Anchorage Daily News

Hey, you there. Yeah, you, Mystery Man in the Silver Dodge with tinted windows and a black racing fin. Some lady in a white Pontiac Grand Am thinks your truck is hot and wonders if you are too.

Attention blonde cutie, the one zipping down Northern Lights in a red SUV. The driver of the dirty blue car that pulled out in front of you caught a glimpse in his rear-view mirror and wants to know if you're single.

Yo party dude, the one face down on the sidewalk in front of Platinum Jaxx the other night. The girl you were hitting on earlier in the club was impressed by how hard you fought those big, bad bouncers. Oh, and in case you were too tanked to recall, she's posted a couple of photos on Craigslist,

This is the cyber-subterranean world of "Missed Connections," a classified heading for the drive-by dumbstruck. It's under the Personals on Craigslist, the wildly popular Web site with headquarters in San Francisco. Specifically, this is Missed Connections on Craigslist Alaska, launched in September 2004 and now getting as many as 670 postings a month.

"It's a very popular category," said Jim Buckmaster, Craigslist CEO. "People want that second chance. Love hopes eternal."

Posters here have an array of agendas, from bewailing love gone belly up to chewing out cheaters. To help keep the focus, Craigslist added a "Rants and Raves" heading.

The target audience of Missed Connections is the lament-laden, those who by fear or circumstance let opportunity slip through their fingers.

The good-looking cab driver who picked you up at the airport.

The hygienist who cleaned your teeth.

The woman the next treadmill over you wanted to say hi to but didn't because you were with your mom.

Our eyes met a couple of times at The Lucky Wishbone ... I CAN'T GET YOU OUT OF MY MIND.

Hi to the guy who wiggled his eyebrows at me at the Wal-Mart in the Valley as I was leaving.

For those who peruse these postings, it's a peek through the keyhole and into the lives of others, many whose hankering is apparently too hot and heavy to bother with spell check. That guy who saw you "voteing" on Tuesday may have thought you were "rediculously" beautiful but it's the thought that counts.

Most "defently."

At Missed Connections, the suddenly smitten kick themselves for not making a move when they had the chance. Although it's like stuffing a note in a bottle and winging it into Cook Inlet, there's hope that the one who got away will see their posts and reply.

That rarely happens. Missed connections tend to remain missed.

Still you wonder.

Will the tall blonde ever find Craig the carpenter from last year's Burning Man festival?

Will the guy looking for his girlfriend from 35 years back ever track her down?

Will the pizza fan ever find out if the cute delivery girl is single? He's not about to make assumptions just because she's pregnant.

OF GRAVITY & GRAVY

You were my waitress, I made one hell of a first impression ... If you are reading this, though my chances are slim that your are, tell me what happened ...

Anthony Carrington, a 26-year-old University of Alaska student, posted this Missed Connection after a cute-waitress sighting collided with the mishandling of biscuits-and-gravy. Twice.

"I was at Windbreak Cafe eating breakfast with my two buds," Carrington explained by phone from his home in Wasilla. "I wasn't particularly paying any attention ...

The first time she walked by I was getting ready to take a bite and it fell in my lap. The second time, I was getting ready to take a bite, I lost control of my fork and there was gravy everywhere."

His buddies were merciless in their ribbing and bugged him to get the waitress's phone number. He couldn't bring himself to do it.

"I got to thinking about it later that day and I wished I had," he said.

So he posted on Missed Connection.

"I thought maybe I'd get lucky. I figured, what the hell, why not?"

He got no reply.

WAY TO BLOW IT

Saturday 10/18 at the Roadside Inn. You were right, I should have had coffee with you. The other guy stood me up. What a jerk! Thanks for the compliment.

That's from Elizabeth Bradley, who's been staying with her aunt in the Valley the past couple of months. She met a guy over the Internet, and after a week of e-mailing back and forth, they agreed to meet over coffee. She walked into the Roadside, pulled up a chair and waited.

"So this other guy came over and started chatting with me. He was really nice. He said, 'You're too good looking to be sitting alone.' Why don't you join me?' "

That would be tacky, she figured. So she declined. When the first guy turned out to be a no-show she realized she'd blown it.

"I thought, gosh, that was kind of dumb."

And so she posted.

"I knew it was a long shot," she said. "I didn't really expect anything and I didn't get anything so I'm not disappointed."

One possible glitch. When she posted, she used her aunt's Craigslist account, which lists her age as 63. Bradley is 37.

Oops.

"I guess he'd want to know my beauty secret."

Tony Olexa, a 27-year-old Japanese and Russian major at UAA , thinks of Missed Connections as more of a gallery for homeless thoughts than a "hook-up, dating thing." That's why he made this recent post:

You look like you were directed by Stanley Kubrick. Today you made me rethink the color orange.

Olexa doesn't know if he even wants a response. And he doesn't necessarily want to date the classmate who inspired his posting. He just likes her style and was moved to tell her so. Just not to her face.

"It's just nice to have an outlet for that. Otherwise those thoughts go to waste."

Find Debra McKinney online at adn.com/contact/dmckinney or call 257-4465.

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