 television miniseries. In the miniseries the aliens stored humans in vats, then let them out when they were ready to consume them.

Alas, unlike these nefarious aliens, we single people cannot store our prospective life partners in vats until we are ready to consume them.

“I definitely can remember having seven first dates with seven different women in the exact same coffee shop, all in one weekend.”

For my part, I definitely can remember having seven first dates with seven different women in the exact same coffee shop, all in one weekend. Of course, that was pre-pandemic. That was a time, when a guy could swipe away on Tinder and get matched with a multitude of women like there was no tomorrow, just like the seven years of plenty that Joseph told the pharaoh about. A guy could communicate with the matches that he liked, line up dates with as many women he wanted to, and ignore the ones that he just wasn’t that into.

I’m not saying it’s right.

I’m just saying that back then, a lot of people approached dating apps with the digital version of “shoot first, ask questions later, (if it pleased you).”

App Dating Is Tedious During Pandemic

Dating now — especially dating by app — is not so simple anymore. Single people today are living in the lean years that Joseph spoke of 3,700 years ago, though I certainly hope that we’re not subjected to seven lean years of dating.

If you’ve never done dating by app, it’s hard work, especially during a pandemic. I currently have active accounts on Tinder, Bumble, Hinge and Facebook Dating. I also have an account with JSwipe, which is like Tinder for ‘Members of the Tribe,’ though occasionally someone who isn’t Jewish will slip their profile on the app. I imagine that part of the reason that swiping right on a prospective match is such slow going, is because a lot of people are afraid to go out on dates during a pandemic, and have fled the apps that they might watch back-episodes of ‘Sex and the City’ while home alone.

But there are other reasons that dating by app is a challenging endeavor these days.

Apps Are Free, Sort Of

For starters, I’m not currently paying for any of these apps. To be sure, the dating apps all are available for anyone for free use, with limited functionally. For example, all five apps limit the number of daily swipes to non-subscribers. I’m not sure what the number of daily swipes each of the apps allows, but they’re enough to keep me busy while I watch an entertaining YouTube video. Non-subscribers are also deprived of knowing which other app members “like” them.

Most troublesome, though, is that the apps also limit your ability to screen out people who you don’t want to meet. A case in point is that, while I can let OK Cupid know that I don’t want to match with drug users, unless I become a paying member, OK Cupid won’t screen them out. And since I’m extremely allergic to cats — as much as love those furry felines — I wish I could screen out cat owners. But I can’t, since I don’t pay.

Sexy Photo … Awful Profile

And even though I cast a fairly wide net in terms of age range and other dating preferences, these days I can swipe religiously on all five dating apps on my phone in one day but not get a single match. (I should mention that I don’t swipe right to accept all my proposed matches). And frankly, since it takes so much work to even match with a person, I usually look at the woman’s photo, but don’t even read the profile until I match.

“These days I can swipe religiously on all five dating apps on my phone in one day, but not get a single match.”
In other words, if you have pretty nice picture and you are a woman, I’m likely to swipe right, requesting a match with women who also swipe right on my profile.

Values, Values, Values (Pay Attention To Them)

But once I match with someone, the real work begins. Aside from being allergic to cats, I’m also allergic to stepchildren and women with ‘off-the-Richter-scale’ political beliefs. In my profile, I’m pretty clear about which of these political beliefs I’m talking about.

And while I personally can’t stand it when women take selfies while sitting in the driver’s seat of their car, I don’t hold it against them. Aside from that, I also don’t date women who smoke, who do drugs or who are who are involved in something called “ENM.”

For those of you who are new to dating by apps, ENM is urban dictionary lingo for ‘Ethically Non-monogamous’ relationships — In other words, a person who is married but who has the green light from their spouse to date and have sex with other people.

Allegedly.

But even as I’m scrutinizing the profiles of the cute women to make sure they don’t own cats, they aren’t looking for ENM and don’t have ‘off-the-Richter-scale’ political beliefs, these women are doing the same to me. Some of these women are making sure that I would love to have their Siamese cat wrap itself around my head while I’m sleeping, and are also screening for any other behaviors or values that they find objectionable.

So, it’s not unusually for me to check the profile of a woman who matched with me in the last several minutes, only to find that her profile has vanished, most likely because she sees something in my app bio that isn’t in line with what she’s looking for.

Be Ready To Meet Mean People

Dating in the Age of Dating Apps takes a thick skin.

People aren’t always nice to you. One woman asked me, right off the bat, if I have Asperger’s Syndrome, though she didn’t say why. Since, after closer examination, it looked like she had a serious boyfriend, I was okay to move on.

And just when it looks like you’re in a budding relationship, your prospect sometimes disappears after a couple dates, a practice known as ‘ghosting.’ (To be clear, I have never ghosted anyone.) I find it incredibly poor taste that some people don’t have the courage to say that they just aren’t that into you.

“Just when it looks like you’re in a budding relationship, your prospect sometimes disappears after a couple dates, a practice known as ‘ghosting.’”

