Maybe it would be helpful if I described my ideal first date: I expect you to arrive at the bar 45 minutes late with no intention of apologizing. But I don’t complain because I get there 10 minutes after you do. There's some glitter smeared on my face because I've just come from a lap dance that was technically illegal, and I explain why in great detail. I'm less than articulate, having spent the past three days huffing pesticide. You’re too self-absorbed to feel my hand on your thigh, and I’m too stoned to feel my hand at all. You seem to have confused me with an upcoming date—which explains all the baffling questions about engineering and Baltimore and being Asian—and you also brought your parrot, which shares your name for some reason. Before you get a chance to answer my questions about your job—"What's it like teaching retards? Kinda pointless, right?"—I pass out. With a sigh, you slide off your stool, leave a Jews for Jesus pamphlet on my head, and leave without paying. Just like always.

So, I've been here about a year and a half, originally from Boston. I write jokes for a living. My first humor book came out in 2007, and the second is due next summer.

What else? I shouldn't even bother mentioning that I like running—isn't that mandatory? I think you get flagged by Homeland Security if you don't say it. Beer snobbery amuses me. Dancing will probably not be my idea, but I'll go if it's yours. I'd love to return to Japan again, though I don't have much use for sushi. I'll like your cat.

Here's where I'll blurt out bands/artists I like, all right? Tom Waits, White Stripes, Velvet Underground, Misfits, Bjork, Aimee Mann, Stereolab, Bob Dylan, Arcade Fire, YYY's, The Clash, Morphine, Massive Attack, Portishead, The Replacements, Raincoats, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Saint Etienne, Stevie Wonder, American Hair Loss.

I came up with that last band name when I was 19 for no particular reason. Somehow, I bet there's an audiophile who owns it, and I'd love to find out what kind of music I made.

The person I'm looking for loves literature and reads without waiting for orders from Oprah. She’s a compulsive wisecracker, maybe, or at least appreciates a sense of a humor. Or at least mine. She’s unconventional in thought, though she may have the trappings of a total square. She'll play Scrabble with me and take her defeat without harming me. She finds herself seized by wanderlust from time to time, which she treats with frequent urban hikes and occasional wilderness excursions. She can deal with fact that I watch football. She can't help but put people at ease. She doesn't have to be comfortable at swank cocktail parties or hiking the Appalachian trail, but she should be willing to try such things because her curiosity always seems to get the best of her fears—in other words, someone who's not intrinsically above things she hasn't experienced.