My last introduction was pretty short and I haven't posted much since then, so I'm gonna go into more detail (apparently somebody thinks I might even be a chick lol). Sorry in advance if this is long. I'm dubious about whether this forum is going to be any help for me, and would really appreciate hearing from anybody else.

I've always been friendly and decently outgoing. Skinny, not what most girls would call hot, but I know how to put a person at ease. In high school this was great, and I had no problem with girls. I was funny and would use sexual jokes and innuendo to flirt like crazy. I had a lot of girlfriends over those years, lost my virginity early (at least compared to most of my friends) and had a great time.

Then I got to college - stayed close to home like most people from my high school did, spent a lot of time taking a lot of different courses and figuring out what I liked. The first while there was fantastic, too - every few months you get different classes, and meet new people, new opportunities for hookups. After a while, though, I started slowing down. I didn't really think much about it, or see it as a pattern, just figured everybody has their ups and downs. After getting friendzoned, or just shut down, several times in a couple of weeks, though, I started getting frustrated. This lasted a long time, maybe a year, and after a while I started checking out pickup and sites like this to see what could help.

Then, a revelation. I ran into some girl I went to high school with. I had flirted with her, but that was only because I flirted with everyone. She had been pretty much off my radar as far as girls I'd like to fuck goes. She was shy, busy with schoolwork, part of all the different school bands, and awkward (physically and socially). I could never tell if she wasn't interested in me, or honestly couldn't get a handle on what flirting was. When I saw her several months ago, she had changed completely. Still intent on schoolwork, but it got her accepted into several great graduate programs. She was no longer awkward, and didn't act like she hated her height. She had a job teaching music to get her through college, paid her own bills, followed politics, was an unabashed feminist but didn't use it to intimidate, and a great conversationalist. While we were talking, she admitted to me that she had hated high school, and it was only since then that she had embraced her experiences as "a fish out of water".

My point is this - that is the kind of woman I would like to have a date with, spend a day with. Sexy, fun, smart, and grounded. But all my recent attempts to attract such women have flopped, and I think it's because I never learned how to talk to women, not girls. What I did in high school worked on high school girls. My tastes have changed but my game hasn't.

So now my problem with the forum: I can't seem to find many threads that are about attracting women like that. They all seem to be about getting women at clubs, bars, shopping malls, etc etc. Everyone here seems to assume that the only options they have are giggling, shallow chicks who want drinks and jewellery and will shit test you at every opportunity. And it's possible that that is all anyone here has every experienced, depending on what circles they run in. So what I want to know is: Is anyone here in the same situation? Any advice? Or is this forum not the place for me, and I should go elsewhere to figure out what I need to do to change?