The University of No Girlfriend

2006-02-11T23:52:00.001Z

I was expecting someone to call, so I wasn't surprised by the ring of the doorbell. I was surprised by who was stood there though; a young-ish woman, about my age, with a child, both smartly dressed. I'd guessed at what they might be calling for as soon as I saw them. She asked me if I'd be interested in their magazine. I politely declined, and she chose not to argue the point. I closed the door, and then made my way back into the front room, from where I could watch them walk back down the path. They paused for a moment outside the house before going on their way.

Question; is it wrong to fancy a Jehovah's Witness when she comes to your door? It feels wrong. I don't have any religious convictions - the state of the world tends to leave me thinking that atheism really is the way forward - but I feel that fancying someone who does, even when she happens to be an attractive woman, seems wrong, as if I'm going to be struck down for doing so by a supreme being that I don't think exists.

The worst of it is that this isn't the first time that this sort of thing has happened. I was walking past a Catholic church at chucking-out time a couple of weeks ago, and found myself following a couple of particularly attractive and nicely dressed young ladies and wondering if religion might be the answer, and if those really fat and saggy old women that I used to see when I walked past the Catholic primary school on the way to my own all those years ago started out like that. And I have seen lots of episodes of Father Ted, so I'm sure I'd be able to fit in...

On the other hand, I do rather like spending my weekends sitting around in old jeans and not shaving or showering unless I really have to, and I'm not sure religion is really compatible with doing that. (I'm not sure that having a girlfriend is compatible with it either, which probably explains a lot.) And there is the throwing aside of everything I believe in on the offchance of getting off with someone nice, but the prospects seem remote, and anyway it sounds more like a bad sitcom plot than real life.

2006-02-01T23:26:00.000Z

I'm waiting for the lift. Someone comes through the doors to join me. I've not seen her before. She nods and smiles at me, before checking that I've pressed the button to call the lift. She's nice. From one of the lift doors we hear some raised voices from the men who are carrying out repairs. We both look at the door the hollering is coming from, then at each other and smile again.

Say something, says the voice in my head. Think of something funny to say and then say it. Go on. It can't be difficult. But the part of my head that thinks of clever and funny things to say refuses to co-operate, and I stand there like an amiable lemon.

Eventually the lift comes. I stand to one side to let her board first, in the same polite and gentlemanly and foolish manner I'd done with the train a few days previously. She stands in one corner. I stand in another. We begin the long journey down to the ground floor.

Come on, think of something to say. She's clearly lovely. But still nothing comes to mind. And that, my friends, is the very essence of the University of No Girlfriend. She's a captive audience, she's got no reason to hate me from the off; I've got nothing to lose, everything to gain, and yet the best I can offer is a polite silence.

I follow her out of the building, and she turns in the direction that I'm intending to go. Which wouldn't be a problem, but she's not walking particularly quickly, and I realise that if I set off at my usual pace I'm going to end up walking alongside her for at least part of the way, and clearly this is going to make things rather awkward should we ever find ourselves waiting for the lift again and I happened to think of something fascinating to say. At first I try to walk really slowly, as if deep in thought and not sure about where I want to go, but clearly that wasn't going to work and so I decided to move as far across the pavement as possible so that she couldn't really see me going past her.

Later on, having spent some time browsing around the shop I'd been headed for, I found myself stood behind her again at the traffic lights. At this point I began to worry that it was beginning to look like stalking, and so I turned on my heal and headed in the opposite direction.

2006-01-26T21:26:00.002Z

The train was slightly delayed. I scanned the platform to see if there was any sign of the girl at the station, as I'd seen her for the first time in ages a couple of days previously when I'd had to go in late; it had led to a re-think on the subject of women wearing jeans tucked into boots. There was no sign of her, however, and so when the train arrived I reluctantly made my way towards the doors.

I reached them at the same time as two women. I stopped to let them go first, because I'm polite and gentlemanly and foolish like that. Because of the slight delay the train was more crowded than usual, and so I had to shuffle down inside the carriage. I put my headphones on and didn't really think about it, or indeed anything much, any further. And yet, as the journey progressed, I became aware that someone was watching me. I glanced around as nonchalantly as I could manage, and caught one of the women I'd allowed to board the train's head snapping away in the guilty manner that I'm all too familiar with.

"Hey", I thought, "you've still got it". And then I paused, and thought "hang on, you never had anything in the first place But you've certainly got something from somewhere. Maybe the years are being good to you, or something like that anyway". She was quite nice as well. I made a mental note to arrive at the station slightly later the next day, in the hope of affecting a meeting.

Arriving at my destination, I found myself in need of a pee and headed straight to the toilet. Because hygiene is important I washed my hands, and as I did so I looked up into the mirror and noticed that, in my hurry to leave the house while ensuring that my mouth was protected against the ravages of the cold, I'd managed to smear Lypsyl all over my top lip and that the effect was to make me look like some sort of inverse clown. Still, I'd had a nice half hour deluding myself, so I suppose it wasn't such a bad thing. Actually, that's not true.

2006-01-09T00:00:00.002Z

During the always-curious period between Christmas and New Year I was sat on a tube train that had ground to a prolonged halt at a station. Looking out of the window, my attention was drawn to an advert featuring a couple enjoying each others company, above the legend "Pull a cracker this Christmas!". Sadly I'd already missed the event that was being advertised, but decided to visit the website mentioned anyway. It's "specifically for the attractive, articulate, confident and eligible", apparently, and so it would have been ideal for me, because I'm eligible. (Mind you, the couple grinning happily at the camera really ought to have got their tree down by now.)

I thought about this earlier today as I made my way along the High Road, when my attention was drawn to another poster. This was for a dating site, albeit not one that I've ever joined, and next to the picture of a happy couple staring intently at each other even though some sort of a disaster was imminent, one of them about to fall down a manhole or something similar, was a guarantee to find you someone "special" and a promise of six months free membership if you don't.

I reckon that this is quite a fiendish move on their part. Person sees poster, thinks "that looks like a bargain", signs up. Chances are that if they don't find this mysterious someone special they're going to give up disconsolately long before their six months is up (voice of experience and all that) and aren't going to be interested in an extra six months. And even if they are still plugging away after six months, chances are that they're going to be too embarrassed to ask for their extra time anyway ("Dear sir or madam, I am so inadequate that I haven't managed to as much as get off with anyone from your site despite being on it for six months. Please can I have some extra time for free." This email is never going to be sent).

(Strictly for research purposes, I had a look at the site and was intrigued by the terms and conditions for the free six months. How are they going to tell, for example, that someone has "created a truthful profile"? And "respond to, or initiate communication with at least 5 members each month"? I realise that not everyone is so doubt-addled as I am with these things, but trying to compose fascinating e-mails to impress 30 different people sounds less like an exciting way to meet new people and more like a new and exquisite form of torture. Interestingly, they don't seem to define what someone "special" might be; presumably if you did get together with someone you'd met off of there you could claim the extra time by saying that you're just trying to make someone jealous, or that you were just using them for sex, or that they're a particularly good cook but the conversation is pretty dull and it definitely isn't going to last.)

I'm almost tempted to join just to see if I can meet all the conditions and claim my six months extra free. Actually, that's a lie.

Back at the High Street, the next hoarding featured a picture of a woman lounging about and wearing nothing but her bra and pants. The bra was looked like quite an exciting sort of a bra. The pants were quite small. I can't say I really noticed the woman's expression, but I'll lay fairly good odds that it was of the 'come hither' variety. I decided that the placing of the posters probably wasn't accidental.

