Flake

Now that my sexual life is almost totally dependent on online services and mobile apps, I'm having to come to terms with how unpredictably people behave. For my part, I am very reserved about hooking up. I need stats and a representative selection of pictures, I need to have a few words of conversation with a potential partner before I will commit to meeting. This is mostly to protect myself. I'm not a large person and I'm now in my mid-40s. In other words, I'm becoming a mark.

To some people, this caution equates to flakiness or game playing, but you can be assured that if I say I am ready to meet, I am ready to meet. And if we agree on a time and a place, I will be there.

Contrast this behavior with what I've been experiencing, largely from younger men.

• The younger, hotter guy who trades pics and compliments and then vanishes as soon as I say I'm interested.
• The guy who, after I invite him over, replies two hours later that this phone died.
• The guy who abruptly stops trading messages when things start to heat up and then writes back two days later as if there were no interruption at all.
• The guy who wants to get together right now but has no pics and a blank profile.
• The guy whose profile says, in no uncertain terms, that he wants only HIV- partners yet hits me up for sex.
• The guy who gets pissed when I point out his behavior is unacceptable, insults me, and then blocks me.

I should confess I don't handle these situations as calmly as I could. Two of these scenarios occurred just last night, and I was completely out of patience. If I hadn't been so tired, I probably would read them to filth over their immaturity, but instead I just went to bed. More and more, I'm finding that going to bed, even alone, is the only way to handle flaky online communication.