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 64

"I swear to God, I swear I never even knew what drugs were."

You know that weird time period between Christmas and New Year when you just feel in complete limbo, and time just seems to stop; especially when you're not at work? Well, that's what I blame for selling my soul to the devil again and going back onto match.com. Despite vowing never to go back to the dark side after my experience with Date 55 in particular, and not getting any replies from 6 women after my free 3 day trial (which I previously mentioned during Date 63's entry); I was offered 2 months for the price of 1 and boredom, curiosity and an unexplainable feeling of impending doom with 2012 fast approaching led me to sign up again.

So, to my first date of 2012. The world hadn't ended and I was actually surprised that this person responded to my message as she was an absolute stunner. Obviously, I'm not shallow enough to just make contact with women due to their looks as their profile and interests have to engage me too, but despite what anyone says, it's only human nature to be drawn to the pictures first, and that is exactly how dating sites are designed to draw you in as the picture of the person is the focal point of the profile. Conversely, there are lots that I'll click on due to their pleasing aesthetic qualities that simply bore me to tears.

The lady in question was Australian, 4 years older than me and as it happened she was back home down under for Christmas and New Year when our messaging took place, ah, the marvels of the internet. We seemed to have a few things in common, mainly to do with music and she came across as quite witty, which is always a good start, and after several emails she asked if I'd like to meet up once she was back in the UK, to which I replied in the affirmative.

Every time I've met someone for a date, it has always been for a drink or a coffee, but on this occasion she was quite adamant that it had to be dinner, and even when I suggested we could have a swift half at a bar nearby beforehand she was having none of it. She must have been absolutely ravenous.

So, we met in a restaurant along the SouthBank. Although it was quiet, I wasn't quite sure it was her at first so didn't go over to her initially as I wasn't convinced it was her. Although I found her attractive, her profile pictures looked to be from about 5 years ago, so she could have been extremely photogenic, a whizz on Photoshop or perhaps she'd just experienced a particularly hard day at work. I found this quite interesting though, as during the date she told me that one of her pet hates was people putting out of date pictures on their dating profiles...

After exchanging a few pleasantries and ordering a bottle of red wine and food, my opening line was to ask her why she'd decided to come and live in London. Quick as a flash she replied that it was because drugs were cheaper over here. I actually thought she was joking but as it turned out, every anecdote or reference was about drugs for most of the night. I'm certainly not averse to drug use as I dabbled in my youth and I'm certainly someone who believes in each to their own, but when a 39 year old admits to you that they have to smoke a spliff a day then I find that a little unusual considering I grew out of that sort of thing in my 20's.

We got on well though as she was really funny and full of good stories, but the date only lasted as long as the meal as she said she had to be up early the next morning for her job in finance. We went our separate ways at Waterloo station and I never heard from her again. By the same token though, I didn't contact her either purely because I've become a bit sick of either being ignored when I enquire about second dates or receiving arsey replies, so I decided to go with a new strategy and wait for her to contact me. She obviously didn't and although I would have been quite happy to see her again, I wasn't particularly disappointed as I didn't think she was that into me anyway. Although, having said that, I've given up trying to read signals on dates so I could have been wrong and she could have been waiting by her laptop or phone for weeks, weeping and wondering why I hadn't been in touch.

Date 63

"Oh, there's more to life than books you know."

My most barren year yet since I started being properly pro-active on my internet dating adventures, with only 5 dates to speak of; and none of them led to a second date. It definitely hasn't been through a lack of effort on my part, but no-one seems to reply to me anymore regardless of what site I'm on. To highlight this, I recently went back on match as they'd sent me a free 3 day trial. I decided to make the most of the beautiful freeness on offer so I messaged six girls and not one of them responded to me. When match sent me another offer of a discounted rate to extend my subscription, I hastily made my excuses and left.

Anyway, back to my second and final date from Guardian Soulmates. The person in question was a Dutch lady, a few years older than me, and she worked as a freelance book interpreter. We had a few drinks and, although we had some things in common, there just wasn't a connection between us and I don't think that I fancied her despite her having a cool and unusual rose tattoo on her wrist. I thought that at the end of the date she actually wanted to see me again as she started telling me what a fantastic guy I was, but this was just to let me down gently in case I wanted to see her again. I wasn't disappointed in the slightest and I completely agreed with her assessment that we'd had a nice evening but there wasn't a spark between us. Although I felt the same way as her and wouldn't have gone on a second date anyway, I completely respected her honesty in telling me afterwards and it would have been nice if some of the other women that I'd met had been so up front and mature.