2005-12-22T23:37:00.001Z

A few months ago, I became infuriated by an advert. And then I went through my giving up phase, and so I didn't think to write about it, and by the time I felt compelled to return to the University it'd gone off the air and I didn't really think about it. Until this evening, when an innocent evening's television viewing was disrupted by it turning up again.

You've probably seen it. It begins with a car pulling to a halt. We see a couple in the car; the woman turns, fiddles with her hair and says "would you like to come in for (slight pause) coffee?"

Let us look at this at this pair more closely.

Now, the woman is... well, she's quite attractive, I suppose. She does a decent line in seductive glances, she's wearing quite a nice dress, and, and here's the key thing, she's speaking with a foreign accent. And this transforms her from being merely "some woman in an advert" into something rather more interesting, because, and it may just be me on this, there are few things more alluring than a woman with a foreign accent speaking slightly-awkward English. (*) And what makes it even more appealing in this case is the little hesitation as she speaks, playfully pretending that she's not sure of what she's saying when she knows exactly what is implied by the word "coffee".

The man, meanwhile... as an ugly man who is aware of his own ugliness, I have absolutely no qualms about calling other men ugly. And goodness me, whether it's his stupid frizzy 80s footballer hair, his stupid facial fuzz that makes him look like a 14 year old trying to grow a moustache in an attempt to impress girls who only go out with 17 year olds with provisional licenses, or his stupid jumper, he's ugly. And yet here he is, in the car, being propositioned by this certainly-not-unattractive woman purring at him with her mysterious voice.

Who he turns down in favour of getting a cup of coffee from a petrol station.

I can only conclude that the idea was to emphasise the excellence of the coffee by making the woman being turned down in its favour so far out of the bloke's league, but frankly I feel that it's backfired. Even if a man that ugly had managed to persuade a woman that attractive to go to the pictures or for dinner or whatever with him, there is absolutely no way in the world he'd turn her down, no matter how bad her coffee might be. She's not just blatantly inviting him in for sex, but doing so in such a way that hints that all sorts of intrigue and dirty things may happen. He is not, under any circumstances, going to go to a garage instead. The overriding message I get from this is nothing to do with coffee, but is "come to our service station, and meet ugly idiots".

(*) Obviously this doesn't apply to someone from Mumbai who gets you out of the shower to try and sell you cheaper phone calls. If they prefaced their calls by asking you how you were and if you fancied going to the pictures tonight, possibly they might sound a bit more appealing, but it's always straight into the trying-to-sell-you-something-you-don't-want bit of the conversation with them. Tsk.

2005-12-14T00:14:00.001Z

I'm having my hair cut by a woman who's cut my hair on several occasions before. We're exchanging the usual sort of chat, about why I'm here on a weekday, about what we're doing for Christmas, about the stuff you usually chat about when you're having your hair cut. We've established that I''m going to my parents' for Christmas, and so she asks if I have a girlfriend at the moment. I say no, naturally. "You used to have one though, didn't you?" she asks.

Probably just idle chat, or maybe she's mistaken me for someone else. Goodness knows, they must have enough people passing through here each day.

Now, as we know, I haven't. Or not someone I could call my girlfriend without inducing a severe look or coughing fit from the woman being referred to, anyway. And I haven't even had one of those for, well, years. And yet if I admit this, I'm going to look weird. There's no two ways about it.

Now, ridiculous at it may seem, I've never invented a girlfriend before. I've occasionally hinted that there may be something going on when nothing of the type exists (which I suspect fooled no-one, but never mind), but I've never attempted to invent a girlfriend. There is a reason for this. Back when we were 17, one of my chums had a very real girlfriend, who existed and we met and everything. Another chum had a girlfriend as well. He was quite a radical sort of fellow, and while he was engaging in political activity he met a girl of fellow persuasions, and as they handed out leaflets and such adolescent love blossomed. He wouldn't let her meet us, though, on the grounds that he was ashamed of us.

Yeah, right.

And ever since I've been wary of inventing a girlfriend, on the grounds that if even an accomplished bullshitter like my young friend, who would go on to invent a string of equally fictitious ladyfriends that nobody ever met, couldn't convincingly create a girlfriend for himself, what chance would a particularly feeble liar like myself have? And yet here I am in the barber's chair, being given a chance to engage in a flight of fancy all of my own, and with none of the pressure that comes from having to keep the fiction up.

So I say "yeah, not for a while now though". It's almost true, when you think about it.

My hair was already rather short by this stage, so there wasn't too much time to establish the details about my ex. It turns out that it didn't end with a big row - it just came to an end, although I did have a few suspicions about stuff that was going on, but I didn't really want to bring them up, and sometimes things just come to an end like that anyway. It's quite useful at this time of year not to have to worry about buying her a present, but on the downside I do miss having someone to do the Christmas shopping with, because she was always much better at it than I was and full of ideas for little knick-knacks to get people. I was worried about this seeming quite nasty, as if all she was was a glorified shopping assistant, but I suppose it's better than missing her for... well, you know. I'm enjoying being single, anyway, although I'm sure I'll get fed up with it sooner or later.

I wonder if I got away with it. Next time I'm going to have a whole backstory worked out in advance.

2005-11-29T00:13:00.001Z

So I'd given up. Much as I'd tried to convince myself otherwise, it was clear that the moment I met someone I, y'know, liked, I found myself utterly unable to talk to them without making an utter arse of myself. And even if I ever did get past that stage, I was so entirely unsuited to having a girlfriend that there seemed no point in even thinking about it. "Son", I said to myself, "you'll be a batchelor boy, and... hold on a moment, that's not the song I was thinking of at all. Mind you, I bet that even Cliff has a better record than I do with wom... am I thinking out loud again? Drat."

So I deleted myself from the dating sites, I swore to stop taking a second glance at anyone I might pass in the street, and when I went out for the evening I kept the company of my friends and didn't let my eye rove, And I lived with this quite happily. In fact, I lived with this quite happily for a few months. Oh, there was the occasional longing glance at the girl who works in the bakers, but aside from that I didn't feel any paricular sense that anything was missing from my life. And then...

I'm stood at a bar at the back of a slightly sweaty gig. It's crowded and the barman, having served the person stood next to me, has started going back the other way. Someone moves into the space next to me and the barman chooses to serve them. I consider harumphing and pointing out that actually I'd been standing there for quite some time now, but then I come over all British and say nothing. However, in my head I'm trying to subliminally persuade the barman to turn his attentions to me by thinking "me next me next me next me next" at him. In fact, I'm thinking this so hard that I find myself unsure as to whether I'm thinking out loud again, or it just seems like it.

The person next to me receives their drinks. The barman looks at me and I ask for a pint. As the person next to me moves out I turn slightly to give them more room, and in doing so I find myself looking at them. I hadn't even really registered until this point that it was a woman.

And she's... oh, I don't know. Saying that she looks nice doesn't really cut it, because lots of people look nice. She looks... right. She looks like someone I want to know. And I'm here possibly whining "me next" like a small child queuing up for a go on the helter-skelter or something.

What to do? Follow her into the crowd, try and engage her in coversation hoping that she didn't hear me? Or, er, stand a safe distance away and hope that her friend goes to the loo at some point because I might be able to pluck up the courage if she's on her own, but never actually doing so? You can probably guess the eventual outcome.

