NotSuperMum and I are fellow single parents as well as anonymous bloggers and so – I like to think -  share something of a natural affinity. When she wrote to ask if I would write a piece on her blog about what it meant to me to be a single mother I felt pretty honoured.

What I did in fact do was dig out a post I wrote almost two years ago entitled: On Being a Single Mother Today. Ah those halcyon days when I actually wrote about proper stuff rather than all this luuurrve and dating and shit. Anyway, I read it back and was struck by how relevant the message of the post still is, despite the fact of it now being two years on. Some of my personal circumstances have of course changed since the original post but the point remains the same.

So for those of you that would like to read it, slightly revised and updated, please feel free to head on over to NotSuperMum towers by clicking on the permalink here.

Thanks.

I know. SEXY huh? I mean really, that is some seriously festive contagion.

I fear I may be scarred for life.

I have discovered that there are in fact two separate aspects to recovering from a suspicion of scabies – that it is a two pronged recovery if you will. Firstly there is the physical aspect, as in the rash that turned out not to be scabies after all but is nevertheless still intermittently there and making me scratch like a stray dog. Then there is the residual mental trauma of having believed myself to be riddled with the galloping mange, being convinced that I had infected everyone I had recently come into contact with, and that I would now be forced to make a bonfire of all my soft furnishings and drown myself in sheep dip.

By far and away the most fun thing about having suspected scabies however, is having to tell all your neighbours and friends. I loved that part the best. Oooh the icily polite reactions accompanied by the small steps backwards; the aghast – I am not even for the sake of courtesy going to try to hide the fact that I’m absolutely appalled – faces. Not to mention all the belly laughing, offers of sheep heads for my front door, and bony fingers being fashioned into crosses. It was a fucking hoot, let me tell you.

Now there was a period in my life, years ago, when I was a veritable ancient tome of information regarding all manner of medieval sounding diseases and parasites. Scabies, body lice, impetigo, giardia; I have seen and been a proud host for them all. I can still reliably diagnose impetigo at ten paces. But you know what they say, when it comes to  knowledge you either use it or lose it, so when a strange but intense itching began spreading out from the back of my neck down to my shoulders, I didn’t really think much of it. I had a cold anyway. It was just a rash that’s all. A rash to add to my collection of other randomly unpleasant symptoms. A perfectly normal, garden variety, annoyingly itchy, rash.

Then I got a new dining room table delivered, and my friend J (a fellow former traveller) came round with her flatbed to collect my old one and help me heave the new one into my kitchen. I showed her my rash – because ours is a caring sharing sort of friendship – and watched while she gulped and took a large step backwards.

“What?” I said.

“Oooh” she said.

“What?!” I said.

“Well… if I’m not mistaken that looks a leeedle bit like scabies” she said, before adding thoughtfully, “Did you know that the itching is an allergic reaction to their faeces?”  At which point she made a hideous face and started to twitch violently because J is hilarious like that.

I went to the doctors. Who also said,

“Oooh”

“What?”

“Well… It does look a leeedle bit like scabies” she said. “Could just be one of those things though.”

Just one of those things. Right.

So I stocked up on industrial quantities of Lyclear and quarantined the entire family inside the house for three days. We became known as the house of the unclean. The neighbours would come in the morning to leave fresh cartons of milk on our doorstep, then quickly back a hasty retreat. It’s a wonder the children didn’t murder each other. We finally emerged blinking into the sunshine to drive the three hours down to my Mothers (who had insisted a tad unconvincingly that she still loved us, lurgy or no lurgy) for some much needed Christmas cheer.

At which point the rash completely disappeared, all on its own.

In the blessed relief that followed I posted a celebratory announcement on facebook: Hey everybody! Guess what? I don’t actually have the mange after all! Christmas doesn’t get any better than not having to smother yourself in Lyclear! Woohoo!  I then realised a little too late, after some hesitant congratulations from my colleagues, that this may not have been a good idea. I shut up about the scabies.

And then soon after that of course I went on holiday.

But now I am back and I’m itchy all over again. Turns out that I am, in fact, allergic to my own home.

Unfortunate, I think you’ll agree.

