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.

Date 58

"I wanna go home, I don't wanna stay."

Perhaps the most well known free dating website is plentyoffish.com, although plentyofchavs.com would be a more apt title.

I decided to create a profile for it, but it soon became very obvious that a date was going to be hard to come by. It reminded me a bit of match.com, although not as cultured or high brow, and a good idea for a search filter would be to have the ability to eliminate anyone who was illiterate, could only write in text speak and solely watched Sex and the City and Disney films.

As it turned out, the few lost souls that I did send messages to either didn't reply or deleted them without reading.

Rather unexpectedly, someone actually sent me a message and we e-mailed for a while then decided to meet for a drink. We hooked up the night after I'd had my first rendezvous with date 57, so I was a bit hungover still. She was a nice enough person, but just didn't really have anything to say, and so I probably over-compensated for the awkward silences by waffling on. This probably led her to believe that I was an ego-maniac, who loved the sound of my own voice, but I didn't really know what else to do as she was just staring at me and saying very little, whilst stealing my cigarettes. We still had 3 or 4 drinks but in the end I called it a night, so maybe her being 8 years younger than me was too big an age gap as she was very dismissive of my music and film tastes and quite patronising in general, which irked me a bit. However, she did amuse me with her middle class Kent accent consistently lapsing into a Lily Allen/Kate Nash-like mockney dialect.

This was my final date of 2010 and I, not long after, deleted my profile.

Date 57

"Then on the sand, another man, he takes her hand, a smile lights up her stupid face (and well it would)."

After not having much success on match.com I decided to try a free site as I was starting to begrudge having to fork out money on a monthly basis just to meet the occasional weirdo or person with no manners.

The site in question was called OKCupid and it certainly on paper is one of the better free sites around. In fact, its design layout and volume of people registered puts most of the famous pay-sites to shame. Being free and having lots of members, though, doesn't equate to going on a lot of dates, which is something that I will address further in a future blog entry.

After being on the site for a few months and basically not receiving any replies or interest, I was amazed when date 57 contacted me. After exchanging a few messages, we then agreed to meet for a drink at the end of October 2010. The first things I noticed about her were her Elvis/Marilyn earrings and height. Her profile said she was 5'10'' but she's actually about 6'2'', so she pretty much towered above me as I'm not particularly tall. Anyway, we got on exceptionally well and she completely drank me under the table, although she does have the advantage of being Amazonian, Australian and still being in the throes of youth as I'm more than 5 years older than her. She tainted herself slightly by opining that The Smiths 'are so depressing,' but she redeemed herself when she let on to me that she was addicted to Final Fantasy (a Playstation title I used to be into when I was a big gamer years ago).

Our second date was a week later and started off in Angel. It was bonfire night so I bought her some jumbo sparklers, which she loved, and we made our way to Camden, lighting a few along the way. We went to so many pubs that I lost count, via a really bad Mexican restaurant, where the Mariachi band just wouldn't leave us alone and we had some really strong cocktails. Then at the end of the night I was really surprised when she asked me to go back to hers, although she said that she couldn't promise me any 'sexy sex' (her exact words). We'd already drank a vast quantity of alcohol that night and when we got back to hers we started on a bottle of red. So, by the time we did go to bed we both fell asleep instantly whilst watching The Time Traveller's Wife, which I've since been told is the best way to see it. And there was no 'sexy sex.'

The next morning I woke up with the worst hangover I've ever had in my life, yet she was remarkably as fresh as a daisy, suffering no ill effects whatsoever. I must have been still drunk as I felt like I was in someone else's body. We then went to a cafe and she polished off a full English breakfast without any trouble, yet I could only manage one or two bites out of a bacon sandwich before I had to admit defeat and leave the rest. I must have been terrible company, but I just couldn't function properly and all I could think of was the long journey home, which took 2 hours on the tube and train, and how I just wanted to go to bed for the rest of the day. I explained to her that I just felt so ill that I really had to go, which I don't think she understood, but if I'd have felt fine then I would genuinely have stayed with her.

Arranging a 3rd date then became a bit of a problem as she kept cancelling on me at the last minute. I did think at the time that it was because of my poor showing the morning after our second date but I needn't have worried as I received an interesting text from her on the morning of our 3rd date. In it she said that she liked being with me but only as a friend and that she'd been seeing someone else at the same time and wanted to see how things worked out with him. I wasn't devastated but I was disappointed and decided to cancel as I just didn't feel like seeing her that evening.

So that was that, and I didn't attempt to contact her. A month or so later I received a text from her out of the blue asking if I wanted to go out for a pre-Christmas 2010 drink. I didn't see any harm in it so I agreed, and whilst it was a bit awkward at first, we had a really good time. A funny thing did happen though during the afternoon as whilst we were sitting outside having a drink and a smoke, a woman came over to our table and basically sat down with us and started chatting me up. This is an extremely rare occurrence for me and we swapped contact details when she had to go, although my Aussie friend actually seemed quite pissed off at this and left soon after. When I did try to contact the flirty woman at a later date, she palmed me off, so nothing ever came of it, but it was quite good for my ego.

I then received another interesting text from her a few days after Christmas. In it she poured her heart out to me and went on a bit of a rant about how all men were arseholes as the guy she'd chosen over me had dumped her on Christmas Day; what a nice chap! I was sympathetic with her to a point but the irony certainly wasn't lost on me.