Of weddings

Oof, well the hangover mist has just about settled from last weekend's antics to condemn them to print. Please bear in mind, this happened after she'd had no sleep on the flight back from DC (and look, you CAN be sympathetic and ignore the fact she was in a bed on a plane. A fact she is still marvelling over). Then she had to go straight back to work that day, then to the London office the following two days, then to the wedding reception of a friend.
What perhaps set the tone was that when she and gorgeous work colleague (and her boyfriend) arrived in the Surrey park in a taxi, they literally stumbled out into the middle of a fight. A big old fist-fight, evidently involving the wedding guests, with F and C bombs being dropped all over the place. Deary me.
They then met up with former work colleague boy - who had decided to drink his way through the day, having been invited to the main event without knowing a single other person. He could barely speak, but managed to furnish them with a bottle of red wine and some cheese, which was about all that was left from the buffet.
She decided, spurred on by the wine, to tell gorgeous colleague and drunk boy about her little work crush. On the smiley boy with the deliciously dark red hair. She was a tad reluctant to do so, and said: "Well, I don't want to give his name. You're going to tell me he has some fantastic long term girlfriend/wife etc etc. And I don't want to know!". This was met with a sympathetic smile, and a: "It's not Bill is it?" (look, he's not called Bill. But he LOOKS like a Bill. And yes, dear readers, it was Bill).
She felt crestfallen and must have looked it, as GC immediately rushed in with an: "Oh my God, are you okay? Here, have some Stilton. And wine. Drink the wine."
It wasn't so much that it was Bill himself, just the fact that here was another crush that was an absolute dead end. There seem to be a fair few too many of those of late.
When he was otherwise engaged (errr... trying to deactivate yet another fight), GC turned to her and whispered: "What about drunk boy? Not tonight, obviously. But still..."
This planted the seed in her head, and she decided a dance wouldn't hurt. She'd always had a feeling they may end up having a little kiss at some point, after all.
She could ignore the fact he was grinding his hips, back to back, against the groom's mother's best friend, who may well have been in the Golden Girls. She couldn't ignore Robbie Williams' Angels when it came on however, which she simply cannot be in the same room as.
Going outside, she happened upon a table of people laughing and smoking, and recognising one of them from work, joined them, hoping for a drunken cigarette. This is the point at which she took two (large) drags of the one offered to her, before realising it wasn't a normal cigarette, by any stretch of the imagination. Oooooops.
Things started going ever-so-slightly blurry at this point. But she had a real gem of a moment, so much so that if any scriptwriters of Bridget Jones 3 are reading this, they're welcome to have it for free (or perhaps, in payment, she could have a little grope of Colin Firth? Thanks).
Then drunk boy and her were dancing. So far so good. She asked if he needed to share a taxi back with her and GC at which point he grinned, and slurred: "Noooo. I'm gunna home with YOU" - and stumbled, plunging to the floor like a sack of potatoes encased in concrete, falling perfectly under a table, leaving only his feet sticking out.
Seeing he wasn't actually dead, she decided leaving the scene with her wine-splashed dress was the only answer. By the time she had regained her composure and returned, it was last song time. And drunk boy was living up to his name.
Cut to outside, and taxis are being lined up. She is having to grab onto him because he (please bear in mind he's built like a rugby player) is stumbling to the floor. Cue argument with taxi driver who insists drunk boy should be going to hospital instead. She uses her best persuasion skills to get him inside, and immediately goes into her best Florence Nightingale mode.
Only thing is, Florence probably didn't rub the back of her patients' heads. Allow said head to rest on her shoulder. Allow the lips on the said head to then kiss her. Literally, from half-dead to being in mid-snog in the space of three minutes.
God knows what GC and boyfriend thought (their reactions, she seems to remember, consisted of jaws hitting floors). They managed, eventually, to get drunk boy home, and he was saved from having to climb through a window by a housemate.
In a way, she wishes this weren't the end of the story. In her (drunken) wisdom, she decided sending him a text that night to inform him of their little cab romance was wise, and to take him up on the dinner he promised her in the middle of the last dance.
But, do you know what? Nothing. Okay, he sent a text apology, saying he feared he'd made a fool of himself at the wedding. But he later told GC he had no recollection of the night at all.
As has been pointed out to her, this was hardly likely to be the beginning of a beautiful romance, was it? It would have been nice to have been asked for that dinner though.
In the spirit of new starts and not giving up, she's now signed up to mysinglefriend.com, thanks to Ms E's helpful nudging and wondrous description of her (she wasn't bribed, honest). She'd kind of given up on the whole web dating thing, but hey! Let's see how it goes. It can't get any worse... can it???