One of these in between dates was with a guy who worked in marketing (I know, I should have known.) He spent his working days analysing data collected from Tesco club cards and turning it into hard figures that Tesco could then use to increase its profits. A candidate for a future mid life crisis if ever I saw one. He hated his job and missed his ex-girlfriend, all of which was sad, but I was out for a good time dammit. The date did have its redeeming features though. The first was that the bar we were in was hosting a hip-hop karaoke evening. Yep, that’s hip-hop karaoke. Not only that but there was a queue of people reaching half way down the road to get in. Turns out lots of people take their hip-hop karaoke veeery seriously. The second was that the bar served its drinks in jam jars. It’s a London thing apparently. I’m such a tourist.

I was really excited about my next date. He had seemed from his profile to be a kind of modern day mod; all tall and handsome with messy hair, green eyes, razor sharp suit jackets and thin little ties. He rode a hand-painted scooter and listened to Northern Soul. I liked his style. Alas I was almost an hour late for our date because the Circle line is stupid, plus I have no sense of direction, so together of course we go nowhere. Then when I did finally get there he in fact turned out not to look anything like his pictures. I was crushed. Even his story about how his mother had stolen an espresso machine and hidden it in the boot of his car (which to be fair was so funny it made me cry) could not quite lift my lingering disappointment.

Out of the three in between dates I had been looking forward to meeting T the least. I wasn’t really expecting us to have anything in common. He looked a bit pretty for my taste. A bit boy band. A bit tooo athletic. I preferred men altogether a bit scruffier. I was due to meet him in the afternoon at the National Gallery. He was running late so I waited, leaning into the winter sunshine over the balustrade at the top of the stairs outside the entrance, watching breakdancers entertain the milling crowds below.

I sensed someone behind me and turned around.

“Hello Gappy”

There is so much a picture cannot tell you. A slight lisp here. A slow smile there. A way of walking, a way of looking. My god he was fucking gorgeous. He held the large gallery entrance door open and gestured me through…

“So are you enjoying London?”

For a fleeting second N came to mind and I laughed unthinkingly,

“Oh yeah, I’m having a ball thanks.”

Another slow, perhaps slightly knowing, smile. We walked unhurriedly together through the entrance hall and into the first rooms of the gallery, falling into easy step, chatting quietly, the occasional small silence sitting comfortably and contentedly between us.

Now I am a bit of a liability in art galleries. This is because I want to touch the art. I want to be able to feel the texture of the paint, to point things out to my companion, to absorb the history. God damn it I just want to touch the paintings! A terribly posh security guard sidled up and quietly asked me to please step away from the barrier. Cue another slow smile, this time accompanied by slightly raised eyebrows,

“You know you’re going to get us into trouble. Also, I um like your perfume. What is it?”

“Oh thank you. It’s er… by Bulgari. They’re an Italian jewellers.”

“I’m sorry? Did you say it was made by Italian gigolos?”

(Laughing) “No, an Italian jewel…. actually yes. Yes, it’s made by Italian gigolos.”

A smirk this time. “I see.”

We walked for miles. Through the National Gallery, through Covent Garden, towards Oxford Circus, stopping every now and then for coffee or to watch the street performers. When we said goodbye T kissed me softly on the mouth. I walked away quickly, suddenly and inexplicably embarrassed.

We met up again a few days later. I had received a message asking did I want to ‘hang out’ at the Tate Modern on Sunday? Being just the sort of woman that spends her Sunday afternoons ‘hanging out’ at the Tate Modern, I replied yes. Yes, I would meet him there at 12.00.

Much to T’s amusement, I proved to be even more of a liability amongst the modern art. Here were all kinds of testaments to human creativity. 3D models, sculptures and carvings. Collages. Paintings made out of latex and sheep shit. The desire to touch made my hands itch. To have to stand there and just look with my eyes was almost unbearable.

I was beginning to feel the same about T.

We spent that entire Sunday together, again walking for miles, talking, poking fun, stopping for lunch, drinking coffee and sitting in bars watching the world go by. Finally at about 9.30pm T walked me to the tube station. I was due to travel home the next day. Again he kissed me softly goodbye, only this time breaking away abruptly, looking suddenly shy and awkward. He gave a small, seemingly rehearsed speech, most of which I didn’t take in – the gist being that he had really enjoyed my company and hoped we might stay in touch. I had his personal e-mail address right?

Yes, I had it. I floated away happily down the steep escalators to the underground, too caught up in the moment to recognise his slightly awkward speech for the subtle and gentle let down it had been.

Circumstance dictated that I had two child-free weeks on my hands (a proper holiday!) so in my enthusiasm I set about arranging to visit various friends and family in and around the South East, plus also rather impulsively setting up a brand spanking new profile on Guardian Soulmates stating that I was going to be in and around London for the first half of January and could do with someone to show me the sites. And with that, all that was left to do was to pack my bags, sit back, and wait for the offers to flood in. Er… yes, that’s right, flood in.

