Mr #31 - Smooth Criminal

The preamble:
Mr #31 was sadly another product of my post-Christmas date-lack panic, so once again there wasn't a tremendous amount of communication leading up to the date in question. But he seemed like a cheeky, chatty sort, and we had a few basics in common, taste in comedy included, so I said yay to a date.

The man:
Age: 37
Profession: Runs his own scaffolding firm

Random factoid: He's the first person I've ever met to own a Smart car. For some reason I'd always thought they were pretend...

The date:
I met Mr #31 outside the tube, and the first thing that struck me was that he was a textbook case for male pattern baldness, and that he'd been very careful to select only photos from his more hirsute days. 

That said, he wasn't unattractive by a long chalk, he had icy blue eyes and an excellent arrangement of gnashers. Well done him. 

We pottered off to a pub, he installed himself at the bar on a quest for wine, and twenty minutes later, yes TWENTY, he emerged with a bottle. I had had half an eye on him at the bar, and it was rather entertaining watching him get chatted up by some brassy blonde, and I'm pretty sure he slipped her his number as they were talking for a long time, and there was some mobile phone action.  

Once he'd returned with the booze, I very soon realised quite what an Essex lad he was, which made me feel incredibly posh, and I did try my best to de-plum so I didn't feel quite so self-conscious. The conversation was great. We covered the life and times of the Mighty Boosh, random inventions, the cats versus dogs debate, playing the piano, and had a lengthy argument about the Top Gun soundtrack. I even did the Marley and Me test on him, which he scraped past (he did say he would watch it if it was on, but wouldn't choose to). 

I couldn't help noticing the tattoo of a girl's name on his wrist, but didn't quite have the balls to enquire whether it was an ex, a daughter or a deceased pet. You can never tell these days. Before we knew it, we'd sunk a LOT of Sauvignon Blanc, it was time at the bar, and we had to go our separate ways. Not a bad evening. Or so I thought...

Memorable Quotes:
'Don't worry about needing to go for a wee, it happens to all of us.' Er, yes...yes it does.

Events of note:
So, all in all it was a rather pleasant night, no? Until it was time to say goodbye, when the following conversation occurred:

Mr #31: You getting the bus home then?

Me: Yes, the bus stop's just round the corner. You?

Mr #31: Actually my car's just parked round the corner

Me: Your car?

Mr #31: Yes

Me: But you're drunk

Mr #31: Yeah but I feel fine

Me: But you're over the limit

Mr #31: I'll be alright

Me: You shouldn't be driving. Why don't you hop on the tube?

Mr #31: I'll be fine, honest. I'll text you when I get in.

Er...that's not what I'm worried about! I'll tell you now, if I'd have seen his car, I would have rung up the police straight away and reported the fucker. Selfish, stupid, irresponsible bugger. With the benefit of hindsight I should have followed him, and I hate myself for that. In case you were wondering, he got in okay. Shame. I wish he'd been pulled over by the fuzz and taught a bloody lesson.

The Verdict:

Dare you need ask? Had he been a good boy and hopped on the tube home, I would have considered seeing him again. I'm sorry, but drink driving is a deal-breaker of the highest order. I'm not sure if I'll hear from him again, I suspect he's feeling pretty sheepish now and rightly so. But if he does suggest another date, I shall be gracefully declining, and telling him exactly why.

Mr #30 - Captain Apathy

The preamble:  

There was pretty much no preamble leading up to my date with Mr #30, the reason being I had a bit of a panic! It was the start of a new year, I had a date lined up for the Saturday, and two hours beforehand the bugger texts to cancel on account of manflu. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't because I had been looking forward to this particular date for ages, but because I didn't have a back up! I couldn't find a back up! And after an desperate afternoon of trying to bag a date for the Sunday afternoon, I failed miserably, and the best I could do was for the Monday night. That would just have to do, and I'll have to find another one for later in the week to make up the quota. Sad, but true...

The man:
Age: 29
Profession: Works in social housing
Random factoid: Is the only person I have ever met whose favourite nut is the walnut. This in itself should have been a warning...

The date:
Mr #30 wasn't terribly forthcoming on the date venue front, so I took the plunge and plumped for a non-committal pub I rather like in Soho. We met outside the tube, and to be honest, I'd spotted him waiting there about five minutes earlier, and my precise thoughts were 'oh god, that's him isn't it! That's bloody him...' And it was. 

His pictures had been very kind. Sadly his actual real life face let him down. He'd turned up in a manky woolly hoodie, grubby jeans and questionable trainers, and seemed pretty quiet and not very forth-coming. This was not going to be easy. 

We ambled over to the pub, actually not the pub I originally had in mind, it was one a lot closer, to make things swifter. At the bar, he announced he was having a January detox, so we procured a couple of pints of OJ and lemonade and found possibly the draughtiest corner of the pub to sit in. 

I have to say, after getting over the fact that the world was going to end during 2012, he warmed up a little. Behind the snuffling into his sleeve and distinct lack of eye contact, the chat was reasonably entertaining: we covered nuts, more nuts in fact, religions, how he loves his job because he can argue with people, Tom Cruise films, Morocco and the fact that he once drank 20 pints of Guinness at a work do when no-one else was on the booze. 

