Saturday 28 January 2012
So there I was, getting ready for my date with Mr Shorty, wishing that I was going out with Mr Mensa instead. 

I walked into the restaurant where I was meeting Mr Shorty and quickly scanned around to see where he was seated.  Oh, nowhere.  The waiter came up to me and asked if I was looking for a table, I gave him my surname (I'd booked the restaurant - warning sign number 1?) and he duly took me to my seat.  I checked my phone and there was a text.

"Running late, be there in 5 minutes"

The text was sent over 5 minutes ago and there was still no sign of him.  Fifteen minutes later (warning sign number 2?) and Mr Shorty walked through the restaurant door.  I saw him before he saw me and I knew instantly that there was no attraction.

He seemed extremely nervous and I began to find it really difficult to hold a decent conversation with him.  I ordered another glass of red wine, this was going to be a long night.  I should have really ended the date there, but I didn't.

We moved onto a couple of bars after the meal, ending up in a pub that I tend to favour when I want to have a good dance.

I must have been very, very drunk at that wedding because when I got on the dance floor I certainly didn't remember Mr Shorty dancing like an extra band member of New Kids on the Block.  By this point I'd moved onto the Vodka Tonics to get me through the night.  Again, why didn't I just end the date there?  I seem to be a glutton for punishment or have some kind of delusional faith when it comes to dates that are perhaps not quite going the way I'd like them to.

In a bid to get a break from Mr Shorty's flailing arms and legs, I went to the toilet.  I didn't need the toilet but I did need a breather to gather my thought and think about the next plan of action.  What I hadn't intended part of my plan to be was to find myself sending Mr Mensa a Facebook message asking him to take me out the following weekend when he was up.  I think it was at that point I realised that I had to bring the evening to an end.

I went back out to face the music, literally and to tell Mr Shorty that we should just end the night. 

I think Mr Shorty must have sensed I wasn't interested as out of the blue he turned round to me and said "I think I'm too vulnerable for you". This was a very unexpected statement and one that I'd never heard before in all my years of dating. Mr Shorty went on to explain that he knew I would end up breaking his heart and that tonight he had realised that he was still trying to get over the break-up from his ex partner and mother of his 3 children.  I appreciated his honesty but really this was a first date and to me it appeared that he had put an awful lot of pressure on himself and his expectations of the night, even by my standards (warning sign number 3?).

As we got outside it suddenly dawned on me that Mr Shorty had been drinking all evening and he lived over 2 hours drive away.  I presumed that he had arranged a hotel for himself, I should have checked this presumption.

Upon approaching the taxi rank, Mr Shorty turned to me and said "where are we getting a taxi to?"

I explained that I was getting a taxi home and asked him what his plans were.  He explained that he'd taken a sleeping bag with him but it was in his car that he'd parked on the other side of town.  Like the softy I am, I said that he could come back and stay at mine and borrow one of my sleeping bags.  I suspect that I was feeling sorry for him at this point and my motherly instinct had set in. 

I made him a coffee when we got back to mine and we chatted for a bit.  I felt in a way that I was giving him counselling and it became apparent that he was very far away from being ready to date.  Mr Shorty asked what I was looking for in a partner and I explained that I needed someone strong, someone who could take control now and again.  I basically explained that I was a traditional kind of girl, I wanted someone who would take care of me, who would love me and support me.  I wanted a soul mate.

Mr Shorty then stated that he got the impression someone else was on my mind.  I wondered if he'd picked up on the flirty comment on Mr Mensa's Facebook page and put two and two together.  I'm not sure why, but I didn't answer him either way and instead suggested that I get his sleeping bag as I needed to get to bed.

He said that he wanted to share my bed, that he didn't want to sleep alone.  And yes, you've guessed it, I said he could but nothing would be happening.

As I got changed into my pyjamas, I looked round to see Mr Shorty standing donning a pair of Superman boxer shorts.  I'd suddenly recalled saying to him in a text message ages ago when we were arranging the date that he'd better be wearing his lucky pants.  It was a joke and in fact I think it's a line I use regularly if I'm going out on a date, it won't be a line I use again.

He'd seen the pictures of me dressed up as Supergirl at Glastonbury and decided to be my Superman, tragically he was anything but that.

As we got into bed, around 3 am, it was clear he was still optimitic about getting a bit of "how's your father" but I made it quite clear that it would not be a good idea.  And ridiculously, in a bid to ease the rejection I asked him if he wanted a cuddle.

So there I was, lying in my bed, cuddling a grown man and effectively being his mum, telling him everything would be ok.

I woke up around 8.30 am on my own.  I suspected that he may have got up and gone down to sleep on the couch in the living room, so I ventured downstairs.