In the end I went on a total of 8 separate dates with 6 different people, the majority of which were crammed into a four day period. YEAH! I’ll sleep when I’m dead… or something.

The first date of any significance was date number two. We’ll call him N shall we? Now N had been a man of few words over e-mail but his profile was funny, I liked his photos, he gave good text and so I decided to take a punt.

And what do you know, I liked N almost instantly. He managed to somehow skip the usual initial awkwardness and go straight to being fun, relaxed and outgoing, which of course was utterly contagious and not only that, but he also managed to pass the Germaine Greer test with flying colours.

Now for those of you wondering what the Germaine Greer test is, it’s really very simple. You just casually drop Germaine Greer into the conversation (for me it’s pretty easy as I actually went to see her do a talk at a local theatre a while back) and then wait for the reaction. Around 80% of men in my experience will either look completely blank or completely horrified. Not N. His response was to lean closer with a salacious look on his face and say:

“Did you know she fucked John Peel?”

“Noooo!” said I.

And that was that – we talked non-stop for half the night. I was pretty taken with N’s company – he was clever, full of energy, full of knowledge, confidence and fun. Woo I thought – I like this guy! The talking gradually became interspersed with more and more kissing and as the evening became night became early hours of the morning I decided to go back to his. (What? I was on holiday ok?)

Now I am not about to divulge any intimate details here (I’m afraid this isn’t that kind of blog) so we’ll fast forward to when I woke late the next morning to find N already up and glued to his iphone reading the days news. We decided to head to a local cafe for a cooked breakfast during which he grabbed a local newspaper and started reading with much amusement about Antony Worrall Thompsons unfortunate foray into cack handed thievery, which then led on to him using his iphone to find out as much as he could about Antony Worrall Thompson himself, which then led on to him googling celebrities with kleptomaniac tendencies (Winona Ryder seeming to top the leader board just in case anyone’s interested) which then led onto him needing to find out about something else and then something else and so on and so on, all whilst simultaneously managing to hold a perfectly acceptable conversation with me. It was becoming increasingly clear just why he was so knowledgeable. The speed at which his brain worked was palpable, almost audible. Grey matter spinning off at a hundred miles an hour in a thousand different directions.

The last of the bacon polished off we set off again on a guided tour of Brick Lane, N proving to be a rather marvellous tour guide. He regaled me with stories about the history of the place, the old begel shops, the public art everywhere, Spittalfields market. He showed me the pub where Jack the Ripper had alledgedly picked up his victims – largely unchanged since the nineteenth century apparently. I stared in through the windows at the wooden interior.

We said goodbye.

Just under a week later we met up again. I raced to the East End to meet him after another less successful date and we made our way slowly back to his home stopping to sit in a pub on the way to warm up and chat. The pub itself was like a time warp  -  the last bastion for every single stereotype of white working class Londoner that you can imagine. I fully expected Chaz and Dave to suddenly appear as if by magic and start singing Knees up Mother Brown. I had no idea pubs like that still existed and whilst I looked around in wonder and amusement N told me that he had ADHD and that he chose not to medicate it.

Of course. The slightly obsessive collecting of information. The spinning off on tangents. The constant energy. I see. Or rather I saw.

I was shaken awake at 8.30 the next morning after just a few hours sleep.  N was up, the sun was shining and he was like a coiled spring ready for the day. It was patently clear that more sleep was not going to be an option so I got dressed with my eyes still shut and we headed again to the same cafe for breakfast. Close to dropping back off over my cup of tea I watched and listened, leaning against the cold window, as N tapped furiously at his iphone, read out the most interesting of the days headlines, and told me jokes to try and wake me up (Why did the chicken cross the road? Because it was stuffed up Antony Worrall Thompsons jumper!) He had shopping he needed to do, did I want to come? He could show me the big Waterstones on Oxford Street! Wasn’t the morning light amazing?!

We boarded the bus into central London and sat at the front of the top deck. The city opened out before us. N told stories about the buildings and the landmarks.

I fell dead asleep on his shoulder.

Part 4 to follow soon…

A long time ago when I was still living with Mr S, eldest son had just started school and middle son was only a baby, we all moved together into the village where the children and I still live today. It was around September time, cold, and in all my memories I am spattered with paint, rushing around trying to get the house decorated and ready for our first family christmas in our new home.

