28 Dates Later

From our Guest Blogger Juliette.


In a spirit of reflection, and after countless online dates, I thought I'd compile a Spotter's Guide To Online Dating. If you've spent any time in this particular circle of hell, see if you can recognise any of these guys...

The Heartbreaker
The total package. Ultimate man of your dreams. Created by a benevolent God to sweep you off into the sunset and father your unborn babies. Chemistry couldn't be better. Signs couldn't be better. Shame you never heard from him after the second date, really. His memory will occupy a small forlorn patch of mental real estate for the rest of your life, along with a legion never-to-be-answered questions. The Heartbreaker makes you realise why people become stalkers and bunny boilers and kil themselves for love. Or, more prosaically, drink far too many Margaritas at a cheesy bar and deliver awful karaoke renditions of I Will Survive.

The Heartbruiser
Not the total package, but scores a straight 10 in a crucial area which may be shallow but matters a great deal to you - this may be looks, money or the ability to tie a cherry stalk in a knot with his tongue. Either way, you'll never hear from him again after the first date, so don't worry about it.

The No
This man comes complete with a deal-breaker so quick and final, its revelation might as well be greeted with a get-the-fuck-off-the-stage buzzer a la America's Got Talent. Perhaps this moment came when you first saw that he had a waist-length beard or six fingers on one hand. Or the moment where he said he was sleeping on his parents' couch. Or the moment when he showed you the authentic Zyklon B canister he'd just snapped up on Ebay. Either way - don't call us, we'll call you.

The Pervert
It's nice when people are open and honest about their sexual predilections. Long gone are the days when people were forced to skulk in the sexual shadows on account of their lifelong splosh fetish. It's just that you didn't necessarily need to know about this before the starter course on your first date.

The What Happened There?
You go out for quite a nice evening with him. He's quite attractive. Quite pleasant. Sends you a nice text when you get home, saying he had a lovely time. You text each other a few more times the following day. Then he just vanishes. Maybe he didn't get your last text or something. Maybe you should resend it. Then again, maybe not. You didn't fancy him that much anyway.

The Yeti
An elusive and possibly mythical creature. Allegedly recent photos of the Yeti have been posted on dating sites - but are widely claimed by experts to be fake or severely outdated. Beyond these dubious photos, the Yeti's existence is solely verified by tell-tale signs known as 'texts' and 'emails.' Its habits include repeatedly attempting to initiate contact via very long dull exchanges of very short dull emails and texts (heavily featuring phrases such as HOW RU? and HOWS YOUR WEEKEND GOIN?) When startled by a direct question such as 'so how about meeting up for a drink some time?' the Yeti will mysteriously vanish into thin air - only to initiate another long rambling pointless text/email conversation approximately 24 hours later. Scientists claim that, when cornered, the Yeti resembles a forty-two year old IT manager with novelty Homer Simpson socks. However, nobody's ever seen the bloody thing in real life, so fuck knows.

The Meh
Well, there's nothing particularly wrong with him. He doesn't vanish into thin air after the first or second date. He doesn't have an extra nose or a National Front tattoo. He doesn't discuss his lifelong passion for nipple clamps over your first cocktail. Okay, he's about as irresistibly alluring as a loaf of bread, but you can't have everything. If encountered after a long string of Heartbreakers and Nos, a relationship with the Meh may end in marriage.

IMHO, 99.99999% of online men fit into at least one of these categories - and sometimes more. For example, a Meh can easily become a What Happened There - while a Pervert is almost certainly a sub-species of the No.

Or perhaps I'm just bitter...

J x
Posted by juliette at 7:10 AM

Henry is having a short allotment break, call it gardening leave. He wants to use the sunshine to make hay.