Vampire Love: First Contact

Yesterday was my first official day on gothscene – I wrote up my profile, posted a photo, and paid for one month of service at the price of $9.99. I did have some difficulty picking out an appropriate photo for my profile. We’re talking about appealing to female vampires here; a picture from my high school senior prom just won’t cut it. These girls are looking for guys like this:

How could I possibly compete with Angel and Spike?

Fortunately, I have a digital photo of myself in a Slayer shirt.

Unfortunately, in that same photo, I’m eating one of those giant, round, rainbow-colored lollipops, a la Shirley Temple in “On the Good Ship Lollipop”:

Would the lollipop ruin any credibility gained from the Slayer shirt? Do vampires even eat lollipops? Why did I even bring that thing out to a party with me? Did Shirley Temple even eat a lollipop in “On the Good Ship Lollipop”, or is that just assumed based on the title!?!? So many questions, so few answers.

My agitation ceased once I received my first message this morning, sent by an expectedly pale-skinned vamp.

It read, “love the lolly pop”.

My first message, and a positive one at that! The tiny thumbnail picture didn’t look all too bad either. Boy, I was so excited to check out this vamp’s profile! ‘This could be the one!’ I thought to myself.

After opening her profile, my state of exhilaration was brought to an abrupt end once I read her self-description: (I removed her name for privacy/legal purposes)

my name is ****** after the guy who killed alot of people yeah its pretty burtal anyways i am 18 years old have depression but who doenst love kids hope to have them one day (if possible) i want to adpot i hate mean people and people who think they are superior to everyone else i love all types of art want to open my own art studio of d.c’s local artist work and i just got out of a 2`year realshonship still kinda torn about it

… i like to talk about deep stuff not sex

Well, that left me kind of confused.

Back in marketing and strategy classes in undergrad, we would often perform ‘SWOT analysis’ on hypothetical business ventures. This analysis calls for the identification of a venture’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats as a preliminary indicator of its success. It would be stupid not to perform the same analysis on this self-description.

Strengths:

1. Bilingual – The blatant lack of grammatical coherence must indicate that English isn’t her first language. What language is spoke in Transylvania?
2. Caring – Wants to have children one day. She might even “adpot”, which I interpret as either “adopt” or wanting to legalize marijuana.
3. Hates mean and pretentious people – Plenty of potential victims besides me if the “realshonship” goes downhill.

Weaknesses:

1. Crosses
2. Garlic
3. Holy Water
4. Sunlight
5. Wooden Stakes
6. Conversations about sex
7. Webster’s Dictionary

Opportunities:

1. Personal bodyguard – Not only is she a vampire, but she was named after a mass murderer; we can live in the worst areas of any city and I’ll feel safe.
2. Might open an art studio and help my friend Scott Brundage get work (www.scottbrundage.com).
3. Potential immortality if she turns me into a vampire – or, she might simply kill me.

Threats:

1. What isn’t threatening about the content and style of that writing?

The SWOT analysis paints a pretty bleak picture of this potential relationship. However, who am I to judge? I replied with a one-liner, hoping to stimulate further conversation. This might not turn out to be ‘the one’, but at least I can learn a lot about the dark underworld. Check back for more updates.