As I sat on the train home quietly cursing to myself, a drunk-to-paralytic girl sat down opposite me. She had the hiccups. I considered trying to help her with her hiccups, and then I found myself thinking that she looked quite nice (albeit not, y'know, right), and then I thought that how nice she may or may not be wasn't important and that the real issue here was whether she was going to be sick on my shoes, and then I realised that I'd fallen back into the old trap. I was, once again, The University Of No Girlfriend. And then I went back to thinking that she looked quite nice. Didn't get around to helping her with her hiccups, but then I probably wouldn't have been much use anyway.

2005-06-11T00:14:00.001+01:00

As I get older, I've noticed that my attitude towards women with children has changed rather dramatically. Time was that when I saw a woman of about my age with a small child - not in a pram, but old enough to be walking along, tiny hand wrapped around two of the parent's fingers - I would quietly imagine a disasterous backstory, bumfluff-chinned boyfriend insisting that it was going to be safe, soap-opera style histrionics, and everyone living out their days in crappy houses where the walls have been stripped but nobody can afford a tin of paint to cover it up, let alone new wallpaper.

These days things are rather different. For a start, I'm a lot more open-minded (I still enjoy Too Much Too Young when I hear it on the radio, but I don't actually take any of it to heart), but mostly I suspect it's because I'm at an age where people could quite feasibly have a child that age that had been carefully planned for and brought into the world with the best of intentions and not as a result of disasterous adolescent sex, and actually it's me that has it all wrong and not them. And this change in attitude allows me to look at a woman with sprog and not feel ashamed if I find her attractive. And this is a good thing, except in the sense that looking at women and thinking "hmm, she's nice" is a dreadful, desperate thing to be doing and I really ought to have grown out of such behaviour by now, of course.

The problem comes when you're in a situation where you spot an attractive woman who just happens to have a small child with her, and instead of her passing by and you thinking nothing more of it, she happens to come to a halt. Say, for example, if you happen to be standing at a bus stop.

Now, obviously, it's rude to stare, but there's nothing wrong with the occasional furtive glance, right? The problem is that it is impossible to glance furtively at a woman with a child. In theory it's quite a good idea - after all, she's going to be pre-occupied with the endless stream of questions and demands for chocolate emenating from the little 'un, so she might not notice (except she will, of course, because all women know when you're trying to glance furtively at them - I don't even know why I'm putting it that way, to be honest; 'bleedin' obvious gawking' would be a more appropriate phrase) but the child will. And while the woman is likely to be annoyed at the unwanted male attention, chances are she will ignore it on the basis that you're going to go away eventually and she doesn't want to make a scene. However, if the child notices, and it will because it's programmed to notice everything, it won't ignore it. It'll look at you. And it'll start asking questions. "Why is that man staring at me?", for starters, and while eyeing up a woman is clearly not a good thing to be doing, eyeing up small children... yeah, exactly. And "I was looking at your mum" isn't going to go down well as a defence either.

Fortunately the bus came along before the sprog started getting suspicious. I probably had the right idea in the first place, come to think of it.

2005-03-18T23:23:00.000Z

The woman sat opposite me on the train looks great. She's wearing a black t-shirt (well, it's slightly more elaborate than that, but it's the same sort of effect) and jeans, and gives the general impression that she's either made no effort at all or she's done her best to look like she's not made any effort. Either way, it's working. I try to look out of the window in a desperate effort not to spend the entire journey looking at her, as if I were a better person and not a hopeless, desperate letch.

She pulls out a book. It's called something like "What every woman needs to know about men" or somesuch other nonsense. I wonder whether she's reading it because she's genuinely seeking advice or if there's some other reason. I really want her not to be reading it because she's seeking advice. She shouldn't need advice. The world is completely wrong if she needs advice. Perhaps she's been lent it by an easily impressed friend and she's intrigued in an appalled kind of a way. Or she's writing a dismissive article about rubbish and wants to make sure of herself before she gets all, er, dismissive. She can't need advice. She could quite clearly have any fellow she so desires. She shouldn't need a book like to help her shift wheat from chaff.

Later on I attempt to find more details of the book, as I cannot recall the back cover blurb which had me silently hooting in derision. I cannot find it, but can find several tomes of a similar title. I can't help but feel utterly defeated.

2005-03-08T21:13:00.003Z

I resumed contact with the girl who was too good for me. I hadn't intended to return to the dating site, but a group of us from work went for Christmas drinks with some former colleagues, one of whom was telling us on his adventures on the same site. I remained quiet while he was telling us about this, partly due to personal embarrassment on my part (I was too sober at that stage of evening to offer such information; a couple of pints later it probably would have spilled out) but mostly because it seemed that he was rather better at it than I was. He apparently had conversations going with several women, and was in some cases having difficulty shaking off unwanted attention rather than being the cause of it.

When I arrived home, a little the worse for drink, I attempted to look his profile up to see if I could spot where I was going wrong, but after a while I gave up on the grounds that, frankly, I was feeling slightly uncomfortable. It just seemed... I don't know, somehow wrong, as if I was intruding on people's private business. I then received a message from someone who was quite possibly similarly drunk, began a correspondence that came to an end within a couple of days, and then, having stumped up the cash, decided that I may as well send the girl who was too good for me a cheery message pointing out the ridiculousness of the situation. She replied, messages were exchanged, and eventually we met.

As predicted, she was far, far too good for an oik like me - intelligent, witty, confident, and really rather cute. Still, our couple of hours together passed enjoyably enough, we parted on good terms, I sent her a message saying as much a few days later, and she replied in a similar vein a few days later. I'd suggested meeting up again; she didn't mention it. A rejection, then, but quite the most polite rejection I'd ever suffered.

And the strange thing was that this made feel really quite good about myself. In fact, 'suffered' was entirely the wrong word; I was, at least, deemed worthy of a reply, more than I'd had the last time I met someone off of the internet. This woman who was clearly miles out of my league in every regard had at least deemed me worthy of acknowledgment. Our time together hadn't disgusted her so much that she couldn't bear to give me a second thought. Possibly this is a sign that I am growing as a person, that I don't take these things to heart so much, that I see the positive side in things. Possibly, at some point in the future, I may just be socially adequate enough to have a proper girlfriend and everything.

Granted, at this rate it will probably be some time in 2013, but it's a step forward at least.

2005-03-06T01:12:00.001Z

I'm on the train home, early evening, mood slightly flat, mind frankly rather blank. I'm almost certainly considering nothing more pressing than what I might have for tea. We're in relentlessly normal territory; the sort of subject matter which might entertain the University of No Girlfriend is far from my thoughts.

A woman sitting behind me begins talking into her phone. I know she's talking into her phone rather than talking to someone sat next to her who's talking extremely quietly because she mentions that her battery is beginning to run out. She's from some part of North America. I once correctly picked out that a woman I was talking to was from Canada rather than America from her accent (she was suitably impressed) and I wonder for a bit if the woman on the phone might be Canadian as well. I decide after a while that she probably isn't, although, let's be honest, the one time I picked this out correctly was an absolute fluke.

She's speaking quite softly. She's discussing the film of The Magic Roundabout. Her voice is giving me an odd sensation. You know how sometimes a voice just connects with you, and your back begins to go, and every word resonates somewhere in your stomach? It's not an effect I'd had in a while, which is probably why my attempt at describing it is so feeble, and I've never known an American accent do it to me, not that I've met that many Americans (or Canadians) to correctly gauge the effect. Irish, yes, Scottish, yes, Yorkshire, yes, but not American. (Not that I need an accent to get attached to a voice - dull Home Counties voices can do it for me sometimes.) Because it's an early evening train there's plenty of chatter - families, groups of kids, blokes on their way home from the football - and so I'm having to concentrate on her voice to hear her properly, which is only enhancing the excitement I'm getting. I don't really follow the conversation; it's nothing too personal, so I don't feel so guilty for eavesdropping. It's not really the conversation that I'm interested in.

