The drummer from Def Leppard's only got one arm

Fact.

He just drums twice as hard (and does some stuff with his foot). I think he’s a got a special drum kit.

Word of advice. Interesting as the musical ability of disabled percussionist Rick Allen may be to you, don’t bring it up on a date. Doesn’t go down well. The other person starts to wonder why you’ve brought it up at all. But I had my reasons. Oh I had my reasons.

I have written up my date from Thursday below. Date report from Friday night will follow on Sunday, as I’m sure you can’t be bothered to read about two dates in one sitting. And, to be honest, I still need some time to digest last night. It was tricky, to say the least. Very tricky. But that’s for tomorrow.


DATE NUMBER TWO - 13/06/09

Aha, so the lovely Emma.

Blue-loving, laughs-out-loud-a-lot, all photos taken from a worryingly long distance, Emma.

Turned out to be a perfectly normal and pleasant human being.

WHAT ARE ALL THESE NORMAL PEOPLE DOING ON MATCH.COM?

I’ll tell you what they're doing there - these are burned women. They seem normal at first but as soon as you scratch below their pathetically wafer-thin surface of togetherness, you realise that all that’s left of them is a tiny, barely beating heart and a pair of eyes that scream ‘oh god, please love me but, for the love of great gurning god, please don’t hurt me.’

Ok. So, we met in a pub in North London. A quite nice one. Barely had the first sip of my cool, refreshing, crisp pint of Kronenbourg (I’m not beyond product placement) tickled my tonsils when I found myself hearing all about Billy, let’s call him, her ex. Who had cheated on her. Quite recently.

Emma, very kindly, informed she would never cheat on me. PHEW. Weight off my mind. She also described herself as ‘the perfect girlfriend.’ Well, Billy might have a different take on that. Mightn‘t he, sweetcheeks? Does part of being the ‘perfect girlfriend’ entail endless nights sitting up staring at your mobile trying, with utter futility, to make it ring as if you were fucking Matilda or something, whilst the man you love is utterly incapable of picking up his own phone to call you as his arms are wrapped firmly round someone who actually makes him feel alive, when in fact she could be just about anyone, as long as she wasn’t you, as the sight of your pleading face now makes him feel slightly sick but he just hasn’t got the guts to dump you because he knows just how much it’ll crush you and he can’t face the idea that the rest of your life will simply be a succession of utterly humiliating yet frantically hopeful first dates where you bore the other person arseless talking about your fucking ex. IS THAT WHAT THE ‘PERFECT GIRLFRIEND’ DOES?

She also told me how amazing she was at her job. How great her social life is. And so on. It was one long big-up session.

But before you admonish her… I thought back about all the burblings that had come out of my mouth that evening. In mildly awkward social circumstances you tend to just let your mouth flap up and down with the filter turned down to ‘minimal’, blocking only racist jokes and outright insults, for fear of being drowned in silence. Silence is the killer. Silence means THINGS AREN’T GOING WELL. And it’s all your fault. Oh yeah. It’s because you’re a boring, slack-jawed playground botherer. So you talk and talk and talk. And it very quickly and easily becomes a mutual self-congratulation society.

So, I too talked about how great I am in relationships (I’m not - I’ve been reliably informed that it’s like dating ‘a less eloquent Ted Bundy’ - I don’t meet a lot of parents, put it that way), how perfect my job is, how cool my friends are (you’re not). Because you’re selling a lifestyle, yeah? Why have a relationship with someone? Because, apart from liking how they look, you like what they do. What they’ve done. How they conduct themselves. How they think. How they dress. How they vote. You like their lifestyle. It’s a good one. This person has succeeded, this person is a winner and, hey, they WANT YOU. No one else. You. So we want to hear about how every other aspect of their life is awesome. And you reciprocate. You sell your life to them.

