Red shoes, charming lesbians and pirates with taste...Dating Thread 24

[ChaoticismyLife]

It's the best I could come up with

As you were...

[snapespeare]

[watchoutforthatsnail]

hi walk :) if you are dating, thinking about it, or have in the past, then join in :)

i dont know what we are going to do for date 5.... probably discuss it wed. Hes just coming here wed, it wont be a late one because of work. but its his only free evening this week, and he really wants to see me :)

snape - kidnap him and go to the mexican thing? :)

[fayster]

Hello, Walk! You'll soon catch up, don't worry. Lovely to see so many people getting out there dating.

So when will the gift-giving take place, Snape?

I've realised I have a massive crush on a married friend. Worse still, I think it might be reciprocated. This means I have an even more urgent need of dating to get him out of my head!

[snapespeare]

Mexican thing is a VIP thing for 10. Doubt I could muster an additional 8 folk at short notice for Friday (might go on my own on Saturday and drink the monster 10 person free cocktail myself.... )

[bantamrooster]

Hi all,

so given that this is a thread on dating for women, and I'm a guy, (although a longtime lurker on MN) should I butt out now and just be a lurker, or would you like to hear my weird experiences of OD? And maybe I could even defend my gender or explain why some men think the weird way they do?

(also, I think the notebook should have gone in the bag as that would be a fantastic thing to find)

[snapespeare]

A man!!!!!!!



You're very welcome and do, please tell all.

(Can't see a way of sneaking it into his bag...)

[watchoutforthatsnail]

a man!!! yes, welcome :)

[snapespeare]

Actually - as a man, you could be extremely helpful and give me your opinion via-a-vis what your reaction might be if your platonic female best friend gave you such a notebook. Would you run for the hills? Is it a bit much? :)

[MirandaWest]

Men are very welcome here :)

Watch pirate looks good :)

Mr Nice and the DC and I are meeting on Thursday night. Decided it was time for it to happen.

My relationship status was nothing when I stopped being married. Then put it into a relationship a few months ago. Was pleased to get nice posts about it

[UnbridledPositivity]

Have sent him my info now, photo, name, work area, everything. But I know the same about him already. Still - eeek.

How do you deal with the first meeting? The way I see it at the moment, never having done this before, doesn't it basically mean you're saying 'hi, I'm looking for a shag and liked the look of you'?

[bantamrooster]

well, platonic is a bit odd. I have platonic friends I secretly fancy, but never got together with, but if they gave me that I'd move across the world for them, and platonic friends I don't fancy at all, and I would probably get all weirded out if they gave me a notebook. I don't know the backstory here, so if you want to recap I'm happy to help.

And can I just say, it's been a long time since I entered any kind of room and heard "A man! A Man!". It makes me feel all kind of warm and fuzzy inside. Thank you. And please don't kill me and eat me.

[MacAndCheese]

Welcome bantam feel free to share. Make yourself at home :)

[watchoutforthatsnail]

hahahaha bant. lol. we might.
:)

unbridled - no, a first date isnt really a date. its more of a hi, to see if you like them enough for an actual date. Dont worry about it, just go and have fun:)

miranda - yay. how exciting :) good luck and tell us how it goes.

and yeah, the pirate is kind of hot. i do fancy him a lot. A LOT. still, not going to sleep with him quite yet.

[bantamrooster]

Hi Unbridled. I'd say no, meeting someone for the first time doesn't mean you're looking for a shag and liked the look of you. To be honest, if I meet someone for the first time and they want to shag me the first time, then being a bloke I'll usually (unless they're really not my type at all) take the opportunity. I know that makes me a bad person, and if I'm completely sober I'll possibly make my excuses and leave, but if it's on offer we're kind of programmed to take it. And then never call again because we don't want to get together with someone that easy.

Can I be honest here and say what I think blokes will do or should I try and be tactful and leave hope for all you romantics out there? Romance is great, a lot of us do actually love it, but you've got to spend some time to get beyond our limbic system (the part of our brain that wants to eat, kill and shag) to our more developed brain. Once you're there, you're in. But to be honest we're fairly primitive on first encounter. We look at the world and our instinctive response is "can I kill it? No? Can I have sex with it?". It's the way we're made, I'm afraid.