We didn’t know anybody in the village so when Mr S saw a flyer advertising the Christmas Eve Christingle service at the local church he suggested we go, you know, to join in with a community event, make our faces known, maybe meet some people. For gods sake there would be loads of candles stuck in oranges, he said when I made a face. It would be really pretty and christmassy and I would like it ok?

Middle son must no doubt have performed his usual trick of doing a spectacularly messy crap in his nappy precisely two seconds before we were due to leave the house (his uncanny knack for timing remains to this day) because I clearly remember us running late, hurrying with the pram down the dark, shiny wet road leading to the stone chapel on the corner.

We spent a while trying to work out which door led the way in. In the end Mr S took pot luck and hefted one open to reveal a service already underway. All available surfaces glowed with what seemed like the light of a thousand flickering candles. I attempted, clumsily, to shunt the pram over the door frame and as I did so looked up to see one mass, but perfectly simultaneous movement. Multiple heads swiveled with faultless synchronicity to stare bemusedly at the slightly paint speckled woman and her noisy family entering the candle lit church…..   Entering the candle lit church to discover that the only available seats were right up at the front near the altar. The entire place sunk into an almost eerie silence as multiple pairs of eyes now watched us make our way up the full length of the aisle and settle into our pew.

I sank down gratefully into my seat. The service went on. And on. And on. Finally something snapped me out of my reverie – there was going to be a song. I heard the vicar say something about needing to stand for the next carol and so immediately stood up enthusiastically. I wondered why Mr S was still sitting down. Again I felt eyes on my back and turned my head slowly around. Myself and the vicar were the only people in the church standing. I promptly sat down again.

When it really was time to stand up and sing, I noticed two elderly people making their way slowly up the aisles from the back, each holding a kind of stiff felted container. People were dropping money – a few coins here, even a note or two there – into the containers and smiling their merry christmases at the collectors, before quietly resuming their slow, dignified rendition of Silent Night.  Ah.  I began to pat the pockets of my coat and jeans frantically. Nothing. I looked at Mr S who looked at me. And then – completely without thinking  – I exclaimed,

“Oh fuck, I haven’t got any change!”

The acoustics in that place were nothing short of amazing. They carried my voice high into the air, lifting it over and above the general hum of the singing, giving it an almost echo like quality. Mr S kicked me in the ankle. The baby whined. I teetered dangerously between hoping hell would swallow me up right then and there and dissolving into wild eyed hysterical laughter.

I have never been back to the Christmas Eve service at our local church. On reflection, it seemed best not to.

Merry Christmas everyone.

The reasons for this are threefold:

1. It distracts me from other, much more important things, like writing and cleaning the oven on a reasonably regular basis.

2. I’m spectacularly crap at it and haven’t been on an actual date in months.

And 3. I hate it.

That is to say I hate it whilst at the same time finding it strangely, addictively, compulsive. A bit like a mind blowingly good in bed but otherwise entirely toxic boyfriend, it is full of promise, the highs can sometimes be amazing, but any woman with half an ounce of sense knows well enough that she’d best get her arse out of there sooner rather than later before it all goes wincingly, horribly wrong and her self esteem is blithely reduced to tatters.

Now – I upgraded fairly early on in my internet dating ‘career’ from the skin crawlingly awful, lecherous, punctuation free zone that is Match.com to what I thought might be the slightly more refined charms of Guardian Soulmates.  The men there could at least spell and seemed, frankly, much better looking.  But I’m afraid to say that my snobbery got me absolutely nowhere. Who was I kidding? Lechery couched in slightly more ornate, flowery, better looking terms, even with appropriate punctuation, is still lechery from whichever angle you wish to  look at it. It got to the stage where I thought that if I received just one more e-mail containing a slightly politer, more middle class version of, “Phwoargh, ‘ello darlin. What a shame you live on another planet eh” (I have the audacity to live outside the M25) then my will to live might finally desert me. Forever. And I can’t have that.

I also decided that if I read one more profile containing any of the following phrases, then I would be forced to take a life times vow of celibacy. And honestly? I can’t have that either…

1. ‘I like going out and staying in’. (Good god, how about that.)

2. ‘I love to laugh’. (No shit, really?)

3. ‘I would like to meet a person who is comfortable in their own skin.’ (Whiffs far too suspiciously of self-help hippy woo bollocks for my liking. No, no, and no.)

