Date 175

"This town has dragged you down."

Geordies (me) historically don't mix well with mackems (people from Sunderland). However, as I'd never been out with a mackem before, I decided to put it to the test and go against my gut feeling and Newcastle upbringing.

I, again, travelled to London to meet her and she told me that she sounded like infamous mackem Lauren Laverne. I had my doubts though as Ms Laverne in reality, has a very obvious Geordie accent, and my date sounded neither Tyne nor Wear. I couldn't quite pick it, but she sounded more Yorkshire.

I have to confess that she beared an uncanny resemblance to someone I dated for a few months last year, which was unrequited and...is it a bit weird that that was a contributing factor in me wanting to meet her?!

As it turned out, in person, I found her a bit obnoxious and cold. She didn't really have any interest in finding out about me and it was difficult to get a word in due to her telling me about all the famous people she knew. 

I should have listened to Ant 'n' Dec.

Date 66

"Still I must speak frankly, Mr Shankly. Oh, give us your money."

I'd been holding off writing this blog entry for quite a while now as I genuinely thought that there was going to be a third date, but sadly I've come to the conclusion that I've been taken for a bit of a ride by her.

She'd initially winked at me on Match.com, which is quite a rarity as no-one really looks at my profile, although funnily enough this only happens when I have an active subscription because when I'm not a fully paid up member my profile gets upwards of 20 views a day....what a coincidence, I wonder what that's about. So, I sent her a message as she looked and sounded great, and she replied. We exchanged a few lengthy emails as we had quite a lot in common, then they just stopped. I thought that I must have bored her until I finally got an apologetic message from her about a month later saying she'd been busy with work and she'd been abroad for business a lot so hadn't had time to reply, and she asked me if I fancied going for a drink.

So, we met up at the BFI on SouthBank (a particular fave bar of mine) and had a wonderful evening as we just clicked straight away. She'd studied at Newcastle University (I'm a Geordie by birth and lived there util I was 16), she'd been a season ticket holder at Crystal Palace since she was 15 and as we were the same age, we had a lot of similar reference points in terms of music, film tv etc., so we had absolutely loads to talk about. I've never had a type of woman that I look for but out of all the dates I've met so far she seemed to be one that ticked all the boxes.

A couple of days later I messaged her asking if she'd like to go on a second date and a week or so later she replied in the affirmative saying that she'd had a really great time and that she really wanted to see me again. The only thing was, as she was busy with work, the only available time to see me was for a gig she had a spare ticket for. The band in question were The Drums (more about them later), and ordinarily if it had been anyone else I would have politely declined the offer, but I really wanted to see her again, and she apparently wanted to see me again too, so I accepted her offer.

By this time I'd come to realise that she was really slow in replying to emails (often taking between 1 and 3 weeks) and in between dates we barely had any contact. However, I actually think that this is a good thing as when you're in constant contact with someone from a dating website then you get used to always hearing from them and you probably think that you know them better than you actually do, and then when they don't want to see you again it's always a bit harder to take when all contact just stops.

So, we met for round 2 a few weeks later with both dates taking place either side of my brief dalliance with Date 67. We had a quick bite to eat at Wagamamas in Camden, then made our way to The Roundhouse, which was incidentally my first visit there. I'd purposely not done any research on The Drums as I knew that they wouldn't be my cup of tea and one of my friends had described them as being vanilla dull...and she wasn't wrong! I was also a bit surprised that I had to pay full whack for my ticket as well as she hadn't mentioned that beforehand. I'm not sure about the etiquette of going to a gig of a band that you have no interest in on a second date, but if it had been a gig that I'd wanted a date to go with me to, then I wouldn't have expected them to pay for it, particularly if I knew that it wasn't a band that they had any knowledge of.

As I knew nothing about them, I had no expectations, therefore, I wasn't going to be disappointed, but I couldn't not be as they were the most blandest and unimaginative alleged set of musicians that I'd ever laid eyes on. I went on a bit of a rant about Elbow in Date 65's blog entry, but I'd rather go and see them any day of the week than these set of soporific sell-outs. Aside from them being so boring though, the weirdest part of the night was when Boy George stumbled onto stage mid-set. He then proceeded to sing one of their songs with them then they all did a rendition of 'Do You Really Want to Hurt Me,' in which my reply was 'yes, I do really want to hurt The Drums....a lot.' At least I was familiar with one song then.

That's not to say that I didn't enjoy seeing Date 66, but as we were there for 2 or 3 hours including the support act too, the loud music meant that we couldn't exactly converse with one another for most of the night. A few friends said that I shouldn't have gone but as she'd made it clear that she wanted to see me again I thought that I had to show willing and that hopefully it would give me some brownie points and that I'd see her again. And it's not as though I went into a sulk while I was there as I made the best possible effort of looking like I was having a fun time.

As we were waiting for the tube home, I gave her my email address, as my Match.com subscription was about to expire, and as the next day she was about to embark on lots more travelling abroad over the next couple of months, she said that she'd mail me when she was away.

