Dating - Another Story

This is part of an email that I received from another friend. I have been waiting to here how a date with a neighbour had gone for months (even before I started this investigation!). She replied yesterday ...

• I have just realised that I hadn't responded-hope it's not too late.
  1st official date was when I was at uni and it took the guy a year to ask me out...(phone shop guy...u know ash) went to watch his band play and convinced him to come out to Gallery after...he did. There was a girl following us around all night whom I wanted to punch...who was she? An ex....anyways eventually ended up going on a date to keystones a few days later (classy i know...) went badly when the convo turned to the weather, I got a peck on the lips and he left...from then it was at his beck and call when I heard from him....turned out he had a kid with the ex from a nightclub but didn't want to tell me...needless to say we spoke no longer.
  
  My other experience of dating (because there has been only two real occasions of proper dates) was much better. It took the guy two weeks to ask me out ( I can only presume I am somewhat intimidating and unapproachable?!) and eventually did when a drunk neighbour asked me for him coz he was fed up of him waiting to ask me ...and so was I.(they are best friends and my neighbour and his wife had been trying to set us up for months which neither of us realised)
  
  He took me out to a nice restaurant. He paid for taxis there and back, a full three course meal and lots of drinks. To be honest it couldn't have gone better or smoother and I really enjoyed it. He was a gentleman and wouldn't allow me to pay! Pretty much (and I can gloat...a perfect date).
  
  From there we had a night in at his with a takeaway and drinks...again I paid for nothing and even though he only lives around the corner and 2 mins away...he insisted on walking me 
  home.
  
  We went out on other dates as well..to the Trafford Centre (god I know how to live lol!) He drove there...he has the better car...and again tried to pay for everything although finally after nearly a week he allowed me to pay for the food...after all a girls got to offer on occasions!
  It was all going well and we saw each other for 'dates' every other night for two weeks.(Again hardly paid and they were great).
  
  He was then asked by work to go to Canada for a works trial...he has been there since...this is now over 9 weeks ago and since nothing was ever official it sucks!
  
  Dating is game playing and to be honest I can't stand it! lol... will he text? do i text? how long do you wait?...blah blah!!
  You should just know where you stand and get on with it....I am dangling on a piece of string till he returns coz I don't really know if he's still interested or wants to see me when he returns!
  Ash, you may have realised I am typing this after a few drinks....hence the complete honesty and slight anger in the tone lol! My opinion and experiences of dating are slightly tinged at the mo...if he returns and we carry on then I'm sure i'll think it's great...till then who knows!! Hope this helps...sort of?! xx

I BLAME DISNEY!

Just as Katie had mentioned the concept of dating and how watching Disney has ruined her expectations of first dates, I too had started to think about this. I spent the majority of my childhood watching Cinderella, The Little Mermaid, Aladdin et al. and have realised that somewhere in the back of my consciences I still have expectations that 'someday my prince will come'. 

I think the majority of woman still fantasise about getting swept off their feet by a gorgeous, well mannered, polite, impeccably dressed, music loving, talks to the animals kinda guy, which is never the case in reality. In Cinderella, Snow White, Sleeping Beauty and The Little Mermaid the 'prince' characters are extremely perfect (if not to the point of boredom). Even in Aladdin, the only real downside to his character is that he is not a real prince, but then the rules of prince hood are changed (which is allowed because it's Disney) and he becomes one by default (winning the affections of Jasmine). 

Even in Lady and the Tramp our expectations of dating are illusive. I know that we are dealing with animals here and it is very unlikely that dogs really do go on dates, but I have always watched in awe at the spaghetti scene! Who hasn't? When I was a child, I thought that dinner dates would entail being serenaded by accordion playing Italians, candle light and pasta (although, I also thought that Ariel in The Little Mermaid seemed 'grown up' at the tender age of 16 and that mice really can rescue kidnapped children as in The Rescuers). As we all know from experience of eating the stuff, Spaghetti Bolognese is a massive no-no on a date! Team that with a white shirt and your just heading for disaster! Also, if the person I was on a date with moved a meatball across the plate with his nose I would probably end up running for the hills! Yes. I really do think Disney has clouded my judgement about dating!

Maybe I'm onto something here? Hmm interesting ...

Some Wise Words from my Friend Katie.

I have a friend called Katie (AKA Kettle) who is one of the most hilarious people I know. The girl has kindly volunteered her thoughts for my investigation about the first date (in her experiences).

Dating the awkward truth 

My younger self’s dream - marriage and kids, lots of kids, by my mid-twenties. Big familie, big arguments the big whole works. My Reality? On a management ladder in a career that is not house wife domesticity! I long for the Regency period debutant balls where social rules are clearly outlined. With a string of could have beens and should have beens with a series of (in the whole) fairly decent chaps (with the odd exception). 

The life motto 'I want what I don’t have, I don’t want what I can have so if what I couldn’t have' became 'what I could have I wouldn’t want it any way'!

And how does all this fit in the world of dating… Time is NO great healer where we all stand on first date depends on how reckless you have been with your heart in the past. My standing is on a ground of learned inadequacies and nerves and so like many situations in life a series of military coping strategies have developed to deal with dating.

