53 The Foreplay

Receive my first text from Fishy.

Is it too late to call you?x

He wishes!

I know he's not a fan of the pre-date call, but I'd like to chat to him before we meet. For a start to tell him that I'm Scottish. Just incase he has a thing against haggis or something. I already know that he'll appreciate my tight-fisted side.

I'm really short on free minutes, but I worry that it will look particularly stingy if I text back and say he can call me now. Plus he probably won't. Grudgingly I phone him.

He's laughing when he answers. Probably in delight. Tells me that he could call me back but doesn't imagine this converstion will last very long anyway.

I realise that there is a distinct lack of a scouse accent. Fishy isn't originally from Liverpool. I'm not from Manchester. We are like two big internet dating frauds. I just hope that I haven't been fooled in other ways, and that he is in fact 67. Or blogging from jail.

I was going to tell you what a lovely voice he has. That's until he started doing crap impressions of my accent. Wouldn't mind so much if he'd gone for the Sean Connery, 'Mishhh Moneypenny' version, but instead he sounds more like Mrs Doubtfire.

We start talking about what we are going to do on the date. Says he'll decide. He says it is the man's job. Good boy.

I find it hard to give up the control completely though, so start tossing around a few ideas. Suggest we do something a bit unusual, maybe like bungee jumping.

Bungee jumping?! What the hell did I say that for? Sometimes I need to tape up my mouth. I'd never want to go bungee jumping on a first date. I pray he doesn't go for that...

He doesn't. And the reason he doesn't, is because Fishy is scared of heights.

'Houston, we have a big, fat problem.'

I live in a tower. My apartment is about 460ft in the air. Two of my walls are windows.

Well...looks like if this works out between us there will be no slumber parties at mine.

He starts trying to find things that we do have in common. Asks me the names of my parents. Says his have the same names. Yeah right! Wonder if he'd be playing that card if I'd said Ermintrude and Goliath?

Chat flows really easily. There's a lot of laughing on both sides. We talk about our bad habits. He says something rude. I laugh. Ask him to write that I didn't find it funny. Just incase my mum is reading. He promises he will.

We talk about our online dating experiences. He laughs about the guy emailing me to tell me about his small appendage. Fishy says he doesn't mention his itchy anus until at least the third date.

We start to say our goodbyes. Don't think either of us want to. Just have to because the time has become Stupid O'Clock.

I check how long we spoke for when I get off the phone.

1 hour and 19 minutes!!

My 1 hour and 19 minutes bill. He's so buying the drinks when we go out.


Read Fishy's (no doubt innacurate) version of our chat here >>

21 Flibbertygibbet

I need a favour...

I've been asked out on another date.

My initial reaction was...Woo Hoo! - How good is online dating when you can get asked out on a date while you are sitting in your pj's cosied up at home? No effort required.

My next reaction was...also Woo Hoo! - That's when I saw the profile photos of the guy that was doing the inviting. Hot!

My next, next reaction was...Woo Hoo again! - Mr Hot-to-Trot was suggesting we go to the German markets for a gluhwein and a bratwurst. I love the markets! What a good date it would be!

Then my reaction after that was...Damn!

I had suddenly remembered my own rule. The rule that I made only on Monday. The rule that went something like... 1/ Always, always, always go on a pre-date first. That stupid rule.

And that's where you come in....

I know it's only Wednesday. I know it will make it hard for you to trust me again. I know you'll wonder if I'm going to go back on everything I say.

I just hoped though, that you might be able to ignore that little comment. Pretend I never made it. If anyone asks, just be like..'Pre-date? What's a pre-date? Never heard of it. Sounds like a stupid idea to me...'

That would be great.

And in actual fact, if I promise to neck the gluhwein and eat the sausage really quickly, it could be like a pre-date anyway...

41 The Date Date part 2

It's a very strange experience going out with someone you've met online.

You don't have a mutual friend to discuss to start you off. Like you would if it was a blind date.

In fact you don't actually know if you have anything mutual to discuss.

You don't even get the chance to have a proper look at your date...

I know that sounds a bit weird, but think about it... when you are out in a group you can give them the proper once over while they are in conversation with someone else. You can even make licking motions to make your friends laugh if you think your date is lovely.

When someone is sitting in front of you though, and it is just you two, you can't properly look at them. It just comes across as staring. Then they think you are weird.

Instead, in online dating dates, you have to look at them without looking at them. All the while trying to fill that space that is meant for conversation. Silences do not work on internet-born dates. They are more than just awkward...they are excruciating.

So, feeling slightly unfeminine after taking on the role of the man, and being the chattier of the two of us, I decided to take the opportunity to be the girl and satisfy that weird fable that females talk a lot...

So, I talked. Ohmigod, I talked. I talked for Britain. No subject was out of bounds.

'Could somebody please get a gag for the girl with the builder's haircut. She won't shut up.'

I talked so much I tired myself out.

I got respite thankfully, (or maybe he did?) when Mr Third Base went to the toilet. I took the chance to check my phone. There was a text from my flatmate. Well?

I was still replying when Mr Third Base came back from the toilet. I apologised for being on my phone. He said it was ok and he'd take the opportunity to check his phone.

Oh, he had a text too.

Ohmigod please don't let it be from my flatmate.

Yes, my flatmate had insisted I leave Mr Third Base's number for him. Although I'd made him swear only to use it if he thought I'd been murdered, I knew his promises were empty.

I mean this is the guy that walked into the living room, saw me sitting with a male friend and despite not knowing who he was, or his relationship to me, asked if he was one of my internet dates.

Subtle is not a word I'd use to describe my flatmate.

Please don't let him have texted my date.

Please!

Phew. The text wasn't from him.