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 62

"If you're so very entertaining,

then why are you on your own tonight?"

This date pretty much sums up the pitfalls which can occur with internet dating and why a lot of the time it can be a frustrating and not very pleasurable experience.

My 3rd date from OKCupid and one that really came out of the blue. She messaged me first which was surprising as I hadn't logged on at the site for a few months so I'm amazed that I cropped up in her search. Anyway, her mails were the funniest I've ever read and we shared a love of Forbrydelsen (the Danish tv police drama phenomenon translated as The Killing) amongst other things, so I was intrigued. She even compared herself to Forbydelsen lead character, Detective Inspector Sarah Lund, by claiming that she owned an extensive range of knitwear and had a great arse in jeans, which was a bit cocky to say the least.

After a few days of exchanging really, very funny e-mails, she sent me her mobile number and told me to call her one night which was very forward of her. I'm not particularly fond of talking on the phone at the best of times, so speaking to a complete stranger and potential date was a bit nerve-wracking. I rang her anyway and we had a good chat although neither of us mentioned going on a date as I think maybe we were both waiting for the other to ask and I couldn't gauge whether she wanted to or not. I left it about a day then asked her about meeting up and she agreed thankfully and started texting me a fair bit.

We met up at a bar and she was one of the most confident and self-assured people that I've ever come across, which was plainly evident when she started happily conversing with a German party in their native tongue, whose reserved table we were temporarily trespassing on.

I've said this many times before, but from my point of view we got on really well as she was hilarious. I also thought she liked me too when at one point she said: 'I'm sorry, but I have to say this. How the hell are you single as you're really interesting and fantastic company?! You're not married are you?!' I didn't really know how to respond but surely that's a good sign if someone says that you on a date, right?

I, therefore, thought that there would be a good chance of us meeting again. How wrong I was. I messaged her a couple of days later, after not hearing a peep from her, to enquire about a second date and she completely ignored it and I never heard from her again. Whilst it's disappointing to receive a message back saying 'no, thank you,' it's much more preferable to being met with stone, cold silence. Honesty is always the best policy as you can't expect every girl to like you so that's fair enough, but when you've actually met someone in person and they know that you're waiting to hear back from them, then to say nothing is just bloody rude and very arrogant. She works for a major bank in the city and is obviously experienced in screwing people over, so I clearly got served by a true playa.

UPDATE (February 2012): About 5 months after our solitary date, I was having a quick browse on OKCupid. I happened to see her profile and decided to click on it for a bit of a nose and it transpired that she was now living in New York. The next morning there was an email waiting in my inbox from her telling me about her big move and asking how I was. I didn't really want to reply but because I have manners (unlike her): I did.

I happened to mention that I was now on match.com. She then went on a bit of a rant about how I should be going to gigs and meeting women rather than bothering with dating sites and that said sites don't work as they're more geared towards social networking than finding romance.

I have to say that what she said makes sense particularly the social networking part, however, there are a number of points where her argument falls down slightly. Firstly, why is she still actively using a dating website if it's so easy to acquire dates from other means. Secondly, when using these sites I've always believed that you should treat others as you'd liked to be treated yourself, therefore, not replying to someone after a date even just to say 'no, thank you' is really bad form and a perfect example of how so many people just see internet dating as a big game. Thirdly, how difficult is it to meet girls at gigs? I go to a lot of gigs with friends, where I catch up with them and we watch the band in question. How is it possible to start going round a venue and chatting women up with a band performing and the music blaring out. It's difficult enough trying to get a good position to see when it's packed, then when the gig is over there's a mad scramble to get out of the door. And finally, my sister and another friend of mine are both in happy and long-term relationships with men they've met off Guardian Soulmates. Whilst I believe they are in the minority and have been extremely lucky; they are proof that dating sites can work as you usually meet people you'd never normally come into contact with.

Oh, well, it's probably just as well that we didn't go on that second date after all...

Date 60

"I know I'm unloveable, you don't have to tell me."

