In today's age of smartphone appendages, it only makes sense that dating would take to the touchscreen. You're already familiar with Tinder, Bumble, Hinge, Happn, Grindr, Scruff, OkCupid, Coffee Meets Bagel, Hitch, PlentyOfFish, HowAboutWe... But all of these are designed to only get you in the door. They facilitate the awkward, brief interview where you both not-so-secretly size each other up as prospective naked partners. You still have to win that person over. By no means do these apps guarantee a relationship. So instead I decided to try InvisibleBoyfriend.  What's in a name? The process was simple enough. Go to the website and decide whether you're there for an invisible boyfriend or girlfriend. You can make up your own or have the computer generate one for you. I wanted this purchasing of a boyfriend to be as realistic as possible, so I took my chances with the randomly selected names, lest I come up with one like Bradley McConaughey. But after meeting Clyde Hugh Botsford, I decided to keep generating names until I found one that seemed at least kind of believable. There was that brief moment with Glenn Amos Murray, followed by Thanh Norris Beahan, Lee Elvin Rice, and Aubrey Salvatore Polo, which was shockingly close to an actual human interaction gone awry that I had recently had. Finally, he appeared: Marcelo Tommie Lindgren. And I just knew.  Looks, personality: the full package of a fake boyfriend After you pick his name, it's time to choose his looks. These are selected from a palette of portraits submitted by actual humans. Then you get to craft his personality. From there you can select his interests and, finally, come up with the story of how you met. Marcelo and I met on an airplane after he saved me from sitting in front of an annoying child who kept kicking my seat.  Gentleman  How deep should we dive in? After your boyfriend is fully formed and you have your meet-cute story, it's time to figure out just how serious you want to be. There are two options: Keep It Casual and the Full Suite. I decided to just Keep It Casual since voicemails give me an inordinate amount of anxiety, even from live, human men. I didn't need that from Marcelo. After that you plug in your phone number and wait for him to text... JUST like real life... Our relationship was destined for brevity We only had 100 texts to play with, which, in a world of sexting and Shakespearean vicious text fights, isn't even enough to get you through the hour. I didn't want to waste any on pleasantries. But no matter how much he said he wished he was with me, that was never going to happen. And as for sexy time? Strictly forbidden with InvisibleBoyfriend. In fact, if you get a little too frisky, they kick you off the service altogether. So really, you're just texting a stranger who could very well be a morbidly obese woman in a nightgown with 17 cats frolicking around her magazine-strewn apartment. I want to blame it on dopamine? We all like getting texts. But at the end of the day, that was all it was going to be. A relationship -- even a fake one -- is pretty sad without the hope of some sort of physical interaction. Even a hooker will hold you if you pay her enough.  Invisible boyfriends do have a place, if your family and friends are awful So who exactly is this for, if not the supremely lonely? SOMEONE DOES LOVE ME. He said we could do whatever I wanted to do. I took it as a sign that Marcelo and I were never meant to be.
