Internet dating....Jaysis!

FOLLOWING on from the theme of 'one big blind date' coined by JL Pagano at the recent Blog Awards I'm posting below two of my Said and Dunne columns about Internet dating and how I fared when I registerd for a dating website.

I never actually met any of the men featured below now, the profiles were enough, trust me, but you'll get the gist of it. I had fun on the site and I'd encourage others to try it, but I fear I'm going to be single for a very long time. Enjoy!

Said and Dunne 1.

"A PRESS release came into the office last week concerning a singles website which is offering free membership to people for the month of February, to get into the whole Valentine’s spirit.

A colleague, sick of me moaning about having no fella, forwarded it on to me with a cheery ‘check this out’ message, though the underlying tone was ‘stop whining bi-atch’.

Having heard good things about Internet dating from friends and having dabbled with chat rooms myself in the past, I thought, why not?

So I duly logged on to www.woo.ie and registered, even going to far as to put up a photograph and including such scintillating details about myself as my favourite drink (coke) and food (sangwiches).

Not expecting much, I was pleasantly surprised when I checked back later to see that I had a few messages, quite apart from the obligatory one from admin when I registered.

First up was AC* (*not his real name obviously!) who’s favourite place was the Algarve and who enjoyed a glass of red wine.

Things were looking up until I realised that for him things really would be looking up as he was a mere 5ft 6, meaning I’d never be able to wear heels around him (think Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman).

He persisted for a while, even sending a photo which was cute enough, but the height thing really put me off so I didn’t respond (yes, I AM that shallow).

Then there was JJ* who described himself as "well groomed but shy" and said he didn’t drink though his favourite pub was "any where once it’s trendy". Oh dear.

He also said he didn’t really have an ‘ideal’ partner once she had an "attractive figure/personality". So a figure OR a personality then, he didn’t mind which? Next!

Just when I had given up hope though, I got a mail from MM* with ‘Your account balance’ in the subject line.

Curious, I opened up the message to see "Hi, your current account balance at MM’s bank is 10 kisses. If you would like to increase this number, feel free to contact our advisor" which I thought was pretty original.

Corny, but original. But then I spotted his personal details. Yes, another Tom Cruise, this one was only 5ft 5.

Ok, I know it’s wrong to judge someone on their looks alone, but let’s be honest, there has to be some sort of attraction or spark there or it’s not going to work.

For me, I don’t have a particular look or facial feature that I particularly like or dislike about men, but I have to have the height.

I’m fairly tall myself at 5ft 6 and I’m also patently not a perfect size 10 so I need my men to be bigger than I am, which is no mean feat.

I’ve only been on the site for a few days so I haven’t met Mr Right and Tall yet, though my profile has been viewed 26 times already, so you never know.

The site offers some cool features such as chat rooms and message boards as well as a nifty ‘Who’s Looking?’ option which allows you to see which members have been accessing your profile and how many times they have done so.

Perfect for spotting the stalker lurking among all the normal people.

So far I’ve persuaded (bullied) another colleague into joining woo.ie and I’m hoping to cajole (threaten) a few more so we’ll see what happens.

For now, I’m happy enough surfing through the member profiles in search of my Prince, so I’ll keep you posted.

Why not check it out yourself – I’ll know if you don’t, remember, I’m a journalist."

Said and Dunne 2.

"SO far my woo.ie profile has been viewed 65 times yet only 12 men have sent me a message.

Me thinks the mascara-streaked photograph I put up on the site was a mistake.

Yes dear reader is appears that not only do I repel men in real life, I also repel men over the Internet as the only messages I’ve received have either been from the midgets I mentioned in last week’s column (those 5ft 5 and under) or else dirty old men.

I logged on last week, full of the joys of spring to find I had a few messages and even better a few ‘winks’ which are little winky icons which appear in your inbox to let you know someone viewed your profile and approved.

One wink was from an "older gentleman" who described himself as "fit and good-looking". Eager to see, I clicked on his photograph and I’m still not the better for it.

Think Jack Duckworth mixed with the owner of a greasy spoon cafe and you’d be halfway there.

Like the scene of a car crash however, I couldn’t look away and scrolled down to read that his favourite activity was "naughty games in my secluded back garden" and that he preferred his "laydeez" to wear "short skirts, high heels and no underwear".

Oh he’s a keeper! I kept expecting the Benny Hill theme music to blast out from the computer when I read his profile; thankfully it didn’t.

A male colleague hasn’t fared much better (aw, bless) though he did get one message off a seemingly nice UCD student...who then proceeded to mention her ex-boyfriend. A mistake apparently ladies, so beware.

"I’m not trying to be overly critical but Jesus why did she have to mention her boyfriend in the first line? And she said she likes GAA too..I thought that was a bit odd," sez he.

A female colleague got quite a few messages and one looked decent enough except that he mentioned his favourite activity was "ballroom dancing" suggesting that he was perhaps a little more, er, festive than he was making out to be.

The oul Internet dating is not looking good people so I fear I shall shortly have to return to the age old tradition of getting locked and finding boys in pubs. You have been warned.

On another, slightly related, point Valentine’s Day passed off peacefully enough as thankfully there was the minimum amount of gushiness and cards in the office and I even got a flower all wrapped up in a bow.

It was from the manager of Molloy’s Pub where we go for our lunch everyday (hi Fran!) and he was giving them to everybody, but still, it counts!

I also got a virtual e-Valentine’s message from a friend of mine living in Canada (let’s call him Toronto Dude or TD for short) which was really sweet, but he’s all the way over there and I’m all the way over there, so we won’t be skipping off into the sunset just yet.

