Category: just-plain-life

Animals of the online dating world

cabbage patch cat.

Iz in youz inboxz with the veg, wat u gonna do?
No wonder your single…

I had never come across A(n)nals of Online Dating before… but I quite like it in a hand in front of the eyes and hide behind the sofa type thing.

Welcome to A(n)nals of Online Dating.  It’s a simple idea: Online dating is the worst.  Submit the horrific messages you get, and we will collectively laugh at them.  Points given for lack of basic spelling and punctuation skills; bad sexual innuendo; reliance on cliche; terrible taste in books, music or movies; use of twelve-year-old-girl text-slang; and creep factor.

Now I have to say few of my dates are worthy of being included into this tragic site but most of them are ok. It would be hard to get over the overall feeling of boredom or the consistent battle to get the conversation flowing. But I could certainly include a few of my total nightmares.

My faith in male kind drops to a all time low after flicking through some of the archive posts.

For example sorry i only do disco sticks….

Okay I’m going to just ask and hope for the best….. lets be honest. Do you wanna hook up and fuck? You seem like my type of woman, personality wise. And I really like you. Sexy, free time college student here.. I’m NOT looking for a one night stand… I’m possibly considering a friends with benefits relationship.

I just haven’t enjoyed the way I would want to with anyone yet, still looking for something promising, like a fwb relationship or something discreet that can be ongoing and not just a one night thing. She needs to appreciate my body and treat it right, I do have a six pack, I do a lot of track and running here at my college, so I’m a runner pretty much. I don’t see the point of anal if the girl just wants a big stick of love up right up stretching her labia apart… I like to take my time when I’m with my partner and not just rush into it all, like to caress her and tease her… a lot… before I even show it to her, that way she will want it more. But I haven’t found the right woman for that can satisfy me with what I need. And no one has wanted to meet me.. haven’t had luck 🙁

And when you think its bad, it gets a whole lot worst…!

Should have gone dutch when I bounced

November 28th

I’m cursing myself for falling for the stupid mistake of paying for the bill in one of my previous dates in the last few months.

My mistake was paying for the bill in total, something which I don’t usually do.

So what happened?

Well we were having a good time, chatting away and I suggested how about having some food? (because we were in a place where we could switch from drinks to food without moving) she agreed, time had flown by and she was also hungry.

After eating and deciding yes its about time we actually went home, we asked for the bill. Bill comes and I can’t remember exactly what happened but I’m pretty sure I said “Hey no worries I got this one…”

Of course I never really heard from her again. Except shes actually a friend of friends (trying not to give away who it was)

Anyhow months later we bump into each other and I ask her what happened?

The crux seemed to be she wasn’t comfortable with being paid for… Something I can relate to, and something which I usually go out of my way to avoid. What had happened is I thought I’d try paying and seeing what happens, maybe things will turn out different if I listened to thoughts of Ngunan Adamu and others over time.

Well I was right! Her original thoughts of a modern gentleman, was dashed when I picked up the whole bill. And the only person to blame is myself… Yes it was a bit of an experiment on my part but it felt weird for me and I assume felt even weirder for her. Its a shame because although not my usual type of woman, I was certainly interested and would have liked to have gone on a second date…

Moral of this little tale… Should have gone Dutch…!

Documenting a ride

HONDA SILVERWING

I now have my scooter (Honda Silverwing) back on the road, thanks to Matt.

I have been on a few longish journeys around but not anything major. So today I went for a long ride in the mountains (well there officially the peaks  but…). I keep meaning to go down the famous Snakes Pass. But there seems to be a number of different routes which are interested rides through the peak district.

Using my tracks on my phone I was able to create a map of where I had gone complete with all the riding info. I was surprised to find you could easily export it to Google Drive and therefore easily something/somewhere else.


View Larger Map

I have always loved sushi…

Vegetable Sushi

…but dared not touch it. Why?

Well with the amount of allergies I have, I would be a total fool to risk it. Now to be fair I did try veggie sushi once and there must have been some cross contamination (which to be fair is bad). That experience put me off for the good part of a decade.

However the other day I went out and met up with old friends Miles, Dave and Harry. We went to a vegan Japanese restaurant near Kings Cross called Itadaki Zen. Looked at the menu and was really stuck for what I was going to eat. Everything had nuts, peas or beans within it.

After a little negation with the patient waiter, he came back with Sushi mainly made of sticky white rice, seaweed and some veggies. They were awesome and after doing my usual try a bit see if my lips start burning or throat starts to feel scratchy, I was off.

So good, the question is if I will try it again one day soon?

A good time to be in New Islington?

From the Manchester Evening News via Steve on Twitter,

An ambitious plan for a multi-billion pound regeneration around a new-look Piccadilly station can be revealed by the M.E.N. Town hall chiefs want to unlock the rewards of the planned High Speed 2 rail link long before it arrives – in a regeneration bonanza dubbed the ‘opportunity of the century’. Planners want to create a new ‘gateway quarter’ modelled on Amsterdam and New York.It would be centred around the new HS2 terminal – and a grand new entrance plaza replacing the existing front of Piccadilly station.

