Blog Award

International Woman of Mystery at An International Affair has very kindly passed on a blogging award to me:















In order to accept the award I have to:
•Thank the blogger who awarded it to you.
•Sum up your blogging philosophy, motivation, and experience using five (5) words.
•Pass it on to 10 other blogs which you feel have real substance.

Well, thank you very much, International Woman of Mystery! Your blog is fun and interesting and exciting and I'm happy to be following the journey. I hadn't actually thought very much about what I wanted my blog to be - I'd started reading other people's blogs and wanted to comment but didn't want to be an anonymous enigma. The experience of sharing thoughts in this way has been Fascinating, Uplifting, Thought-provoking, Informative and kind of Addictive!

I'd been thinking of writing a post to thank all of the bloggers I've encountered for being so welcoming and friendly. This is an ideal occasion to give special mention to the ten blogs and bloggers who have been most instrumental in my experience so far:


Lifebeginsat30ty at Life Begins at 30ty - she not only has a great blog of her own split between two countries; she also organised a Secret Santa blogging experiment for her fellow bloggers, and I was very lucky to have her supportive comments on my blog right from the start. I really appreciate it!

Little Miss Angry at Love Me Knot - I arrived at her blog at a time of Jake Gyllenhaal lookalikes and farting discussions! But other posts have given us a glimpse of deeper stories and complicated situations still unfolding...

Larissa at thoughts simply arise - Larissa thinks a lot and writes beautifully about the results. Her blog is thought-provoking and inspiring on every topic it touches on.

"Just Sayin...." at "Just Sayin...." - she's not afraid to tell it like it is come rain or shine, which really lets us readers into her world - to the extent where her Followers list is labelled "My Stalkers"!

Snafugirl at snafu - of the ten most amazingly crazy exploits I've read, Snafugirl must account for at least nine of them. Luckily for us all, the woman behind the legend has the skill to bring her stories to life for us grateful vicarious livers.

Something She Dated at Something She Dated - she has a great quirky sense of humour and a truly unique writing style which is infiltrating my own vocabulary! Her blog is total Awesome Sauce.

Catherine at Simply Solo: Single girl starting over - almost as new to blogging as me, but ten times more talented - she tackles the topics of dating with consummate ease and engages her readers wonderfully.

KayDee at ...like nailing Jell-O to the wall! - currently blogging without her partner in crime, but she hasn't let that stop her from posting some very well-written and thoughtful explorations of issues both in dating and in life.

CrystalSpins at Everybody Wants Some - a great mix of dating stories and advice to those who need it, including the kind of self-pitying nice guy which I once might have been.

Lucky Girl at how very lucky to be a girl - last but not least: the one which started my whole blogging journey. An ostensibly unrelated Google search landed me in a fascinating world of dating tales and I've been hooked ever since.


I'd like to say a massive thank you to all of you and to everyone else with whom I've crossed paths in our patch of the blog world - I'm glad to have arrived here!


Matt

Mutually Exclusive (Part 2 of 2)

My first three dates with Mutually Exclusive had been fun-filled and gradually more kiss-filled, but I'd felt hampered by an unfortunate lack of sleep and this had prompted me to shorten dates two and three. I'd then caught up on sleep and was very much looking forward to date four and got the vibe that she was too. There was one fly in the ointment: she had mentioned that she would be busy for one week following our upcoming Thursday date. But I had high hopes for our date being good enough to carry us through that week.

After work on Thursday I headed to her place. We kissed and chatted as we made dinner together. After dinner, more chatting and kissing in front of the television. But then came a change of pace: she said that she didn't want anything other than kissing to happen that night. She still wanted me to stay the night but just to hold each other and kiss and nothing further.

It did feel kind of like she was abruptly putting the brakes on after having urged quicker progress on the previous date - I'd got the feeling that she'd wanted to go further just two nights before. Was this a test? Or was that a test? I was confused. But I reasoned that I would rather come across as too cautious than too pushy, so I took the opportunity to be the perfect gentleman - I gracefully accepted her request and held her and kissed her as we went to sleep with underwear still firmly in place.