Another dating site and another disappointing dating experience. I'd been debating for a while whether to go back onto Guardian Soulmates, however, I put it off for a bit after their catastrophic relaunch and revamp in April 2011 (more of this in the next entry). Whilst reading an e-petition calling for the reinstatement of the old Soulmates site, there were a lot of people commenting on how good The Love Lab was and how lots of Soulmates members had left to join said dating site in protest. It also used the same company who used to run the old Soulmates site and had the same layout and searching facilities; plus it was free to join for the first month, so I took them up on their offer out of curiosity.

After joining I have to say that I was shocked as to how few members there actually were who had recently active profiles. All the talk of it being a sanctuary full of disheartened Soulmates was just a blatant lie. In my month there I didn't message one person. However, one woman messaged me, and she really stood out from the rest, plus she was very keen to meet up.

She was a Mancunian and told me that she'd be wearing a leopard print scarf so that I'd recognise her, but that's where the parallels with Bet Lynch ended. I was instantly attracted to her as she was very pretty, funny and we shared the same taste in music, films, books, tv etc. so the conversation easily flowed. After a few drinks she said she had to go as she needed to get up early for work the next day, which was fair enough as it was a school night, and she said she would have stayed longer as she had really enjoyed the conversation.

I e-mailed her a couple of days later to see if she fancied hooking up again, but, alas, I was met with a response that I hadn't quite anticipated. In her reply she said that while we shared a lot in common she'd prefer not to, and from her point of view that even if we did meet up it would only be as friends, but she then went on to categorically state that she had enough friends already. So, I think that was a 'no' then.

I have to say that I think that was a bit harsh, as while she was being honest, a polite no thank you would have been enough. I did think about replying to her and asking if she could e-mail me again, but make it a bit more condescending, but instead I just deleted my profile as my free subscription was just about to finish anyway.

Despite this being the 60th woman that I'd met since I started internet dating, rejection is always hard to take and I was really quite down about this for a day, as in terms of first impressions, I was quite taken by her. And although, from my point of view, we'd got on well; she really didn't like me at all! I'm not naive enough to think that every person I meet will want to see me again, but I felt that she was unnecessarily blunt and it made me question what was so bad about me for her to really dislike me. I've learnt after going on so many dates to not take these things to heart, as the whole thing is completely random and I mostly take it with a pinch of salt, but sometimes it's difficult not to, until you put it all into perspective...

Date 59

"I've seen you smile, but I've never really heard you laugh."

After another brief hiatus from dating, I decided to give OkCupid another go. And, boy, is it difficult to get a reply on there, let alone a date, which is highlighted by the fact that I've only met two women off it after being sporadically on it for a year (technically, it should have been more as at least two girls agreed to meet me for drinks but never replied when I tried to arrange them).

As I'd alluded to in an earlier post, being on a free site doesn't mean that you're going to go on loads of dates, as, on paper, OKCupid is full of intelligent and like-minded people supposedly looking to meet others. However, being a free site does often mean that there are going to be lots of members and this results in predominantly women being bombarded with messages (including a lot from socially inept freaks). Another reason could be that with a pay site, members are possibly more likely to go on dates to get their money's worth, which I think is backed up by the high number of dates I've been on through pay sites compared to the low number on free sites. Having said all that, though, this could all be bollocks as maybe people are just becoming more choosy, super fussy, up their own arses or just plain rude.

To the date itself. We'd been e-mailing for a good few months, and, although her constant overuse of the acronym 'LOL' was a bit annoying (a real pet hate of mine, which, surely should be a punishable offence), she seemed nice. Anyway, she asked if I'd like to meet for a drink and as she fancied coming to London, she travelled up from Brighton to see me. We had a very pleasant afternoon and evening drinking along the South Bank, and although we were still in text contact the following week and she did ask if I wanted to meet up again but things just fizzled out and we never did. I also wasn't overly enamoured by her assertion that I was the spitting image of Coronation Street's Steve McDonald. I've since asked a number of friends and they assure me that this isn't the case. At all. No, sir. Really, I don't. Look, I don't resemble him in any shape or form whatsoever.

UPDATE: 2014

Upon moving to Brighton in early 2014, she actually made contact with me through OKCupid again. We met up for drinks and it was nice to see her. But, there was something odd about her though that I just couldn't put my finger on and we never saw each other again.