Anyway, Emma was fine. But it got quite boring quite quickly. I tried to think of ways to liven the evening up. A while ago I read an interview with mildly-amusing gross-out frat boy rockers, The Bloodhound Gang. One of their songs contains the refrain ‘The drummer from Def Leppard’s only got one arm’, repeated over and over, for no apparent reason. When asked by the interviewer why they had done this, the lead singer replied - ‘We wanted to write the stupidest line ever written in music history. This line seemed like the stupidest, most pointless thing we could say.’

So, taking my lead from a band who mainly write songs about wanking, shit and wanking I decided I would try and interject into the conversation the stupidest, most pointless thing I could say. I soon realised that The Bloodhound Gang had pretty much got it sewn up. So.

‘And, yeah, so I don’t speak to Billy anymore.’

‘Right, right, yeah.’

‘But I’m totally over it now.’

‘Yeah, totally, yeah… Hey, did you know that the drummer from Def Leppard has only got one arm?’

‘What?’

‘You know Def Leppard?’

‘Er, yeah.’

‘Yeah, their drummer, Rick Allen. Only one arm.’

‘Right.’

‘Still drums though. Just twice as hard. And he does some stuff with his foot. I think he’s got a special drum kit.’

‘Are you a big Def Leppard fan?’

‘No. No, I don’t even think I could name a single song.’

‘Oh ok.’

‘Could you?’

‘What, name one of their songs or drum with one arm?’

‘Either.’

‘No.’

SILENCE. I had done something wrong. But what?


So I started talking about how great I am at my job instead.

Will I see her again? Well, I don’t really have any inclination to but seeing as most of my previous relationships lasted for as long as they did simply because I forgot to tell the other person that I had left them and they just KEPT TURNING UP AT MY HOUSE, yeah, I probably will see her again.

Eyes peeled for my second date with Victoria report.

Until then, keep the love ALIVE.

It's great when you date, yeah

First date tonight.

I am more nervous about it going well than going badly. If it goes too well then it’s a massive letdown for everyone concerned (except, you know, the person I’m dating but since when did their feelings come in to any of this?).

I’ll be writing the first date report tomorrow, so keep your eyes peeled.

Oh and this one is beautifully set up for a classic internet dating fall. She seems like the kind of person I would actually like to date. Which means she will probably be a pig-limbed horse frightener with electronic parts.

And so the usual fears come a-creepin’. There’s nothing like a date to make you completely reevaluate your life. Suddenly my clothes seem shit. The fact that I dress like an 8 year old boy doesn’t usually bother me but how will this attire convince my prospective loves that I am a suave, sophisticated man about town? So, the question is, do I dress to impress? Or be myself? Or do I find some kind of uneasy middle ground that will please no one? Yep, probably that one. Crap, I have to do some ironing. OH BALLS, I don’t even have any clean clothes. Oh this is going to be a bloody shambles.

Another problem is how to behave. Women want a gentleman who will treat them like a princess. No they don’t, they want someone sensitive who’ll treat them as an equal. Ah no hold on, they want someone who’ll be a real man and tell them what’s what. Baffling. It’s almost as if women are all individual beings with unique thoughts, feelings and desires. I know! Mental. Anyway, the point is, WOMEN, if you go on a date with a man and he simultaneously holds a door open for you then slams it in your face or pulls out the chair for you to sit down but then whips it away and forces your arse to connect heavily with the stone floor, then you only have yourselves to blame. HAVE YOU ANY IDEA HOW CONFUSED WE ARE? At least we men have the decency to be utterly one-dimensional and predictable. Make a decision about what you want, get Huw Edwards to announce it on the news and then we’ll take it from there.

Right now there is only one certainty as I waste time writing this blog and actively avoid getting ready for the date - the one thing women certainly don’t want on a date, is me.

Wish me luck. Lord knows I need it.

It started with a simulated wink

The game has begun, ladies and gentlemen.

The profile is live. HOO YAH. And so am I.

So, there are many ways to do this. You can search for your one true Love, with a wide or narrow field as you like. You can stipulate that you want a 5’4’’, red-haired, blue-eyed, athletic librarian who likes cooking, wants 3 kids, has never been married….and so on… There’s almost no end to it. You can literally narrow it down to one person. But where would be the fun in that?

