Tinder and Blind

A once single Tinder obsessed bad dater London girl living in Dubai, to a step-mum who bagged a boy in Dubai, now living in London

Month: March, 2014

March 25, 2014

The Jug and Candle date

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Date of Date: Thursday 20th February 2014

Source: Tinder

Place: Brixton Village

I went to the gym after work then joined work colleagues for a couple of drinks (I stuck to water) near the office. I realised I had to be quick-ish in order to make my date and not be too late. It got to 9pm, the time my date and I were supposed to meet..I got my phone out ‘sorry, running late, will be there at 9.30’ I tapped in. Blew my air kisses and off I went, sexy Reebok gym bag in tow.

I caught a glimpse of myself in a tube ad panel reflection and realised I had sweat hair- you know, the hair that’s freshly washed from that morning but you’ve just done a cardio session at the gym so your scalp is almost sodden- but not gross enough to warrant a hair wash. So it was at this point I realised I needed to go home to at least run the GHD’s over, stick some heels on and dump my gym bag.

‘Sorry, another 15 mins’ I bashed in on my brisk walk back to my house. I quickly sort my hair out, slick on some lippy, wack on some heels and run out of the door.

By this point I’m late, really late. You try walking in the dark in new heels, pointy heels- it adds an extra 20 minutes onto any journey.

I approach the entrance to Brixton Village and see a guy stood there on his phone. Ah, that must be him, does he look like his photos? Oh shittttt, what’s his name again? mind is totally blank. I cannot remember his name so I panic.

‘Are you waiting for..a Tanisha?’ I say, presenting myself as though I’m some sort of showpiece that he’s just won at an auction. ‘Erm, no, I’m waiitng for a mate, sorry’ a confused looking stranger says to me. Oh god. Awks.

Meanwhile the actual date siddles up to me carrying a leather man bag and says ‘I am. Are you looking for a Mike?’ he copied what I did. I don’t know whether to laugh or cringe. I’m cringing. As I take a proper look at him I realise he’s not at my eye level. Bloody great, someone shorter than me. I’m not going to look good on his arm walking down a red carpet am I? was the first thought that entered my mind, but I’m open minded, let’s see how this goes.

To lighten the mood and my red face after that awful embarrassement, I make reference to that Specsavers advert with the train platform- you know the one, when she kisses the wrong guy. He laughs and we find a cute little bar/restaurant to sit at.

We sit at a cute little candlelit table and order the same cocktail, the conversation starts flowing. The waitress brings us a jug of water as well- yes this is significant to my story.

Turns out he works in Oxford but is staying with a friend in Brixton, hence the man bag, also hence why we matched on Tinder the weekend before. He’s only been waiting half an hour for me- I apologise and offer to buy the drink to make up for his wait in the freezing cold. He asks how tall I am ‘you seem very tall’ he says. If you call 5’5 tall, ok ok I’m probably 5’8/9 in heels, but still guys, that is not giant.

He seems lovely, but keeps bringing up how he loves lazy Sunday’s and all that’s missing is a girlfriend to laze with (bleurgh). By this point I’m two Tom Collins’ down and need some water. As I reach for it I knock the entire jug over and it spills ALL over his man bag and part of his right leg, before smashing into pieces on the wooden floor. Oops.

I literally have no idea what to do by this point because I’ve taken off my shoes under the table and I’m scared if I move that -a) he will wonder why the hell I’ve decided to make myself at home and go barefoot in a random restaurant during a date, and b) I will cut my feet open, and I really do need my feet, it would be such a waste of shoes without them.

So I keep saying ‘sorry’ over and over, while he gets the waitress and a cloth. Meanwhile I’m vigerously fighting to put my feet back into my shoes, but they’ve expanded in the heat of the restaurant/swollen from the walk, so I feel like one of the Ugly Sisters forcing on the glass slipper. They won’t budge, I’m bloody stuck with half a foot sticking out of each shoe while I stand up and try to help pick up shards of jug glass.

After that kurfuffle we sit back down and talk more date chat. I laugh at something, only I don’t just laugh like a normal person, oh no, I laughed through my nose and blew the candle out with my NOSE air. So we’re now pretty much sat in darkness, him with a wet leg, me with swollen feet and neither of us can see eachother due to my nose laugh.

It gets to about 11pm and the waitress starts clearing up, we’re the last ones left now so I start easing my feet back into my shoes a good 5 minutes before I suggest leaving.

We stand up, oh yep, he’s shorter, forgot about that. He walks me part way home and we say our goodbyes.