Eventually the phone gives out and I have to listen to kids arguing about some popular musical artiste of the day or something for the rest of the journey home. When I eventually get up to leave the train I turn to see if she's still sitting there. She is, but she's looking out of the window and all I can see is a mop of hair that we shall in the modern fashion generously refer to strawberry blonde. Hell, it might even have been strawberry blonde. I don't even know what that means. Either way, it all seems oddly apt.

2005-02-16T21:14:00.000Z

I have received an e-card.

I received it a couple of evenings ago (14th February, you see) at my work e-mail address. Which, in itself, is rather odd. Most of the people who know my work e-mail address but not my home e-mail are people who would know me through work and do not include anyone I would expect to receive an e-card from on 14th February. Not that I would expect to receive an e-card from anybody, of course.

On discovering the email telling me about the e-card in the inbox on Tuesday morning I decided that, rather than attempt to look at it in the office, I would forward it to myself at home and examine it there. My first attempt at following the link caused my computer to crash, as did the second. I decided that it must be the browser, and tried another only to have the connection refused. So I tried another, only to have the same problem. So; someone is trying to send me Valentine's-type wishes, only I can't see them.

Of course, it could just be spam. It probably is just spam, isn't it? There's no heartbroken young woman out there wondering why I haven't said "a-ha ha, you cheeky little minx with your electronic greetings, you". Bah.

2004-12-23T16:20:00.001Z

I haven't mentioned the girl at the station for a while now. Truth be told, I'm slightly disturbed that she still turns my head so long after I first saw her. In my defence there was a phase where I didn't see her much at all, but then there was a phase where I saw her practically every day, so I can't really hide behind that as an excuse. Anyway, the point is that she's still there. Well, not there now - although possibly she could be there now, I'm sat in front of my computer so I can't tell - but I still see her at the station in the morning. Sometimes.

I should probably explain my journey to work at this point. I catch a train into a major London terminus, and then switch on to a tube train. It's an unremarkable journey, there are hundreds upon thousands who do the same each morning. And, as of one morning a couple of months ago, the girl at the station began to do it as well. In fact, she takes the train into the same terminus and switches on to the same tube line. In fact, and this is where it all got a bit disquieting, she chooses to stand at the same spot on the platform as I do.

As any commuter will know, the position you take on the platform is all important and, once you've established where you stand, it very rarely changes. Many choose to board the train so that when they get off the train they will be close to the exit. I base my decision on where the train tends to be the least crowded, on the grounds that I don't want my sandwiches to get squashed; I have failed to find a suitable-sized container to put them in that fits comfortably into my bag without rattling around in an annoying manner, and so on a crowded train the sandwiches would be at risk of an unfortunate squishing incident. This means that not only do I board the train at its least crowded point, but also that if a train comes in and is quite packed, or if there's been a gap in the service and even my lesser crowded part of the platform is overrun with commuters, I tend to wait on the platform for a less crowded train to come in.

I first noticed the girl standing practically next to me one morning. I was stood at my usual spot, looked around to look at the information board, and there she was. And so it began; some mornings she'd already be stood there, others she'd walk down to where I was stood. She also seems to share my habit of not wanting to board crowded trains; I have yet to establish whether this is because she is attempting to protect her lunch. I have considered whether this is a legitimate reason to start a conversation; I suspect that it isn't. It has occurred to me that she might think that I'm following her around, which worries me; it was my route to work, my spot on the platform - it's hardly my fault that she's chosen to copy me. And I get off the train before she does (we tend to get on the same carriage, you see, so I can't help but see that she's still there; besides, when she's reading something and she's got her head bent over slightly she looks
really, really cute), so if it is stalking it's really rather inept stalking.

There was an unfortunate staring incident the other day. I'd already boarded the tube train, only for it to be held up waiting for the signal to change, and as such the carriage was beginning to become slightly crowded as more people arrived on the platform. (Fortunately I was stood in a corner, and thus able to protect my sandwiches.) As I gazed idly back to the platform I saw the girl walk past the door and then halt; clearly she had no intention of boarding. As the doors closed I looked across at her through the window; as the train began to move off I caught her eye. At this point years of experience of jerking my head away at the moment of eye contact should have come into play but I held my stare, on the grounds that as the train was moving and I hadn't flinched she might think that I was just looking in that general direction and she happened to stand there. It's a forlorn hope, but then, this is The University of No Girlfriend. Forlorn hope is what we do.

Maybe she'll find a new route to work in the new year. It'd be for the best, really.

2004-12-01T21:45:00.000Z

Call me strange if you will, but I think the time when the clocks go back and autumn gradually turns into winter is my favourite time of the year. Clear, cold mornings where you can see your breath in front of your face - marvellous. And in the evenings I like to walk through the city streets, looking up into the lit-up windows of the office buildings and watching the late workers at their desks - not that I'm in any way smug that they're still beavering away at their desks, more that it's reassuring to know that it's just not me plugging away.

It also happens to be the time of year when you see far more women wearing boots up to here and skirts down to here, with a tantalisingly small gap between the two. But that's not why I approve of the season so. No.

Well, maybe it is a little.

If I see a woman walking towards me and she's wearing boots to just below the knee and a skirt to either just above the knee, or a longer skirt below the knee with boots protruding from beneath it (I wish I knew more about women's clothing so that I could dazzle you with technical terms at this point), I can't help but give a second glance. Not that I'm not disgusted with myself about this. I know it's wrong, and I try not to look, but as I'm trying not to look I invariably realise that I have no idea what I would be looking at if I hadn't noticed that the woman walking towards is wearing a skirt and boots. This leads to me either looking in another direction entirely, usually at something so dramatically uninteresting that I could only be looking at it if I was trying to avoid looking at what's in front of me (and can lead to unfortunate near-collisions if you misjudge it), or forcing myself to look straight ahead and pretend that I've haven't noticed the woman as we pass, which I suspect makes me look as if I am forcing myself to look straight ahead and pretend that I haven't noticed. Which is, of course, exactly what I am doing.

I wouldn't mind but finding women in boots up to their knees is such a bog-standard thing to find so alluring. I could try to differentiate myself by pointing out that I'm not nearly so attracted by women in really very short skirts that don't extend as far as their coats or by women wearing boots tucked into their jeans, and that in my occasional examinations of what the internet has to offer I've not found women wearing knee-high boots and practically nothing else particularly exciting either and so it must be the lure of what's underneath that I find interesting rather than the actual footwear itself, but really - I may as well be stood on a building site, bum cleavage protruding from my ill-fitting jeans and whistling at anything even slightly female for all the good it would it do.

I wish I understood why. There's probably a perfectly reasonable explanation that, if it were explained to me, would enable me to keep my ugly eyes to myself for the winter months. I've tried Google, but trying to work out what to look for without just bringing up pictures of women wearing very little other but a pair of boots is too taxing to my addled December brain. Or maybe the part of me that's disgusted is in thrall to the part of my brain that finds it all rather exciting and won't let me. That seems quite plausible.

2004-11-01T22:42:00.000Z

Er, yes. Ahem. Umm.

