Date 172

"I never talk to my neighbour."

An odd thing happened at the beginning of our first date. She turned up a bit late and said that she could only stay for a little while as she was a stand-up comedian and she'd just received a call to say that she had a gig, which she had forgotten about. She seemed really nice and we had a couple of drinks.

I did, however, think that this was an elaborate ruse as she'd never mentioned before that she was a comedian. And when I asked her about contacting her about a second date she said that just after she'd been reminded about her gig, she dropped her phone down the toilet and it was drying off at home in a bowl of rice...

Bizarrely though, when I got home I did some detective work and she is a stand-up comedian, and a funny one at that. The story about her phone was also true as when she'd got a new one, she texted me and we made plans for a second date.

Although we both live in Brighton, I was in London for a couple of days and she met me at the Southbank as I had tickets for BUG with Adam Buxton, and we also had dinner at Ping Pong. It was a really enjoyable night, but it was evident that there was no chemistry between us.

I moved a couple of weeks ago and I now live a couple of streets away from her, so she came round for coffee to check out my new gaff. Thankfully she liked it but I don't think she'll be dropping by anytime soon to borrow some sugar. I also went for a walk with her along the seafront and she told me that she'd recently not turned up for a date as she forgot, but essentially blamed it on the poor guy as he hadn't reminded her...despite him remembering to be there.

Date 166

"Her skirt ascends for a watching eye."

London was my destination again, but as she lived in Kent it was halfway for both us and it was also a really good first date. Things had gone really fast as we'd only been chatting for about a day when she asked if we could meet and we did a couple of days later after a lot of texting.

I really fancied her straight away, although at one point I thought she'd done a runner as she went to the bar and took her coat and bag and 15 minutes later she hadn't returned. She then reappeared and said there'd been an accident behind the bar in which a load of glasses had been dropped. The bar staff initially had told her to wait but eventually suggested she use a different bar, which was when she came running out to ease my abandonment fears as she was worried that I thought she had left me. During her bar wait an odd man came up to her to ask how long she'd been waiting...hold that thought.

After having a few more drinks at one of the BFI's other bars we made our way out to get something to eat and a man came running after us shouting: "Daleks! Daleks!" We all just looked at each other for a few seconds and he said we looked like two people he'd seen watching a Dr Who film that had just been shown. And yes, he was also the odd man who'd been talking to her at the bar. He walked off in a very disappointed manner and we just had a bit of a giggle, whilst making our way to Ping Pong, which pretty much blew her away.

After a bit of a snog at Victoria Station we made our separate ways home. Although we'd got on really well I wasn't sure how much she liked me. However, over the next week we texted constantly and she even rang me up a few times for a chat. Due to childcare responsibilities she only had every other weekend and Wednesdays free so we couldn't see each other for 10 days as the following Saturday night she was seeing Bon Jovi...well, no-one's perfect.

It was great being in so much contact and she'd always tell me how my texts always made her smile and laugh and we shared a very similar dark sense of humour.

On her next free Wednesday we met in London again and I took her to a really posh French steak restaurant in Soho, which she loved. She looked beautiful too (which I told her) and said that she was going to wear a very sexy outfit but decided against it due to the unseasonal gale force winds...damn the weather!

After the meal we went to the pub next door and pretty much snogged the whole time and did so back at Victoria Station. Things seemed to be going well.

The next night I went into London again with a Brighton friend to see Adam Buxton's BUG so I told her all about my last couple of dates with the Kent lady. Just before I'd met my friend, I'd received a text from my date asking what I was up to and asking about my day.

On the way home I hadn't heard from her again in response, and it was quite late at night. She was still online, which was unusual for her as she normally went to bed early. She hadn't replied to my text though and was quite vague when I sent her another one. Though nothing was obviously wrong, I had a bad feeling. The sort you get when you've had a lot of contact with someone and you get used to their habits and nuances.

I then didn't hear from her for the next three days. This was extremely unusual and I feared the worst. I knew what was coming but I waited to see if she got in touch with me.

On our dates she'd told me some interesting stories about her marriage and previous relationships. Apparently her ex-husband had been very controlling and it sounded like it hadn't been a happy one for a while, but she was shocked when he asked for a divorce. Another recent relationship she'd been in was with a cocaine addict. Initially she'd get worried and paranoid if she hadn't heard from him for 12 hours. Then he'd go missing for days and he eventually confessed that he'd been on cocaine binges with prostitutes, however, he convinced her that he'd just take drugs with them and nothing else, which she believed. She kept giving him chances but he'd keep go missing again and finally admitted that he'd also been having sex with the hookers. This is when she broke things off.

