Um, this isn’t going to work
I know it’s going to sound mean, but one deal-breaker for me is if she’s a vegetarian (“Dating deal breakers,” May 9 cover story). I’ve just encountered enough to know that I’m not going to be compatible with one in a relationship.
Also, I’m an Internet junkie, and instant messaging and e-mail conversations also help weed out women who can’t spell. There’s a difference between typos and “netspeak” and just plain misspelling. I can’t date someone who can’t differentiate there/their/they’re, among other common mistakes.
Oh yes, and the worst first date I went on involved almost getting arrested by the police. Turns out that when someone you barely know says she has to stop at a drugstore, she may be referring to a “drug store.”
Aaron Samuels, 23, Bridgeport
Anything for hotness
[Your article] gave me validation for ending things with a guy who broke all the rules on the first date. The only reason it lasted four months was because the guy was incredibly good-looking. And that is the exact point you had at the end of the article. Looks matter!Here are some more doozies:
– Talked for hours about not one, not two, but THREE of the exes that wronged him.
– Showed up on the first date with a cropped, sheer, muscle-stripper shirt in December.
All red flags, but flags that were outweighed by hotness.
Richard Ramsey, 31, Buena Park
The buzz on green tea
Just a quick note about green tea (“Caf-fiends,” May 7 cover story). My wife and I switched from drinking coffee in the morning to caffeinated green tea. We did this for about two months. I was really dragging for those two months, so we recently switched back to coffee. My wife prefers the green tea in the mornings.
Green tea does make you feel better, but it just doesn’t give me the boost I need in the morning.
Tim Janes, 34, Evanston
True hip-hop
I must say, your article on hip-hop was the best article that I’ve seen in a long time (“The do’s and don’t’s of discussing rap lyrics,” May 4 column by Kyra Kyles). To be able to judge hip-hop, it’s simple: You have to love hip-hop! Because if you think that hip-hop is just music then you don’t know or understand hip-hop and you may need to do some research.
If you only own 50 Cent, Ying Yang Twins and a Young Joc single, please don’t call yourself a hip-hop fan. If you don’t know that true hip-hop is not all about 24-inch rims, grills, money, clothes and half-naked women, then you don’t know hip-hop.
If you don’t know that true hip-hop can educate, uplift your consciousness and make you feel good about yourself then you don’t know hip-hop. True hip-hop is not what we see on videos these days or what we are forced to listen to on corporate radio. True hip-hop is a movement, a culture that was born in a struggle to uplift, celebrate and educate.
Much love to Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton, but they fall in the same category as Bill O’Reilly on this subject because they don’t know or understand hip-hop. Only true “hip-hoppas” that love the art form and culture will be able to reshape hip-hop. Because the garbage that we hear and see today is not hip-hop.
Bethany Gomillion, 27, Edgewater
Defending Jackson
With all due respect to your position at the RedEye, Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr. has been on the case when it has come to music as far back as 1978, when the Rolling Stones were degrading all women, including black women. I would guess that this was before you were born.
Rev. Jackson has been in the forefront of cleaning up lyrics and has helped make an environment in this country where rappers can make the kind of money they do. In other words, if it weren’t for Jesse they wouldn’t be the millionaires they are. Now, they did not start this bad lyric mess — but they can stop it.
Donald S. Kuss, 49, Humboldt Park