4. ‘I want someone who is passionate.’ (Oh for crying out loud  – what does that even mean? Passionate about what? I can go on and on for bloody hours about my job if you really want me to, but if what you’re after is kinky sex on the first date you can forget it.)

Yep – nothing quite like an online dating cliche to send you running to the local nunnery. I mean why do perfectly intelligent people write that kind of shit about themselves? It’s not that I lack empathy – I know it can be tricky to write something coherent and cliche free that makes you sound in any way dateable, but christ, even I managed it in the end. Or did I?

In fact I asked a friend (we’ll call her K) what she thought I should write. She had thought long and hard, her brow looking all suitably furrowed, and in the end said, ‘Well…. why don’t you put:  Works for Women’s Aid, has tattoo on head, is a bit gobby, prone to occasional bouts of angry feminist ranting, and likes gazumping men in busy car parks, particularly if they are deemed to have a ‘wanky’ car.’

‘Aw Kaaaaaay’, I wailed. ‘I really don’t think that will get me a boyfriend any time soon.’

‘Noooo’, she replied. ‘I don’t suppose it will. In which case I should just put up a picture of yourself in a tight dress and say as little as possible, frankly’.

I made a face. ‘Do you think I should mention the fire spinning?’

‘No. That just makes you sound mental. They’ll all worry you’ll set fire to their curtains.’

I did mention the fire spinning in the end. And the fact that I drive too fast and swear too much. Try as I might I just couldn’t quite bring myself to say how much I liked laughing and going out and staying in.

I’m still boyfriendless believe it or not.

But what I do have is a functioning blog and a very clean oven.

She was only 27 years old.

And in a popular culture full of manufactured, plastic dross, Amy was the real thing. Her voice and the emotional intensity and rawness of her songwriting always, always took my breath away.

Here she is at her best.

I loathe them.

They taste like the particularly acrid semen of a man who doesn’t get his five a day.

There, I said it.

I have tried to like olives. I mean really tried. I have put far more effort into it that any damn foodstuff deserves frankly.  I still periodically re-try them in the hope that I might have changed my mind, or that they will have magically transformed themselves into the delicious treat that everyone claims them to be. But much like leopards and philandering husbands (sigh) they never change.

There is a myth that abounds about olives that states if you force yourself to eat fifty of them in a row you will then like them forever. Some of the most dedicated peddlers of this myth come disguised as my friends. My own friends are involved in a conspiracy to try and  make me eat olives. Sometimes they vary the theme by persuading me that these particular olives are different – perhaps they are a different colour or maybe they’re stuffed with something equally vile such as pimento paste – but the outcome is always the same…  My friends clutch at each other crying real tears of mirth whilst I pull tortured faces and make agonised, strangled, heaving noises.

It recently occurred to me that I had my olive attitude all wrong. Why the self induced pressure to develop an appreciation for something that was so clearly the spawn of a furious and vengeful Satan? Why the tenacity? The dogged, zealous  determination to stick with a challenge that provided no pleasure factor whatsoever? I realised in that moment that I could never win against olives. That they were pure, undiluted little ovals of evil and there was no shame in admitting my defeat.

Hey, I thought, I don’t actually have to like olives!

It was an epiphany people. And I am now finally free. I thank you.

Of course one of the reasons I have been absent of late is that I have been incredibly busy sifting through the vast hungry hordes of my various on-line admirers   Oooh there are some smooth virtual talkers out there, let me tell you. My inbox is fit to bursting with such profound statements as:  ‘Hi how r u? U r hot.’  I mean how could a girl possibly resist? Although I have to say that my absolute all time favourite e-mail read: ‘You faccsinate me. I really like you.’ Now that is a quality typo. I read it as you vaccinate me, which probably made me fall about laughing rather more than was strictly necessary but hey ho. If you’re going to dabble in on-line dating, one thing I have found is that you’ve got to take the laughs where you can get ‘em.

So… I believe that when we last spoke, I was parting company rather hastily with Mr Asian Babes. Well I have since then met up with three other potential prospects. For the purposes of this blog, we’ll call them Mr Premier Inn, Mr Daily Mail, and Mr Unidentified Baggage. With this post I’ll begin, shall I, with Mr Premier Inn.