A couple of weeks later and I'd not heard anything from her, which wasn't unusual, but there was a gig that I was interested in going to and as I didn't have her email address, I texted her to see if she wanted to go and see Kate Jackson (former Long Blonde lead singer) at the end of March. She replied a few days later from New York and said she couldn't as she'd be in Amsterdam then. We exchanged a couple more texts and I suggested that maybe we could meet up once she was travel free. She didn't reply and I never heard from her again.

This was a real shame as we'd got on exceptionally well on the first date and I was quite excited beforehand for the next one as I hadn't been on a second date for well over 18 months. However, in retrospect, I think that she just needed someone to pay for her spare ticket and accompany her to the gig and I was the sucker that obliged. Still, at least I was able to fulfil a life long ambition of seeing Culture Club's lead singer in the flesh...

UPDATE: About 6 weeks after our last bit of contact, I thought that I'd text her again and see if she fancied going for another drink. She responded a few days later and basically said that she was too busy to see me again so I didn't reply and deleted her number from my phone.

Date 65

"Death At One's Elbow."

As mentioned in the previous 2 blog entries, during a 3 day free trial with match.com I had sent messages to 6 women and not received a reply from any of them. Well, about a month later one of them did reply.

After exchanging a fair few emails I decided to ask her out for a drink and she accepted. We had a few things in common such as sharing the same birthplace (Newcastle upon Tyne) and both supporting the same football team (Newcastle United of course), so plenty to talk about, one would have thought.

Sadly, the date turned out to be excruciating in terms of making conversation. I think that I may have even just started making things up to avoid the awkward and painful silences. She was 8 years older than me and very attractive, but completely humourless and a bit up her own arse. Normally, these uncomfortable dates only last a couple of drinks, but this one lasted 4, so I think she really just wanted a drinking buddy for the evening as she didn't hide the fact that she thought that my banter was bobbins.

As a footnote to the evening, I'd like to point out that I'm a huge music fan, and whilst most of the bands that I love are relatively obscure, I do have quite varied tastes. I can be a bit of a music snob at times, however, I also have plenty of guilty pleasures which I daren't mention here and if I genuinely like the sound of a song then it doesn't matter who it is by. I do also think though that you can really tell a lot about the personalities of people by their tastes in music. A case in point would be the band Elbow (see also U2, Snow Patrol, Kasabian, Oasis, Coldplay, Blur, Stereophonics, Muse etc.). This will probably upset a lot of people, but they really are one of my pet hates. They're quite clearly nice guys and have done well for themselves of late after so many years of being in the music wilderness; but to me they are blandness personified. And they can in no way be defined as alternative or exciting. Date 65's favourite band of all time are Elbow, and to paraphrase one of my friends: it's ok to like them but you just can't have them as your favourite band as that just shows a lack of imagination. She was also a huge James Morrisson fan too, so I rest my case. Rant over. This of course doesn't make her a bad person though, but is merely an observation.

Anyway, as the date came to a close, the finale amused me somewhat. As I was going back to Waterloo to catch the train home, I asked her if she was going there too and she was, so we started walking back together. However, half way there, she suddenly, without warning, sprinted off in the direction of a cab, told me it was nice to meet me, jumped in and then sped off into the gloom. A fitting end I thought!

Date 38

"Bigmouth strikes again."

A really great evening and I'm still struggling to comprehend why it ended so badly.

I had a lot in common with this Blackpool lass and I was very attracted to her as well, which is always a bonus. We had very similar music tastes and she'd just moved down to London after living in Newcastle for the last few years so there was plenty to talk about.

The evening got off to an amusing start when I found us some seats in a really busy bar. We were happily enjoying our pints, when after a while a guy leaned over to her and said 'I've just seen Bob (I can't remember what his real name was) arrive. Pass it along the line as we need to sing him happy birthday.' She just looked at him with a blank expression and said: 'who's Bob?' He then got quite annoyed and informed us that we were sitting in reserved seats for a birthday party. She asked him if he wanted us to move and with a very deadpan expression he looked at her solemnly and said 'yes.' We stayed in our seats for another 5 minutes or so out of principle then we upped and left when I spied some nice armchairs for us so we could go and laugh at our minor indiscretion and sit and speculate as to which person at the bar was the legendary yet enigmatic Bob.

We then went for a meal and continued drinking late into the night. I really enjoyed the evening and she was hilarious despite me being the butt of every joke, and everything so far had gone very well until we got to the station. I then made the fatal error of having the absolute audacity of telling there that I'd had a great time and would like to see her again and would she like to do the same. Her face then turned to thunder. She looked at me with complete contempt and accused me of taking things too seriously. Being slightly taken aback I told her that I was just laying my cards on the table in saying that I 'd be really happy to do it again. She then intimated that I was a weirdo and stormed off. Which was a shame as I was just about to ask her to marry me.

I felt awful all the way home and even worse the next morning as I'd really enjoyed her company and I felt I'd completely blown everything by being honest and not playing by the rule book of Swingers by saying nothing then contacting her three days later. That would have been money. As it turned out I mailed her a week later, as it's possible I'd imagined the whole thing, and told her I'd enjoyed our date and would she like to hook up again. She never replied.