The next morning, before we went our separate ways, she was at great pains to reiterate that she would be busy for the whole of the next week. And by busy, she meant no time for any contact at all. She said that her family were coming to stay. I didn't really understand why that would leave her unable to even send an occasional text, especially as we were now dating exclusively (and she'd been the one pushing for that status just a week earlier.) But I was still in gentleman mode and accepted the situation without pushing her for further explanation. She kissed me goodbye and was gone.

For the next seven days I respected her instruction not to try to contact her in any way and, sure enough, heard nothing back either. Seven days became eight days, nine days. On day ten I sent her a lighthearted text. No response. On day eleven I sent her a less lighthearted text indicating that I really wanted to talk. Several hours later she finally called me. She said that she had continued to be busy after her family had left and she just hadn't had time to contact me. She apologized but also said that she had more busy times coming up and wasn't sure when she could fit me in. This from the woman who'd said "What's wrong with tomorrow?" when I asked for our fourth date to be two days after our third!

I let her know that I wasn't happy to be seeing somebody so rarely after agreeing exclusivity. I said that I wanted to see her more often if things were going to work out. She said that she'd try to sort something out and she'd be in touch soon.

And she was in touch the next day - sending me the following email:


"Hi,

Hope you are well and happy. Been thinking about us dating some more and i can't really see it going any where. It seems we aren't as compatible as i thought we would be in the beginning. I don't know what your veiws are on this but we could try and be friends although it maybe too late for that."


Hmm, OK... I guess it wasn't really out of the blue, but her choice of words threw me a bit - did she come to the conclusion that we weren't compatible during the ten days of zero contact? Oh well - I might have ended up ending things anyway if her busy times had continued.

After reading the email I saw that she was on online chat and had a brief chat with her. I said that I respected her decision and that I was up for trying being friends too, but she seemed to have changed her mind on that front - she started saying (writing) strange things about worrying that I'd be really angry at her and try to get revenge on her or something. What?? I had no idea at all where this was coming from but I readily agreed that we didn't need to stay in touch. I tried to explain that I bore her no ill will and wished her all the best. End of chat. I never heard from her again.

Mutually Exclusive (Part 1 of 2)

My next internet date continued the trend of very quickly moving off the dating site once we'd initially made contact through it. We used other online chat and email and she was keen to meet up quickly, which worked fine for me. Our first date was on a Tuesday evening just five days after our first messages. I had another first date lined up for the Wednesday which had been arranged further in advance, so it almost felt like this new one was jumping the queue, but then this is how dating works, right?

We met at a pub and spent the evening talking and laughing. She was fun and cute and I enjoyed being with her. I got the feeling that she enjoyed being with me too. The time flew by and all too soon we were saying our goodbyes at the end of the evening. I gave her a quick kiss on the lips, which seemed to go down fine, and on my way home I congratulated myself for having made that move rather than proceeding with caution as I had on too many previous first dates.

The next day, while chatting online again, she asked me whether I had any other dates lined up. I was honest with her: Yes, I have a date tonight - I'd already arranged it before I met you. This didn't seem to go down too well. I guess everyone has different ideas about what's acceptable in the early days of dating and what isn't. To be honest, I would have felt more comfortable only arranging one first date at a time, but I'd got the impression that this would have severely reduced my frequency of dating and hence my chances of finding someone, plus most other people seemed to be multidating anyway.

So I went on my Wednesday evening date. We didn't click - nothing particularly dramatic happened (not even enough to make a blog post!) but we both agreed that we weren't a match. The next morning I informed my date from Tuesday of this and arranged a second date with her for that Friday evening. She asked again if I had any other dates arranged. I told her that I didn't, but that I had been talking with a friend about trying speed dating. She asked whether I was actually looking for something serious and I explained that I was, but that I thought most people did early dating this way. I said that if our Friday date went well then I wouldn't go speed dating.