The plan would also include:

  • A leafy boulevard linking London Road with east Manchester, ending in a park on Fairfield Street – creating a green corridor between the Medlock Valley and the city centre.
  • A ‘Spinningfields-style’ business centre between Great Ancoats Street and the Rochdale and Ashton canals.
  • An ‘East Village’ of waterside homes, shops and offices in Piccadilly Basin.
  • 10,000 new homes between Piccadilly and the Holt Town area of Bradford.
  • New homes, green spaces and offices on the former Mayfield Depot site.
How Piccadilly station could look after the arrival of HS2

Sure there will be some kick back on the plans but honestly from Piccadilly Station to Great Ancoats Street is pretty poor. Heck part of it is the red light zone. I do wonder about Piccadilly Basin which currently is a nice quiet part of the city but as long as none of the Northern quarter is taken over, I don’t have much of a problem.

If the plans go ahead along with the new retail park which will include a cinema, it will be a great time to have bought at Islington wharf.

Is free online dating catfish central?

26/365: A tribute to nosy aunties and aunty-like uncles...

I listened to Radio 4’s women and mens hour special about online dating. It wasn’t too bad, but it wasn’t great either. Anyhow I kind of got into a discussion/debate with C_T_S to do with her (I would suggest) somewhat unique experience of talking maybe dating a person who was a catfish.

Now to be fair we have a small twitter history of disagreement. But when I put the idea of never paying for online dating sites out there, she responded with…

As a victim of an emotional fraudster on a free website, I’m totally the opposite.

The best dates I had were from paid sites, without question.

Fair enough thats her experience, but I still feel from my experience and others paid for online dating is a bigger con, as the panoroma documentary revealed recently. I do have friends who have met up via match.com and others paid for dating sites but I have many more who met via free dating sites and the likes of Facebook. I also have never had someone catfished me as such. I’ve had some timewasters but generally I’ve spotted the signs of any kind of scamming.

So the question comes into focus…

Is free online dating inherently more prone to catfishers than the paid for dating sites?

On the face of it, it would seem more likely, however it also seems likely that people willing to pay will be more serious about there dating? In my experience this isn’t necessarily true. I’ve been thinking about this and one such reason is because of the focus on time the sites add to the equation. A lot of people pay month by month (wish I could find the survey which talked about this). Knowing in the back of there minds that the month is coming to an end, the mentality could be to speed things along a little more. While on the free dating sites, you can sit back and relax. Take it all in and decide to go full on or not when it suits you.

So theres a slight paradox… Could there be a slight paradox around catfishing on free sites too?

But how do/can you judge sites for their catfishing potential? Of course none of the sites are going to shout about there catfishing…

I guess you could look at the way they monitor their users, usage policies, etc… But this is data which we just don’t have. Its interesting that OKCupid resorts to crowdsourcing. While others seem to resort to alerting the likes of eharmony via the spam/abuse buttons. Looking a little further theres quite a lot of stuff about this catfishing from online dating sites. Reddit has a dedicated OkCupid subreddit, with some very interesting related threads. On the Match.com front theres some stories in the subreddit relationships but not a dedicated subreddit, however theres relevant court cases and views.

I would suggest its still undecided due to the lack of data available…

The big problem with most online dating conclusions and results. I would also include the fact most men are willing to put up with some crazy issues. Maybe someone should do some research how men and women react to being catfished?

So much to research, so little data…

The Radio debate: Who pays on the first date?

Who pays on the first date: the debate

What can I say…? Time flies… What was I worried about ?

It was fun to be honest… Thanks to Ngunan Adamu, Northern Lass and the rest of the radio team.

I forgot how much I love Radio. Its so simple and so flexible. Me and Northern Lass turned up about 30mins beforehand. Spoke the production team for a while then we were in to the studio. Yes it was 3 against 2 and Ngunan was in control of the faders. Originally It started out with 4 vs 2, so hey it could be worst. No need for the facts and data on my tablet.

Judging by the first story (poor EJ), some more dating advice could be debated. The Godfreds experience is bad but you can’t let one bad person change your values and views. The “its part of the culture” is interesting and may need to be explored a little more.Through-out the debate they never answered the question of what happens when you speed date or meet through other means. (actually Ngunan said she wasn’t sure if it applies then).

Know your place as a man? Really? And the whole Emasculating thing, geeez! Come on!

I was so happy when Frankie asked for Kanya West. “Very proud gold digger” indeed!

If you didn’t hear the show, never fear you can listen to it on BBC iPlayer (UK only sorry and be quick its only up for 7 days). Its 1hour 8mins in to the show upfront. For friends outside the UK, there is a cut on Archive.org

Before entering the dragons den… Radio debate

entering

I sent a email to my friends about my debate on the radio tonight…
Just in-case you didn’t know, I’m due today to debate the topic of “who pays on the first date” with my good internet friend Northern Lass 32 (http://www.theguardian.com/profile/northern-lass). I assume most of you know my feelings about this but I guess debating it live will be tricky, specially against the woman (Ngunan – https://twitter.com/NgunanAdamuBBC) who triggered my whole research into the area. So blame her!
As its her programme, I may take it easy on her but I’m expecting she will cut me off with clever use of the faders if I make a good point 🙂 No idea if theres live calls or if Ngunan has another guest to help her.
Feel like i’m walking into the Dragons Den here…
So I have no idea what’s going to happen tonight but its from about 9pm on BBC Radio Merseyside which I believe goes out live on the internet too (UK only I think) – http://www.bbc.co.uk/radiomerseyside/on-air
Don’t think they make a podcast of the show, so it might be a one time deal sorry…
I will see if I can record it somehow too.
Should be fun 🙂 Please feel free to share it around and listen…