What pretty girls? I never saw any in 4 years. Give me a break. Ephwomen have the advantage of being smart and from good families (if you’re into that sort of thing). They have the distinct disadvantage of unattractiveness, complexity, emotional immaturity, shelteredness, and lack of distinctiveness. While cutting such a broad swath of sereotypes is bound to raise hackles, I’ve found post-Williams to be superior than Williams in opportunities to meet women. A question of taste I suppose.

John what a real charmer you must have been in your four years.

Hmm…that’s a nice sentiment, and I gave it a whirl in my time at Williams, but I have to admit, romance was a basically unmitigated disaster. At the end of the day, I found the best use of 24 hours during winter study involved about 8 miles of running, a nice lunch and a huge dinner, shooting the shit (with friends of both genders), and some good thesis progress.

Of course, it wasn’t necessarily a black hole of time for others, and if you’ve got game, go for it. I always found Williams women to be somewhat, well, stereotypical in their tastes. They either liked ’sensitive’ guys- in my opinion, ones who were willing to deceptively conceal or somehow subsume the sexual nature of their interest in women- or guys with lots of social capital- members of a helmet sport, guys very concerned with projecting and carefully grooming the proper social image, and so forth. I guess that’s fair- I mean, to claim that I was interested in going after women for any reasons other than the stereotypically superficial ones would be sheer hypocrisy- but it doesn’t engender much mutual good will or trust.

On the other hand, I’m still pretty pissed that I consistently lost out to guys who seemed, here and there, less attractive, less interesting, and more socially defunct. But who am I to judge? At this point the plan is just to accumulate massive wealth and burn through trophy wives like a raving drunk through bottles of Jim Beam- the key is the ironclad prenups.

Also, I find your use of the language of ’soulmate’ quite unpleasant. It implies an entire set of normative assumptions that, to me, appears either poorly reasoned and/or willing to accept at face values an extraordinarily shoddy construct that the more tawdry components of our culture have flung at you.

no conscience of mine would drink Jim Beam. That is all.

Aidan, I don’t actually intend to drink Jim Beam- it was an analogy, a simile- you know, poetic device? Just because you were a bio major doesn’t mean you get to be friggin’ illiterate.

AC, sounds like you were having issues with your game. You consistently lost out to guys less attractive, less interesting, and socially defunct? Ouch.

I think you should commiserate with Aaron Redfern ‘07, who writes

I lost my game a while back, possibly as early as First Days back in ‘03. It is kind of medium-sized, with a cocky exterior and a sensitive inner core. Without it, I will need to resort to less conventional means of finding dates, such as pit traps and large nets. If found, please return.

Ouch… just ouch

John, stalking out High Schools does not constitute a superior opportunity to meet women. Though I do agree with you about the question of taste — I suppose some men will never be attracted to anything over the age of 18.

In my opinion, Williams men are simply too scared to hit on anyone. That is, unless you consider drunken leering to be a form of flirting. The frequency at which men have shown interest in me (in not socially inept ways) has increased dramatically since graduation.

C’mon guys. No matter what you say, there are pretty girls at Williams. Hot ones even. I’ve seen them. Disguising your inability to show interest in a girl by claiming attractive ones don’t exist won’t get you anywhere. Get some balls and ask out the cute girl you have been afraid to talk to for four years.

John’s ex, I hit on you numerous times, only to be constantly rebuffed! :-(

(and only once or twice was it drunken, and no leering was involved.)

Lowell, I distinctly remember a time in which you drunkenly twirled me above your head. In the snow. I think this nicely falls into the category of socially inept ways to hit on a girl ; )

How was I supposed to know that you had a phobia of being dropped?

Besides, it worked on some of my ex’s ;)

Oh, good. I wanted to post a comment to last year’s, but comments weren’t available. We didn’t even read EphBlog, or at least last year’s “fall in love” post, until months later. And yet:

During winter study last year, a guy from across the quad did ask me out, and although I cannot say that we have been happily married for 17 years, we are happily still together and both happily authors of EphBlog, which is about as good as you can get.

Diana is a SUPER-HOT cross country runner who doesn’t conform to any of John’s negative stereotypes. Plus, she’s teaching me how to make my own webpage during winter study- yay! She and her boyfriend are awesome.

I agree that Williams men are too scared…have you seen Eph women? I rest my case.

In case you were wondering, yes i’m purposefully being a dick, but it’s more of a reaction against the outrageousness of the original post.

I mean, yeah, most of us had Williams goggles which enabled us to pick up and throw certain women over our shoulders. But we were usually drunk at the time. And by we, I actually mean Lowell ;)