Well, is good to see I have a captive audience!
I was quite nervous to begin with. The venue was a bar on the outskirts of town. I sat in car, parked outside, looking to see if anyone was in there! Couldn't see in or anyone walking in. I eventually plucked up the courage and strolled in and ordered myself a drink. The barman announced that if you are here for speed dating go upstairs. To my relief I saw 2 women and 4 men head towards the stairs. I gingerly followed them!
I continued to sit upstairs for another half an hour whilst we waited for the rest of the speed daters.
After been issued with a badge (I was number "2"), we were given a list for us to write down the date and a YES/NO box to fill in as we went round.
There were 11 women and 13 men in total. The women sat at a table with their number on, and the men moved on one table after 3 minutes.
The speed dating began. I started talking to the first date. I thought "what have I got myself into?!". The first lady I did not find attractive and perhaps a little old!!
Let me take a step back. When I registered on-line the event said for people aged 23-34. When I think about it, that it is a wide age gap, particularly because I am 25! Anyway, back to the first lady, she was 34, divorced, two kids, eldest one was 13! Anyway the three minutes flew by... next... tick the "no" box....
The second women was 33... I am not being ageist but I was hoping to meet someone around my age.... next....
It was a similar story with the rest of the 10 women. I think the average age for the women was about 30. I recon I was the youngest person there, out of all the men and women.
Eventually date number 5, Karina, aged 28 was the first one I ticked "yes" after the date. The three minutes seemed very short. And at that point we all had a 30 minute break to grab drinks and generally socialise. So I carried on talking to Karina for another 10 minutes.
After the break we continued with the speed dating. Their were a couple of other ladies that took my fancy, in terms of age, looks and intellect (those were my criteria).
At the end of the evening I had ticked 5 "yes". Two were my type. The other three were cool, maybe a little old, but would be nice as friend criteria. I summited my form and made like a tree and leave (left). I did not feel I could hang around and mingle because everyone else came with a friend.
Overall, I realised I am actually quite fussy when it comes to picking women. I like women that are educated, well travelled and interesting. (That is one other thing that links all my ex-gf's together, the first being that they are all female!). And basically dispite most of them being older, none really fitted the bill, but I guess they saying the same about me! If everyone was the same the world would be a boring place.
Anyhow. Today is Tuesday and I got a text message today saying I had two matches. I was very relieved to see that Karina was one of them. Two out of five?? Well it is good to know I made a good impression with two of them. Now I guess I'll have to call them...
and do this dating thing!
Overall, dispite the experience, I did enjoy it and I would do it again, probably not at the same location. I spoke to a friend at the weekend and he has done the speed dating thing, he did it in London, where there are more YOUNGER, educated, well travelled and interesting women. It is good fun. You get to see the results quite quickly, and I think it is dead true, that you can form an impression on someone within the first 1 minute of seeing them.
Anyway I have rambled on for too long.