Anyone know any good dating agencies?

I need to spread the reputation, apparently.
Absolute gold Balki, you've just brightened up my day.

EDIT; Remind me, one and all, never to show Balki where I keep my oyster card.

The last girl I went out with I met in that little bike shop on Kingsland Rd. She was paying for something and had her money in an Oyster card holder. It was one of the yellow and blue ones that were sponsored by Ikea.

I saw it in her hand and had never seen one other than mine. In my dopey surprise I took mine out of my pocket and said something along the lines of "Hey! We've got the same yellow oyster card... thing... sorry."

I scurried away.

After I left, I decided to go back and ask her for a drink with something equally fucking smooth.

"hey, sorry... um... theres a pub just up there.. its probably the worst in London... um.. do you want to go up there?"

We ended up spending quite a bit of time together over the subsequent months before it fizzled - dont really know why it did. She was really sweet.

Good times :)

I've got one of those! It's really embarrassing.

Incidentally... thank fuck for Hugh Grant.

He has somehow managed to convince prostitutes that a bumbling idiot holds some kind of appeal. More deserved of the Nobel Prize than Obama, IMO.

well, it's controversial but you're entitled to your view.

Cancel your dating agency memberships, evidently I am now a pick up line ;-)

http://www.londonfgss.com/post1004102-20127.html

Incidentally... thank fuck for Hugh Grant.

He has somehow managed to convince women that a bumbling idiot holds some kind of appeal. More deserved of the Nobel Prize than Obama, IMO.

It's a look I like, tbh. But I very rarely (when I was single) ever got men asking me out, normally the other way around. But then, I am a scary Candian witch.

i'm with nhatt on that one, too slick = scary and insincere. (not that the Idiot or slick jerk speak to me) lol.

He has somehow managed to convince women that a bumbling ENGLISH idiot holds some kind of appeal.

Don't think it works as well for someone from your parts. I just can't see it coming off.

I've got one of those! It's really embarrassing.

An Ikea Oyster card holder??? Really??

Hey... um... I know this pub on Kingsland Rd and/or do you know Nhattattack?

Don't think it works as well for someone from your parts. I just can't see it coming off.

In this case, please disregard previous post.

An Ikea Oyster card holder??? Really??

Hey... um... I know this pub on Kingsland Rd and/or do you know Nhattattack?

:D

You can slag off having a bike loving girlfriend all you like,but the fact is that it's awesome to know someone who is obligated to bring you a puncture kit and a spanner wherever you are regardless on what your gender is.
It's even better to date someone who works in a bike shop ;-)

...one that coshes you around the head with a prosthetic giant cock if you screw up.

I haven't been on a date for 13 years, it seems a little different now to my day :)

I haven't been on a date for 13 years, it seems a little different now to my day :)

I can't say I've ever been on one. What is a date, anyway? Does it involve someone buying you dinner? What happened to getting pissed and getting off with someone?

The modern internet date is all about getting pissed and getting off with no-one. :-)

I can't say I've ever been on one. What is a date, anyway? Does it involve someone buying you dinner? What happened to getting pissed and getting off with someone?

Dating is the American version of this.

I've never "dated" either. I have a friend who does it habitually though. He has a lot of sex with a huge variety of quite attractive ladies. That seemed to be his main motive when he started his dateathon a few years back so well done there. He is an incredibly shallow and selfish person and that seemed to suit him fine.

But now he's 30 and still doing it two or three times a week. It seems insane to just keep going out with an endless procession of strangers, constantly assessing them, scoring them, being scored etc. He told me the other day that he's sick to death of first dates. Can you imagine the energy that must take? Jeez. I get tired just thinking about it.

Personally I've only ever been out with people i'd got to know a little bit first. i.e. either had some connection with already (like flatmate, work, friend of a friend or whatever) or met socially at least a few times... even if thinking about it now perhaps i had engineered those "chance" social meetings a bit.

