Crotch grabbing, jelly nailing, double-quick portions and man parts floating in a pear tree...dating thread 33 survived Christmas so bring on NYE!

[OhLittleTownofWesternWind]

Here we are!

VelvetSpoon, I can understand you wanting to hold onto old emails, but nights like last night, when you end up upsetting yourself, are hard to deal with. Go easy on yourself. And fwiw I think you should ring him and set up a second date; strike while the iron's hot and all that and there's nothing wrong with taking the initiative. The worst that could happen is he'll say no, and if you think there isn't a spark there anyway then what have you lost?

Velvet, what happened with your nice ex? (Obviously don't say if you'd rather not). It just seems as if you're still really fond of him.

48, Mr C is back from Yorkshire (lightning-quick visit) and we're meeting up today, but I've come down with something (probably cystitis) and so there'll be no action tonight. Can't believe my bad luck!

Wallison, your post yesterday was really similar to one I wrote a couple of weeks ago. I was feeling really nervous too. I found it helped telling Mr C that I was nervous, so that at least he understood - don't know if that would help you? Plus the advice about following his lead (if you want to!) is good. Another piece of good advice I got from someone on here was that even if things don't work out perfectly the first time, they often get better and better with practice...

Aww libby No action that is bad luck. Just wish Mr R&R would get his ass back here.

Is anybody getting any action. Fucking christmas

it is me decided to have a new year, new me stab at getting out there and meeting people who don't go to toddler groups men

I will branch out. So, recommendations people? Do you have to pay up for a decent site? I hear POF is mostly 'dross' but maybe that's not true?

Choco, I'd recommend Match, but only cos I met Mr C on there. You have to pay, though, and although there are lots of people on there, to be honest there were very few people that I wanted to contact (perhaps I'm just very fussy). I've never tried POF (far too much of a wimp) so can't comment on that.

48 so frustrating to have to wait for Mr R&R to return. If you're feeling anything like I was a couple of weeks ago (when I only had to wait 5 days to see Mr C again) it was a cross between wonderful anticipation and agony - I was barely capable of thinking about anything else all week! Is Mr R&R still triumphing over Yorkshire mobile networks and keeping in touch a lot?

Choco - POF has the largest number of people I think, but possibly a greater proportion of married men trying their luck, dross, and topless men holding fish.

You can find decent people on there, but I found it's difficult to find them and once you do they're so busy wading through the dross as well that it's more difficult to get a conversation going (but I'm coming at it from a guys perspective) So it's free but takes a lot of work. You can screen out those just looking for Intimate Encounters too, which helps.

Match costs money, of course, but tends to have a smaller number of crap profiles.

Guardian or Times, or something like that, has an even smaller number of profiles, mostly in bigger cities, but they tend to be better quality.

OKCupid takes a lot of work setting up a profile and does apparently have a lot of polyamorous people, but it's free (although incredibly full of adverts which slow things down to a crawl) - and you can weed out people by misogynistic/racist viewpoints based on their questions, plus see who's just looking for sex because those are the only questions they answered.

Basically, if you're in London or Manchester or something, you can try GSM or Times (for free I believe?) Otherwise, pickings will be thin on the ground.

I've tried Match, OKC & POF - I've only met people off Match though. The others are just too hard work and full of 'hey babez' messages.

libby It is so frustrating. Feel like driving up there for a quickie in the car

He is still arm waving. Bless him. Sex texting isnt really helpful though. I want him and I want him now. Stamps feet

Velvet I'm sorry this has brought up a lot of stuff and you feel so crap today. UnMNty hugs sweetie.

It does sound as if you are not that bothered about the Spaceman but feel that you ought to give him a second chance because maybe, just maybe he could be a slow burner. If you don't call you don't risk a no but also will never know and the wondering could drag you down. If you call, you risk a no which could also upset you (even though you don't seem that bothered about him as such).

Otoh, you could decide that you would like him to make the effort and that if he can't manage to sort something out with his phone or take the initiative to get in touch via the site that he is not for you. Only you know if it would serve you better to call him and find out or decide to walk. If you decide to call, you know we are here.

Choco I found PoF to be fine, no rude nonsense either on the site or on dates. But I did set my preferences to exclude IE and only searched for people looking for a relationship same as me. I think if you go on the advanced search you can narrow things down quite a lot. You can go on and search without creating a profile so you can see if there's anyone who takes your fancy before you go through all the rigmarole of doing a profile.