So you could do what I do and search for ‘women’. The results are surprising.

The other option is to trust Match.com. They send you an email every day with brand new ‘matches’. This is rated in percentage. I assume they only send people who match you 65% or so or more. I will date anyone who Match.com matches me 90% or more. That’s a promise. In their hands, my heart. Opposites don’t attract in this world, buddy. My top match today only rated 77%. Which seems high but it didn’t take me long to think about the 23% of this woman that I already know that I don’t want or like. That’s like both her arms and half a leg. I couldn’t do this to myself.

Or. My personal favourite. Sit about in your pants and wait for those lovely ladies to contact you. And, whaddyaknow, they only bloody well have. You’ve got two options when you find someone you fancy the look/style (mainly look) of. You can ‘wink’ at them, which is much like a Facebook post. I have been winked at by a few people but am uncertain how to react. What’s the etiquette when it comes to winking? Do I wink back? This runs the danger of turning into a frenzy of back and forth winking, like two strangers in a sandstorm. Or email them? This is the other option, you can email your potential Love. This is very forward. Isn’t it?

I have received three emails (the saucy wenches).

One merely pointed out that I like cricket. NICE ONE, COLUMBO. It only says that on my profile. I know, I know, she’s initiating a ‘hey, you like cricket, I like cricket, this could work’ thing. But telling me things I already know about myself is a major turn-off for me. My ex did this a lot - ‘you’re a narrow-minded sociopath’, ‘you’re crying', ‘you’re hurting me, let go’. That kind of thing. I have emailed Mrs Cricket back. Doing it was the same feeling as picking a nice juicy scab off your elbow - i.e. stupid.

The second two were very surprising. Mrs Cricket is 25, that’s expected, as I am 26. The other two are 34 and 35 respectively. I went into this thing moaning and moaning and moaning about how women like older men. And I get this thrown in my face. Typical.

One of them is also a Japanese divorced single mother who works in banking. I mean, I pretty much have to date her, right? I really don’t want to. But I might, just for YOU.

One more thing for today - whilst searching profiles I have seen so many women who have stipulated that their potential partner must be earning £50k+, 75k+ and even £100k+. Wow. I haven’t searched the men but I assume it’s the same on that side. THERE’S A CREDIT CRUNCH ON, YOU FLAPPING TWERPS. Some people.

I have set myself the target of arranging 5 dates with 5 different people by 29th May. Not go on the dates, just arrange.

Stick around, Lover boys and girls, it’s about to get socially uncomfortable.

I explore but I also negotiate. DATE ME!

Filling out the Match.com profile is like painting a giant naked self-portrait of yourself which will soon be unveiled in Trafalgar Square to thousands of cold unsympathetic eyes. Terrifying. Filling out this profile has had me plumb the depths of my deepest (previously subconscious, so thanks for that) fears and question exactly who I am and what I’m doing with my life.

I did not part with £65 for this. This is not Love. Is it? Is this Love?

So, in other words, my profile isn’t ready yet. I’ll let you know when it is.

Look, it’s difficult, right? Here are the sections and their individual conundrums…

Basics - in this section I have to stipulate what age the women I would like to date are. I’ve put 20-30. I am 26. Have I done the right thing? Am I being ageist? Do I want to date someone barely out of their teens? Do I divide my age by two and add seven? I have also had to admit to being a short weakling with the body of a child. Galling. To be honest. Absolutely galling.

Appearance - Match.com give you the opportunity to list your best feature out of a bizarrely limited list. So, is it my arms, belly button, arse, calves, chest, eyes, feet, hands, hair, legs, lips or neck? Come on people, don’t be shy - I need your opinion. Which one is it? There is an option for ‘none‘. Should you want to choose that. You’ll probably choose that. Thanks a lot.

Interests - I have 1000 words to describe what I like and what I do in my spare time. 1000 words is simultaneously not enough and far too many. This is existential madness. I need help here - how do I not sound like a twat?