After feeling quite sad from not hearing from her for a few days I texted to see if everything was ok. She replied instantly and said they were but she'd been too busy to text me. I then asked if everything was ok between us and she said no. She said that I made her smile and laugh and that she wanted there to be fireworks and that I wasn't her 'forever guy.' I said that's fine but we'd had two really good dates and that it was pretty uncool to just not to say anything. She apologised and said our chats and dates had been great and she should have said something. I asked her what she wanted to do and she said call it a day and I agreed and that was that. Everything was amicable but I shouldn't have had to have contacted her for the privilege of finding out that I'd been dumped. I was also very confused as to how she'd gone off me so quickly.

I was deeply disappointed but 'drowned my sorrows' by scoring some coke and partying with some escorts.

Date 104

"No hope, no harm. Just another false alarm."

I knew as soon as I first laid eyes on this Jersey Lady in the flesh that we were going to get on, and it also helped that she was beautiful. We started messaging each other through Match and agreed to a date fairly quickly. There was a slight logistical problem, in that she lived in North London whereas I'm in Brighton now, but I just happened to be staying in the big smoke for a couple of days and she happened to be off for the week when I was going to be there, so that worked out perfectly.

We met in an old favourite of mine: the Benugo Bar at the BFI along the South Bank and we instantly clicked. We got fairly tipsy but after about 4 hours she had to go and meet a friend for dinner so I walked her to the restaurant she was going to and then I went off and had a meal on my own. Before we went our separate ways though, she said that she wanted to see me again.

For our second date she wanted to come to Brighton so I made arrangements to meet her at the station. Unbeknownst to us at the time, the Saturday that we were meeting on was Brighton Pride. If I didn't know beforehand then I knew when I got into the centre. When I got into town I just couldn't move as the whole place was completely rammed and I couldn't get to the station as the parade was taking place. She called me to say that her train had got in so in the end I had to run in front of a float and dive through the crowd on the other side and hotfoot it to meet her. From then on we went from pub to pub and had a couple of meals. We also had our first snog, in the queue for a cash-point, which I was told at a later date was a very disappointing first kiss. We had an amazing day and watched the sun go down on the beach. It was nearly time for her to go home and I just didn't want the day to end so I asked her if she wanted to come back to mine. She shared the same sentiments as me and agreed. By this time we were more than merry and made a schoolboy/girl error of opening a bottle of wine when we arrived back at my house...I wish we'd had a cup of tea.

We managed to have sex during the night but when she woke up the next morning she had the Hangover from Hell. She couldn't get up as she felt so sick and had a throbbing headache but she had to get home to London. I live out in the sticks so I'm not really that near the station and I couldn't drive her as although I didn't really have a hangover; I still felt drunk so I didn't want to take the car. I said I'd pay for a taxi for her but she refused and so I walked her into my village and put her on a bus to the centre. I don't know how she made it home without throwing up but thankfully she was ok, despite it taking her over 2 hours to get home by bus, train and tube!

Afterwards we both admitted that her coming back to mine probably shouldn't have happened, mainly because she was such a nauseous waker, but we were getting on so well that it seemed a good idea at the time...The next couple of dates involved me going to London for the day and then her coming back to Brighton again on another weekend, and on both occasions we went home alone at the end of the evening as, despite the fact we were talking on the phone every week and texting every day, we wanted to take things slowly.

By this time we'd been going out for a couple of months and I was due to be staying in London again for a few days. I was going to see Morrissey in Hammersmith so I stayed at a hotel about 20 minutes walk from the venue.

I enjoyed it a lot but I was looking forward to the next night as we were going to be seeing each other again. I met her after work the next day and we went out for dinner and then went back to my hotel where we slept together for only the second time. She took the next day off work and didn't end up going home until 10:30pm the next night as we mostly spent the day in bed, only surfacing for food.

During the next few days she appeared very distant and vague, and so finally I asked her what was up. She rang me that night and said she wasn't feeling it and that us living too far away was a problem. We had a very frank discussion and by the end of it she admitted that she'd just been over-thinking things and that she wished she hadn't said anything to me as she wanted to keep seeing me. Things then seemed back on track again.

She was due to see me a couple of weeks later in Brighton, but due to engineering works we met in Littlehampton and I treated her to a Birthday celebration. I booked a table at the below restaurant, which was on the seafront and bought her dinner.

The food was beautiful and we had a long walk along the beach afterwards...again watching the sun go down. It was very romantic and the only downside to the day was that one of the presents that I bought her was the Spaced boxset, which she hated when she saw it. I thought it was a good neutral comedy to buy but I should have known it wouldn't be up her street as she's a big Miranda fan. Besides that, things appeared to be going really well again.

