Missed Connections

Life is overly complicated as it is, but states of mind when it comes to your social life is very cut n dry, to me anyways: theres single people, attached people, and the lovely children who dont give a shit (yet). Most will say there are more types, with permutations in between, but I definitely disagree. For example, to give a point of reference and add scale, if there is a girlfriend that flirts with other boys and partakes in extracuricular majumbo... then state of mind is not attached, even if offically serious with partner, engaged, or married for 35 years. Titles and reality are never always one in the same. It goes the other way as well; if one is officially not seeing anyone, but completely crushing on or in love yet unrequited; thats attached. You see to me it really is a state of mind. Plutonic friends of the opposite sex but still do everything together; attached. My personal favorite though is the 8 year old boy down the street whose clothes were always dirty, had constantly messy and matted hair like he just woke up, had dried up crusty snot beneath his nose, didnt want to do anything else except roll around in the bush, and plainly and innocently equated girls with the bubonic plague. Life at its simpliest. The point is everyone, or at least almost everyone, has intimate experience of being in each of the three states, even though one of the states is impossible to acheive again after the ages of 10-12. We know how they all feel. #2 and #3 are the lucky ones. Blinders are on, nothing else exists. #1 though, even though some say to prefer it because of the liberal aspects, is the hardest one... you can sometimes do the craziest shit to either get out of it (find a meaningful relationship) or stay in it while maintaining sanity (get your rocks off with attempts at meaningless intimacy, usually involving great game skills or the lowering of standards.) Its either or, no inbetweens.

Yeah, so somebody being single can be a great thing and suck completely at the same exact time. And like I said, it can drive people to completely insane levels of delusion, but funny enough, still justifible somehow. This is why I love the Missed Connections phenomenon in classified Ads. Absolutely brilliant. No one, and usually I talk shit alot like as if I know some thing about something even though I dont really, just like in the paragraph above for example, but this time I insist that there is not a single person who has looked up Missed connections section in the classified without having at least the faint *hope* that one of the ads is a call out for them. And if someone denies it, I call complete bullshit on them. One might say its romantic, in a completely ass-backwards way lets be honest, but endearing nonetheless. And entertaining as hell... like how can you read this and not smile?

Heading: Gorgeous blonde with pink top was doing her hair on the northenline yesterday btw 6-7
-hi you was on northenline, a beautiful blonde girl with pink top and white jumper, you was doing your hair on the tube, we only had eye contact, and shared a smile, i wasnt brave enuf to ask for drink we both get off at camden town, i was wearing grey coat, i felt something strange inside when i first saw you, mail me plz


LOL... "something strange inside", its a called a rush of blood to the penis.

or this one:

Heading: Man with brown teddy bear.
-I was walking along Hornby and you were driving in your hot red car with your cutums brown bear in the passenger seat. I waved, you waved..now I want you
...and the bear.
Please take me home. *paw*


This is all good stuff. Im not innocent at all in this either. Twice in my life I was a frequent subscriber to the weekly Missed Connections classifieds, but with real vested interest. During my first engineering workterm, i was commuting to Ballard in North Vancouver (at the time) using the Sea bus from Downtown. On the sea bus was this blushingly cute girl (she had short hair, just as I like, and looked like Natalie Imbrulia) that seemed to sit near me every time we ended up on the same trip. We'd catch each other looking every once in a while, and every time I made quick eye contact, I would freeze, my heart would stop and Id go clamy, all mostly because Im a verified pussy. And also remember, this was the year when the high socks, plaid skirt fashion was in, and she wore that about twice a week. Im Jello against those powers(and why doesnt this fashion trend come back, why? Did sexual assault go up as a result or something? Unfortunately this combo has been relegated to strippers only). That whole term, I checked for the Georgia Straight missed connections like clockwork. No luck. Thats what you get for being shy. (and no I didnt put an ad up, cuz thats embarassing; I was hoping she would, how more passive could you get..)

Second time was when I first started working for ABB and was taking the bus from Kits to North Vancouver. On the first bus, from Kits to downtown, there was another girl, equally lovely and show stoppingly pretty. I was so bad that sometimes I would let busses go by until I spotted her inside one of them. For a couple months, every day would be the same, get off at Granville and West Pender, and wed both go to the starbucks for morning double tall cappucino. Following each other in silence, mind you. One day, she smiled at me and said hi, and I subsequently had a mild heart attack. Dont remember much after that point. Never saw her again after that though, and my hopes were dashed when nothing appeared in the missing connections ads calling me out, i was expecting something like this "funny lookin dude that didnt speak to me while lining up at starbucks after getting off the Seymour bus". Again, Im a complete verifiable pussy.

And to conclude, and Im not going to take credit for this, but heres something cut and paste, an entertaining read:

I love reading missed connections just for the entertainment value. It's good to see how seriously deluded some of these people are. As far as i can tell there's four types of advert.

1) The Ali G

It's always written by some guy who uses textspeak and wants to pretend he's some cool brotha who's so chilled he couldn't even be bothered to talk to the girl. Truth is he works in Phones 4 U, lives at home with his mum and gets the bus to work.

The advert

Yo sista I waz on the numba 44 bus rollin thru ma crib wen I spies u out da corna of ma eye, u was boom bangin in my neighbourhood but I waz 2 bizee chillin listenin to some phat tunes to come and chek u out. So holla back if u wants to hook up and get ya crunk on.
Laters
Kaz

2) The sex crazed Borat

My personal favourite. In reality some sad IT worker who lives at home by himself and harrasses any women on the tube who accidentally looks at him.

The advert

Hey babies, I have never seens such beauties before I have sawn you on the London Undertube the Piccalili Blue line. You have many beautiful long black hairs and goldens smiles that makes my groins moist. I was the cute guy with moustache in the maroon dungarees wearing a green beret, I am official number one love man machine in Londons Town. Maybe we can meet up for a cup of beer and some sexy bedlove times.
Ciao Armando

3) The Executive

The high flyer who was on his way to work in the city. He has it all the looks, the great job and the charm, so why he's posting on Gumtree??!. In reality he's a HSBC bank clerk who lives in a bedsit in Hackney and spends his evenings looking through mail order bride catalogues.

The advert

Yah hey babe I would never dream of posing on Gumtree as I have lots of girls who want to date me but I had to say you were really cute. I saw you on the Jubilee line when I was off to work in my highly paid banking job in the city and you just blew my mind. I was the pasty faced guy in the Primark suit emailing my mum on my Blackberry GZ400 with built in GPS. Things is I have two tickets for the rugger at Twickers next week so if you would care to join me just drop me a line on my Blackberry (did I mention I own one)
Au Revoir Tristan


4) The good old fashioned stalker

Finally the old classic. Bad dress sense, bad attitude and bad breath and unlike the others what you see is what you get.

The Advert

Remember me the guy who eyeballed you in the park and then accidentally bumped into you and groped your lovely body. I felt there was a connection I knew you enjoyed it as much as me. I know you didn't mean to scream out for a policeman. Anyway we should meet up, maybe I'll come round and pick you up, after all I already know where you live.

your secret admirer
XXX