Lifestyle - You can list how much you earn here. Is that necessary? Is that important? I earn very little so naturally I have ticked ‘no comment’, which is the same as ticking ‘less than £20,000’ and everyone knows it.

Background/Values - You are given 250 words to talk about your single favourite book but must choose your political leanings from five basic and very broad choices. I can only imagine that this is because Match.com have a simple equation. Books = sexy. Politics = conversation filler. And they’re right.

Express Yourself - the most baffling section. Five utterly unrelated tick box questions, each of which give you no option to ‘express yourself’. One of them is your favourite colour. If you, and by ‘you’ I mean my potential dates on Match.com, are searching with ‘favourite colour’ as one of your requirements then you can fuck right off.

Intro - 4000 words to tell people everything else about yourself. This section has brought me out in a cold sweat. The implications of getting this bit wrong are enormous and depressing. Suggestions would be nice. What could I say to capture people’s imaginations and make them believe I am an interesting yet humble yet intelligent yet exciting yet loving yet mysterious yet funny yet yet yet yet yet yet yet yet yet. YET.

Luckily you don’t have to do everything yourself. PHEW. There’s also Dr Helen Fisher’s personality test. WHO IS SHE? I done it. I am mainly an ‘Explorer’ but also a bit of a ‘Negotiator.’ Good news. Now this is nonsense but what I love about it is that on everyone’s profile is a little bit that says ‘According to Dr Helen Fisher I am an…explorer or whatever’. Brilliant. They should do more of this. ’According to my ex I am emotionally stunted’. ’According to my dad I am a grinding disappointment’. That kind of thing. Keep up, Match.com.

Love is...

...at best a balm to sooth the open wound we call ‘life’ and at worst a horrific, malicious practical joke. But what do I know? Let’s think about some descriptions of love from history and hopefully we‘ll get to the bottom of it.

So some people think love is a ‘good thing’.

The Roman poet Virgil said ‘omnia vincit amor’, love conquers all. This is ridiculous for a start. No, it doesn’t. H1N1 conquers all. The Beatles claimed that it was ‘all you need’. Utter madness. Beyond the obvious, food and water and all that, we also need to not be subjected to the cod-philosophy of Scouse hippies. The actual philosopher Bertrand Russell said that love is a condition of ‘absolute value’ rather than ‘relative value’. Not a fucking clue, mate.

Margaret Atwood said that we should have as many words for love in English as the Eskimos have for snow. That’s 52, Margaret. Fifty-two. We just don’t have time for that. I'm busy. F. Scott Fitzgerald believed love was the ‘beginning of everything’ (but he was an alcoholic, so…), Vincent van Gogh claimed love was eternal (self-mutilating alcoholic, so…) and Frank Sinatra crooned that love meant more than money (rich alcoholic, so…). And so on to the depressing end.

But not everyone has been so bleedin’ chipper.

Jean Baudrillard said to love someone is to ‘isolate them from the world’. This isn’t a nice thing to do. Is it? No. Our own womany Poet Laureate, Cazza Ann Duffy, decided she’d give her lover an onion instead of a rose. Onions make you cry. Crying is a bad thing. Bad onion, not happy rose. Sadness ensues. Boohoo. Philip Roth called love’ bullshit’. Charlie Brown said that love ruined the taste of peanut butter. And Plato denounced the whole shebang as a ‘grave mental disease’.

Yep. I am none the wiser.

But who cares what these people think. The point is, how can Match.com define love? How do I know if I can get my money back or not? Is there a test?

No. There’s a ‘Love Guarantee’ which is worded so cleverly that they basically guarantee you’ll get the thing that is guaranteed (which is guaranteed) or your money back. In a nutshell, if you show me someone who has ever successfully managed to get a free 6 months out of Match.com then I’ll show you a man who thinks you’re lying for no good reason. Why would you lie? Don’t lie. Stop it.

Anyway - love. Wahizzit? The poet and novelist Charles Bukowski described love as ‘a piece of paper torn to bits’ He also wrote ‘what counts now is one more tight pussy before the light tilts out’. But. We’ll stick with it.