Oh, all right. The official explanation is "I've had problems with work and that, and so I haven't really been able to think much about not having a girlfriend, let alone commit any of it to, well, not paper, but, you know, typing it and that". I'm not sure that that necessarily explains away four months but, well, it's my story and I'm sticking to it. So there.

(It certainly isn't "because I have a girlfriend". For a start, I don't (and haven't), and secondly, I'm sure the scrapes and hi-jinks and such when someone entirely unsuited to having a girlfriend has a girlfriend, however temporarily, would provide a world of comic pratfalls the likes of wot we can only speculate on.)

All right, all right, in those four months I did engage in some No Girlfriend activity. For example, I, er, joined another dating site. Yes, I know, but this time I really thought it was going to be different. For example, of the first dozen or so profiles I read, not one person claimed to be "bubbly" (in fact I've barely seen the word used at all on there). People actually tried to say funny things instead of just saying that they had a great sense of humour. Most of the spelling mistakes looked like fair-enough typos rather than people not actually knowing how to spell. This was clearly far more like it, and I decided that this was probably my best chance of ever finding a girlfriend on the internet.

It went wrong in the end, of course. I might write something about it one day, once I've worked out exactly how and why I fouled it all up. (My current theory is that I'd subconsciously realised that the young lady my attentions were centred on was simply far too good for me, and so I decided that I had to send her a message making myself out to be a tedious, boorish idiot because otherwise, sooner or later, I was going to end up horribly disappointed, and that it was better this way than if we'd actually met and I'd seen what I was missing out on through my being hopelessly inadequate, like some Bullseye contestants being shown the star prize that they've just failed to win but without Jim Bowen and an animated bull expressing sympathy. I'm sure that this theory is at least 50% correct.) Whatever it was that happened, I'd decided that this was officially it for me and internet dating pages. They were just making me miserable. So I resolved never to get involved again. I had one last log in at the couple of other pages I'd used in the past, and then went off and did something less dispiriting instead.

The next day, I received a message from someone.

And she seemed nice, and so I sent a reply, and she read my reply and didn't write back. And this is really annoying, because this was a good reply. This wasn't custom designed to show off my tedious and boorish side. No, this was a clever reply, a reply with a twinkle in its eye. As far as I could see there was nothing in the reply not to like. But obviously she thought otherwise, and of course she's entirely within her rights to think I'm an idiot, but it's still really dispiriting. Not least because, as I'd written such a good reply, I'd made the elementary error of getting my hopes up. So I think this really is it for the dating sites this time.

It is.

Really, it is.

Oh, all right, for a bit anyway.

2004-07-04T20:26:00.000+01:00

The University of No Girlfriend presents a new, and occasional, and poorly named, series:

Bands I Hate Because Of Gurls

Number 1: Green Day

Actually I never liked Green Day much in the first place. The singer's voice annoyed me. The tunes were dull. The lyrics were rubbish. The sort of people who liked them always seemed to very pleased with themselves for liking Green Day. So it wasn't an irrational swing of opinion against them; I was already all set to hate Green Day, if only I could bring myself to be really bothered about them.

So, I'm at some crappy indie disco or other. I'm about 19, and I'm sitting on a step having a conversation with someone who, to start with, isn't much more than a vague acquaintance, more a friend of a friend. But we're talking and, because I've started from a position of just about knowing her, I'm not a stammering wreck because I don't fancy her. Except that as the conversation goes on I'm finding out that she's clever and funny and lovely, and as I'm looking at her face and in her eyes she's looking more and more attractive (alcohol is being taken, but I find out later that it isn't just down to that) and we're getting on really well.

And then the DJ plays Ever Fallen In Love by the Buzzcocks.

Now, I love the Buzzcocks. Always did. Great tunes, lyrics at least partially about not being able to get off with anyone - how could I not love them? And the girl looks across at me and says "I love this song", and grabs my arm and leads me to what, despite it being largely filled with spotty males in Rage Against The Machine t-shirts jumping up and down, we shall call the dancefloor.

Now, I can't dance. I'm cumbersome and awkward and I have no discernable co-ordination, so I just flail around and hope for the best. And the thing is, it doesn't seem to matter, because she's smiling at me and I'm smiling back and all those years of going to crap youth club discos and having girls come up to me and say "my mate really likes you, come and dance with us" and their mate saying "oh, stop it Trish, don't be mean to him" don't matter any more because here is someone really nice who actually wants to dance with me. Truly, it is a magical evening.

And then the Buzzcocks come to an end, and the DJ plays Basket Case by Green Day.

I'm not sure if I shrank at the opening of the song: I suspect that I probably did. The girl screws up her face in an adorable manner and mouths "I don't like this" and we go back to the step. Except that now, because I do really fancy her, I can't think of anything to say. For crying out loud, we've established that we both love the Buzzcocks and don't like Green Day, so we've at least got something in common. And yet I can't say anything, and she doesn't seem to be able or willing to say anything, and we look at each other and smile and nod and then go back to looking at people moshing away to Green Day and whatever follows them, which isn't any good either.

And she leaves soon after, and I don't see her for a few weeks, and the next time we see each other she tells me about some great new fellow that she's met, and I curse Green Day. And years on, whenever I hear Green Day I still curse them, a situation compounded by every song they make sounding like a very minor variation on Basket Case. Apart from that acoustic-y one about having the time of your life that they always use on montages of clips at the end of major sporting events, although that was rubbish as well. And that one that starts off like Stand by REM that fooled me into thinking that I was about to hear Stand by REM at least three times when I heard it on the radio. Except that that's probably something for another blog entirely.

2004-06-26T00:24:00.000+01:00

It's Friday night and I'm leaving work late, but it's all in a good cause because I'm about to have a week off. For all that the thought of not having to heave myself out of bed on Monday morning is keeping me going, I am feeling rather tired and not a little bleary eyed, and so I'm grateful when the train pulls in. I'm only going a few stops, so even though the train isn't busy I decide to stand.

The woman who gets on the train with me elects to take a seat. She's wearing some sort of uniform - I guess that she works in one of the bars near the station. She takes the top off (she's wearing a t-shirt underneath, I hasten to point out), takes a different top from her bag and puts it on. I can see the side of her face and she looks nice enough, I suppose - maybe not the sort of person you might see on a tube train and spend the rest of the journey desperately trying (and failing) not to look at, but perhaps someone whose photo you might see on an internet dating site and think "hmmm, she looks quite interesting" before getting slightly disillusioned when you read her profile and find out that she considers herself "bubbly".

Anyway.

She puts on her clean top, checks her phone for messages and then reaches into her bag for a mirror and begins to apply make-up. And here's where, try and I might, I can't look away, because for some reason watching women apply make-up on trains fascinates me.

It's strange. I have no particular feelings about women wearing make-up - I'm more likely to be put off by someone wearing too much than none at all. As is probably apparent, I know practically nothing about this subject at all. I have no idea what the desired effect of some of the things I see women putting on their faces actually is. And it has to be trains as well - in any other setting I can think of it has absolutely no effect. Possibly it's because I'm admiring the level of skill required to put on make-up while being jerked about as the carriage rattles around, although I suspect that the whole business says more about my relationship to trains than it does about anything else (slightly vulnerable, invariably on my own and, depending on time of day and intoxication levels, lonely). It's an irrational turn-on, I suppose. For anyone else it would probably be a rational turn-on, but in my circumstances it's definitely irrational.

