The Seventh Bae of Christmas:
The three minute bell rang and having drunk and debriefed, Woody and I returned to our dating. This time I was joined by Arnav. Now, I must confess, I wasn’t being completely honest with my dates. I knew that no one would show any interest in a girl who lived over three hundred miles away so I told a small white lie and said I had recently moved to London from Cumbria. I was somewhat surprised when Arnav responded to this, ‘Oh really, where is Cumbria?’. Having explained that I grew up just south of Scotland, his next question was ‘Hmm, ok, so what are people actually like up north?’. I was quite sad that the three minute bell went at this point before I could have fun fabricating the intricacies and features of the Northern race!
The Eighth Bae of Christmas:
I will admit, when Kevin sat down opposite me I wasn’t exactly bowled over. There was a heavily receding hairline and an arrogance that wasn’t entirely endearing or attractive. He got major brownie points for his first question though: if I was going to host a music festival, where would it be, who would I book and what food would I serve? Discussing and comparing responses filled up the three minutes nicely and completely avoided the disastrously dull quagmire of occupations and hobbies - full marks to Kevin!
The Ninth Bae of Christmas:
Harun had clearly been taking tips from his neighbouring dater and kicked off by asking what animal I would like to be reincarnated as. An otter, obviously! Who wouldn’t want to be reborn as an animal that has a special pouch for keeping their favourite rock in!? Harun, apparently. His animal of choice was a cockroach. His reasoning: ‘Who wouldn’t want to be universally loathed by all of humanity?!’. I can’t say that I have ever looked for a recipient of widespread hatred as a lover and don’t think that Harun quite bought me round to the concept. Although, as he pointed out, if there is a nuclear attack, he’ll fine and dandy - I think I’ll stick to my pebble pocket thanks!
The Tenth Bae of Christmas:
The cockroach eventually scuttled off and was replaced by the man with hands down, the most swagger I have ever seen. Nelson told me he worked for Hugo Boss - a fact which, in sight of his sleek black outfit and tasteful smattering of jewellery, I was inclined to believe. He was killing it, he looked intimidatingly cool! His street-cred was raised even higher when we discovered a mutual love of Brazil and we happily spent the next three minutes discussing Copa Cabana, caipirinhas and cachaca . As he got up to leave, however, the vision was shattered. His very smart suede, pointy boots would last all of two minutes in the Cumbrian mire and his coat looked far more suited to Rio than Wreay!
The Eleventh Bae of Christmas:
Rhys sat down next, looking like the type of guy that plays rugby at weekends - a definite plus point appearance-wise for me! There wasn’t much he could have said that would have stopped me from fancying him. He managed it though. Six years ago Rhys made the decision to set up a new social network, it failed. The three minutes largely consisted of a self-reflecting monologue. Rhys appeared to be using speed dating as a form of therapy to examine his own previous failures. Although I am all in favour of a man who is willing to recognise his own flaws, this seemed a little excessive. Also, it was six years ago! Move on!
The Twelfth Bae of Christmas:
We had got to the last one so this guy had to be THE one. In all honesty though, a heavy night the night before followed by eleven rounds of intense small talk were starting to take their toll on me. I confessed my slightly hungover state to AJ and asked whether he had also been getting stuck in the festive spirits over the weekend. Nah, it had been a quiet Saturday night in with a film for him. He asked what I had been up to the night before and I told him about my friends’ house party. ‘Oh, that sounds fun,’ he said, ‘I really like house parties but have only been to two since I graduated from Huddersfield’. I tried to cheer him up: ‘Two isn’t that bad, when did you graduate’. ‘2008′. Two parties in eight years - that must be some sort of record! What a note to end on!
Woody and I reconvened and agreed that although it had been a thoroughly enjoyable and entertaining afternoon, not one of our speed dates had changed our lives. We grabbed our coats and headed for the door. This is not where the story ends, however. What I have failed to mention thus far is that, before signing up to go speed-dating, I had sent my sister to one of their events three days before to suss it out. I got back to her flat on Sunday evening and pulled out my card to compare notes. As we ran through the list of names together, it became obvious that there were several repetitions - at least four of the men appeared on both of our lists. The biggest shock of all was Kevin, the music-festval-maker! This explained his nonchalant attitude - he was an old hand at the speed dating game! I have no problem with people trying speed dating more than once - as ‘No Sex, No City’ proves, I am all in favour of people being proactive in bae hunting. I do feel that going twice within a week is really a bit much though, they wouldn’t have even had time to arrange dates with the first batch before moving on to the second.
The whole thing made me feel a bit sad. Whilst there were clearly groups of girls there just to try something new and have a bit of a giggle; there were a number of men who must attend these events week in, week out on a solo mission to try and find ‘The One’. Maybe I have read the situation entirely wrong though and these men actually weren’t wife-hunting at all; maybe these men were all just journalists, writers and bloggers, searching for something to write about - stranger things have happened!