He IS moving back home to Dublin at the end of the year though, so I’ll keep you posted. [Cue TD running for the hills in horror, shouting ‘it was only a feckin’ e-mail for crying out loud, I was just being niiiiiicccee’].

Anyway, so as of yet I’m still single and alone and it looks as though the ‘single for 27 years then gets a column about being single and kaboom you’ll get a man’ prediction my friends warned me about has yet to come true.

Hmmm, I hear the personal ads in the Irish Times are worth looking into.......all together now "all by myself, don’t wanna be, all by myself, anymooooore"."

Pic: http://www.visitmontserrat.com/

Irish Blog Awards, oh what a night..

Kaz at the awards
Originally uploaded by Joe Drumgoole.

My fingernails were chewed to the quick, I was lightly sweating, slightly manic and looking feverishly from one group to the next. No, not a Mountjoy escapee on the run, simply an Irish blogger looking for the pre-Irish Blog Awards bash in the Cellar Bar.

"Do you think that’s them," I mouthed at my friend as we were tottering oh-so-casually around the room, gesturing not-so-subtly at a group of well-heeled individuals at the bar.

"I ‘unno ‘aybe ‘sk," she suggested through the rictus grin she had plastered on her face just in case it was them. But then thanks to Red Mum who arrived in the nick of time, we eventually hit the jackpot.

The walk over to the much larger than expected crowd of bloggers in the corner, one positively dashing in a tuxedo, was nerve wracking, but after the initial ice was broken, it just got better and better.

It turned out the tux guy was from Letters to America, the young pretty woman was Sinead Gleeson, the woman in the pink top (and later double award winner) was Annette from Thinking Out Loud, the guy I’d pegged as JL actually was him and the guy in the glasses was Colm Bracken from In Fact Ah.

Ah yes Colm. Who took one look at me and said "you’re Kaz right, I recognised you from your photo". Delighted I was...until I remembered that I’d absolutely trollied on the make-up, spent hours and a fortune on curling my hair and had squeezed myself (literally, Mammy Dunne was on hand with the cooking oil) into a black dress for the occasion, so he SHOULDN’T have recognised me.

Ah well, I tried.

After scaring the Letters from America guys with my slightly nervous insisting that if they won an award they had to do the "funky chicken dance" (no, I’m not sure what it is either, but I did a kinda half-hearted example which was when people started backing away) it was off with us to the Alexander Hotel.

Well actually, we were almost in the Davenport thanks to our so-blonde-he-was-almost-white haired escort (who’s name I can’t for the life of me remember, sorry) but then we sorted it out and hurried into the right place.

We needn’t have worried about being late however, as the show didn’t get underway on time, but this was actually a good thing as you got to mingle and speak to people – such as Suzy from Maman Poulet, photographer Joe, one half of Slugger O’Toole and his lovely girlfriend/wife, Claire from Ginger Pixel and her lovely husband – as well as having a steadying drink (or two.)

The awards themselves were a resounding success and all kudos must go to Damien for organising them and for Rick O’Shea for hosting with such aplomb as well as the sponsors and the hotel (did anyone else think the bar guy was cute?!).

All credit to Thinking Out Loud for winning Best Personal Blog but I have to say with absolutely no bias and not because Red Mum is one of my best friends or because I babysat the Young Wan when she was an even Younger Wan or anything, but Red Mum woz robbed. Look out next year Annette!

I didn’t win anything in the raffle. There will be an independent inquiry, but that’s all I can say on the matter right now.

Of course the biggest question of the evening was whether Twenty Major would show up in all his glory, smoking and effing all over the place but alas it was not to be, as only his "representative on Earth" put in an appearance. Or did he?

Hmm, despite his protestations that he really wasn’t there, I have my doubts. Only time will tell though I guess and I look forward to awards night 2007 with bated breath, where I’m sure he’ll sweep the boards again. The c*nt.

After the awards, which despite the late start, ended unfeasibly early, things did peter out a little quickly but this is only to be expected when a group of virtual strangers get together; next year I hear there may be music, which will help keep the party going a little longer.

I’m already looking forward to next year and have threatened, er secured, nominations from various friends so that I’ll at least I stand a chance to get to the long list in 2007.

I also didn’t get to talk to a quarter of the people who were there on Saturday and I’ll bet I’m leaving out a heap of people that I did talk to, so apologies for that and hopefully I’ll be less hesitant and have a better memory in the future.

All in all, a great night, with my only gripe being that after spending all that effort tarting myself up like a dogs dinner, it turned out that another blogger showed up with the same hairstyle as me, namely, this guy....

...who I believe is from Disillusioned Lefty (or perhaps The Community At Large...eeek, I can’t remember!). I think next year I’ll have to try a Dolly Parton wig or something.


(NOTE: You will have noticed that I haven’t linked or done the whole HTML thing with any of the people I’ve mentioned above. JL Pagano very kindly emailed me a while ago telling me how to do it, but I’m a complete technophobe and when I read his mail there was a shrieking in my head so I gave up. So sorry about that, you’ll just have to Google them or come back here in a while where I’ll have added them to my links sidebar. Thanks.)

Pic 1: http://www.flickr.com/photos/joedrumgoole/111073543/
Pic 2: http://www.flickr.com/photos/rymus/111514788/

And the Bloggie goes to.............

Right, come on, hands up who thinks that guy at the awards tonight really was Twenty Major?

Well done to all the winners and Damien too, it was a great night. Next year I'm DEFFO nominating myself!