I suppose one of the most telling things about him was that he gave up eating meat for a year. For why, says I? Oh because I could. I see. So for no good reason whatsoever. Well done you. 

Sadly, there were a lot of awkward silences, and I was aware I did have to pull some of my dickish surrealism out of my handbag in order to try and keep things going, which for the most part succeeded. And I spent the entire time trying not to look like I was on a first date as there were two very handsome guys sat nearby giving us the odd look. After a very long pint of something non-alcoholic, I had to make my excuses and head off to the bus.

Memorable Quotes:
'I don't get hangovers. Probably explains why I use and abuse alcohol so much. I'm detoxing now as I was on a bender for the entire of 2011'

'I dropped out of uni. I drop out of things a lot'

Events of note:
Probably the best event of the night actually was at my expense. I'd been curled up on the sofa with one leg tucked under me, and when nature called, I hopped up to answer, but sadly my foot didn't quite wake up in time, so I ended up performing some ridiculous fall slash limp on the lengthy walk to the ladies. By the time I reached the loo, my leg had almost returned to normal. I swear that's why Kaiser Soze's limp goes at the end of the Usual Suspects, it's nothing to do with the fact he'd been faking, he just had a dead leg! And before you get angry at me for spoilering the Usual Suspects, that was nearly 20 years ago. Bruce Willis is also a ghost in Sixth Sense. What of it?

Anyway, that's the last time I sit on my own feet on a date, that's for sure.

The Verdict:
Do you really need to ask? My initial thoughts were dread, they improved marginally, but at the end of the day he was far from the cute East London fop that his photos shows, his conversational skills required far too much coaxing on my behalf, and his general apathy towards life was somewhat sapping. Oh well, I thought things were going a little too well with Mr #29. Who is still away in Mexico, in case you were wondering. Still, no time to dawdle, I have a date to make up, so expect a Mr #31 coming your way shortly.

Mr #29 - The Man is the Moon

The preamble:
Mr #29 and I had been bantering to and fro by email and text for a few weeks, and despite slightly poor texting etiquette, on the whole we seemed to have a fair amount in common, he seemed like a good enough sort so we arranged to meet. Slap bang in the middle of Christmas. Pretty brave move, for both of us...!

The man:

Age:37

Profession: Freelance web designer for a TV production company

Random factoid: He had the roundest face I have ever seen on a real life human being. It was literally a perfect circle; the moon, with hair. Amazing.

The date:

We met outside the station and although we'd both clocked each other standing in the cold trying not to look conspicuous, we had to send the cursory identification text just to avoid that eternally embarrassing situation of 'Hi, are you Mr #29? 'No, I'm not'; stranger clearly knows you're on an interweb date; you die inside. 

Apart from his perfectly circular visage that I have previously mentioned, he also had an awesome head of curly hair and one very pretty set of  baby blue peepers on him. He was definitely a lot cuter than I had been expecting, even though he wasn't a lot taller than me, he was cute enough for that not to matter. 

We ambled off to one of my favourite pubs, although once in we did a prompt 360 when we realised a. there were no seats, b. it was playing Slade so loud our chances of conversation were drastically low and c. 90% of the revellers looked and smelt but a cider away from sick. Not to matter, the next pub along was both with-seat and without-cider-sick. Bonus. 

I have to say right now, this will be a relatively short write up. Not because he had nothing to say. Oh no. He had plenty to say. We covered everything from John Terry to Twitter, Mexico to Masterchef, and football to Facebook. But I have to say, I can't fault the guy. He was cute, polite, bright and really good company. We chattered non stop for a few drinks, time at the bar was called, and we went our separate ways, snog-free but smiling.

Memorable Quotes:

He was so nice and normal, I literally don't have anything to add here. Genuinely.

Events of note:

Again...he didn't fall over drunk, didn't spend the night talking to my chest, didn't offend me, had no errant bodily functions and didn't appear to have a criminal past. I think this is probably also notable in itself.

The Verdict:

Well 52 First Dates readers, I feel in some ways I've let you down here; by going on a date with someone rather nice, and not having some ridiculous anecdotes to take away from the evening. But for me, this just goes to show quite how many 'unusual' dates I have to go on to meet someone pleasant, and out of the 29 dates so far, he's one of only about 3. Those aren't great odds. So I suppose the question now is would I see him again? Yes. Did I fancy him? Yes, I think I probably did. Was he good company? Yes he was. Did we have any ROFL moments? No, sadly not. Was there chemistry? I don't know, I really don't know. But I'd certainly be up for meeting him again just in case. But the kicker is he's off to Mexico for 3 months next week, so whatever happens, I'll have to hang on a little bit and keep on dating and see what happens when he's back in Blighty. But I think this is where time really tells.

As I've mentioned before, I'm not going to be chasing anyone for a second date over the course of 52 First Dates, as I've done on many an ocasion in my undignified past. I'd like the guys I meet again to want to meet up enough to actually ask the question, which funnily enough seems to be rarer than you might think. I've had a few pretty successful dates before where they've just not been arsed to get in touch again which questions both their motive and I suppose also my view of how well the date went. So I guess for now, this is a 'watch this space' scenario. But if this is as far as it goes, I'd just like to thank Mr #29 for being nice, normal, and nothing like Mr #28. Faith in men once again restored. God bless 52 First Dates.