A couple of weeks later she accompanied me to one of my closest friend's 40th Birthday at a pub in Notting Hill where she met some of my best friends. It was lovely being there with her and I felt so proud when introducing her to people. I stayed over at her flat for the first time and she made me a roast dinner the next day, which was restaurant standard and I went back to Brighton in the evening. The only problem was my snoring, however, which meant I was banished to her spare-room half-way through the night.

We didn't see each other again for a good few weeks due to both of us being busy but to make up for it we planned to spend 3 nights together! It would be the most time we'd so far spent with each other and we were both giddy with excitement in the days leading up to it, even going so far as to text each other how many sleeps we had left each day. We'd been getting on brilliantly and were face-timing as much as we could and we could just talk about anything with each other and were never lost of words.

The weekend came and she journeyed down to meet me in Brighton on the Friday afternoon as she had taken the day off and fancied a jaunt away from London. I'd booked a table for dinner in the evening and then we headed back to her flat in North London afterwards, where I again had to relocate to the spare-room after she'd had her wicked way with me. The next evening I'd bought us tickets to see my favourite comedian, Adam Buxton, in Islington and it was quite a fun night as there were other acts on too.

The next day, after sleeping in the spare-room again, we went out for further adventures as she'd bought us tickets to The Crime Uncovered Exhibition at the Museum of London. It was fascinating and a subject I'm really interested in, having just completed a course in Forensic Psychology. She seemed a bit grumpy, but I thought that that was just her as in all the time we'd known each other she was grumpy EVERY morning. That evening I was going to see Garbage at Brixton Academy with two other friends of mine. I'd bought the tickets months ago but she still wanted me to stay at hers even though she had work the next day and so I made my way to the venue on my own. It was really enjoyable and I didn't end up getting back to hers until nearly midnight. We tried sleeping together again but my nasal antics woke her up so I volunteered to take the sofa as I wanted her to feel refreshed for work. I couldn't have the spare-room as she was having a lodger move in the next day and the room was newly-prepared for him. The next morning we said our goodbyes as she went to work and I went back to Brighton a couple of hours later.

That was the Monday and on the Tuesday our relationship was over. She'd started being a bit distant again so I knew what she was thinking. I again asked her what was going on and she said she'd ring me that night. I knew what was coming and waited until the evening when I got a text late saying could she ring me the next night as she was really tired. I said no, so she reluctantly face-timed me and told me she wasn't feeling it and that my snoring and the distance was a problem. I tried to hold it together but I cried a bit, which made things a bit awkward as she started crying and abruptly finished the call.

I was really upset but not entirely surprised as I'd been paranoid ever since she'd said she wasn't feeling it the first time round. We didn't have anything in common whatsoever, in terms of music, film, tv etc. however we just got on and I'd always told her that this was a good sign as we didn't need to have common ground.

A week later I'd heard nothing more but I couldn't get her out of my head so I texted her to tell her that I missed her. She replied and said she was sorry and that she cared about my well-being but she had to be true to me. We then face-timed a again a few days later and we spoke through things for a good hour and a half. She said the snoring and distance weren't really the problem but she stopped feeling it for me halfway through our weekend together and became irritated by me being there and she couldn't stop herself snapping at me (this is exactly what happened to me with Date 99 when we had our ill-fated trip to New York). I asked her if we could try and work things out and she said although she'd missed our texts and being in touch she hadn't actually missed me and had just been getting on with things. We both started to cry at various points and she had to go off for a few minutes on one occasion as she said she couldn't bare to see me upset. However, we still shared the odd laugh and I'm very grateful for her to have the balls to explain to me what went wrong. I knew there was no going back which gave me closure and we both agreed to cease all contact with each other. She blew a kiss at me and then that was that.

She assured me that it wasn't anything that I'd said or done, which I think is true but I still don't how you can be excited to see someone one day then go off them over night. She would often tell me that in between us seeing each other she would wish her life away as she just wanted to be with me and I felt the same. To me the distance didn't matter either as I felt that it meant we'd always make the most of our dalliances together and they'd always be special. Whilst I have my imperfections, she wasn't Mary Poppins herself. She drank a lot, was a real party girl and would ring me so drunk I couldn't work out what she was saying sometimes and I was once woken up by her at 2am one night as she was crying in a taxi because she was so pissed. Her grumpiness was a pain sometimes but I just accepted these things as I really liked everything about her and I'm a very tolerant and easy-going person. She broke my tiny heart but I just think she doesn't know what she wants and I wonder if she's looking for something that doesn't exist. I wasn't experiencing the initial butterflies I used to get when I saw her but I still loved being with her and I still got excited when I was due to meet her. Doesn't that just happen over time?

