So. Hello. I'm Alice.
After 6 years of being in a relationship (...well, several different relationships which ran concurrently into one another), I have found myself aged 22, at university, living in London, and properly single for the first time since I was 16: when I thought that being single was both social suicide and an affirmation that I was, infact, the ugliest girl in year 11 (patently untrue, it was Alison Thomas). In contrast, my current situation should be a recipie for romantic success. My life should be a hotbed of sexual frisson, full of short-lived but exciting affairs with inappropriate boys, a kind of romantic montage of flirting in the library, dates along the south bank filled with laughter and whimsical witty jokes .. etc. etc. At least, that's really how I'd like the '22, free and single' chapter of my autobiography to sound. (Too many of my life decisions have been, and will continue to be, motivated by my 'how would this sound in my autobiography?' thought process. This includes a failed seduction of my hairy seminar tutor and one horrifying sex-in-a-bunkbed scenario.)
However. For several reasons; including being at a 70% female university, not having a thing for weedy art boys, hating students and not just being unattracted to, but actively disliking men under 6ft tall, I have found myself with a shortage of men whom I am interested in, and men whom are interested in me. After lamenting this fact to my mother, she responded with some classic 'Mum advice' that sounds like a cleverly worded soundbite from a romantic comedy trailer. The hook. "Alice, you just need to get out there on dates with strangers. You're guaranteed one of three things: a good dinner, a good time, or a good story."
Armed with this advice, the knowledge that generally, most guys are too afraid to ask random girls on dates, as well as some less soundbite-sounding advice from one of my best mates ("join the dating site I'm on, it's such an ego boost how many men want to date you if you're not facially horrifying"), I have set about to do three things.
1. Meet many different men.
2. Use dates to experience many of the things that I'd like to do in London for free. (Who says Feminism is dead...?)
3. Arm myself with an endless ream of great anecdotes to tell to my friends over drinks, thus satisfying my attention seeking persona.
In order to achieve these three things I have taken one small step: signed myself up for www.plentyoffish.com.
At this point I feel that it's fair to compile another numerical list about why this is less creepy and desperate than it may first appear.
1. It is, in some way, an excuse to write a blog, practice my writing, and generally entertain myself at the expense of many of the weird characters that exist on the planet, but seem to congregate on the internet.
2. I am NOT looking for a relationship, and so will never have to bear the burden of telling people that I met my boyfriend/fiancee/husband on a dating website, or bear the similar burden of the lie that we met in a bar/at Alcoholics Anonymous/anywhere less embarrassing.
3. I have made it a rule to never message anyone first, ensuring that I can still play the part of the innocent prey, rather than the horrible internet predator. (Let's forget the fact that I'm putting my photos and 'About Me' out there in plain sight of all the predators. For some reason, the image of a gazelle wearing a photograph of a steak and sitting in plain view of a lion springs to mind.)
Stand by for progress reports. I'm going fishing.
Stand by for progress reports. I'm going fishing.
