How hard it is to not be a stalker..

I just read a story about someone who noticed that they were being watched in a creepy way by a dude while they were hanging out on a swing set..

Firstly let me just point out a few things... The person who was on the swings was a girl, but she was also an adult. The person watching her was an older man.

That's fairly obviously a bit off.

But just literally as I typed this it occurred to me that an adult playing on a swing-set by herself (at 6 in the morning as it happened) could probably be seen as a bit creepy too. Maybe the adult that was watching the woman on the swings has a child that likes to play on those swings and he was wondering why a grown woman would be sitting there waiting for his kid..?

I don't believe that this is the case, but it's interesting to consider the other perspectives.

I bring this up because I do my own fair share of harmless stalking on social networking sites.. Not to name anything in particular but lets just call the one I'm talking about "Headscroll". I'm really after a bit of input here as to how stalkerish my behaviour is and if it's excusable. I don't plan on ever using my strange skills for any messed up purposes but depending on the way you look at me I could seem a little weird.

I met a girl at uni a few months back. Truthfully by accident. I went to sit next to another person and she was in the other seat next to me, I asked her if the seat was taken or reserved for a friend and she joked to me that she didn't have any friends. I told her I'd be her friend in a similarly joking way and we shared a bit of quiet conversation before the lecture started. Pretty normal so far.

Now I'll just mention that this girl was cute and that I like cute girls (wow that's crazy talk). So I tried to find her on 'Headscroll' a little while after because I didn't share any tutorial classes with her and wanted a chance to talk to her, but I only knew her first name so I didn't have any luck.

That'd be the first questionable stalkerish behaviour I'm displaying... In my opinion fairly ok, especially since I didn't even find her.

I didn't see her again for a while except for 2 mins outside another lecture and a wave through a window and never got any more info on her, until the other day when I had an exam which she too was in.

Now as a bit of background I don't know how other universities organise their exam rooms but at mine they have a huge hall full of about 2000 students and they just run 10 or so different tests at the same time. Students sit in their class groups in alphabetical order on numbered tables. The seating plan for each student is displayed on a list by subject outside the hall. You see where I'm going? Ok for the profoundly innocent of you reading this I found this girls last name on the list by seeing roughly where she was sitting in regards to the alphabet and because I already knew her first name...

So that's stalkerish behaviour number 2. I got her name off a list to use it to look her up on 'Headscroll'.

I have not added her because I don't want to seem weird but at the same time maybe she wouldn't think it was stalkerish at all, maybe she'd just be flattered...

I spoke to her after the aforementioned exam by the way, so I'm really not a stranger anymore. In fact I walked her back to her car (kind of by just talking to her till she got to it though, not by ant chivalrous offer).

Sorry if this is all a bit unorganised but it's late and I really want to wrap this up so I can get my sleep cause I have one more exam tomorrow which funnily enough this cute girl is going to be at too.

Before I finish I just want to outline my last stalkerish actions so that I am completely honest with you all now. After getting her name off the list right before talking to her I then went home and found her on 'Headscroll' and was disappointed to find a private profile. Don't get me wrong, I think private 'Headscroll' profiles are a good idea, in fact mine's private too. But as a guy in pursuit of a cute girl I wanted to know if she was single before I make my move and I couldn't get that information from her page... Please don't judge me too harshly here on this next bit, but I kind of outdid myself on the stalker scale next.

So looking at this enticingly locked profile I still had access to her friends list (a small mercy) and I took a quick look through the list (no mutual friends, damn) and found a friend who had a picture which included cute girl in her profile pic (bingo). Her account was not private and I ended up trawling quite painstakingly through a number of photos in a search for more information on the illusive cute girl.. In the end I found a lot of pictures of her hanging out with her friends, no pictures that suggested a boyfriend and generally felt pretty good about the whole exercise. Except for that niggling feeling that I became the worlds most dangerous stalker over the course of about half an hour.

What do you think?

I admit, it was a bit obsessive, but in my defense I was procrastinating studying for my exam and it was only trying to find out if it was worth pursuing this girl...

Tomorrow as I may have mentioned, I have another chance to see cute girl and I've decided that if I do get the opportunity, I'll try and get her number and organise a date or something via traditional means (talking) but if I don't see her (and it could easily happen if she finishes the exam and leaves before me) I plan on adding her on 'Headscroll'..

Am I a creepy stalker.. Or a non creepy one?

Why I'm Single

I like to think there are a number of reasons for why I don't have a significant other.
Reasons that I have control over, that I put on myself.

I like to think that if I relaxed myself a bit then the women would flock in my direction and that I would still be as lonely as I am right now so what's the point.

Every few months I'll get sick of how I live and I'll decide that the latest girl I know will get the call she's been waiting for and I'll let her in because she can't be any worse than what I've got going for me right now.

