There have been many Tinder dates over the past few months, but the one that will forever stick in my mind is with a guy I shall affectionately call ‘Latex Man’. Most of my unsuccessful dates end up with a nickname, much to my friends’ delight and I’m afraid his is rather a spoiler.
We met for a casual drink after work, and halfway through the second round, he started telling me about what he liked to do at the weekend. Namely, dress up in latex, go to fetish clubs and get involved in what can only be described as a fellatio human centipede. Now, for those of you that know me in person, you’ll know I’m incredibly open-minded about this kind of thing, and I really admired his honesty, but at that point I couldn’t really see where I fit into that equation, so we finished up our drinks and I headed home.
Date number two was with a guy who got nicknamed ‘the runner’. This one fell on a Saturday night, again just for drinks (as let’s face it, no one wants to be stuck for an entire dinner with someone you might not get along with). Five minutes in, I knew we had zero in common and to be honest, it just wasn’t going to go anywhere. The fact he kept trying to buy me Zambuca shots (despite me continually turning them down) an hour after meeting him wasn't the greatest selling point.
I thought I’d be polite and stay for a while, so got us a drink and halfway through a conversation he leaned in and tried to kiss me. I gently put my hand on his shoulder to stop him and at that point, he took great offence, turned his back on me and proceeded to down the rest of his drink. Two minutes of silence later, he said ‘I’m just popping to the loo’, stood up, and...then walked out the front door of the bar never to be seen again. Good times.
Tinder dates are a minefield at the best of times, but not to be deterred, I carried on swiping. At this point, ‘Jack’ entered the scene.
Jack and I never actually met in person, as pretty quickly it was established that Jack was actually a male prostitute touting for business on Tinder. Clearly Jack missed the memo, but if you’re after a hookup, Tinder is a pretty good place to start, so I’m not sure he was having much luck finding new clients. Poor Jack.
Thankfully after that, there were some more ‘normal’ dates. They haven’t quite renewed my faith in online dating, but the cynic in me might just be proved wrong, you never know.
Probably not though.