Am I in a man low spot, or is there definitely a deficit of decent looking, intelligent ones?

[SarahStratton]

Nothing. Absolutely nothing is catching my eye. I must have blocked half of them on one site alone.

Is it because I live in a rural area, or is this general?

Its general, I find that there is a severe lack between the ages of 38 and 42

In that case, I will scare you by saying that there is also a severe lack between the ages of 44 and 54.

All the half decent looking ones live too far away from me to even half bother.

There is a very severe lack - the odd gem online but they are very rare.

I've completely given up dating, have been unbothered since october and it's very liberating. I'm going to keep it up all year and carry out tons of self improvement in the hope that when I do date again, I'll actually be attractive to those rare gems. I mean I'm not bad at the moment but I just want to improve my chances as much as possible.

In the mean time I have a FWB or two so that I'm not tempted back to the land of dark, desolate, hopeless despair online dating.

Why would you limit yourself by making distance an issue? How far are we talking?

You can't really complain about a lack of opportunities if you then self impose restrictions.

Same here. None at all

100 miles Sparks. But I live in a very rural area, and 60 miles is a good hour and a half to 2 hours drive away, easily. So realistically, 50 miles is a maximum.

I recently dipped a toe into the world of online dating and backed away in horror. I know many fabulous women without partners in their late thirties and early forties. They are attractive, solvent and smart. I only came across one man who knew where to put an apostrophe and he had some very dubious political views. The rest were largely illiterate and wouldn't know one end of a ballot paper from another.

There have been loads of lovely success stories that people have posted across the course of the various dating threads, not us lot posting I hasten to add but others who would just pop in to the thread with a bit of encouragement.

Actually two of the dating thread posters have been succesful since it started in August ish and are now loved up.

So it DOES happen - but I think luck and location have a lot to do with it - right place, right time etc.

Fucking Lincolnshire :(

"100 miles Sparks. But I live in a very rural area, and 60 miles is a good hour and a half to 2 hours drive away, easily. So realistically, 50 miles is a maximum."

In which case i'd say you're always going to have a restricted choice by definition.

I guess distance is relative to different people. Might be worth chatting to blokes a bit further afield. You never know, one of them might be worth the trek!

As regards online dating, the dumb, unattractive majority is not gender specific!

I've just been described as 'comely' by a poet from Bath.

comely is better than homely

I anticipate problems too, I live somewhere with a v low population density and a v high retirement rate. And it's expensive, people move here with their families, not as single men/after divorces. I genuinely haven't met a single man (straight, 35-45) for years.

I'm still loving your posts lubey

I think there is most definitely a lack of decent looking, intelligent, single men. Even when just going about my every day business I don't come across any. I sit in my favourite coffee shop some times, people watching, having conversations in my head about the lack of good looking blokes who take care of themselves. When I look at blokes around my age, well, I just become depressed.

Do we really have to widen our search to over 100 miles away just for a potentially decent man? That's one heck of a bus journey.

Sarah, do you remember the Country Living feature Farmer Wants a Wife? They followed it up a while later (there was also a docu thing) and most of them had married.
Maybe we should lobby them and suggest ourselves?

"Do we really have to widen our search to over 100 miles away just for a potentially decent man? That's one heck of a bus journey."

I'd wager there's just as many males probably saying the same thing!

Well actually, while conducting my POF IE experiment, I have discovered that there are many males more than willing to travel excessive miles just for the chance of a shag to meet me. Distance doesn't seem to put men off at all. Maybe men are more desperate

I don't want to do shagging though. I can't do shagging unless I'm in a relationship.

You know what Sue, that is a damn good idea. They should do that again, shall we contact them?

YY. We would be ideal, all hearty and tweedy and horsy as we are. The only trouble is, men don't read CL. So any man would have been entered by his mother/sister/whoever. That could be a concern, my main objection to farming men is the MIL in situ for life

Good point.

Maybe we should advertise on here? Someone on here must have the ideal friends/relatives for us.

I think Chat would be best, most traffic.

I know two men in their early to mid thirties and one of them is in Linconshire. Both are smart and solvent if somewhat geeky but if your geeky that's fine.
Their single by virtue of the fact that outside of school and university it can be damn hard to meet people particuarly if you work full time and work isn't conducive to meeting people.

I'm 44 though :(

Sarah, I suggested MN dating before on one particularly raucous AIBU thread that wandered off into a dating thing. MUCH frothing (outing, vulnerable women on here etc). Continue at your peril.

hmm im not quite ready for dating yet after splitting with ex 7 months ago but have started to look at men again lol doing the shopping i'll study whats about etc it's quite depressing. I'm 34 i do not want to be single forever :(

God help me, DD2 is now involved and merrily looking at sites for me.