Men's Turn to Offer Dating Complaints

SEATTLE TIMES -- Oct 30 -- If many women over 40 find the dating scene a dark continent, older single men have their own news to share: It's not all that great for them, either. 42% of single men in their 50s named bitter baggage as their #1 complaint, according to a 2003 AARP survey of 3,500 baby boomers. 35% of women had a problem with this, as well. "I'll meet a woman and the first thing she'll do is ask 'What do you do?' They'll weigh your wallet," says Scott Abraham, a 53-year-old Seattle counselor who says he's given up on dating. "I have a friend who's a doctor, but he never wants to tell women that because he'll be treated differently. We went out one time and he said, 'OK, tonight, you be the doctor.' That night, I got all the attention. I had my choice of three or four women.  He said he sold cars and he got no attention."  "Dating is a numbers game," he says. "The more people you meet, the better chance you have of meeting quality people and to me, dancing is a good way to meet them. It's not like you're being set up, it's not like a Match.com type of thing. You've got a girl in your arms for two and a half minutes. You can talk. They're right there."  Match.com lists 9,000 local members in their 40s, nearly 60% of them men. There are another 5,000 in their 50s.  Seattle's own PerfectMatch.com currently has more than 100,000   "over-39" members in the Seattle/Tacoma area. The over-39 category is one of their fastest growing age groups.  Some local options: PlayDate Seattle, Space City Mixer, Elements of Soul and Spartay.com, which recently added events for the 35 to 55 set.  FULL ARTICLE @ SEATTLE TIMES

Mark Brooks: Social events are a pain to organise and not that profitable. But, they are the last vestitude for online personals to make a real world connection and offer instant gratification for those who venture out from behind their computers.  Check out my little club www.ace-club.com.  I started it in 1998 by sticking a poster up in a bagel shop in Silicon Valley.  People talked and it grew to an email list of 3600.  Now, my legion of hosts run a few hundred events a year for an exclusive base of paying members; $20 a month.