A case in point was a woman I went out on several dates, had several phone calls and with whom I had an extensive texting exchange last fall. During our second (or first?) date, she invited me to her family cottage in Delaware to meet her family soon and also offered to help me get a job at the agency where she works. (Mind you, I never asked her for any assistance in my quest to find a new job.)

Then she disappeared on me.

With that ship sailed, I continue to explore life in the digital world of dating by app, hoping to find my ‘Tinderella.’

Three Promising Conversations?

As I’m writing this article, I’m currently engaged in promising conversations with three women on three separate apps.

In the first conversation, with the first woman — on JSwipe — we’ve agreed that we’re both looking for a relationship, to which I responded, “Gosh … do you think it would be a good idea for us to meet?” I wrote that message yesterday, but haven’t heard back from my prospective JSwipe date.

In the second conversation, with the second woman — on OK Cupid — we’ve agreed that we should talk before meeting, though she doesn’t want to give me her phone number before we meet. I said fine, “that’s what Skye and Zoom and Google Hangouts are for.” It’s been two nights since I’ve heard from her, though says she’s up for having a Google Voice or Zoom chat before meeting.

The third conversation, with the third woman — on Facebook Dating — seems the most promising of all three conversations. As I’ve been writing this article, she wrote me “I promise I’m not avoiding you. These days are very full with family and holiday stuff.” Nevertheless, she wants to talk with me on the phone come the new year. At the very least, we both love our Vitamix® blender and both have a passion for writing. I’m keeping my fingers crossed.

And then there’s the scores of women that I’ve matched with on the five apps that I either haven’t heard back from, or which have petered out. You never know when the other person’s life gets busy or they get a boyfriend.

Sometimes they tell you, but most times they don’t. Or maybe the just lost interest in you, and haven’t taken the time to go through the dozens of chats on multiple apps to tell everyone they’re not on the dating market anymore.
Nevertheless, I’ve learned a few things about dating by app, which I’ve listed below.:

Preparing for Online Dating

1. Photos

If you’re serious about app dating, make sure to have at least three nice photos of yourself that show your face without sunglasses on. A picture of yourself with your pet is fine, but you don’t need to have pictures of your friends or photos of you kissing another man. I don’t know why people who say they are single post pictures of the backs of their head or photos of flowers.

Also, I can’t tell you how many women write that they are looking for a serious relationship leading to marriage and children — but then post a picture of themselves wearing nothing but a bra and their underwear. Let’s stay tasteful here. Pictures of you fly-fishing or eating crab are fine, but if I see you in either of those pictures, I’m probably swiping left.

2. Values

Say what you want, and don’t want in a relationship. All the apps limit the number of characters for your profile, but it’s enough to say your ‘must haves’ and list a few of your interests. Just do it. See the text of my Tinder profile below.

Author’s Tinder profile taken from his Tinder app.

3. Phone numbers

Don’t feel obligated to give out your phone number before you feel comfortable. I once went on one date with a woman. I didn’t give her my last name or say where I worked, but I did give her my real phone number. Within an hour of our date, say texted me saying that she had found my LinkedIn profile and was asking me about our common contacts on the social network. I know, really creepy.

I now give my dates my Google Voice number, a free phone number you can get through your Google account that isn’t linked to your personal phone number.

4. Video-talk first?

I never used to want to have a phone conversation with the women I met online before the pandemic. Why spoil the fun, I thought? I only did phone conversations if my prospective date insisted. But now, with the pandemic going on, I want to verify that my date is vaccinated and that we’re on the same page with other values. I don’t do it every time, but I always keep Zoom in my back pocket.

5. Pursue, within limits

Sometimes if I don’t hear from a woman on an app for a while, I’ll ping her, to make sure I didn’t get lost in the shuffle, but most times I’ll just move on. No woman can be that important — especially if you haven’t met her yet — to get blocked for harassing her on OK Cupid. Just don’t do it. Move along. There’s plenty of other Tinderellas out there.

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Take-Aways

I‘d rather be doing almost anything other than dating by app — even bungee jumping. But the problem with bungee jumping is that it gets you nowhere closer to finding a lifelong partner than hugging a sheep does.

I know that dating by app has spawned a whole industry of people who offer consulting service on how to write your first message to your future Prince Charming or Tinderella. But really, the most important thing about dating by app is to use your head. If you make sure your head is screwed on right before you create your Tinder profile and put in nice photos of yourself instead of a semi-naked photo of yourself flexing your muscles in front of a fogged-up mirror, you’ll do just fine.

Dating during the pandemic is, well, different than it used to be before the pandemic. And if you want to avoid the seven lean years of dating that Joseph cautioned the pharaoh about, then you should go into dating by app with concrete goals and reflect them in your dating profiles.

And when you do connect with your Tinderella, be smart. If she sounds like a creep, she probably is, and you shouldn’t give your phone number.

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To read more of Jay Krasnow’s stories on Medium, click here.

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This post was previously published on medium.com.

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