I will always be on the phone on approach to the meeting place, or if worse and I am waiting for them. A friend of mine who was on the receiving end of one of these “date approach phone calls” once questioned this methodology. The answer is simple. If you are sat there waiting you don’t want to look like you’re on your own, you can also easily escape if you are stood up. 

The usual recipient of this phone call is my mum (friends can be unhelpful as you will read later). Who by knows the routine; as I approach the target I will pretend that I am on the phone to another boy, and I’m clearly in the middle of a hysterically funny conversation of which the date should be very jealous and nervous... right?? So know I’ve evened the nerves playing field and also successfully managed to avoid the first greeting, while they wait for me to finish on the phone, there can be no hug, or kiss or whatever it is that you’re supposed to do when you first meet the date can commence. And as ludicrous as this routine sounds I consider it an achievement to have made it this far. I would have normally talked myself out of a date long before this stage with lame ass excuses of work commitments and unexpected netball training (I’ve even once used “not tonight Britains Biggest Loser is on”). 


So while at your mouth agreed to go to dinner with enthusiasm your brain is going F*****CK. What the hell am I going to eat, I’m not one of those salad girls but burgers and pizza are off. Nobody wants to have the cut vs. dig straight in with your hands debate. 

Disney lets blame Disney. Disney never tells you how to behave on your first date. You patiently wait for the moment when they ask you a question just as you shovel slightly too much food in your mouth and your cover is blown you are actually a man masquerading as a gentle female… the sort they would take home to meet mum. And now you thinking about their family and whether you will meet them and then you start to panic wondering if they can tell what you’re thinking. The whole time you’re sitting there reminiscing how comfortable it was with your ex. And bang now you’ve done it, you’re thinking about your ex, and not the money grabbing, lying waste of space bits but the bits that make the person in front of you not them.

So you eat, drink and more often than not you laugh and then the awkward truth… you’re exhausted (and a little disappointed the ex hasn’t seen you having such fun)… and no matter who is in front of you, you have already vowed to never fall in love again, so home you head for a duvet spoon pretending to be indifferent to whether they text or not. Better to be disappointed now than shattered later.

My Friend and Her Very Funny Dating Escapades

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Some Stories From My Ladies

Here are some dating stories that have been sent to me for my research (no names mentioned):

'Our first date lasted 180 hours! He came up from Chesterfield on the 29th August, we spent the day together, he stayed over and the next day I went down to Chesterfield with him and ended up staying there for 6 Days ... total hours on one date - 180! Four days later he moved up to Rishton and we've been pretty inseparable ever since!'




'I'd only known this guy for a week and he was pretty straight with me about having a girlfriend who was living abroad at the time, but I agreed to go on a date with him anyway (I'm bad I know). Anyhow, after a few cocktails he invited me back to his place for 'coffee'. He told me that he lived with six friends in a shared house, all of whom where good friends with his girlfriend thus expressing a need to keep the 'situation' under wraps. After 'having our coffee' and staying the night, I was awoke the next morning and we tried to usher ourselves towards the front door, pulling on my top, zipping up my trousers and rubbing the panda eye mascara marks from my eyes. I got to the front door thinking that the coast was clear when a polite, if not bewildered couple appeared and just stared at me.I was trapped in the pathway of his house, desperately trying to pull my heels onto my feet and tuck my boobs into my hooker-Esq top. Oh my god, I'm sure they thought I was a prostitute or something! How embarrassing! They then uttered a very quiet hello in utter bewilderment. Never again!'


'I once went on a date with a guy in York to Pizza Hut (very classy) and when I asked for a glass of 'Cab Sav' he stated that 'you can take the girl out of Sheffield, but you couldn't take the Sheffield out of the girl' and that I should call it by it's full name of Cabernet Savingion. He was from Rotherham. Enough said.'


Thanks girls! These are great!

Did I Accidently Go on a Date Without Knowing It?

It's been a while since I have wrote on here as both my Broadband and phoneline have been down. Thankfully, they are both working perfectly again so I can update the blog with the last few weeks worth of goings-on...

DATE - n. - the time when an event happened; an appointment, esp with the oppposite sex; rendezvous; a sweetheart. Geddes and Grosset Dictionary and Thesaurus 2001.

Did I go on a date without knowing it? I thought it was just a few casual drinks, but the more I think about it, the more I'm starting to wonder ...

'A guy I know breifly, lets just call him Rob* as not to mention names here, came into my place of work just as I had finished my shift. I was sat with another work collegue at the time just finishing some drinks and then Rob* joined us and ordered some more drinks for the three of us. My collegue had to leave, leaving the two of us with our drinks. We had a few more drinks and the conversation was flowing nicely so we had a few more. Rob* left the table to go to the toilet and another collegue came over and pointed out that it looked as though we were on a date. I laughed it off, Rob* was just a new acquaintance who I was having a few drinks with. Later on that evening he walked me to get a taxi and asked if we could 'do this again sometime'. I said ok and we said our goodbyes. 


Two days later whilst working a long Saturday split shift, I finished work only to notice that I had 53 (yes 53) missed phone calls from him. He obviously thought the previous encounter was a date too! I haven't heard a peep from him since ... although I never did reply ...




So, the first date in my investigation has been and gone and I didn't even know about it! Onwards I go. A friend has suggested going speed dating soon. That should be fun. At least I will know that I am speed dating, unlike this little encounter!