I recently had dinner with a friend, who described not three but four interesting men she met through work.

I thought about my work place, my home, my colleagues, my cat, my clients, other women and had a hard time concealing my jealousy of my friend’s access to thousands of people, a.k.a men.

“You should try internet dating,” she suggested. “That’s what people do now.”

“No way,” I laughed. “You know what a luddite I am. I can’t imagine that working for me.”

Two nights later, I found myself cruising the sites.

“I’m just looking,” I told my cat. But before I knew it, I was downloading photos of myself and getting my credit card out.

I have to admit, it was exciting to see so many “requests” in my inbox the next day. That is, until I opened the emails.

The first was from someone called “Lusty4u.” I deemed him and his name ridiculous and deleted it immediately.

The second only showed a picture of a hairy chest. “Ewww,” I yelped and deleted that one as well.

The next one looked promising. It was from a good looking divorced man in his 40s with children, and it stated that he was a musician and good cook.

It sounded ideal until I read that his favorite book is the Bible. Literarily speaking, I could accept that, but his numerous references to “Him” and “God” made my agnostic side nervous.

My inbox filled with pictures and emails from men with 70s porn-star moustaches, topless men on motorcycles (OK, that one intrigued me until I saw the next photo of his groin), men from the Air Force and many, many balding, overweight men working in “technology.”

I know you can’t judge a book by it’s cover, and believe me I tried really hard not to. I read all of their bios and interests and even emailed a few of them, but honestly, they all started to blur together.

Every single one of them claimed to love traveling and one included a photo from the last time he went to Mexico (in 1991) to prove it.

They all claimed to love to cook (and damn it, I actually fell for that one) and to love sports and to be physically fit.

I don’t care about sports, but please don’t doubt my intelligence about your physique. You included your photo, remember?

After a few days of this, the allure was gone and frustration set it.

I emailed the service and asked for my money back, but they said no. The bastards. So, I stuck it out for a few more days.

Pictures began to be accompanied by questions such as, “When you meet my parents, how will you act?” “If I come home upset from work, how will you respond?” and of course, “How important is sex to you?”

To say these questions unnerved me would be an understatement. Meet your parents? I haven’t even met you!

And how do I know how I’ll respond if you are in a bad mood? Again, I don’t even know you, nor do I know if being “upset” means you yell and throw things or clam up. If it’s the first, I’ll probably run as fast as I can. Actually, I’ll probably run away in either case, because I’ve had my fair share of clammer-uppers and prefer not to repeat that agony.

And as for how much I enjoy sex, wouldn’t you like to know?

After a man invited me to dinner but then canceled because “we didn’t have any chemistry” (again, I had not actually met this man, I’d only emailed him twice), I cut my losses and closed my account.

I don’t know why I thought I had to spend fifty bucks to learn what I already know.

I don’t read books online, because I prefer to feel the pages in my hand, I don’t even read long emails or blogs because I prefer to talk to people in person, and I can’t date a man online because I need to know how easily he laughs and smiles, what he smells like, how well he listens, does he hold eye contact, and most of all, is he interesting to talk to?

And, I can’t learn any of this from a picture of his groin.

Corbin Lewars (www.corbinlewars.com) is the founder of Reality Mom (www.realitymomzine.blogspot.com), author of "Creating a Life" (Catalyst Book Press, 2010) and the sexy mommy-lit book "Swings" (out for submission). She lives in Ballard with her two children.