Group therapy in a blog.
Esther Kustanowitz
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Posts by Esther Kustanowitz
Dumenco Opines: People Read Blogs Because…
419 years
Ever since I started blogging, I became a lightning rod for questions about the emergent technology: isn’t a blog the same as a website? could anyone start a blog? and why would they want to?
Now, media expert Simon Dumenco announces the answer to that last question: people read blogs because they want to get laid:
In this week’s Media Guy column for Advertising Age magazine, Dumenco contends that knowledge of the hippest, hottest blogs can increase hook-up opportunities and boost sexual attractiveness. He maintains some people are using niche blogs such as Gawker.com and Defamer.com to gain pop cultural insights that make them more socially desirable and ultimately more likely to get lucky.
Picture it, Los Angeles, sometime last month. I’m sitting at a Coffee Bean with Nina Litvak, the co-writer of the new movie When Do We Eat (billed as the first Passover comedy, review coming soon…). A man at the next table, clearly also a writer, starts schmoozing with us…”are you guys comedy writers?” Nina explains that she’s just co-written a comedy, and I say something along the lines of “I have a column in NY, and generally do a lot of writing, and a great deal of that is comedic.” He looks at me, pauses, and says, “You’re a blogger, aren’t you.” He said it just like that, no question mark at the end, just a period. He knew. And that was when I decided to dress a little nicer for the rest of my trip, and always put on some semblance of makeup, even if I was just going to the Coffee Bean.
I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that if I looked like Cameron Diaz, no one would have assumed that I was a blogger. But in my jaunty cap, a sweatshirt, no makeup and jeans, and I was instantly identifiable. Which brings me to my point: blogs, and by extension, bloggers, are not perceived as sexy. As I’ve said before, after standing in a line of bloggers waiting for admittance to a screening of Serenity, “we are not a pretty people.”
Additionally, I believe that my blogs–particularly this one–have actually cost me dates. True, anyone who wants to know the real me will by definition need to understand and tolerate the blogginess of me. But there are those men who are easily scared by a woman who has a forum online and an audience of hundreds in which she can discuss any manner of dating-related customs, behaviors and miscellany. Never you mind if she doesn’t actually discuss her own dates, relationships and specific personal behaviors the way some of her peers do. That the potential, the readership, is there, is enough. Couple that with my singles column in the Jewish Week, and it’s a daunting media machine to come to terms with before a first date.
So, although I hadn’t ever intended it that way, acceptance of my blogs has become a prerequisite for dating, the way other people feel about having a guy get them a glass of water or opening a car door and waiting until they go inside. If anything, for me, involvement in blogging is impeding the lucky-ness that Dumenco seems to indicate that blogfollowers hope to get…
Looks like I’m going to have to kiss a lot of blogs before I find my prince. No offense to the rest of the blogtribe, but I’m hoping that people don’t always look at me and say, “You’re a blogger, aren’t you…”
Once a Quitter…
519 years
…always a quitter.
That’s right. Queen Esther’s Royal Budget no longer allows for products with such a low return on investment, so she’s opting out until her finances improve. Or until her optimism that she can meet someone great in real life plummet sufficiently. Whichever comes first.
Blog Night: Help Me Choose…(Part Deux)
419 years
Greetings, loyal (and new) readers…
I’m pleased to announce that I’m scheduled to do a reading at the JCC’s Lit Cafe Blog Night, co-featuring Stephanie Klein. And I’ve been asked to read some of the highlights from my blog (er, blogs). So now’s the time for all good blogreaders to come to the aid of their–um, me.
Over at My Urban Kvetch, I’ve taken the liberty of compiling links to a few posts that I’m considering reading. I’m doing the same for JDaters Anonymous so that you guys can see what I’m considering in terms of material.
Feel free to vote, or nominate your own favorites…and come by to this FREE event on March 30th to hang out with Stephanie and me as we blogjourney before a live, wine-soaked audience.
Back at Nothing
The Vanishing
In the Air
Refraction
Got others?? Share your favorite posts here…
Marching With the Penguins
619 years
Marching With the Penguins (JW-March 4,2006)
Every year, penguins embark on a long, dangerous journey. Their destination is the locus of all penguin life, the area from which they all originated, their homeland in the Antarctic. Although they are birds, they do not fly, and although they make their home underwater, they do not swim. They walk. One foot in front of the other, trudging on into a horizon that’s all ice, snow and instinct. The impetus for movement is biological and perhaps also emotional. Despite the frozen clime, they’re on a regenerative mission of life: the search for a mate.