Finished dinner. Had another drink. Had been all very pleasant. What a nice guy. I was ready to go home though. It was a school night after all.

'What time is your train?' I asked.

'Not for another hour.'

Damn.

Get through the next hour. Walk him to the train station (well may as well keep to the theme of the date, with me taking on the role of the man...) and bade each other farewell.

Get home. Tired and drained from talking so much.

Flatmate wants all the gossip.

I didn't really have any.

Wants all the details.

I didn't really have any.

Asks me what my date was wearing (I don't think in a weird, 'what was he wearing?' leery, way, just in a curious, way. I hope anyway....)

I had no idea.

I realised he can't have made that much of an impression if I didn't even remember what he had on.

Also realised I'd just spent a very long evening with a stranger. And apart from not being very memorable, the only thing I had to show for it, was a lighter purse.

Decided there and then to invent a new dating rule...

1/ Always, always, always go on a pre-date first - It won't tire you out as much, and at least the most you will lose is the time it takes to have a cup of coffee.

20 The Date Date

I was going on a real, live, date!

None of this pre-date nonsense. Someone thought my profile seemed interesting enough to want to go for dinner and drinks with me.

I was pretty excited.

Until I realised that the date was going to involve work that is.

Yes, Mr Third Base had asked me out but that is where his effort ended. He's from Liverpool so said he that despite being happy to come over to Manchester, he doesn't know it, so I'd have to decide where we were going. Damn!

Putting any fantasies I have about the man being the man and making the decisions, I started going through possibilities in my head.

Do you know how hard it is to plan an evening with someone that you know absolutely nada about? Was he veggie? Would he prefer Indian, or Chinese or maybe Mexican? Should we go cheap and cheerful? Or posh? Or in the middle?

I was non the wiser by the time I met him, so after our initial awkward greeting (where we stood about a mile from each other and just mumbled hi), I said I needed a bit of help choosing.

And his idea of helping? It was to come up with the quirky idea that we should just go to wherever the third nearest place was. Third nearest? God, where's that??? What direction??? We were sitting at crossroads! Call that a help???

Anyway, I finally managed to make a decision and off we headed. Posh-ish pub grub. Nice, cosy, log fire. Hoped he wouldn't notice that we didn't pass two places in between (well I suppose we did if you count the chippy.)

Had to wait a bit for the table. The table that I'd had to ask for. Then when it seemed like we'd been forgotten, I had to go and sort it out.

Ah, I was starting to see a pattern. Despite Mr Third Base being 10 years older than me...tonight Matthew, I was going to have to be the man.

Not to worry though, an opportunity soon presented itself for me to go back to being a girl and I took it...

5 Pre-Dating Mating

I fully accept that, in some ways, I am a commitment-phobe.

Like in the way that I won't buy a weekly bus ticket to get to my temp job. My colleagues query my lack of thriftiness, but I just worry that it will send the wrong message out into the ether, and the universe will think I really like the job and make me stay.

Similarly, I had problems when I went to get a new phone contract recently. I'd prepared myself for the fact that I'd probably have to go on an 18 month contract rather than a 12 month one like I'd been on previously. Yet, it appears that while I was psyching myself up, the mobile phone people were busy changing the rules behind my back. Now all of a sudden they want you to sign up for two years. Two years! I mean, come on! Anything could happen in two years! Loads could happen! I might move abroad, or maybe I'll get married or perhaps have a baby. Or all three. I mean, I don't necessarily want any of those things to happen but what if they did? Do you think for example I'd want to have a baby but still have the same mobile phone? Have my life completely change but yet still be stuck with the same phone from my old life? God, no!

I explained all this to the teenager serving me but he couldn't offer me any solutions, perhaps I'd confused him about whether I was looking for a new phone or a baby. In the end though, I decided that as I couldn't make a decision (that may have been down to the palpitations) I should keep my current phone and go on a 30 day rolling contract. Phew! Much better.

These are perfectly normal things to have commitment-issues about though aren't they? I'll hold my hands up to them. When it comes to relationships though, I'm pretty sure I don't have a problem. So when I heard about the new...er...craze in the dating world for 'pre-dates', I realised that this would be one trend I couldn't keep up with.

Can you imagine me telling my friends I was going to start pre-dating? Pre-dating, which is essentially a quick meeting you have, just a coffee or something, to see if you both think it is worth going on a proper date. Oh, how they would laugh and say that it proves I have issues if I can't even commit to a date, and have to go on a pre-date!

Aside from that, I also thought it was a bit of a crap idea. It could be down to the fact that the article where I first read about pre-dating also listed the pre-date rules. One of them being, that at the end of your pre-date, despite whether you think you'd like to go on a proper date, you must under no circumstances...I repeat...under no circumstances...never ever.. kiss your fellow pre-dater. Instead you must shake their hand.

Now I've never fully embraced(!) the whole European thing of kissing all the flipping time. I avoided going to parties when I lived in Holland after reading in the book 'Dealing with the Dutch' that you were supposed to go up to each individual on arrival and kiss them three times. I figured out I'd be too tired for partying after all that.

On the other hand though, isn't the hand-shake thing a tad formal? I get that it is to leave them wanting more and obviously I'm no expert (as I wouldn't be online dating in the first place) but couldn't it give someone the wrong impression? What if they move in to kiss you on the cheek? Have you to move away and stick out your hand? Wouldn't that suggest that you aren't interested? Or that you think they might have herpes? Or suggest that you have?

So that is why when Mr Third Base called and asked me out (he must be into girls with weird chat!) and suggested we go for dinner and drinks, I decided, to hell with fitting in with the in-crowd. I was going to do it the old-fashioned way and go on a date date....