No sign of him.  I checked Evie's room on the offchance that he may have gone in there.  Nothing.  I ventured back down stairs again and realised that the front door had not only not been left unlocked, it hadn't been closed properly.  By this point I was getting really concerned for Mr Shorty.  He didn't know the town that I lived in, where had he gone?  He surely didn't go to get his car, he would have been over the limit.

I checked my phone, 2 texts.

The first was apologising for leaving, that he'd felt pathetic and that he wished me the best.  He finished the text with a Lord Byron quote.

I was increasingly concerend about his mental state at this point as I began to open his second text.  It was sent just 20 minutes before I got up stating that he'd walked around the town for 2 hours to sober up before driving home, that he'd arrived back safely and he hoped I was ok.

By this point I was actually very annoyed.  I was annoyed that he'd put me at risk by leaving my house unlocked.  I was annoyed that he'd put himself at risk by walking around a town that he did not know in a drunken state and I was also of the opinion that even walking around for two hours would not have meant that he was safe to drive.  But then I began to feel sorry for him.  Here was a man who could not move forward, who was still, in my opinion, in love with his ex partner and desperately missing his children.  He was right, he was vulnerable.  But he was also right about something else, someone else was on my mind and as the memory of sending Mr Mensa a Facebook message floated back into my head, I wondered if I'd just opened a brand new can of worms...
Friday 20 January 2012
Back in May, following a meeting in Stirling, I got on the train back up north and bumped into my good friend, Miss Brodie.  We chatted away about what we'd both been up to and before long she asked me the now typical question, "how's the love life?"  I began to wonder if I should just start wearing a badge with the statement "my love life's non existent".  Maybe that way people would stop asking and I would stop feeling like a relationship failure.  As it was I gave Miss Brodie the generic answer.  She seemed to think she had a solution to my now regular issue and recommended I checked out one of her male friends as she was certain he was single and keen to settle down.  Naturally I was sceptical at first.  After all, this was the woman who had tried to set me up with her future Brother in Law who appeared completely illiterate even by text standards.  This guy did seem promising though, 6ft, had hair and more importantly was English.  Yes, I have a "thing" for Englishmen. 
She seemed convinced that I knew this guy she was suggesting, that we must have been in each other's company back in the days when we were 18/19 years old and hitting the pubs.  The name certainly seemed familiar but I definitely couldn't make a connection.  Miss Brodie suggested that I check him out on Facebook as he was one of her friends on there.  I explained to her that I'd come off Facebook in the New Year and didn't access it anymore, so that was that.

On my way home from Glastonbury while standing in the Sleazyjet queue at Bristol Airport I spotted a guy who looked suspiciously like he was also returning from the muddy fields.  Ok, so it was the wellies and Glastonbury wristband that gave it away.  Once I was on board the plane I decided to make a bee-line for Mr Glastoman as I was desperate to speak to anyone who was willing to listen and share experiences about the last 5 days.  He seemed more than happy for me to take the seat next to him.  As luck would have it the third seat in our row was taken up by another guy that had been to the festival along with his brother who was seated across the aisle.   The two brothers were veterans just like myself but Mr Glastoman on the other hand was a first timer and was still on a high from the experience. It didn't take us long to get into conversation about our festival highlights past and present and resulted in the flight feeling like it had passed in seconds.

While at baggage collection waiting for our respective dirty rucksacks we all discussed meeting up for Glasto 2013 and so went about friend requesting on Facebook, except I hadn't been on Facebook for over 6 months, well, my personal page wasn't on Facebook but my blog page was still up and running.  However, I'd only just met these guys and I wasn't so sure that I wanted them to have access to my blog when many of my own friends didn't know about it. So, after very little persuasion I rejoined Facebook so that I could stay in touch with my new Glasto buddies and little did I know what the result of that would be.

That Friday night, 3 days after I'd rejoined Facebook, the night before my date with Mr Shorty and after a few glasses of wine, Miss Brodie's earlier recommendation of a potential date popped back into my head.  I'm not sure what triggered this, but triggered I was and searching through her friends list, I came across him.  His photo was a little fuzzy so I clicked on his profile but his settings were set to private so I thought what the hell and friend requested him.  He accepted almost immediately and I went straight on to his profile to view his photos and see whether Miss Brodie's recommendation was an improvement on her last.  I certainly didn't recognise him but regardless of that, there was no doubt he was handsome.  Suddenly I had a message from him.  I opened it eagerly and it read:

"Hi, nice to see you again - hope things are good with you x"

Nice to see me again?  When did he first see me??

I responded stating that I had no idea who he was although Miss Brodie had assured me that I would know him from the past.

