Saturday, June 1, 2013

Age Difference among Women I've Dated

I was discussing with a woman a few days ago how a certain man she knows constantly goes for women he has no chance with, hotties in their early twenties (he's in his late thirties). It made me wonder, since here I am still single and over forty, whether I have a similar pattern. I suppose it depends on what one views as an unacceptable age gap. A recent survey noted that women want a man, on average, about four years older than they are, with a good number of them accepting men up to seven years older. I can say I've mostly stuck to women within eight years of me (what I've long considered the base norm, one year above that seven years), though most women I've gone out with have been younger than me. As I've gotten older, the age spread does seem to have become more liberal, but it doesn't seem that out of whack, I don't think.

In the chart below, the difference in age is shown on the vertical axis, my own age on the horizontal axis:
The chart above is an approximation, based on memory (I haven't kept a record of each woman I've asked out, so it's likely I've forgotten a few, especially among those who I never ended up going out with). Women closer to my age rejected me just as women farther away from my age did, and women who accepted dates also varied accordingly. There doesn't seem to be an overall trend, outside of the fact that the few women I went out with or asked out in my twenties tended to be much closer to my age for obvious reasons.

Saturday, May 25, 2013

Trains, Planes, Automobiles, and Buses

I recently went to Indiana via bus, the first time I've taken an interstate bus since age five, which caused me to ponder how I generally have traveled long distances. Below is the summary of how I've traveled each year, when taking trips (that I remember, sometimes estimated) over three hundred miles and trips over five hundred miles. Train and bus have not been too popular; car and plane have been used the most for between three hundred and five hundred miles, though most of that plane travel was in the early 1990s, when I had a job that involved a once-a-month trip from Southern California to Northern; on my own, I'd usually drive that distance.

Three Hundred Miles
Five Hundred Miles

Saturday, May 18, 2013

Phone Calls for February 2013

I kept track of phone calls made to me and returned in February, which renders possibilities for all kinds of charts, some of them quite different from earlier charts regarding November 2012. 

Phone Calls by Gender
Phone Calls by Person
Phone Calls by Relationship

Saturday, May 11, 2013

Beard Progression

So I didn't shave for eight weeks. Here were the results by week, for weeks 3 through 8 (unfortunately, I didn't think to take photos of weeks 1 and 2):
 

Saturday, May 4, 2013

Beard Comments

I grew a beard about seven or eight years ago. This past winter, I decided to grow one again. There wasn't the same kind of angst as the first time I grew it. I was just being lazy and trying to avoid cold. Still, it's been curious people's reactions, most of whom don't remember the six months I previously had a beard--or maybe they do, since fewer people have commented on it this time around, it seems, as can be seen in the following chart, denoting the first time a given person has made a remark about my beard:

Saturday, April 27, 2013

Tax Refunds per Year

Most years I've ended up paying taxes (as represented by the negative numbers); this year was one of the first in a long while that I received a refund.

Saturday, April 20, 2013

Where My Money Went in 2012

I was curious to know what percent of my income went to what things, so I created this handy graph: