No. You shouldn't be surprised. You were in a chat room. Chat rooms are a good time, especially if you're in an iron lung or you live in a bank vault. Everyone is funny in a chat room. Everyone is beautiful, sexy, and fearless. They're fun because they're places where people hundreds of miles away from each other can live out a fantasy. They are nothing more than that.

I'm sure you are a lovely person. But you should just naturally assume the worst of every person you meet in a chat room. The charming, witty guy you're chatting with? He's probably a hairless, three-fingered Cyclops. If a guy tells you his age, just naturally add fifteen years. If he says he's single, assume he's a polygamist. Don't trust anyone. But have fun!

It's easy to feel like you "get" someone in an environment designed to grant each person maximum control over their personality. I have met people in chat rooms before. It can feel eerily intense and real. Once, I even moved the conversation offline, and on to the phone. Sadly, she went from sounding chirpy and sassy in my head to actually sounding like her throat was full of cat hair.

Chat rooms are like casinos. You're going to lose money, or in the case of a chat room, self-respect. Eventually, the house is going to win because the house always wins. Chat rooms exist in houses of lies. But in the end, you had a good time. So enjoy chat rooms for what they are, not what you hope they are.