I will remember our time together fondly though and I respect her decision totally.

Date 75

"Money Changes Everything."

My third and final date using Lovestruck and I was glad to delete my profile when my 3 month subscription ended. Any replies to messages or profile views from other members ended after about 2 weeks of being on there so I really didn't get my money's worth.

I contacted this person within the first few days of being on the site and she very quickly gave me her phone number...without me even asking for it. So, very soon we agreed to meet in Richmond at 4pm one Saturday afternoon. It went very well and we got on splendidly, although she really hit the red wine and even after eating at a restaurant, she peaked too early and we had to call it a night at about 8pm as she was very merry.

I was very keen to see her again so I texted her a day or so later and asked her if she wanted to go to the flicks. I won't say which film as I'll just be laughed at, but she said yes and seemed very excited. Although, probably by the film I'd suggested rather than seeing me again. Apart from the fact that the cinema's heating had broken down and it was -2 outside, thus forcing us to don scarves and gloves half way through, the film was decent...and ok, I'll give you a clue what we saw: I'm Team Edward all the way. Afterwards she asked me to walk her back to her car which was about 10 minutes away and she then gave me a lift back to near my bus stop, although I had to suddenly jump out at some traffic lights which was a bit of an abrupt end to the evening as I barely could say goodbye and I didn't have a clue how the evening had gone.

I heard from her briefly over Christmas but then the trail went dead. As luck would have it though, I managed to acquire a couple of tickets for my beloved BUG at the BFI (hosted by Adam Buxton). I hadn't been for a year as tickets are like gold dust, but for some bizarre reason there were still a few for sale which is extremely rare as it's almost always sold out very quickly. I'd found out on our first date that she was a big fan of Mr Buxton, although she'd never heard of, let alone been to BUG which I was amazed at. So, although, I hadn't bought them especially for her, I told her that I had a spare and she jumped at the chance.

As it turned out, it was the best BUG I'd been to for ages and some of it was so funny that I couldn't breathe as I was laughing so much. She really enjoyed it too. However, afterwards we had a few drinks and she never once offered to pay for her ticket or buy me drinks. I couldn't obviously ask her for the money and while they were only £15, to me that's just a bit rude, is it not?

Although I got a text from her to thank me for the evening later on, I've not heard from her since so I'm just going to leave it as I actually can't be bothered to chase her. Whilst we got on well, I felt that she wasn't really putting any effort into things as I'd chosen the venues for each date and I still feel her not offering to pay for BUG was a little bit naughty. The fact that she was a smoker also bothered me a little bit too. I stopped smoking almost 4 months ago and it's still a real struggle for me. I realise it's completely hypocritical of me but having to sit out in the freezing cold while she smoked fag after fag before BUG was really unbearable, and maybe I'm better off without the temptation.

Date 61

"Let me get my hands on your mammary glands."

As I'd alluded to in the previous entry, I was intrigued by all the furore surrounding the re-vamp of Guardian Soulmates, so curiosity got the better of me and I signed up again after my self-imposed exile of a couple of years. In retrospect, I wish that I hadn't.

For a number of years GSM was universally thought of as the most popular dating website around in terms of its layout, search engine, messaging facilities and the people on it. In this respect, one would normally go with the old adage of if it ain't broke then don't fix it, however, it appears that the good people behind the site decided to have the fantastic idea of going a bit leftfield and removing all the good features which made it popular and thus forcing people away in their droves.

The main problem seems to be that the company who designed and maintained the original site have been jettisoned, I think, in favour of The Guardian now doing it in-house. This may seem sensible in terms of a cost-cutting exercise due to the uncertain economic times at present, however, I can't see how this would be the case by the fact that the subscription charges are now higher than ever, so I have no idea where all the money is going as it's certainly not being used to develop or improve the site. Although The Guardian acknowledged that they made mistakes during the re-vamp in April 2011 by offering refunds to subscribing members at the time, they've not addressed any of the criticisms or rectified any of the poor features almost 9 months later.

The original site, while not completely aesthetically pleasing, had a simple but effective appearance to it but now it just looks cheap and generic. One of the best features which has been removed was the previous ability to be able to send one line replies to people . The most useful aspect of this was that you could let people know that you didn't have a subscription or that you weren't interested, however, now you have no idea whether people are being rude in not replying or they're just not signed up and are unable to respond. A lot of my messages to girls were ignored, and while it could be the case that I've lost my touch and people just didn't like the look and sound of me, which is not the site's fault, not knowing if they had a subscription or not doesn't help matters.