In other words, it’s kind of like a national Jewish singles event  think of the United Jewish Communities young leadership conference, or a JDate-sponsored trip to Israel, with all the marriageable Jews sporting permanent formal wear.
For the rest of the article, click here.
Back at Nothing
1819 years
[Not sure if I ever posted this…I wrote it a while ago and shelved it. But on a night when I’m feeling wistful in the waning hours of my escape from my New York life, it seemed somehow appropriate to share it now. –EDK]
I was sitting there at dinner with him, when I felt the change, like a click of a gear, or my breath stopping, or heartbeat skipping. It wasn’t anything he’d said, or his tone or body language that told me where I was. But suddenly, everything was altered, and not in the way I’d hoped for. My mood went from mirthful to mournful in a moment, and something in my eyes or face must have changed, too, because he noticed the shift.
What’s wrong? he asked.
Nothing, I said, because nothing was all I had to say.
In the beginning, when I think there’s something, it all comes down to nothing. I thought he felt something, and he felt nothing. Nothing ever happens. Nothing is what it seemed to be. Nothing is what I’d expectedâ€â€nothing but hope, that is, and hope has once again amounted to nothing. And there was nothing else to say.
At that moment, I had realized where I was again. Back where I always end up. Wherever you go, there you are and always have been, as I always am, regardless of miles traveled on highways or through occasionally turbulent skies; regardless of the presence of leg or cleavage shown or the suggestive tint of lipstick; regardless of the hope springing eternal and the belief in my intrinsic, still-unacknowledged worth; regardless of how closely I’d listened and how well I’d understood. In the end, it doesn’t matter.
Back at nothing is where you are when you realize that you’ve misinterpreted everything at every possible turn. Easy smiles and emotional nakedness do not a romantic connection make. In fact, the recipe may differ from circumstance to circumstance, city to city, but the resulting dish is always disappointment: yields one serving. Once again, I’ll be dining alone.
That moment of a hushed eureka was one of pure understanding, pure disappointment. It extended beyond the reach of ordinary silence. There was simply nothing else to say.
Online Dating–Better for Flings or Relationships?
1819 years
According to an article in this new online magazine called Shebrew, online dating, while good for casual hooking up, is no place to meet anyone for a long-term relationship. Now, we all know people who have met and married through online dating. But the question is, does the culture of online dating in general create an atmosphere of burning hot and fast, eventually burning out entirely, or does it actually serve as an important foundation on which to build a future?
The anonymity of the internet created a strangely depraved atmosphere. I was
suddenly some kind of Jewish Casanova. I developed a system, documenting names
and contact information as if I were running a business. It was fun, I cannot
deny. But there was a surprisingly sleazy and sordid side to this dating site,
and eventually the novelty was lost. I had signed up looking for a relationship,
not a series of meaningless hookups. The promise of endless encounters with new
women kept me ensnared for a while, with, but for me, the setup was too
contrived to breed the emotional climate necessary for a real relationship.
Do we agree? Disagree? Discuss…
Like Reading JDA? You’ll Love Commenting on JDA!
819 years
At the Jewlicious @ the Beach conference, I was just speaking with two participants who told me that they read JDaters Anonymous…so great that they identified themselves…so great, in fact, that they get a shoutout (yo, yo…Kevin and Jenna!) and inspire a post.
You know I love and value all of my readers, whether you’re silent or vociferous. But I want to encourage those of you who love to watch to actually participate in the conversation…your opinions are as valued as your site visits…
So feel free to pick a Blogger identity, even if it’s the very popular choice “Anonymous”, and leave your two cents here for us all to see. You’re all welcome here…
“Writing the Book on Breaking Up”
219 years
Nothing like a breakup-related post for just after Valentine’s Day. Not that you should need it, ever, but still:
Writing the Book on Breaking Up (Jewish Week, 2/17/06)
Famously, the course of love does not run smooth  have Brad and Jen taught us nothing?  nor does it always become the eternal substance of legend. Real relationships contain struggles, problems and arguments. And when a breakup occurs, whether it’s expected or an utter surprise, the end result is it’s over. Sometimes there’s pain or anger. Sometimes there are new, dysfunctional relationships with men or women who are not good for you (like Ben & Jerry or Sara Lee). Some people proclaim disinterest in ever dating again and others run right out and join JDate or Frumster. (Reactions to breakups may vary.)