[ChaoticismyLife]

Watch fantastic news about date 5 :)

Hello, Walk, welcome to the thread. We're here to listen to each other's dating experiences, well those of us who aren't sofa surfing that is.

[ChaoticismyLife]

Knew I should have refreshed before posting.

if it's on offer we're kind of programmed to take it. And then never call again because we don't want to get together with someone that easy.

That easy?

Do you consider yourself 'easy' for sleeping with someone on the first date?

[Yogagirl17]

Hi Walk, hi Bantam - you may regret this, you'll be having all of us asking you what the men we've met/dated/shagged etc are thinking!

[snapespeare]

Oh I can't recap bantam. It's all too tedious...

(Sigh). My best friend, met three years ago on a course, we live two streets away from each other, when we're drunk (which is often ) we're very tactile, hand holding etc. everyone thinks we're a couple, but we're not. He's turned me down before, last occasion January 2011. Kids all adore him, we go snowball fighting and he lets my DS2 put his hair in curlers. When he started seeing someone last year, I backed right off, because if you love someone you can't intrude. It didn't work out and I was gloriously happy. Sometimes we look at each other and beam. He gets me. He has terminally low self-esteem, is borderline aspergic and suffers from depression. He can be a lot of work sometimes. I love him.

Sorry for the tired re-hash everyone who already knows. I'm currently thinking notebook is a ridiculous idea. I just need to be brave and at least my cards are firmly on the table if I don't chicken out

No idea when he's getting it . His birthday is next Monday.

[hatesponge]

I'm sorry, I've really tried not to bite to that comment but referring to someone as 'that easy'?

Nice.

[snapespeare]

'Easy'?!?!

[bantamrooster]

Ok well I just wrote a hugely long response to Chaotic about if we consider ourselves easy (and yes, some of us do, and don't do it, some of us just think it's a notch in the bedpost and grin. There's no one rule) and MN or the network in my hotel lost the huge long post and I got tired typing it.

Snape I read some of the notebook entries, and I think it's amazing. having just read your description of stuff I would say hold off. Yes I know people will shout at me, and I know everyones hoping for a romantic ending here, but I think you have to clarify feelings from both sides here. I think if he's borderline aspergic you have to make sure things are understood about how you feel, and check how he feels, before you move in with the whole undying declarations of the Pixies. Once you've done that, the notebook is an amazing thing, but it's like hitting someone over the head with a big stick full of 'I love you', If they love you back, then it's wonderful, but maybe a small stick would work better? And if they don't, a small stick doesn't break stuff so much?

I dunno. It's difficult to know how anyones going to react without actually knowing all the ins and outs.

[Taghain]

I presume you mean an electronic notebook rather than a nice Moleskine paper article? Both would be good, but something that expensive would be worryingly overwheming for me. But I'm not very into presents.
You know him best. Would he like it?

[snapespeare]

Ha, no. Moleskin.

I think he'll appreciate the artistic content, the sentiment is another matter altogether....

[Taghain]

In that case, a Moleskine is the perfect present. Not too expensive to make the recipient feel beholden, but luxurious (?) enough that they would be reluctant to buy one for themselves (unless they're comfortable or self-indulgent)

Yes, a good idea.

[bantamrooster]

And I seem to have offended people with the 'easy' comment. And I'm sorry. The fact is that I think a lot of men want the chase. A bit. We want to know that the woman we are pursuing, who may be wonderful, and funny, and beautiful, and gorgeous - all those things, is worth everything we're willing to put in to try and 'get' them. All the phone calls, dinners, texts, emails, waiting in a restaurant alone because you're fashionably late, the romantic moments, the things we do to make you feel special - all of that is to get someone who gets us, and makes us feel special, and wonderful.

And if you don't do all of that, the waiting, the funny moments. If you don't (and I'm sorry and I know I'm going to get flamed for this) - if you don't prove you're worth all of that effort from us, then we lose interest. Anything which is worth getting is worth trying for. If you just want a quickie with us, you may just want a quickie with the next guy, we want someone who knows how amazing we are, and will only want to be with us. If we didn't have to try hard, then the next guy won't have to try hard either.

If, however, there is too much chase, we lose interest too. Think of it like throwing a stick for a dog - however patronising that might sound. If you just throw the stick at it's feet, it loses interest fairly quickly. Throw the stick across 6 fields and it just goes and sulks. And we're simple creatures.