Lovely guy, I’m convinced I won’t hear from him again after the water and candle incidents, but I do. He added me on facebook, and text me, but I had to be honest with him. I could happily be friends with him, but as for romance, just not the one.

Maybe that Oxford graduate will be more my type..

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March 20, 2014

The Oxford Graduate

Latest date: 19th March

Source: Tinder

Place: Southbank- Founders Arms (my choice, naturally)

Firstly I had made the mistake of eating a tube of mints to curb my chocolate craving throughout the day. Then was told by a colleague ‘you do realise they have laxative effects?’ well yes, I did know that, but did I think that when I was eating them? No.

My mint binge resulted in me heading straight for the loo’s upon arrival at the date venue on the Southbank. I received a text while holding onto my stomach saying ‘I’m here, have a table outside by the entrance’. Great, it’s good to be ‘fashionably’ late I thought, let’s just hope I can get off the loo by the time it becomes ‘taking the piss’ late. I make a tactical exit out the back door before walking around the pub to make it look like I’ve just come in from the outside.

I spot him, tall, nice looking, different from his Tinder photo but then again I picked my best *airbrushed instagrammed the shit out of* photos so I can’t really talk. Anyway we greet eachother, I order a gin & soda then we start talking..about work. About 20 minutes in and we’re still talking shop. It’s fine, I’ll change the subject. We get onto the predictable ‘have you been travelling?’ convo.

I asked if he had ever been to Vegas and he said: “no it’s somewhere I would never want to go. I’ve never been to a strip club, I don’t really drink, Vegas is very fake and I like more natural places like Cape Town and I would rather trek round the Himalayas than look at tacky hotels and gaudy shows.” This was after I said I’ve been 3 times and love it but really want to go on a girls holiday there..

THEN he slagged off Victoria Beckham. Those who know me will be surprised that I didn’t chuck my drink over him. I kind of held my tongue..kind of. This came about after he asked about previous jobs etc, I’m a trained fashion journalist & had a column reviewing VB’s collection in 2009 and I loved it but it didn’t pay the bills, he said he didn’t even know she ‘did’ clothes. Well that was just blasphemy in my book.

He goes to the loo and I text my dad saying “he’s SO posh” my dad replies: “that’ll be a communication issue. Easy on the drinks though, a lady shouldn’t get drunk, espcecially on a first date.” Dad, I’ll be lucky if I get offered another- I think to myself.

So we finish our drinks and he doesn’t offer another (knew it), he tells me he needs to be in Manchester for a meeting at 8am and ‘can’t wait for my bed’ he also tells me he needs to make dinner which will be chicken & kale, the former is thawing in his fridge (erm, so you’re not feeding me then?).

So after my ONE drink I just said shall we go, we walked to the tube, talked about bed linen and his ex (whom he’s still amicable with and ‘good friends)..then.. I ask how long it will take him to get home, he says he recently bought a kindle so time goes quickly, I bought one last week so we had that in common at least, apart from the fact I only bought mine after only being able to afford a kindle case in the Mulberry sample sale, so I had to buy the kindle after.. he turned his nose up at that.. I said I really am enjoying reading again though and it makes the time go so much quicker on the tube, especially as I’m so engrossed in this amazing book at the moment and I just look forward to reading it every morning.

He asks what book I’m reading. Well I couldn’t tell him the truth which is ‘Shopaholic and baby’ (I don’t care, I love Rebecca Bloomwood) but I can’t really say that to this posh guy who hates Vegas. I say ‘oh it’s by Dan Brown’ (first bloody author that pops into my head) he says ‘oh great, which one? I’ve read all his books’ oh god, oh god I’m screwed. The only Dan Brown book I know is The Da Vinci Code, I can’t fall back on that after I’ve just said I’m reading this amazing book, surely I would’ve just said I’m reading the Da Vinci Code straight away? So I just dug my hole even deeper and said ‘I can’t remember the name of it’ to which he replied ‘you don’t know the name of the book you’re reading?’ ahhhhhh I can’t just say ‘actually I’m not reading Dan Brown, I’m reading the bloody Shopaholics series and I thought tonight I would be meeting my Luke Brandon who would’ve taken me to the OXO tower and we would’ve sipped Bellini’s all night while you tell me about your amazing life and we laugh about things we have a lot in common with’. So I just said ‘oh my kindle came with a free Dan Brown book and I’ve gone blank at what it’s called.

He took the Jubilee line, I took the Northern line and that was my 63 minute date. Don’t think we’ll be in touch again, worlds apart! He’s obviously very intelligent- an Oxford graduate, but his social skills clash with mine/ are non-existent.

Next..

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