All of this was taking place against the backdrop of a very busy and stressful week of work for me. I was running low on sleep and feeling rundown, plus I had a weekend trip away with friends coming up. I let her know that I wouldn't be out too late on Friday because of this. We met after work and went to a restaurant. We enjoyed each other's company again and it was unfortunate that the evening could not be longer, but I really needed sleep. We parted ways with a longer kiss and a feeling that things were going really well.

During my weekend away I kept in text contact with her and we arranged a third date for the following Tuesday. On Monday I started sending messages to other women with whom I'd been in contact, letting them know that I was now seeing someone exclusively and wouldn't be going on any new dates. I called off the speed dating plan too.

Tuesday rolled around and I was still stressed at work and low on sleep. Our third date began at a restaurant after work again chatting and having fun, or so I thought, but then she explained to me that she was getting the feeling that I was moving too slowly for her - that I just seemed to be happy to continue going to pubs and restaurants for ages. So I asked her back to my place and she accepted enthusiastically. Off we went. Upon arrival we got drinks and went to my bedroom. We sat chatting and kissing on my bed. The question loomed large and unspoken: would she be staying the night? I didn't want to be moving too slowly again but I really was feeling very tired and desperately needed a good night's sleep. Reluctantly I let her know this and walked her to her car. I asked to see her again on Thursday and she said "what's wrong with tomorrow?" I repeated my need for sleep and she seemed to accept it.

Thankfully I did manage to catch up on some sleep in advance of Thursday. We had arranged that this time I would be going to her place and that this time we would be spending the night together...

Picture Imperfect

January 2004: Around two years after my first foray into online dating, I was now on something like my fourth. The fruits of my efforts had been roughly a dozen first dates, far fewer second dates and a decidedly messy on-off relationship. But I persevered nonetheless. I still had faith in the concept and figured that if I continued to contribute time and effort then fate would at some point contribute luck.

My next date was with a young lady with whom I'd shared many texts and a phone call or two over a couple of weeks. When I say "young lady" I mean that she was several years younger than me, and I was only 24, but we'd seemed to click humour-wise in our texts. Over the phone we hadn't connected quite so well but then I'm not that great on the phone anyway. We had exchanged photos (by this point in history most online daters had managed to acquire a digital photo of themselves but many of us did not openly display them on our profiles) and had each made appreciative noises about the other. So, next step: meet up.

We met at a restaurant on a Saturday lunchtime. The restaurant was fairly quiet. This was lucky because I'm really not sure I would have recognized her otherwise. She looked absolutely nothing like her photo. How had someone so young had time to change so much? I was having trouble even convincing myself that it was the same person.

Of course, I thought that it would be rather rude to say any of this to her, so I tried to settle into the date and chat, but I was really struggling with the idea that my date had morphed. I felt like I was in one of the more confusing David Lynch films.

We ate our food and talked a bit but my heart just wasn't in it and I think she sensed that. After the food I let her know that I was planning to head off. She asked where I was going. I realised that I couldn't really claim tiredness at 2pm on a Saturday, so I admitted that I was going to do a bit of shopping. She asked to come along and again I didn't want to be rude so off we went. What little chat there had been was drying up fast. I did my shopping and then said that I would be heading home. I was relieved that she didn't ask to come with me.

Afterwards, looking back on the date, I was trying to figure out what I could have done differently. Would it have been better to tell her what was going through my mind? I guess that might have just made things more uncomfortable and still led to the same result anyway: we weren't going to see each other again.

Mystery Woman

It's funny to think that in early 2002 I used to spend weeks, occasionally even months, getting to know prospective internet dates via online chat/email/phone/text before meeting them face-to-face. By late 2003 I was far more focussed on getting to the point of meeting up. I didn't want to precede the first date with lots of virtual contact. Occasionally this had led to comic minunderstandings, but generally it felt like I had the right idea. I was looking for real-life interactions, not an online penpal.

