There is desperation and then there is desperation. Speed dating is a manifestation of someone's frustration. Just look at the people that show up to try their hand at the latest way to meet their soul mate.

Every dating service promises results. They are the ones that will locate that one person in the world that is meant for you. If your soul mate is in the heart of Iraq infiltrating some terrorist boot camp they will be found. If they are deep in the deserts of Africa studying a new species of insect they will be located in a matter of days. Sit back, relax, let them do the dating for you. Like the Internet dating sites and phone message services have a homing device on anyone with even the slightest compatibility with you. You might both like lasagna, does that make you soul mates?

Late night commercials urge you to dial the 1-800 number and find someone to spend the rest of your life with. Internet pop ups tell you they have more potential mates than any other site on the net. Funny, you just signed up for a different one that sucked you in with that exact same slogan.

Your credit card bill is bursting with monthly fees from places like 'Love Line' and 'Heart Finder'. Activation fees. Perk packages. Cancellation fees. They all progress in the same way and you end up alone on a Saturday night just like you were last week, last month, last year. But that doesn't stop you from signing up for the next one.

You know the speed-dating crowd. They think they are better than the Internet and phone daters. They are so smug, sneering at you when you walk into the room timidly. They run manicured fingernails through their fake red and blond hair and put their purse on the seat next to them so you don't sit down. As if your bad luck in the dating scene will rub off on them if you get too close. You didn't know it was contagious.

Where is dating headed when people are willing to manipulate themselves into a version of perfection to even have a hope of being glanced at?

The women have their hair up in fancy up dos and their make up looks ready to drop right off their face into their lap. First impressions are everything in speed dating. All you have is that initial moment where there is either a flash of the rest of your life with that person or you lying face down in a ditch, up do knotted and bloody.

It's fifty blind dates in a row. You forget the guy's name the second he tells you he has three kids. You can disregard people right away because there is always someone else waiting behind them. But they are doing the same to you.

The variety of men in the room is not very appealing. Some wear knock off Armani suits and some slink into the room in plaid button downs and dirt under their fingernails. Men have it so easy. They forget to brush their hair? That's okay, they are just considered laid back. A woman ventures out in her front yard without a pound of foundation on her face and she must not care about the way she looks.

You pay your first membership fee and sit down in one of the orange plastic chairs. The worst part about all these dating alternatives is they give you hope. They shove testimonials satisfied customers have written at you and say, that can be you. What about the millions of people that find jack shit on your dating plan? What is important, they say, is the possibility.

Possibilities aren't going to buy you a ring. Possibilities aren't going to get your mother off your back. Possibilities aren't going to end your boring Saturday nights alone with the latest romantic comedy and a bag of microwave popcorn.

It never seems to cross your mind that maybe it isn't the dating alternatives that are the problem, maybe it is you.

Speed dating is a race to get as many phone numbers you can. They talk at you a mile a minute never stopping to pop a breath mint in their mouth and then they ask for your number at the thirty second warning. You throw a card at them and sigh. Even if they did call it would probably be because they had mistaken you for the blonde to your left.

Disappointment feels familiar. You are used to it.

Giving up is the next step. You have officially tried everything short of a mail order spouse from Czechoslovakia. You pass through hope, denial and acceptance on your way to giving up and it gets you nowhere.

Your next credit card bill will be stacked with cancellation fees that are more than the activation fees. Giving up is pricey.

Maybe indifference is the new dating alternative.

It pisses you off how some people find the love of their life standing in line for the ATM at the grocery store. You do that every day and you never find anything besides gum in the card slot. But one day you are standing there waiting for a couple teenage boys to finish trying to figure out their mother's pin number and you see someone you recognize.

Your old speed-dating buddy. You used to go to new services together every Friday night. She is wearing expensive high heels and a diamond necklace that probably costs more than your life.

You wave her over and she smiles at you.

"How are the alternatives treating you?" she asks.