But then I'll watch a TV show with one of those perfect couples, or a movie with that artistic girl with the perfect balance of eyeliner and funk, or I'll meet a friends girlfriend who's just great, or I'll get to know a girl that's too young but if she was only 5 or 6 years older would be perfect for me... And I'll decide that whoever I was just about to make a move on just wouldn't cut it for me.

And then I end up right where I started.

It's a confusing situation, because although my heart tells me it doesn't care about the girls I do know, my brain starts to think my heart's ruining its life. My brain starts to get concerned with how it's perceived by other brains, how come it doesn't get the girl when all those other brains do? Is it really alone by it's own choice? Or by someone else's...?

(One day someone will actually read my blog and I'll be able to get some opinions on this..)

I think this all springs from that first real girlfriend I had in high school.. I'd known her for years but never made a move because I didn't really care about her. I mean she was nice to me, in fact I think I knew that she liked me. And she was cute, though nothing amazing.

Eventually she pulled the classic 16 year old girl trick of 'why wont you talk to me..:(' what was I to do? It was either the ignore flirt denial trick, or the 'I'm shy cause I like you' perfect response by an equally naive 16 year old boy trick.

I chose the second and suddenly I had a girlfriend. It was never planned, and it was against my better judgment.

Suddenly I was loved, and someone wanted to send me messages, and sit next to me, and hug me, and I liked it.

It lasted 4 months. That seems like a short amount of time now but It was a pretty solid effort back then.

Eventually due to the obvious path that this course was destined to take we broke up.. Well she dumped me, I'll admit that. And to this day I don't know what her reasons were for it. But it's not really important.

Whats important is that I knew from the start that she wasn't absolutely perfect for me. She was 4 month worthy. I suspected as much. But we were always going to break up but I thought 'whatever, I haven't got anything else going on'.

I haven't had a girlfriend since.

I've had girls who were friends, I've even had girls who were more than just merely friends. But never a girlfriend. Because none of them have been perfect and I didn't see the point.

Lately I haven't even bothered to get a more-than-just-friend girl, because deep down anything physical doesn't seem to even matter if there isn't love behind it.. But I say this as a virgin.. So maybe I don't know what I'm talking about.

More on that another time.

Not pretty enough, Too much makeup, Too religious, Not enough care put into her personal presentation, Lives to far away, Has a boyfriend, Too young for me, Too old for me, Doesn't like the same music, Too stupid, Too smart, Not sporty enough, Not artistic enough, Not random enough, Crazy, Hasn't spent a night sitting on her house's roof looking up at the stars thinking about her perfect guy...

These and more are real reasons I've stopped myself from taking the leap.

But are they?
What if they actually translate to: I'm too skinny, She knows way cooler guy's than me, I'm stuck in the 'friend' group, She wont like me, She doesn't like me, I'm not pretty enough, I don't have enough style, I'm too awkward, I'm not funny, I'm lame, I can't impress her, I'm not good enough, Not good enough, Not good enough, Not good enough...

I can't work it out, one way or the other...

So I sit here and type to no-one.

Because that's who cares...

Cause It Saves Me Worrying

I know a lot of people.

According to my Facebook profile I have a lot of friends.

A lot of these friends are pretty girls.

A lot of these pretty girls are younger than me.

I stop myself from doing things that would hurt them, but it would be easier if someone else stopped me.

I hope that all the pretty young girls that I crave always have good boyfriends so that I have no opportunity to get involved.

(Before you start to wonder, I'm not talking about any pedophiliac thoughts here, they're simply younger than I think is right for someone my age to be interested in. In that they're younger than my brother. That's been my rule for a while now. My rule used to be, if they were only younger than me then they were too young, but I think I'm slipping.

But I'll never slip that far.)

I got to know a girl over the last few days that is the same age as my brothers girlfriend. Well ok she's a little older, but she's still a fair throw younger than I should be thinking about. According to my rule.

She has a boyfriend. Thankfully.

I hope she and him are happy because I know that I could make her happy if he wasn't there. But my brain stops me from wanting that.

Thanks brain.

I know another girl that is even younger than the first girl. She's absolutely gorgeous, so is the first girl. Being around them is like being on the set of a movie. The younger girl is in even more danger than the older one. I'll call her Girl 2.

Girl 2 likes to dance. She also likes to flirt with older boys.

I don't think girl 2 realises the dangers of her beauty. But she definitely knows she's beautiful.

This weekend a boy younger than me but still older than her started to fall into her eyes(thighsbreastssoftskinsmoothdarkhair). But he held himself back from the brink.

I think he did, but maybe he just failed to jump.

The best outcome for both of them regardless.

I don't think it's fair that girls can have that power over men. Yes men.

We might have resisted, but in a few years she'll be surrounded by those who wont. I worry about what will happen then.

I don't want her to get hurt. My brain tells me she will be.

Damnit brain.

I just hope she gets a boyfriend. So that she's safer from everyone else.