Just avoiding the subject here.

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Do you have any hobbies/passions other than engineering & computers? More specifically, do you have any hobbies/passions that are likely to be shared by a higher percentage of women?

A shared hobby/passion doesn't make you "unavailable." On the contrary, it can be a great source of bonding. For me personally, it's an indispensible source of bonding. Ideally, in my opinion, you would find a woman engineer/programmer who also shares some other, more girly interest of yours.

Last edited by Mona Pereth on 29 Jan 2020, 8:30 am, edited 3 times in total.

I strongly recommend NOT posting photos (or videos) of oneself here UNLESS you are "out" as autistic to absolutely EVERYONE in your life, including any and all conceivable potential future employers and other authority figures, AND you don't mind them reading everything you have said about yourself here.

Facial recognition software -- and search engines using photos of faces -- are extremely hard problems in terms of software development, and are still a research area. Nevertheless, significant progress HAS been made on that front lately, which is rather scary in its implications.

I thought cberg said he was not talking about women in particular, but people as a whole.

If you are looking for a female partner, that is a different story. If you are looking for a female partner then Mona's advice about finding an interest that more women than men like is a good one. You would stand out in the crowd, so to speak.

When I was fishing in the everglades from my canoe, I met lots of male fishermen who would have loved to marry me. They can't get any wives or girlfriends to go fishing with them. This is somewhat tongue in cheek, because we just laughed and passed each other by.

I'm looking to make myself more adaptable & relatable as a person. Beyond that whether or not I'm looking for anyone again is totally circumstantial. It's tough out there.

I do enjoy cooking for what it's worth. My job also consists of design as well now.

Cburg. For some reason, when I see your user name I see a slightly orangy yellow Mercades sporty car. The ones which don't have a boot that sticks out. More of a rounded back to them. No idea why I am saying this. Just one of those things I guess!

Strangely enough I'm a liftback fan, I think you're recalling the Benz c230 sport coupe, I'd love to have one but I just had Saabs before.



I like Mercs quite a lot but I drive a Volvo for now. Maybe I'd do better with women if I made my petrolhead thoughts more apparent with something sportier.

That's the car! Just needs to be a yellow which leans towards a hint of orange if that makes sense.
I am a big Volvo fan and I have had many Volvos from a 1965 Amazon (131 that had been improved) to the most modern Volve being an early T5 estate. Most more modern Volvos and the new ones don't grab me. I was a little dissapointed with the T5 as it just sits there shredding tyres... Some less powerful rear wheel drive Volvos were actually quicker accelerating. I had a 740 GLT which in a straight line would have left it standing. (2.3 twin overhead cam engine designed by Porsche and listed as 155bhp). Was just I found the 740 was a bit of a handful around corners... But with very small modifications to the body where the suspension sat, the 940 that was almost identical cornered beautifully. So if one finds a 940 (Not a very early 940 as these did not have the handling improvements) with the GLT badge and the 2.3 twin overhead cam engine in saloon form.... (They did do them but not many so are hard to find)...