You quit, you tell her.

She shakes her head and hands you a card for a new service. It is called 'Delinquent Dating'. No, you tell her, you are finished with all the websites and phone lines.

"This isn't like all the other ones, this one actually works," she assures you. "Come to a meeting with me tomorrow, I'll show you."

You want to say no but you can't. You can give it one more shot. This could be the one that works for you. That's how they always get you, that irrational hope. False hope is still hope when it comes to advertising.

The meeting is full of people you used to see in the speed dating circuit. People you thought had found their one and only at one of sessions. You were sure that was the reason they stopped coming. But they had just found the ultimate alternative.

Women stand onstage and talk about how they have accepted true love does not exist for everyone. But that doesn't mean they can't experience something resembling love. A

love knock off. Like the fake Armani suits and the plastic surgery faces of the people trying to make a good first impression.

Delinquent Dating would set each member up with a man or woman in the state prison. The prisoners had completed a survey describing what they were looking for and a match would be found for them among the desperate people on the outside that have nothing left to lose.

Your speed-dating buddy has been in a six-month exclusive relationship with a former CEO that had been convicted of tax evasion. White-collar criminals are in high demand. Most of them are so rich to begin with that even after they are found out and their money is taken to pay for their mistakes, they still have secret off shore accounts and investments that are just sitting there while they rot alone in an eight-foot by eight-foot prison cell. They need a nice woman to take care of their finances and pay them the occasional conjugal visit. What more could a girl ask for?

It is the epitome of desperation. And you are at that point. You have been for a while.

A week after you join you are handed a list of prisoners that you make a nice match with. They are listed from most desirable such as lawyers and doctors to.. less than ideal like the murderers and rapists.

You tell yourself you will never be that desperate.

You start off by visiting a brain surgeon that is in prison for accepting bribes. He is exactly the kind of guy you have always been looking for. He is friendly and considerate, outgoing and funny. If he had been at one of the speed dating sessions he would have been snatched up before he even took a seat. So, he is going to be in prison for a few years. So what? Does that make him a bad person? By most people's standards, yes but you are so far beyond having standards that you barely even know the meaning of the word.

You meet CEO's, criminal defense lawyers, publicists, radio personalities and designers. Garbage truck drivers, plumbers, electricians, convenience store clerks and door-to-door salesmen. They all have their reasons for being locked up. But should their one lapse in judgment rule them out of being your soul mate? If you didn't meet all of the people on your list you would only be depriving yourself of someone who might be it for you.

The murderer in the very last position on your list used to be a security guard for a famous actress. He was trying to protect her, is what he tells you. He is very protective.

You were picky with who you would talk to when you used "Love Line" and "Matchmaker". If they had already been divorced it was a strike against them. If they didn't like sushi you didn't like them. If they couldn't spell the word 'special' they couldn't possibly be the one for you. But "Delinquent Dating" is full of flaws that you are allowed to see. There are no questions because it is all right there, laid out for you in their permanent criminal record.

Your speed-dating buddy is marrying her CEO next June. She is pregnant with his child. He will spend the first five years of his child's life behind bars. But that is what they are willing to go through for love. Or something similar.

You pay your murderer a few visits before he tells you he has found someone else. He doesn't think you are the one for him. The murderer on death row tells you he would rather you didn't visit him again.

You thought you had hit your low point when you didn't get a single reply on "Love Me Online" but it could get worse. It can always get worse. Desperation is when you have nothing to lose but the truth is, there is always a little bit left to lose. Dignity isn't welcome in the dating circuit.

You quit Dating Delinquents and go back to speed dating. At least there you are only being rejected by people you never wanted anyway. People that could probably do better than you. You can accept that.

You are willing to try whatever comes next because you won't find anyone if you don't put yourself out there. Maybe your one and only is already dead and that's why the dating sites you sign back up for can't seem to find him.

It can't be something you did, it never is.