Another big grumble I have is also the inability to delete profiles from searches. This is particularly annoying when all the people whom you've messaged and haven't replied still keep coming up and clogging up searches. The profile page information itself has also been cut down, so now it's really difficult to gauge what people are like as profiles now contain the briefest of details.

Compared to the success I'd had in the past of going on a quite a few dates, this time around I was limited to just two in three months. I'm not sure if that's down to the site's re-vamp, whether subscriptions are vastly down or whether the people on GSM are now just a different demographic. The majority of messages I sent were ignored and if I was 'lucky' enough to get a reply then they would ignore my follow-up, which is a very common part of dating sites now. This is probably due to the over-saturation of members or just the death knell of manners.

Anyway, to date 61 itself. I'd messaged her first and after a couple of emails she asked me out for a drink. She was 5 years older than me, very attractive, very interesting and I really fancied her. We got on well enough and we had loads in common in terms of music and films, however, by the end of the evening I could tell she was a bit bored as when I suggested we get something to eat she said she was tired and wanted to go home. I still thought I'd email her about another date and to no great surprise she asked if we could just be friends. We've seen each other three times since, which has included going to the cinema to see The Guard (an absolute gem and my film of the year so far) and attending BUG at the BFI twice. We do get on well when we hook up, although I do wonder if she stays in contact purely so she can join myself and my friends for Adam Buxton's marvellous video showcase as I never hear from her besides BUG .

UPDATE: I met up with her again last night (May 2012) in Camden to see Avengers Assemble and a really bizarre thing happened. I'd texted her a week or so ago to arrange it but when we met up she got the shock of her life as she'd been under the impression that she'd been texting and was due to meet up with another friend of hers who happens to have the same first name as me (technically my name is spelt slightly differently). When she first saw me, she was in absolute shock and asked me what I was doing there and said she wasn't meant to be meeting me tonight! She then went into a panic and a state of mass confusion and I was just standing there not knowing what the hell to say. I actually felt like just going home as she didn't hide her disappointment that it was me who had turned up. As we'd agreed to meet for food first of all we went in the restaurant eventually and I've never felt so awkward in my life and she was also quite concerned that the other guy was going to turn up...he obviously didn't. We then went to see the film, which was good but don't believe the hype, and she apologised profusely afterwards. She also said she couldn't find her other friend's number in her phone and said that she must have deleted it which led me to assume that she'd removed his number thinking it was mine. Needless to say, I won't be contacting her again as this was actually the 4th or 5th time that we'd met after our first date as to say that I felt uncomfortable all night was an understatement.

UPDATE: Despite vowing to never have anything more to do with her, some months later I randomly bumped into her on a night out in Camden when I was out with a couple of friends. She joined us for the rest of the evening and was actually very good company. Since then we've actually become fairly regular cinema buddies and we do get on pretty well. However, I always let her contact me first as I still feel uneasy about her not knowing who I was! And, in fairness to her she has since told me that she's still embarrassed by what happened.

Date 46

"Coyness is nice."

This 'coy' lass from Billingham is by far the closest friend I have made from my many forays into internet dating. We're still very much in contact and see each other on a fairly regular basis, mainly to stalk the wonderful Adam Buxton at BUG from the front row, which he hosts at the BFI every couple of months. The great man himself even commented at one of the November 2010 shows how we both looked very cool in our almost matching thick, black rimmed glasses; so he's clearly on to us.

After a number of very enjoyable dates, I decided that we'd be better off as friends and we still get on really well almost 2 years later.

Probably the most explosive and entertaining incident to occur during one of our dates happened one evening when we were sitting outside a bar on Charing Cross Road having a drink and a smoke on an absolutely freezing cold night. We were deep in conversation when a severely pissed up city boy/Essex lad, not very resplendent in a grey suit and matching waistcoat, and heavily resembling the maverick snooker player Ronnie O'Sullivan, launched himself at our table to acquire a lighter without so much as a please or thank you. We just stared at him as he tried to light his cigarette without any luck, then forcibly tossed said lighter back onto our table claiming it was broken. He then walked off and I breathed a sigh of relief only for my companion to shout back at him that his flies were undone, which they actually were. He then stormed back to our table demanding a working cigarette lighter, and then grabbed my ladyfriend's bag on his ultimately fruitless quest for a tiny, hand-held flame. A very minor struggle ensued and when he'd realised that he wasn't going to get what he wanted, he proceeded to clear our table by smashing our drinks and ash tray onto the ground. Then, to top things off he drunkenly stumbled off up the street shouting back at me over and over that I was a fucking c*nt, which I was simply aghast at, having not said a word to him during the whole altercation! If only he'd taken the time to get to know me better.