Speed-Dating With MorrisseyLast night, 60 of the most awkward people in New York convened for Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now, a Smiths-themed speed-dating event at Black Rabbit in Greenpoint.
Tell Us How You Date on the CheapLet’s not sugarcoat it: Dating in New York City is an expensive habit. Not the relationship part, per se, but the actual date itself. Can we woo without going broke?
Happy-Hour HorrorThe ugliness of the New York dating scene could not be disguised at last night’s “Fashion Meets Finance” event at Taj, no matter how much lip gloss it put on.
Tell Everyone You Know How Awful Your Date WasInternet dating is about to get slightly less anonymous for the city’s post–Sex and the City set. Jennifer Piacenti, 28, a married opera singer and manager of the Wellpath spa, and Elaine Schweppe, 45, a recently divorced interior designer who began dating via the Web, are launching a dating-review site this month called “What Do You Know About Romeo?” Tagline: “We don’t review the sites, we review the guys!”
“If this were a small town, you would know something about the guys by reputation,” explains Schweppe, who was inspired to review guys after one potential date e-mailed her obscene pictures. “We are trying to make it more like a small town.” To this end, women will report back on such details as manners, generosity, appearance, and the veracity of the man’s online description. “We want to establish a sorority of Internet daters,” says Piacenti. “Wouldn’t it be nice if you could look someone up and see if he is nice, a psycho, rich, or married?” But, as Nerve.com CEO Rufus Griscom (founder of Nerve Personals) notes, “Spurned lovers aren’t the most unbiased reviewers, and if you meet someone wonderful, you aren’t about to announce it to everyone else.” Beth Landman
intel
Looking for Love on a Listserv (Or, in All the Wrong Places)We’re all familiar with the almighty alumni listerv — that source of mild e-mailed irritation, delivering a steady stream of requests for apartment leads, neighborhood advice, and, inevitably from a onetime rush chair, attendance at a really! fun! drinks night. For j-school alumni — like, say, those who attended Northwestern University’s Medill — that standard stew is further flavored with discussions of journalism ethics and occasional pleas for help finding sources. Which is why an inquiry to that list yesterday stood out:
From: Mandy Stadtmiller
Date: Nov 1, 2006 2:35 PM
Subject: Looking for love in NYC, okay on the apt situation
To: [MedillNY listserv]
Any leads send them my way — thanks!
Mandy Stadtmiller
BSJ ‘97
Was Stadtmiller — a features writer at the Post — really using her alumni list as a no-fee Nerve personals? (Online dating is sexy; online dating with journalists is sexier?) Or was this maybe — please! — just a gimmick for a story?
