Date 128

"Ice water for blood."

This turned out to be my last dalliance on GSM before my subscription ran out, and in retrospect I wish I hadn't bothered as it turned out to be a waste of my valuable time.

We didn't live near each other as she was in Surrey and there was also the fact that she was tee-total so we couldn't meet for a quick drink. This wasn't a problem and when I asked why she didn't drink, she said she just didn't need to. I, therefore, had to be a bit creative, so I suggested that we meet at Kings Cross, go for a coffee and then pay a visit to the Wellcome Collection as there was an exhibition on there called Bedlam: the asylum and beyond, which she and I agreed sounded really interesting.

This was also not going to be for a few weeks as we could only meet on a Saturday and we both had plans for quite a few. In the weeks leading up to it though we were in regular contact and a couple of nights before I relayed the plan and it was set in place. I was really looking forward to it but on the night before we were due to meet she asked if we could postpone! She claimed she had some work to do which would take her all afternoon, and said we could meet for a quick coffee in East Croydon instead. I rejected this idea as it would have taken me a couple of hours to get to Croydon, whereas she was only about 20 minutes away. I was really pissed off that she cancelled at the last minute and I suspect that she got a better offer. She did say we could meet properly in a couple of weeks and, despite my misgivings, I said yes, as I always like to give people another chance.

When organising our date she said she could meet me at 2pm but when I suggested we could have lunch, she said it was too late for her to eat, so she ate beforehand which I didn't really understand as surely she could have moved the time to an earlier one. On the way to see her, I was nervous and excited, which were emotions that I'd not felt for a while, but these became dulled a bit when she was late and I had to go looking for her as she didn't know where our rendezvous point was. When I did locate her she looked like she'd just got up out of bed a few minutes before. I don't expect my dates to wear ball gowns but I always make an effort with my appearance, but she looked more like she was popping out to the corner shop for a pint of milk.

She then didn't want to go to the coffee shop I'd chosen as there was a small queue so we ended up going to a Costa. We only spent about 15 minutes in there then made our way to the exhibition, which was nearby. Once inside she then fucked off and went round the whole place ON HER OWN. ON A DATE!!!! I couldn't believe it. If you're with friends then doing that is acceptable but not when you've just met up with a potential suitor. I sort of did that too but kept making a beeline for her to make conversation but she was in her own world. She then sat down to watch a video on a loop for 20 minutes or so. This really took the piss as while she was doing that I went round the rest of the place and kept going back to her and she was still sitting there. I did this several times and each time I went back there were different people sitting next to her every time.

When she was finally finished with her viewing entertainment she then went round to the finish while I hovered about. Afterwards we went upstairs to look at another floor of a different exhibit and she did the same thing! After a while I said I was really thirsty and suggested we go the cafe downstairs as for some reason I wanted to get to know her properly as apparently we were on a first date.

Whilst sipping our cans of coke in the cafe I decided to quiz her on her no drinking lifestyle. She claimed that she just wasn't fond of alcohol and it just wasn't her thing. I then jokingly said "oh well, at least you're not a recovering alcoholic." She then looked at me in a very strange way and said nothing. After a short silence she confessed to actually being a recovering alcoholic and that she'd not had a drink for 16 years. She'd also been in rehab and had regularly gone to AA meetings. This didn't really bother me at all, and I was sympathetic and tried to make the best of an awkward situation. She then announced that she was meeting friends for dinner and we made our way to Victoria together and departed on our separate journeys home.

To me, the negatives outweighed the positives on this date. To be honest, I didn't find her very friendly and I'm not sure she showed much interest in finding out about me. I also felt that I'd gone to a lot of effort in arranging the date and it also took me about 3 hours to get there. I also felt a bit short-changed as we'd barely had time to speak after her solo voyage round the museum. I was certainly attracted to her and I found her intriguing and wanted to find out more about her, so I messaged her the next day about meeting up again. This is the response that I received back from her:

We barely spoke so I'm not sure where she got her information from regarding my expectations and situation. I expected her to say no and, thinking back, I think that I mistook her mysteriousness for aloofness.