Or you could just pick up the new book, “It’s Not Me, It’s You: The Ultimate Breakup Book†by Anna Jane Grossman and Flint Wainess, which celebrates successful breakups of all sorts. INMIY, as it is bound to become known, derives its strength from humor and balance: one man and one woman lay themselves and their romantic histories bare to comfort and entertain the masses. If we are all soldiers on the battlefield of love, then INMIY is the USO show we’ve all been waiting for.
–more here–
Romancing the Bloggers…
719 years
For many people, the question is, “would you date someone who has a blog?” The implication is that said person who has a blog will undoubtedly blog in some way about your relationship. But increasingly, for bloggers, the question is morphing and becomes “would you date someone who didn’t have a blog?”
Over at WebProNews, Ken Yarmosh talks about why he’d like to date women bloggers:
It may sound funny but blogging may actually help foster more successful dating relationships. Why? Well just take a look at their blog either before or after a date and you’ll begin to get a pretty decent picture of their beliefs, ideology, and interests. If their blog exists in a social environment like MySpace or Xanga, you can also get a pretty good idea as to who they are “interacting” with on a regular basis – yeah, I’m probably going to stay away from the girl who has tons of comments from other guys, she may be a bit too flirty. Would I date someone who doesn’t have a blog? Yes, I guess I would. But blogging is attractive. It means the wheels are turning upstairs. It shows that someone is observant, pensive, and engaged in their world.
Oh Ken…have I got some really great, spunky, pensive girls for you…
“They’re Not Even a Real Country Anyway…”
319 years
It’s time we talked aboot this. We have nothing agaynst Canadians per se. Unless “we” includes South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone, but you already knew that they Blame Canada for everything. And George Carlin, whose “Let’s Bomb Canada” routine makes strange, disturbingly violent foreign policy sense. Not that Canada should be blamed or bombed. No. Some of my best blogfriends are from Canada.
But you Canadians need to get off your butts and ask us out. According to a new survey–coordinated by Harlequin Enterprises, so consider the source–a whopping 75% of Canadians lack the cojones courage to make the first move. Since I’ve made the first move three times in the last twelve months (never you mind the gut-wrenching results), this is proof that either a) I am not Canadian, or b) I am an exceptional Canadian. (Only the passport agency knows for sure.)
So what’s a Canadian to do? Become a “North American,” because the survey then stops talking about Canadians per se and extends the territory of shyness to the entire continent:
More than 70 per cent of North Americans who were surveyed depend on friends to do the legwork when it comes to meeting people. Relying on an old college buddy to set up a double date can actually work, as 33 per cent of those surveyed met their current or last squeeze through friends.
Friends! Now why didn’t I think of that? Now, where are all of my old college buddies? Oh yeah. Married. With kids. And SUVs. In the suburbs.
And if all else fails, some Canadians turn to fortifying their courage with alcohol. Twenty-six per cent of the men surveyed admitted to drinking in order to get up the confidence to approach someone, while only 15 per cent of women said a drink or two helps.
Finally an equal opportunity idea that we can all embrace. Happy hour anyone? How about AA?
The survey found that North America has a somewhat idealistic view of love as 42 per cent of those questioned said they think the best way to meet new people is by chance…[but] only 17 percent of those surveyed said they met their current or last significant other by chance.
Chance…like the meet-cute of movie legend. Stumble over a frog who loves you and suddenly he becomes a prince. But how many frogs exactly does it take?
Forty seven per cent said they believe you need to date between two and 10 people before finding the one, whereas only 12 per cent of those surveyed feel you only need to date one person to find your true one and only.
New math: Forty-seven plus twelve equals a hundred. It doesn’t? Well, count me among the 41% who are missing in action on this question.
I don’t have any answers. I just don’t want to buy anything sold or processed. Or sell anything bought or processed. Or process anything sold, bought or processed. In a word: kickboxing. It’s the sport of the future.