I had made contact with another woman through the dating site but we'd swiftly moved on to external emails and a telephone call. She seemed interesting but also secretive - we'd had a strange moment when she'd been shocked by my knowing her real name after it had been clearly shown in her emails. I'd also sent her my photo and received a reply which I found somewhat enigmatic:

"Hi Matt,
Nice photo. Funny but i have imagine you completely different. You look strong, but in your msgs you sound softer. i bet i will look different to what you imagine. However i will not send you my photo."

I wasn't sure whether to take the message as a compliment or whether I should be irked by her refusal to send her photo in return. And what did she imagine I was imagining? She then gave me a hint in our phone call - casually tossing in the words "when I was modelling..." - but was this part of the process of leading me to imagine something and then finding that she looked different? I wasn't sure. Only one way to find out.

Our date was to be at a restaurant. On my way there I received a text from her saying that she would be waiting outside a nearby shop. I guess that gave me a fighting chance of spotting her! Luckily for me, there was only one woman standing anywhere near the shop as I approached. My first thought: OK, I completely believe that you've worked as a model! Wow. My second thought: I'm really going to try not to get all insecure like I had before in this kind of situation. Let's make this one different.

We went for our meal and chatted away. She was enjoyable company and seemed very interested in me. She was particularly interested in my job - at that time I worked in the stock market. The thought crossed my mind that this might be the main reason for her interest in me but I tried to push that thought aside.

After dinner she suggested that we go to the cinema and seemed very keen to do so. I tend to think that early dates and cinemas don't mix well together but I didn't want to shoot down her idea, so we went and it actually went fairly well - the film was lighthearted and watchable, and she didn't shrink away when I put my arm round her a bit. It did put a stop to most of our talking though.

As we parted ways after this I debated in my head whether to try to kiss her - I liked her and thought the date had gone well but I really couldn't tell whether she wanted me to kiss her or not. In the end I kissed her on the cheek. No particular reaction from her. No idea what's happening in her head.

The next day I texted to say that I had enjoyed seeing her and would like to do so again. She said that she'd liked the evening too but that she was quite busy - maybe in a week or two? Hmm... I wasn't sure that she sounded very keen but I figured I would find out in due course. I asked her out again the next week, then the week after that, then the week after that... She generally sounded quite enthusiastic but always was busy. Then at some point her explanations of being busy started to involve visa problems (she wasn't from around these parts.) Was this:

1) An attempt to say "No" to me in a slightly less subtle but still very indirect way?
2) Or just an honest update on her situation?
3) Or was she even dropping a hint that maybe I could "help her get a visa"??

The week after that she didn't return my call or my text. OK, I guess it wasn't option number 3. I decided that it was time to stop chasing.

My Two Briefest Dates

Autumn 2003: After taking some time to recover from the (final) messy ending with Pop Idolizer, I staggered back into the online dating ring for Round 3. I reasoned that my gradual accumulation of experience would serve to make the activity more successful for me. However, two of my dates in this stint did little to support my theory. Both women were students and I must be somewhat lacking in imagination as I write this because I can only think to call them Russian Student and Dental Student.

My date with Russian Student had not been preceded by all that much online contact, but enough to establish that it was in fact a date which we were going on. Therefore it threw me completely when one of her first sentences on the date began with the words "My boyfriend..." Er, sorry? Your what-now? It turned out that she had a long-term boyfriend back in Russia but didn't see this as any reason not to go on a date with me. Cultural differences maybe? I don't know - I didn't ask. I didn't take very long over my drink and then I said something about being tired and needing to head off. She seemed surprised, and as we parted ways she said something about meeting up again. I said "Maybe..." and she could see from my face that I meant "No." Her shoulders slumped and she walked away looking dejected.

As I watched her walk away I realised that I really hadn't handled the whole thing very well. Why hadn't I just talked with her about my reaction to her revelation? I'm not sure - I like to think that the me of today would do so. Maybe I was just still quite stunned, plus I genuinely was tired too. Happily for my future conscience, I did the decent thing the next morning and texted her explaining what had happened. She laughed (in text form) and seemed pleased to have received an explanation. I felt much better too for not having just left her to try to decipher my actions.

