Heifer at a Cattle Auction

So I went in to the Dating Service to having my photo shoot the other day. For our online profiles we have to have their photographer take pictures of us and also do a 1-3 minute video clip to put on our profile as well.

It was a traumatic experience. I imagine this is what a heifer feels like when she is at a cattle auction. Will you be taken home to a nice farm or will you be sent to the slaughterhouse?

We were told to bring two outfits--one formal and one casual--so that there would be different shots. The problem was that the instructions said that the photos would be taken from the waist up, but the photographer takes full body shots too. I wore the wrong pants (they were too short), my flip flops (since I didn't think my feet would show), and painted my toenails to match the wrong outfit (the formal one, not the casual one). I didn't like the pictures that much.

My video was okay, but not great. I should have redone it when they gave me a chance. I did talk about Iceland on my video--the puffins, the reindeer, the jams on cheese pizza. So maybe it wasn't a total disaster, just a near disaster.

The most traumatic part was at the end when I was looking at the pictures with the photographer. He was trying to sell me a package of bells and whistles that costs $2,000. Yes, in US dollars, not yen, not pesos....dollars. The package included things like free touch-ups to the photos (as if I don't know how to use photoshop myself), the ability to send someone an email message before you have their contact information, the ability to switch pictures on the profile whenever I want (why switch if we have already put up the best ones?) and the option of putting up four additional shots with the primary head shot. The photographer went to great lengths to try to tell me that EVERYONE does the four additional shots and that I need to invest in my future. He said that if I didn't do it then then men wouldn't select me and my membership would be wasted. Yes, he did indeed use that phrase. He finally offered to put up the four additional photos for only $500. As I do not have an extra $500 sitting around, I continued to decline. Besides, I also considered it highway robbery and I resented being pushed and emotionally manipulated. I luckily did not cry in front of the photographer, but I did cry the whole way home (and most of the evening). It made me feel that I had made a big mistake and that I was going to be a Dating Service Failure (can one sink lower than that?).

But after getting over the initial trauma, I am feeling positive again. Surely the lack of four pictures won't ruin my life. There is a Dating Service activity this weekend that I am going to. We'll see how this goes. I feel as if I have taken on a part-time job. This is all work.