So i've been on a date or two in the bit between being single and being in a relationship but i've certainly never "dated". It's a bit of an American thing anyway isn't it? That concept of dating? Sad as it is I'm pretty sure my shallow mate's relationship role model for is/was Joey from friends...

I can't say I've ever been on one. What is a date, anyway? Does it involve someone buying you dinner? What happened to getting pissed and getting off with someone?

Still happens. The dinner bit is if you make the call within the first few drinks that the person you've gone on a date with will never under any circumstances get to snog you. That way at least you get fed.

It seems insane to just keep going out with an endless procession of strangers, constantly assessing them, scoring them, being scored etc. He told me the other day that he's sick to death of first dates. Can you imagine the energy that must take? Jeez. I get tired just thinking about it.

Doing anything obsessively is a bad call. Obsessive dating definititely falls into that category but so does bouncing from long-term-relationship to long-term-relationship. Moderation is the key, isn't it?

Personally I've only ever been out with people i'd got to know a little bit first. i.e. either had some connection with already (like flatmate, work, friend of a friend or whatever) or met socially at least a few times... even if thinking about it now perhaps i had engineered those "chance" social meetings a bit.

Same here - I've only ever had relationships with people I've met through friends. I think it's a good 'loonie' filter. But if you want some no-strings-attached evil, it's impossible to do this with mates of mates - gets too messy. I think a balance between the two things is important.

no-strings-attached evil

Ha. Nice turn of phrase.

I can't say I've ever been on one. What is a date, anyway? Does it involve someone buying you dinner? What happened to getting pissed and getting off with someone?

Well that date 13 years ago involved me buying the dinner and ended up with marriage. Getting pissed and getting off with someone is an even more distant memory (well the getting off part).

It's not possible to prove conclusively that someone who exists doesn't exist. What she did would have been sophistry (and is a sign of fairly immature philosophy student behaviour, I might add). :)

How can you be Saussure?

I am Kantegorical about this.

You're "friend" sounds like they are sexually / romantically disfunctional. Serial first dating is symptomatic of sexual addiction, and if "they" ever want to develop a significant, meaningful, emotionally and spiritually intimate relationship with another person, they need to address "their" addiction.

Hey now, what's with the quotes? It's not me! i'm fucked up in a whole variety of mostly low key and hopefully undetectable ways but a weirdly narcisistic sex addicted emotional bankrupt I am not. "He" however is. Funny thing is, I know that he wouldn't even mind me saying any of this and would probably agree with most of it. That's why I know he'll work out okay in the end. He at least knows he's behaving strangely.

From a selfish point of view I don't really want him to change. He's got bad date stories for miles, including a recent semi-sort-of-kinda relationship that only ended after the "girl" in question was outed as a post-op tranny in the paper after being papped snogging some Callum Best. That was an interesting one. Certainly beats "My missus still isn't doing her fair share of the washing up" for pub banter, which is about as salacious as my life gets these days. And I'm very happy with that situation really.

I just get drunk and tell people I'm the best looking person in the room until one of them believes me.

I should sort my life out.

Balki reminded me of this thread yesterday....

I went on a date the other week with a saffa.
Awful.

Just a taster....
Him: "so you like swimming, how many laps do you do when you go"
Me: "100"
Him: "How do you manage to keep track"
Me: "You count"
Him: "But how, don't you loose count"
Me: "Well one number follows the other, and no, you don't loose count, there's not much else to do"

and THEN.

Him: "So you say you're really bored at work. Why don't you like start your own project"
Me: "I'm not a post doc, its not my money"
Him: "Yeah but you work in cancer research, you guys should be working harder"
Me: "I do what I'm told to do. I"m good at what I do, but at the end of the day for me its a job. Whether I research plants or depression or cancer at the lab level its pretty the same".
Him: "My dad died of oseophagal cancer, if you were working harder there might be a cure by now and he might still be alive today".
OUCH
Me: "Mate, I work on ovarian cancer which was never really going to help your dad out, sorry"
End of date.

Surely I'm not the only one who goes on crap dates?