My date with Dental Student was a disaster entirely of my own making. We met at a station in town and I invited her to choose which bar we would go to, giving away the fact that I totally hadn't come up with ideas for our date. Off we went to her chosen bar and started to chat, but after maybe fifteen minutes I decided that I really didn't like the bar and said that I wanted to go somewhere else. I think her chosen bar had been a bit noisy, but why on earth did I think that this justified shooting down the choice which I'd just left her to make?

As we walked to the alternative bar which I'd suddenly thought to suggest, I was thinking "I'm an idiot, she must think I'm an idiot and she's right..." It didn't help at all that my bar was crowded too and we had to stand. This was particularly tricky because she was over a foot shorter than me (I'm 6'1) which made talking (or more precisely hearing) more difficult. I didn't mind the height difference at all otherwise, but I got the impression that she might have been self-conscious about her height and possibly didn't tend to date tall guys.

Our conversation was starting to struggle and I excused myself to the bathroom, partly to try to regroup. I liked this girl so far but wasn't doing a good job of showing it. Time to turn that around. As I came back I saw that she was sitting down and said "ah, you found a stool..." Then I realised with horror: No, she was not sitting down! My eyes had somehow ghosted in a stool behind her which actually did not exist. She was standing right where she'd been two minutes ago. What the hell was wrong with me??

I recoiled in embarrassment, trying not to laugh at how ridiculous my mistake had been. And not fully succeeding. I apologised profusely and she accepted my apology but with a look on her face that said "wow, you really are a loser." Not long after this she "remembered" that she had to go and "meet some friends" and our train wreck of a date came to an early end. I think I even had the audacity to ask if she wanted to meet up again when I texted the next day - not surprisingly she replied in the negative.

I wonder if, somewhere out there, Dental Student is writing a blog about her past dating experiences, and I'm in there as the biggest dickhead of all time?

Pretty Lady

So... back to the drawing board again. Where would my next date come from? I considered taking out another personal ad but decided against it with my low response to the last one in mind. Instead I tried replying to a few. I heard back from one woman whose ad had been entitled "Pretty Lady" - brief and to the point! We arranged to meet at a bar after work one evening.

I arrived at the bar first and grabbed a free table. A few minutes after our arranged meeting time I received a text from her: "I'm outside the bar, wearing a red top. Come outside." I liked its confident tone and I did as instructed.

Her advert title hadn't been false advertising - she was very pretty. I'm sad to report that the thoughts going through my head were along the lines of "She's out of my league... Just a fool to believe I have anything she needs... She's like the wind..." I was intimidated by her good looks, feeling that I didn't measure up. I tried to tell myself that attractiveness is subjective but I didn't really convince myself!

She wanted to go to a different bar instead and I complied. Once we were sat with drinks our chatting went through the usual basics of getting to know each other's pasts and presents and then started to stall through lack of common interests. I could tell that she was getting bored, especially as she started using her mobile phone at one point - not a good sign! But I continued to try to find a way to connect with her. I was aware that I was being quite shallow - here I was finding little in common and seeing my date more interested in her phone than in me at times but still persevering. Would I have acted the same had I not found her so good looking? I thought I probably knew the answer but wasn't comfortable with what it meant.

Soon after this she indicated that it was time for her to head off anyway. I walked her to the station and we went our separate ways. I had a feeling that I wouldn't be seeing her again but despite this I can remember feeling quite elated at having been on a date with a beautiful woman even if she hadn't been all that taken with me. Looking back I feel sad that I was seemingly so superficial at that time, but my memory reminds me that I was.

Of course, when I texted her the next day I suggested meeting up again. Her inevitable declining was concise but gentle - something like "We weren't really a match, don't you think?" She did have a point there. I wished her well and that was that. Hello drawing board my old friend, I've come to talk with you again...