Back from the USA!

But she has LITERALLY not stopped since. Well, okay, maybe done a teeny bit of sleeping in between, but that's it.
Washington was absolutely gorgeous - all classical architecture, green spaces and beautiful monuments. Oh and flying First Class and staying in a $1,000-dollar a night hotel suite? Yep, those were pretty good too! Just a shame that the gorgeous, vast bed was just hers, and that the rooftop bar Champagne was shared with workmates. Lovely as they were, she hastens to add. But when you're in such a fabulous place, so obviously designed for couples, it really accentuates the singleness.
The only pick-ups she had were truly pitiful. They were:
1) The smiley Japanese lady who waved at her from a passing taxi
2) The afro-haired student in the sweaty club who seemed to think pointing passed as a chat-up line
3) The tour guide who looked like Moby who the others were determined to set her up with. They danced to A-ha and NWA and he looked a little awkward. Lovely, but awkward.
Ummm. That's it. Shameful, isn't it? But let's forget about dating (believe me, she is trying!).
The main thing is, she loved DC. She swooned over the Smithsonian, had the best sushi in her life, cycled round the Capitol, found her favourite bar in the world (The Gibson, U Street), lusted after the beautiful things in the shops, and loved her own company and her newfound work friends'.
And after all that? She did come home with a man, believe it or not.
He looks great in pants, comes with his own (magnetic) wardrobe, is living on her fridge (currently in superhero garb with a garland of flowers round his neck)... and goes by the name Obama.

A gap...

She has taken a little hiatus, both from the blog and from the dating world, as you may have noticed.
Don't take it personally folks, there was a possibly festival-related flu-ness thing going on, which required her to make her signature cocktail of blackcurrent Lemsip, apple squash and Bombay Sapphire.
Somehow she survived both the flu (okay, bad cold. whatever.) and that concoction, and was thrown back into the wonderful world of work, where things have been a bit too busy, it has to be said. Whatever happened to the silly season?
Anyway, she is very, very excited indeed about a trip to Washington DC next Friday, where she is hoping for some SATC (or should that be SADC?) action with a hot American politico. Look, it could happen, okay?? Don't burst her bubble just yet! Stranger things have happened on press trips, after all.
She is also trying to rope Miss H into some dating shenanigans - speed dating with wine tasting, and an indie dating night where everyone brings along their favourite record are the top two contenders at the mo. Any other quirky dating nights you know of? Send them this way!

Fast train to Dumpsville....

It had to be done. And so, despite her friends saying it was never going to happen, she told Daniel that this thing was never going to get off the ground. She did stop short of saying he was frigid, which is what Miss H (her festival buddy) was telling all and sundry at Reading on the weekend!
Urgh. It really is the worst thing to have to do. Especially with a three-day-festival-comedown-hangover while you're walking along watching everyone else having fun by the pubs in Hammersmith.
But she called (cop out? perchance.) and bumbled on for a little while about how much fun she'd had at Reading and asked how his weekend had been (he'd done "not much" other than having been to his brother's house. call her a bitchy cowface, but she likes to be intellectually stimulated and also occasionally made to feel a little jealous of the exciting things other people have been doing).
Anyway. She ummed and ahhed and then called it all off. Belted out the old lines about it being more of a friendship than a relationship and not really working out for her. She explained she was absolutely shit at doing things like this. Not sure if that helped. Felt a bit bad he then sent a text apologising if he had done anything wrong. Which he hadn't. Perhaps also suggesting they go out to gigs together was a bad idea as well. Altogether, she'd give herself a B-minus for her efforts. Did the deed, completed successfully, but hardly excelled at it.
She took herself off to Broken Embraces afterwards and for some cheap Chinese which somehow managed to make things feel a little better.
Hey-ho (and why is that entering the dictionary? But anyway) and, indeed, onwards and upwards. Next!