By the time our brief journey comes to an end she's dusted on some stuff with a brush and she's applied what I assume to be lipstick. All I can see of her is the side of her head and her cheek in the mirror. I'm feeling nice and warm and comfortable inside. I do worry about me sometimes.

2004-06-20T23:19:00.001+01:00

I admit it: there are times when I spend my precious personal time sat in front of my computer looking for pictures of women wearing very little in the way of clothing for my own unpleasant onanistic purposes. I know I shouldn't do it, I don't do it very often, every time I do it I feel suitably ashamed of myself and vow never to do it again, and every time a few weeks later the urge takes me and I find myself doing it all over again. I'm sorry.

A few weeks ago, I found myself looking at some pictures of a young lady wearing few clothes and was surprised by how attractive I found her. (That sounds horribly brutal, I realise, but there's nothing pretty about the entire act so there's no point trying to be nice about it. You look for the first one you find vaguely attractive, do what you need to do and then get out. Anything else would be unhealthy. Unhealthier.) In fact, I found the young lady so attractive that I continued to look at the pictures of her even after the tissue had been disposed of. And the next day, instead of remembering how disgusted with myself I'd felt, I remembered how attractive the woman was and how I'd like to look at her again. And the same the next night, and the night after that, and so on. I'm not sure quite how long I would have continued in this vein. I hope it wouldn't have been too long, my mind is warped enough as it is. But eventually it all came crashing to a halt.

The turning point was when I realised that the woman in the pictures looked an awful lot like a girl I'd really fancied when I was about 15 or 16.

Now, obviously there were differences. The breasts, for a start. And she looked quite a bit taller, not that these things are easy to tell from a few pictures. And, to be fair, I never saw this girl wearing so few clothes (and even if I had, I strongly supect her underwear would have been rather different from that temporarily worn by the woman in the pictures) and so I suppose it's difficult to make that certain an assessment. But the hair and the eyes and the face in general seemed very similar, while being slightly (but reassuringly) different. And this had the effect of putting me off completely, because there's something very creepy indeed about masturbating furiously over pictures of someone who looks a bit like someone you fancied when you were 15.

(Not that I didn't masturbate furiously at the thought of the girl when I was 15. No, when I was 15 I wouldn't have needed recourse to the internet for pictures of rude ladies; just the thought of this girl in her school uniform was enough, which was particularly awkward should I encounter her in such a situation (in school, for example). I did have the odd thought of her wearing slightly less, but it was always rather fuzzy and non-specific. I suppose it would have had to have been, really, what with how little I knew then.)

Oddly (or maybe not) I haven't felt the need to look at any web porn since. This is probably for the best, and will probably come crashing to a halt the first time I come home slightly drunk and feeling lonely. I shall enjoy it while it lasts.

2004-06-06T22:11:00.000+01:00

It must be something to do with the Spring bank holiday. I noticed it when I was on the screen where you hand over your money - I'd created the account on June 1st last year. And then it had lain fallow for months on end, and here I was again. I don't know why this bank holiday in particular should do this to me; maybe it's the weather, maybe it's the culmination of that series of bank holidays you get from Easter onwards being spent alone (well, not necessarily alone, but three days of going home alone in the evening rather than two). Whatever it is, there's clearly something about the Spring bank holiday that leads me towards internet dating sites.

Having handed over my cash I resolved that this time I was going to make proper use of the thing. No looking for one perfect-sounding person, spending ages fretting over the exact wording of my little note to her and being crushed when she doesn't respond. No, this time it was going to be different. I was going to be bold. Why do anything else? If she ignores me it's not as if she's anyone I'm ever going to meet, so why be worried? Send a bunch of short (but hopefully sweet) messages out to anyone who doesn't fall into too many of the dread categories and see what happens. Much better than this...

and then I came across someone absolutely perfect, and spent two days carefully planning my message to her. And then, two days later, when I came to send her my witty and erudite little note, she'd already completely disapeared from the system.

And I shouldn't worry about these things, really I shouldn't, but this seems horribly unfair. Clearly she's had a bunch of messages from slack-jawed lunkheads and fled the page in horror. It's my fault, really; if only I hadn't been so meticulous and just stuck with the original plan I'd have got in there and she would have appreciated my little note all the more in the sea of chuckle-headed imbeciles.

There's a moral in there somewhere, but I'm not sure whether it's "stick to the original plan" or "don't ever use internet dating pages again, I mean, are you ever going to learn, you useless chump? Or what?". It's probably the first one. Hope it is, anyway, otherwise I'm going to feel really foolish next Spring Bank Holiday.

2004-04-14T22:52:00.000+01:00

It's Easter Bank Holiday Monday morning, and I'm walking around Tesco. It's surprisingly empty considering that it was closed yesterday, and happily they seem to have practically everything I want to buy in stock. There's only one problem, which is that I seem to be finding every woman I see within a certain age range - starting at about 18-ish (I hope) and ending, I dunno, around the early 30s or so - extremely attractive. What is happening? Is it because I've not had much contact with other people over the long weekend (a spot of shopping on Friday, an afternoon at the football on Saturday, a day with the family on Sunday) that suddenly even the plainest of women become hugely attractive? Or is it just that there happens to be have a lot of particularly attractive women who've chosen to go shopping fairly early today?

It's the first one; it's got to be. The thing about the struggle into London of a morning is that there are so many people about that the chances are that you'll see someone who, at a glance, is quite attractive. And you need that sometimes, particularly if you've just been horribly rejected (well, not horribly rejected, but rejected and you've taken it particularly badly because, well, you're an idiot); seeing lots of attractive people gives you a small amount of futile hope. And so not seeing an attractive person for three and a half days leads to all manner of foolish behaviour. Which reminds me, what is it with people on internet dating sites saying that they like going out but they like staying in as well? These people must be happy at all times. I cannot imagine anything more unbearable.

Unusually, none of the attractive women in Tesco were putting items into a trolley steered by some great hairy gorilla of a man. This is the usual problem of going shopping; you look up from the freezer that you've been reaching into for oven chips, you see someone you like the look of across the way, and then some oafish looking fellow strolls up to her carrying a family sized pack of Crispy Pancakes or something.

2004-04-02T22:48:00.000+01:00

I always assumed that if there was some sort of disaster - say, for example, I been gone done wrong by my woman, for example, or (and this is a strictly hypothetical example based on something that never happened and isn't true) I'd met someone really nice who actually seemed interested in me only for me to completely fuck it up right from the off, I'd be able to write about it and stick it up here in a terrific display of catharsis before moving on and, well, doing it all again the next time anyone appeared to take an interest, which would be several months later.

And I can't. I can't do it. I've tried to come up with something amusing on the occasion of completely fucking it up with someone who seemed really nice and interested in me, and I can't. Self-pity I can manage. Humour, no. Even a vague attempt to humour would be nice, but it ain't happening. Instead: the dismal reality of the aftermath.

I'm on a train into London. It's Saturday afternoon crowded - not heaving as per the weekday morning and evening rush hours, but most of the seats are taken and a few people are having to stand in the doorways, which is where I am, propped up against the glass partition bit. A couple board the train. They are very happy. They stand right in front of me, arms wrapped around each other, noses a matter of centimetres apart. The train moves off. Everyone else who isn't leaning against something reaches out for something to hold on to, except for these two. They don't need to balance, they can just grab on to each other.

I am feeling thoroughly nauseous.