I met up with him (oddly enough considering it was in a city an hours drive away) in the exact same pub in which I had met Mr Asian Babes. The venue had been his suggestion and I hadn’t wanted to admit to any concern about getting a reputation amongst the staff, so instead I had smiled inwardly and said o.k, that was no problem, yes I knew where it was, I would meet him at eight. When I arrived slightly early he was already there waiting for me in a stiff collared shirt and v neck jumper. I could tell almost instantly that he was not my type of man, but never mind thought I.  Meeting new people is always interesting.  May as well just relax and enjoy the conversation. Midway through the conversation however, Mr Premier Inn suddenly informed me that he was in fact working in this here same town the next day and so was thinking of booking a room in the hotel over the road. Did I, by any chance,  know how much it cost?  No I did not, said I with a frown, and promptly changed the subject. At which point Mr Premier Inn suddenly became strangely concerned at what a long drive home I had. In this weather too. That’s o.k. said I, I like driving. Particularly in the rain. At which point Mr Premier Inn deftly steered the conversation back to the hotel across the road. At which point I made it clear that I was leaving. Alone.

The next morning I received a text message informing me that he didn’t think we’d really “hit it off” last night, but thanks anyway. I resisted the urge to reply, “Oh. You think?” and instead contented myself with spluttering various takes on ‘you cheeky little bastard’ at my blackberry for the next minute or so.

I mean, a Premier Inn? For goodness sake.

You may remember I recently wrote a post entitled The Fish and the Bicycle, in which I discussed relationships, my lack of one, and the fact that I was following Slummy Single Mummy’s forays into the internet dating jungle with interest. Soon after that I read a post in Sandy Calico’s archives about her eight hour long first date with her husband, whom she had first met on-line.

You can see where this is going can’t you…

In The Fish and the Bicycle I bemoaned the fact that most men my age seemed either to want to settle down, get married and have a family or just have casual non-committal sex, usually outside of their marriage or primary relationship, and how both of those options left me cold as if I was going to bother becoming involved with someone I would want a relationship that lay somewhere in between those two ‘extremes’. Something that was loving, monogamous, exciting and fun, but with someone who didn’t want to monopolise my time or move in.  I seem to remember writing that I wasn’t holding my breath. Also that I didn’t care enough about having a relationship to actively pursue one – which is true – but that of course didn’t take into account the burning curiosity that could possibly arise as a result of reading other womens posts about their on-line dating adventures. It didn’t take into account the sneaky little thoughts that would then flutter around in my mind whispering: what could possibly be the harm of having a little dabble in a dating site and seeing what happens? Maybe it might just be fun!

So I did it. It is done. I have put a profile – complete with photos – up on a well known dating site. I have been as ethical as possible and stated clearly that I am interested in “making new friends and meeting new people” rather than claiming to be searching for the love of my life, and so far it has been up for about a week. And well I never! An eye opening experience is the most polite phrase I can think of to describe it, and I did spend at least ten minutes trying to think of something less hackneyed, but no – I can’t think of anything else that doesn’t involve prolific amounts of swearing. I mean WTF?!

I’ve found on-line dating to be rather like reality television, in that you know it’s awful (the ‘winking’ especially makes me cringe) but you can’t help watching it play out anyway. I mean don’t get me wrong – I have no problem with the concept of on-line “dating” (although I hate that word) especially for people who are no longer in their twenties and able to spend every weekend out socialising and meeting other single people. I don’t think there’s the same stigma attached to it as there once was anyway – we do everything else on line these days: banking, studying, shopping – why not meeting new people? And it obviously works for plenty of folk.

It is not working for me so far though, I have to say. In fact I’m starting to worry that I have a sign on my forehead visible to everyone except me that says: Freaks, Weirdos and Fred West Lookalikes, Come On Down! I have so far managed to attract the slightly dubious attentions of both RandyAndy and MagicFingers, (please don’t even get me started on DrRob) and am also receiving on average about four e-mails a day, out of which the most interesting content as of yet has been that I apparently have a “very well maintained face.” Er… thanks. I think.

So you can imagine my relief when the other day I finally found a profile of a man who could spell and was funny. Who had interesting hobbies. Who was tall, good looking and solvent. Great, I thought. I’ll go out with you.

So I did. And aside from the fact that I was half an hour late because I couldn’t find the pub and had spent the last thirty minutes driving aimlessly around a deserted marina, it had sort of been going o.k. He wasn’t ever going to set my world on fire (he looked rather different to his profile photo in person and was a bit timid for my liking) but he was good enough company and I was having a good enough time. Until that is, he showed me his iphone and I saw very clearly in the bottom left hand corner of the screen a rather busty app entitled Asian Babes. Or was it Asian Hots?

Anyway,

NEXT!