808s and Heartbreaks

She is feeling: utterly entranced and ecstatic at the amazing Radiohead set she just saw which brought down the stellar curtain on Reading.
She is also: utterly heartbroken at having met a great guy on Friday, who she saw again on the Sunday of the festival and had this mega mega connection with, like insanely, and then to watch him walk off as the litter pickers started clearing up the mess. They may as well have swept up her heart which had just fallen onto the ground.
It was hot, sexy, beardy kissing, and a hell of a lot of it. He said amazing things, about her eyes, her smile, her life, everything. In short, she had one of the best nights of her life. But what happened? What happened? He seemed intent on them going their separate ways despite everything - which, it has to be said, was definitely not imagined.
He wrote a note for her on a five pound note, and, seeming as torn as she, said if it ever made its way to her hands again they were meant to be together. He said it felt like he was a missing opportunity and that there were things he should be saying. She just wanted the question why to be answered.
Maybe it was just a festival romance - those gems that are even more truncated than holiday loves, but burn just as brightly. Maybe he's married with five-and-a-half kids. Maybe they'll get married and recount this story over dinner party tables. At this particular point in time, none of those options sound too far fetched to her.
Radiohead and Gaslight Anthem (their first kiss) will never sound quite the same again. And if you see a fiver with Love in the Time of Cholera written on it in a running-out biro? Do let her know. It's got her name on it.

* She's just checked by the way - there are 1,302,000,000 five pound notes in circulation at the moment. This could take some time.

Boom bang a bang

How disappointing. Her reaction, that is, to seeing that she has a new Facebook message from the Uni Boy. She isn't 16 any more (happily. honestly, who would really want to turn back time and be filled with all the angst and hormones? not me) so why is her heart now threatening to burst out of her ribcage? Bugger. She really did not expect that. Thought she had realised he is a bit of a player, and can be a bit of a tosser. BUGGER. Better see what he says....

Male intuition

Turns out it actually does exist.
She's decided that really, in her heart of hearts, things aren't going to go anywhere with Daniel. There is no specific reason (but his lack of physicality and bad grammar really don't help - someone in their twenties should know the difference between 'to' and 'too', and 'there' and 'their'). There's no big banging-heart-flutteriness going on. Maybe it's unrealistic to hope for it. Isn't it worse to give up your chance of achieving it though?
However, the big 'but' coming up here is that she really hates to upset people, which makes her life a tad difficult at times. So, against her better judgement (and passing up a chance to see a band playing with her workmate just down the road, damn!) she went for another drink with him. In the last chance saloon.
They were having their third drink when he punched her on the arm (see, told you physicality was an issue) and said: "Hey! I was really nervous about coming to meet you tonight!".
When she asked why, he looked down and said: "I dunno. I thought you were going to say you didn't want to carry on seeing me or something."
Of course, any sane person would have grasped this opportunity along with the Pinot Grigio and said: "Yes. I'm sorry. But this really isn't going to work. Another drink?"
But no. She lied. And waffled slightly. And is now regretting that as he keeps texting and calling her. The eagerness is ever-so offputting. That whole thing about playing hard to get? It's definitely true.
He was at home with his family for a few days, so she didn't want to call to have The Chat with him there. She's done that before, at the age of 16. Wondering why her paramour wasn't sounding too overly heartbroken at the dumpage, she heard him hiss down the line: "I'm watching Neighbours. With MY MUM." And texting is just wrong, wrong, wrong. How about meeting up and giving false hope, is that any better really? Conundrums.
Before you ask, there aren't really any other fine specimens out there in the old fishing net of life unfortunately. Mr Sixty-shirts is trying to muscle back in on the scene with some amusing (and fastiduously grammatically correct) emails.
Then there is the most gorgeous, gorgeous man from work who she met out on a job last week. Goodness, but his EYES. They are literally hypnotising. There's a chance he may be at a friend's wedding reception in a few weeks' time. GOD she hopes so.
Before that though, there's the fun of Reading Festival ahead. She's armed with a backstage pass. She has her eyes on a few musician types. She's heard there'll be free beer. This could be dangerous!
It may be an idea to clear her conscience and end the whole thing with Daniel first though... But how?