"Are we going to get there in time?" asks one. "Yep, no problem - Jubilee Line all the way there" says the other. They resume the noses-barely-apart position. I know full well that there's no Jubilee Line. I checked the travel on the teletext before I came out. I could tell them... but nah, sod it. Let them get off, traipse down to the Jubilee Line platforms and find out for themselves. Serve them right. Ha! Yes.

And does this make me feel any better? Well, temporarily, maybe, but you could probably measure it in nanoseconds. So all told it's probably best that I can't think of anything much to say about the disaster.

2004-03-21T18:40:00.000Z

I shouldn't even turn the television on when I stumble in slightly drunk. It always ends badly. At least in the good old days Friday night meant rubbish soft porn on Channel 5, custom designed for men who've come in a bit drunk and are feeling slightly lonely. The worst thing that ever happened there was that you'd end up feeling slightly disgusted with yourself, and that the next time you stumble in slightly drunk you wish that you'd taped it. No, the really dismaying thing that happens with late-night Friday television is the dating-type show.

The BBC had one that was clearly inspired by Meet The Parents (I can't actually recall the title, but it was as close to 'Meet The Parents' as it could be without invoking copyright difficulties) but all that proved was that the BBC aren't afraid to show something that seemed to be intended for an earlier slot but turned out to be crap late at night when they know slightly drunk, lonely people will be channel hopping. One Friday night I came across this bizarre thing on Channel 5 called The Ultimate Singles Party or somesuch. The programme's main tips on holding The Ultimate Singles Party seemed to be a) live in a really huge flat, b) have lots of really attractive friends and make sure you don't accidentally invite anyone who's really funny and clever and interesting but also a bit of a dog, c) actually don't invite anyone who's really funny and clever and interesting at all, as it only complicates matters, and d) get everyone pissed and they'll all get off with each other because they're all really attractive so it doesn't really matter who you get off with because you won't be embarrassed in the morning. All useful advice, but nothing for an ugly fat bloke to work with.

And so, last night, I came across The Bachelor. There was nothing else on, I thought I may as well leave it on for a few minutes before Buffy started, I became shamefully engrossed. The Bachelor is one of these programmes where a large number of women get to fight it out (er, not literally) over some bloke. There was one of these on Channel 4 not all that long ago as well, but I only watched about three minutes of that. Why is it always large numbers of women and one bloke? Presumably it's supposed to be a delicious reversal of the traditional 'men-chat-up-women' gender roles, but it seems a mite unfair.

Anyway, you have The Bachelor, who I suppose was a handsome enough fellow (I can't really judge these things) but, well, a bit dull. Maybe it was just the way the programme was edited but he didn't seem to have anything much to say for himself beyond "they're all really nice and it's going to be so difficult to choose", that sort of thing. When I first switched on he was with five women at some sort of wine tasting thing. All of the women were attractive, I suppose (let's face it, they're hardly likely to be anything else - I'm sure the advert didn't say "Single women wanted for reality dating show type thing - no mingers need apply" but it may as well have done), but they were all, without exception, bubbly (or, if you will, annoying). And proud of it. And, astoundingly, this seemed to suit The Bachelor down to the ground. "You're all very bubbly, I like bubbly people" he said to one of them. Why? Why? What sort of man is he, exactly?

I probably should have turned off then, really (I'd forgotten all about Buffy by this stage) but I left it on, being in that unwilling-to-move stage that often occurs when you're slightly drunk. The five women returned to their house full of bubbly women, to say things like "he's really nice" and "he's definitely my type", and then the next day The Bachelor set off with five more of them. Except. While there were a couple of bubbly ones (if I've learnt anything from this programme, it's that people who describe themselves as "bubbly" consider a lack of bubbliness in others as a weakness. Not sure how I can use this information, but it may come in handy at some point) there were a couple who were resolutely un-bubbly, and as such I liked them very much.

There was one who seemed to have decided that she didn't like The Bachelor all that much, and instead seemed content to watch amusedly from the margins, and who seemed to have far too many wits about her to have applied to have been on the programme in the first place. And then there was the Scottish one. Where the others were attractive enough, the Scottish one was something else, ridiculously cute, pixie-ish thing going on, not in any way bubbly. The Bachelor clearly fancied her, but couldn't understand why she wasn't more enthusiastic about him. She tried to avoid saying that she thought he was boring. There was no "he's really nice" or "he's definitely my type". I liked her.

The programme ended with some big selection ceremony with The Bachelor offering roses to whoever he wanted to stay, with the Scottish one and the writer one being ignored in favour of the bubbly ones. How do you choose one attractive-ish bubbly blonde woman over another attractive-ish bubbly blonde woman? There was a video for him to watch with varying degrees of begging from the women (the Scottish one didn't appear, although she'd said that she might not stay even if he'd asked) and he seemed to pick all of the ones who'd worn bikinis in it. Which is as good a way as any, I suppose.

2004-03-10T21:21:00.000Z

Struggling around the magazine shelves of Smiths one lunchtime (always a chore because of the number of people who stand around reading magazines for large chunks of their lunch hours before putting them back on the shelves; annoying if you want to get to something that you actually want to buy, even worse if, when you get the rack, the only copy left is one someone's already had their greasy fingers on) I found myself stood in front of the wedding magazines. I may have been waiting for someone to manouvre a pram past, I forget now. Anyway, the point is that the wedding magazines were in my eyeline, and I noticed that one of them had a picture of two gurning blokes on the cover rather than a white-clad young lady. I noted that the magazine appeared to be called "Stag and Groom", and then the woman with the pram managed to fight her way past and I moved off to fight my way towards the rack I'd been initially trying to get to.

Later on I found myself pondering Stag and Groom. For a start, it's unusual to see a magazine aimed at men that doesn't feature a picture of Jordan or someone of a similar negligible-talent-big-tits persuasion on the cover for a start. Except! is this really aimed at men? And if so, why is it racked with wedding magazines? It may be thematically correct, but in terms of target audience it's out of position. Even if the young gentleman has entered the shop with his betrothed, the moment she stops to look at wedding magazines he's off across the way to look at magazines about music/computer games/cars/hi-fi equipment/model railways (delete as appropriate, although to be honest I'm not sure who gets engaged to people who like model railways. I think the liking of model railways probably doesn't get mentioned until the honeymoon at the very earliest). I think the idea is that the woman sees it, picks it up, says "oooh, look here Steve, you should get this" and Steve says "yeah, whatever".

Also, what on earth is the content, exactly? From what I recall from the only wedding whose preparation I watched at anything like close quarters (my sister's, although whenever anyone started discussing weddings I tended to either change the subject or leave the room on the grounds that I really wasn't all that interested beyond knowing what time I had to turn up) all the groom does is hire a suit and drive people around when necessary, and that doesn't seem to lend itself to a regularly published magazine. I suppose for one issue there's a certain amount of things you can cover - "Which top hat? - a consumer guide", perhaps, or "Answer these 20 questions to reveal which drunken prank is most suitable for your stag night - Mostly A's: Why not try handcuffing the groom to a lamp post and then pulling his trousers down! PRO: Classic, traditional, tried and tested. CON: Hand may brush groom's dribbling winky during trouser-dropping, causing embarrassment and accusations of gayness". And presumably there'd be a groom's underwear section, theoretically for the groom's benefit but actually mostly looked at by the fiancee while he's out down the shops.

I would have answered the "what on earth is the content" question, except that when I walked past the weddings magazines section today Stag and Groom was filed behind other mags and I couldn't see the cover. I could have picked it up and had a look, I suppose, but I'd have felt like a fraud. In the same way that I couldn't bring myself to pick up a magazine with a picture of Jordan on the cover, I couldn't bring myself to look at a magazine which would suggest that I was adequate enough with women to have persuaded one of them to get wed, even if I wanted to do such a thing.