My favourite Volvos of all which take a little getting used to, but once one knows the car they are AMAZING are the Volvo 360 GLT 3 door hatchbacks. Totally amazing handling and a surprizing amount of go for what is a 120bhp car (Later ones were reduced about 5 to 10 bhp as they were fitted with catalitic converters). The acceleration was just a tad quicker then a 1980's BMW 5 series with a 2.8 engine. Of course, the Volvo is lighter weight.
I wheelspun the rear wheels on mine from a standing start in third gear. Also the handling was tail happy, but though the back went out, it was soo precise and easy to control. One could go down a straight road at an angle of 45 degrees and just hold it at that angle with the rear wheels spinning for as long as you wanted. You could feel every bit of the car and it just went where you put it. Even when sliding out at the back or if in extreme cases the front as well, it was totally precise in that evennif all four wheels were sliding it was predictable. Only once I span it through 180 degrees through a narrow section of the road as I know I had approached the road far too fast (I was having fun racing a mini owned by another worker in a neighbouring, store where I worked... So we were both messing around as we left the car park on the way home trying to get to this exit road first), and the back end carried on going and I held it and though the width of the car was only about two to four foot narrower then the road, I was able to prevent it from hitting the sides. I was then looking at the guy with the mini and going backwards towards the junction. I dare not spin another 180 (Which would be easy to do from going backwards) incase I did clip one of the hedges on th sides of the road. It was such a fun car to own and drive. And in all the years I owned it, only two cars ever out accelerated it. One was a 3000cc Renault (The Volvo had a 2000cc engine) and the other was a Porsche 928 with a 2.5 twin turbo engine which a friend used to own and he overtook me years before I really knew him.
As a guide, when the Volvo Owners Club (In the UK) had an event where they hired an hour or two at a certain well known racetrack in England, other events had overlapped so they had to have tneir Volvo racing event with another racing event at the same time, and a Volvo 360 GLT was consistantly lapping 2 seconds slower then a Dodge Viper which was racing at the same time amongst other cars. I believe the 360 was second as he was beat by a tallented driver in a Volvo 740 Turbo which was a more powerful car and the driver managed to hold it on the track in the corners!
Going back to those Mercades. Well made cars though they overcomplicate the mechanics. I had two Volvo 850 estates, one being the T5 and both had extra rear facing seats in the back to carry children so they were 7 seaters. My Dad had a Mercades. Now if I wanted to put all the seats down for carrying big things (The Volvos front passenger seat could fold forwards so I had 10 ft in length(About 2ft wide where the seat area is) length or 6x4 ft without the front seat folded). Now the Merc had a slopy back which gave about 7ft or just under at the bottom, but more like 5ft near the top so if one carried a wardrobe the Volvo was better.
To get the seats down the Volvo was childs play. Just pull a leather strap that was sticking up at the edges of the seat... The Mercades... They always have to overengineer everything! It was a nightmare of a job for anyone who didn't know the car. The seats refused to unclip and move forwards unless the headrests were removed. I seem to remember it all had to be done in just the right sequence and everything had to align in just the right spot or angle or one could not get the seats down or up again. I had the Merc for a while after my Dad died. A heavy well built Mercades 200E automatic, which was actually economical and besides what the books say that they lacked power, this one had enough power and could hold its own.. Could certainly pull well on the long steep motorway hills coming back out of visiting Cornwall and was doing over 40mpg on the trip (2000cc petrol rated at 143bhp). A heavy well made car, but handling was "Drifty" when pushed. For example, one would cruise it at a sedate 50mph on twisty Welsh roads and not bother touching the 60mph allowed,as the whole car would start to slide over if one tried 60 so it was actually quicker at 50 as one wasn't needing to balance the car with the brakes etc. It had lovely floaty soft suspension. No doubt the sportier versions of the car handled better with stiffer suspension. I was really glad of the car when I tore a tendon in my left calf muscle and was in plaster... As this car being an automatic which only needed my right foot to operate it, I could still drive.

I could go on much the same about automotive stuff for days, it's part of why I'm as alone as I am. I can infer my way through any machine. I can't remember the first no-brainer thing(s) about how to be a human being. If my mind isn't stuck between 2 lines of code or a glacier & a cliff, I have no bookends so to speak.

I want to do SOMETHING to make these supposedly masculine pursuits more female-inclusive on my part.

I don't really think I can survive without figuring out how. I seriously need to make some actual space & time for my female friends to help me along. I don't even really care about dating anymore until I have some perspective again. I'm not "on the market" because I don't see purchases & games as part of my concept of love anyway. I'm not OK with wasting more mental energy overthinking the implications of my own romantic train wreck situation.

Seriously I'm super done loving people the way this f****d up society says I'm supposed to. It doesn't work & the expectations only hurt everyone. I've been called disabled before & it feels like this is my main symptom. If everything about how I love anyone just works wrong for both of us, c'est la vie, implications be damned, I'm going to show at least some love anyway.

Actually despite my love of machinery & loud music, I'm always grappling with being kind of feminine for a straight guy. It's not so much even a taboo as much as it's just really subjective. It seems like a reason why I've been needing more time to think over the female influences in life.

Bump; this theory-of-mind restricted lifestyle is boring enough to qualify as terrifying.

It's unhealthy, depressing & entirely morbid to live with the degree of isolation I find myself in.

I don't want to be around the people who decided this is somehow enough for me anyway.

Internet dating & social media is really screwing up everyone's minds & by extension, the rest of us.

Fwiw, in my very short life I've noticed if I just act like I enjoy a person's existence, that they will like me as a person/friend/romance, etc... (it seems to work on any level of intimacy).

If you can offer a person appreciation and never ask them to change, people will become drawn to you.

People deep down are all very lonely. Most of us don't know how to connect anymore and yet we long for it so much.

I used to attend this really nerdy meetup, and I swear every person who attended felt lonely. The host would make sure to ask each person how their week had gone and how they were doing. And I noticed that he would have to tear himself away from one conversation after another because so many of the attendees were starved for even such simple interactions.

What I'm trying to say is, even if your efforts feel forced and uncomfortable, people will appreciate it, and they likely won't even notice that you feel awkward.

Remembering to mistrust my social instincts isn't easy but I've been trying to find my way back into touch with some friends.

small steps are good. let us know how it goes.

Sounds really good, one step at a time.

I saw my friend today in the grocery store. I wish I could communicate better with her & I also tend to doubt that I would be alive without people like her in my life.

I'm startlingly in agreement with her that I should at the very least move quite slowly with relationships now given my overtaxed mental state & all the anxiety I deal with anyway. Nevermind, she reminds me I should hug more people.

I guess inept, dizzy, oblivious steps are still steps.