His response had me in fits of laughter, he had no idea who I was either and so that was the beginning of a beautiful new Facebook friendship.  We had a few email exchanges and he seemed to be ticking a lot of my boxes, he appeared to have a sense of humour, was literate and a member of Mensa!

The following day we had a further email exchange while he was on a train to Edinburgh, I remarked how he should have travelled further north and he replied that he'd be doing that the following weekend, which filled me with a little excitement.  Suddenly I found myself wishing that I was going out with Mr Mensa that night instead of Mr Shorty and surely that was a bad sign?  This was only the tip of the iceberg of things to come.....
Wednesday 11 January 2012
Glastonbury Festival - I love it.  I've been going since I was 17, although I did have a gap where I didn't attend after I had Evie.  A gap of over 8 years.  You may have noticed that it's the new year and I'm speaking about Glastonbury Festival, but I'm behind with my blogs and to bring you up to speed I have to first tell you about what and who got me to where I find myself now.

After taking Evie last year, I decided that this year I wouldn't.  I'd found it particularly stressful last year, although I suspect a lot of that had to do with my state of mind following my involvement with Mr Rockstar.  Evie of course, having been bitten by the Glastonbury bug and being my daughter, was most agrieved.  I had to strike a deal.  Glastonbury every second year and a local music festival every other year.  I kept the fact that the festival would be off in 2012 due to the Olympics to myself though.

So there I was, child free at the best music festival in the world (in my humble opinion), ready to rock 'n' roll.  I was attending with 2 Glasto virgins, my cousin Molly and my ex Mr Skinny Jeans.  Although the journey down had been relatively straight forward, once we arrived at the site it was a different story.  The infamous mud had appeared due to the rainfall earlier that day and even though we arrived early afternoon on Wednesday, it was proving extremely difficult to find a pitch, let alone a good one that was still grassy.   We eventually found one, not too far from the toilets (ahem!) but far enough not to smell them and after getting our tents up we set to work exploring.  Being an old Glasto goer I took on the job of being tour guide and advising on the different types of toilet facilities, "long drops", portaloo, flushable (yay), shepee urinals and compost toilets.

Unfortunately we would later discover the huts that used to house the compost toilets now resembled something from a third world country, i.e going to the toilet involved squatting over a hole in the wooden floor of the hut.  Over the years I had got the skill of using a Glasto toilet down to a tee, reverse in, hold breath and don't look down but this was a new challenge, as was using the Sheepee urinals.  Looking around at women standing, some with their bums exposed, holding cardboard funnels was all too much for me.  I got stage fright and couldn't go.  I was desperate but it just wasn't happening.

"Relax," Molly said mid flow.  "Pretend it's a penis."  So that's what I did.  I stood there, taking deep breaths while silently telling myself that the cardboard funnel I was holding between my legs was indeed a penis and with this cardboard penis I could pee.  But no matter how much I tried the whole mind over matter thing it just didn't happen and I had to dispose of my "penis" and rush to the nearest portaloo.

It's fair to say that on the first night I let my hair down so much so that Molly, who is ten years younger than me, wasn't entirely happy with me.  I could have blamed the cider for kissing two blokes but I certainly couldn't blame it on one of them being married. The next morning I felt decidedly ashamed and apologised profusely to Molly.  The rest of the festival pretty much took a more subdued tone after that.  Molly would return to the tent every lunch time for a sleep and I felt that she wasn't really enjoying herself, which to a degree I felt responsible for.  This was her first Glasto and I wanted it to blow her away, unfortunately I think it was just too overwelming for her and with having had a run up of nightshifts prior to the festival, it was maybe just all too much for her.  Or maybe I was.

While at the festival I was texting Mr Shorty and we arranged a date for my return, the following Saturday.  I wasn't quite sure what I was expecting but it was only dinner so what could really go wrong?

Glastonbury came to an end and as we left the festival site I reflected on what had been the highlight for me, watching the Chemical Brothers for the first time, headlining on the Saturday night. I'm not sure whether it was the fact that I was dressed up as Supergirl wearing a purple wig but for some reason that night, completely on my own in a crowd of thousands I didn't feel lonely at all, in fact, I felt ready to take on the world.



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Bird on a Wire
Imagine Carrie from Sex and the City morphed with Bridget Jones and a baby thrown in for added entertainment – that’s me, the ever optimistic romantic looking for my Mr Big but already with child! Read my blog from the beginning where I find out I am pregnant following a brief fling with my much older male colleague and fast forward to where I am now, stressed out working mum to my beautiful 10 year old daughter wondering if love really does in fact exist at first sight.
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