At the end of this process is a prize; a house somewhere, somewhere quiet, and in it your world, you, them, a dog, a fire, wine, sunsets, BBQs when it stops raining, hugs, small shoes in the hall, one day, homework on the fridge, somewhere there's a John Lewis advert with your name on it. And at the end of this process is a prize, and you don't want it, you're not looking for it, you're not sure if you even believe in it, but wouldn't it be amazing, you, with them, couldn't you really make a go of it.
This is a special date. Let me tell you why. We all have a fantasy of a safe place, a home, a place where when the world is falling down around you, you can go, and they are there, and everything is fine. As with everything in dating, you decide what it is you want from the person, and you create an emotional state that makes your date feel they want to give that thing to you. The London Aquarium is like the Sistine Chapel, you want to walk around it when it's empty and silent, but you rarely get this opportunity. Standing with someone, looking at sharks, both listening to No Surprises, whilst surrounded by noisy families, is the strangest experience, it's close to spiritual. That feeling of the two of you being completely in your own shared world while everything goes crazy around you is palpable. It's an experience so memorable that you should do it anyway, with or without a date, and once you've done it once you'll probably want to take someone and have them experience it too.
The Trying Not to Propose Date at the Landmark Hotel
In my flat there is a notebook with your name on it, I started it the evening we met. Things that may or may not be in there: photos of you, or you and me, stubs of tickets of films you liked, funny texts we sent, fragments of conversations written down before I fell asleep and forgot, the places we aspire to go, the people we aspire to meet. The only rule for inclusion is that it has to remind me of why I so consistently like sitting next to you. The notebook has one of two destinies. Either it will become a family heirloom, or I'll rip it up, turn the broken pieces into a collage, and sell it as a piece of conceptual art detailing heartbreak.
In my flat there is a notebook with your name on it, I started it the evening we met. Things that may or may not be in there: photos, obviously, stubs of tickets of films you hated but I liked or vice versa, horrible texts we sent, fragments of arguments written down in the hours I laid awake knowing we weren't quite right. The only rule for inclusion, it has to remind me of why we should never end up together. The notebook has one of two destinies. Either on the day of our wedding I'll burn it and deny it's very existence, or on the day we split up, I'll look at it and maybe, not smile, that's too much, but, you know, no that is it, smile.
Legend has it Dali would lay in bed with his hand touching the rim of a wine glass. When he fell asleep his hand would drop, knocking the glass over and waking him up. He did this because he believed all his greatest ideas occurred in the part of the brain only accessed between awake and sleep. The Date Guy uses a similar technique, although instead of a wine glass he uses an innate bitterness and sense of regret. It makes him sit bolt upright.
Midnight dates are wildly unpopular as people frequently misinterpret them as booty calls. On the plus side, if they agree, you know it's probably a booty call. Here are the advantages of dating in the middle of the night:
- Your availability at this time of day is pretty open and so is there's.
- It has a far quicker bonding effect as you feel outside the norms of society.
- Normal conversational rules don't seem to apply.
- You get to wake up and wonder if it actually happened.
- You get to use the Dali part of your brain.
Text: Read the rest of this entry »
The Two Most Prevalent Lies Told in Relationships
There is a lie that women consistently tell men, and a whole separate lie that men consistently tell women. What is strange about this, isn't that either exist as a common feature in a relationship, more that the recipients almost always truly believes what they are being told as true. I'm sorry to talk about this out loud but I feel we should all make an effort to be in relationships that are honestly as good as we say. Think of it like an injection, it may hurt, but there's a bigger, happier picture. Lie number one:
Girlfriend to her Boyfriend: You're the only person that's ever made me cum / best sex I've ever had.
It's probably true maybe 5% of the time, yet women say it to more like 95% of their boyfriends. I suspect it's born out of an early realisation that men are deeply insecure about the sex a woman has had before she met him. The justification is always "but she has no reason to lie." In actuality it is a lie that subconsciously, but powerfully, communicates three attractive ideas:
The Talk to me in Italian Date at Somewhere Boring You Won’t Like
So, accents are sexy, deceptively so. Take an average Spanish person and put them in London they immediately start to look like Penelope Cruz. If we were all a little smarter we would move to a different country to meet our partners, we'd all go up a league without even trying. Luckily for Londoners sexy accents are everywhere. You want to meet someone who has left their home country and moved here to pursue a different life? Walk into Pret and order a coffee. If you don't fancy any of the people working there, walk down the road and go into another. Pret is like a delivery service for people I want to date. Look past the unflattering uniform and you have a person living in a foreign city dying to meet a native.
The Conversation you need to be having with your Barista:
Five Songs that Sound Romantic but Subliminally Communicate that You’re About to End It
To cater for all scenarios, today's Valentine's post is a double bill. More a last dance than a first, this is the list for the you're-on-your-way-out-as-soon-as-I-sort-out-an-appropriate-mix-tape-to-communicate-the-idea side of the crowd.
5. God Only Knows - Joss Stone
4. Lately - Stevie Wonder