I'm a bit biassed as I met LM on PoF so I know there are good ones on there.

With all sites you are going to get bad guys and good guys.

Only met one complete nutter on POF. Lucky ole me!

OWW There is a vid of tips for men on POF. One bit of advice is always say you are looking for a relationship. Wether you are or not

Feeling slightly better. Managed another hour or so of sleep, and heard from one of my friends, who id is going to pop round later for wine and a catchup.

Re Spaceman, am going to text him, and say that I'd like to see him again, hopefully he feels the same and if so, to get in touch when he has phone/internet back (should be on Mon/Tues). And if he's not interested, then he either won't contact me, or send a polite text.

It probably will be a no, which isnt the end of the world, but does mean I'm back to not getting second dates again :( Every bloke I know in RL thinks I'm amazing, yet none of the ones I go on dates with ever do. I wish I knew where I go wrong!

Wine and catchup sounds good, as does throwing the ball into Spaceman's court.

And don't think the worst will happen! You don't know that it will probably be a no, so there's no reason to extrapolate from his as yet unknown response that you won't ever have a second date.

Just had another delightful first message on POF... 'just explain , want to date , but nothing serious, just stay on your own' ... Wtf?! Followed by.. 'i just dont get it, the fact thet we are on here is to meet people, do you agree? what follows after is unknow, why dont you ut down , a part time lover with no feelings for me, sex when i want it, company when i want it , but you have to like it when i do, i like you , your good company when it suits me ha ha'
Jeez...sour grapes anyone....

He's not bothered replying to me asking him if he'd only messaged to have a go at me or if he genuinely wanted to know....

Velvet, I like that approach of sending him a text. Puts the ball firmly back in his court! Hope he follows through and you get the wooing you really want

PoF sounds scary. I don't think I could subject myself to that and I admire anyone who does.

Some of the messages I got on OKC were bad enough - adult babies, polyamorous people (including one bloke who was a children's entertainer at a do me and my son had gone to - for some reason that seemed even more 'wrong'), blokes wanting to introduce me to the wonderful world of S&M and swingers' parties etc. Not that there's anything wrong with any of that if you want to do that sort of thing, and I suppose it's as well to be upfront about it, but it was a bit weird having such messages dropping into my inbox.

Wallison, on the whole I've had perfectly lovely messages on POF but I've filtered out who can message me. I get a lot of one/two word messages, you know the kind 'hi', 'hi sexy', but I either ignore or send a simple 'hi' back to see if they will be more talkative. Most haven't been so far! Only had a couple of tw*ts so far. It is hard work sorting through the dross though and in already feeling rather apathetic about it all..

There seem to be lots of new people joining Match at the moment.

Just spent an hour or so on the phone to CabinCrew, we were supposed to have a date tonight, but I'd said I'd call her on Boxing day and didn't manage to due to sick DC (and sick me) but now we're on for tomorrow - same place as the Nurse, strangely.

coffee followed immediately by wine, leaving us the whole evening to talk and get to know each other, or for either of us to run screaming.

The ex has departed. Thank fuck. children all upset, will be spending my planned 'me' time over the next few days putting the kids back together.

Wallison sorry I meant to reply to your message from yesterday before now. I was in exactly the same position as you, hadn't had sex with my ex for years whilst we were still together and he'd taken all my self-confidence sexually. Plus I'd had two children, saggy bits blah blah blah. To be honest, I did chicken out the first two times I'd planned to do it, finally found some courage and it was amazing! Sex is so much better now, feel very uninhibited and confident in bed, to the extent of trying a lot of new things. I think it helped having a couple of "trial runs" as by that time he'd seen the worse there was to see and hadn't run screaming for the hills.

I did tell him beforehand about things and that I was nervous and I think that helped too.

All will be well.

Text sent .

Now I wait to be politely turned down.

Thank you And Libby and OhLittle. Your experiences are very encouraging, especially the "amazing" bit! What a lovely thread this is! It's weird. I feel like a completely different person to when I last had sex. I suppose I've got to discover that side of the me I have become.

VelvetSpoon, pish tish.

Just a flying visit while I prettify myself. I've got new underwear and everything!

velvet good. :)

Re old emails from the LOYL... could you keep them in a seperate folder and password protect it with something like 'dontlookitwillhurt' ? It might at least give you a second chance. Then you know that they're still there, it just puts in a survival level...