2004-02-17T23:09:00.002Z

I suppose that I really should have done an entry for Valentine's Day. (Actually it probably needed some sort of treatise, some sort of statement of intent or something, but never mind.) I was busy doing... well, all right, there were some bits I wanted to watch on tv and then, well, it was a bit late and I was a bit tired and not really in the mood. I certainly wasn't out, if that's what you were thinking. Where to go? Anywhere you might choose to go is bound to be laying on some sort of Valentine's special event, which, even though it's more than likely going to involve nothing more than putting a few pink balloons about the place, must have a psychologically damaging effect on the perpetually single male. (NB I am not a trained psychologist.)

The thing with Valentine's Day is that, when it falls on a weekday, it's easy to ignore. In fact, were it not for the occasional florist hawking their wares more enthusiastically than usual and the odd person with an overlarge bunch of flowers - either slightly embarrassed looking young women or slightly worried looking men, who you suspect hadn't really considered that a big bunch of flowers isn't something you want to carry on a crowded commuter train - it'd barely register in my consciousness at all. But at the weekend it's more difficult. You can't pop down to the shop for a paper and a bottle of lemon Lucozade without coming across at least half a dozen couples resolutely gripping each others' arms (or, indeed, other parts of the anatomy). And if you have business on the other side of London... well, by the end of the day you'll be convinced you're the only one on his own. Believe me.

I think, with it falling on the Saturday and thus allowing the after-effects to ripple through Sunday, there's a spill-over effect into the week as well. There were at least three couples pawing away at each other on the train home tonight. The couple sat opposite me were worst, if only because it was one of those were she's clearly far too good for him; she's gorgeous and he has really crap thin facial hair, and yet she's the one snuggling up to him - it's just, y'know, unfair. How come he can cop off with someone far too good for him and I can't? Eh? I didn't know where to look, not that that's anything new.

All of which brings us round to the fact that, on Friday evening, I couldn't get any information from the Tube website as to whether there were any delays but could fill in a questionnaire asking whether I'd ever got off with anyone on a tube train. "Are you one of the many that are finding that special someone underground..." it said, apropos of, well, nothing in particular, "or is there someone you can't help but notice and flirt with - every morning?" Now, possibly I'm being Mr Picky here, but I'm not really convinced that there are legions of people finding that special someone underground. The fact that they couldn't even be bothered to fake a few real-life testimonies suggests that they didn't believe it either. But I dutifully filled the survey in anyway (mainly because I thought if I did, they might give me some update as to how the trains were running - no luck though) answering "no" to each question, natch.

Looking for travel news today I came across the results. In short: I don't believe them. Or, rather, I don't believe the people who answered the survey did so truthfully. 23% of people have found love on a tube train? I doubt that as many 23% of people have said anything to anyone on a tube train ever, except maybe to confirm that this train is going to Edgware Road or something. 74% have flirted? I can't help but be reminded of someone who told me that, if she couldn't get a seat, she'd pick someone and glare at them in an effort to get them to stand up and offer her the seat. I suggested that any man she glared at would automatically assume that she fancied him and mistake her attempt to get them off of their arse for her making a move. I strongly suspect that everyone she glared at has answered this poll, believing that they have had an exciting romantic moment which in fact was nothing more than someone wanting to rest her delicate feet.

In summary then: my niece is six. She received more Valentine's cards this year than me. In fact, she's received more Valentine's cards in her life than I have. Such is the lot of The University of No Girlfriend.

2004-02-11T23:06:00.000Z

I'm sat on the top deck of the bus back to the station. As usual in these situations I have my headphones on. The bus is fairly empty, just a couple of people sat in the front seats and, across the way from me, a young-ish woman, early 20s or so, yabbering into her phone. I can dimly hear her above the music but not so that I can actually make out what she's saying, which is probably just as well.

As the music fades at the end of one song I catch the odd line. I'm trying to ignore it, but then something drifts across and stays in my head:

"I really don't have time for love at the moment".

And this strikes me as an odd thing to say. It seems to me the sort of thing that people never actually say; thinking back through every conversation I've ever had with anyone ever, I cannot recall anyone uttering that particular line. It seems to me to be the sort of thing that a soap opera actress might say in an interview in an attempt to attract England under-21 internationals or their agents, not something you'd say to a trusted confidante from the top of a bus motoring through London. Maybe she was a soap opera actress giving an interview (it's not as if I'd recognise her if she was). Maybe she reads too many interviews with soap opera actresses and thinks that this is the sort of thing she ought to be saying. Either way, I was relieved to get away from her and her stupid big mouth.

2004-02-04T23:03:00.000Z

I'm on the train home from work, headphones on and generally minding my own business. At the first stop out of London a woman sits in the seat directly opposite me. I try to convince myself that I don't find her attractive, that she's too blonde or she's got too much make-up on or her hair's too cool or something, but I know it's a lie.

I'm trying not to look because I don't want to be the sort of person who stares at women on public transport, but my brain gives up on me. I'm trying to remember what I'd usually look at on the train home but I realise I don't know because, well, you don't usually think about it, do you? You just stare blankly into the distance and try to make sure that you don't miss your stop. I curse myself for being unable to read on trains (er, not that I can't read, just that I can't concentrate properly while I'm being bumped up and down by the train and so anything I read doesn't go in and so I find myself literally losing the plot) and stare intently out of the window.

She's staring intently out of the window as well; in fact, she's half turned round to face the window, not necessarily a comfortable position on a cramped commuter train. Possibly the reason she's turned around is that her gentleman friend is sat down next to her, draped his arm around her, and is leaning against her in a manner that doesn't look particularly comfortable. Despite it being an unseasonably mild day, he is wearing leather gloves. Occasionally he says something to her and she turns right around, looks at him and then returns to looking out of the window or at her phone, otherwise he has his eyes closed. I hate him, I've decided. Not so much because of his girlfriend, but because of his gloves. Oh, all right, partly because of his girlfriend, then.

I'm wondering if she hates him as well. She clearly doesn't like him much at the moment. Not that I'm professing to be an expert on these matters - if I was I'd be appearing on daytime talk shows instead of writing twatty old rubbish on the internet - but it's not as if the hostility is being that well hidden. I wonder what the reason is - I decide it can't have been a row, because I can't believe he'd be draped around her like that if he knew she was hacked off with him. Maybe he made some crass comment and upset her but hasn't realised it. Maybe she just hates him and he hasn't realised it. Maybe she hates his gloves as well, I couldn't fault her for that.

The train reaches my stop. As I stand up to make my way to the doors he doesn't move his leg out of the way to allow me to get past, so I have to shuffle past awkwardly. I really hope she dumps him. In the most humiliating, painful way imaginable. Yes.

2004-01-24T23:01:00.000Z

Dinner services are heavier than you think they're going to be. You think "plates and that, well, this isn't going to weigh all that much", and then you get three steps out of the shop and suddenly your arms feel awfully stretched, and a few steps later you have to readjust your grip, and a few steps later you have to have a bit of a sit down.

I could have told J this had I known she was going to go and buy a 16 piece dinner service at lunchtime, but as it was the first I knew about it was when she came back, having cleverly co-opted a wheelie chair to get it the last few yards back to her desk. Later on, she engaged in conversation with her boyfriend, in which he was eventually cajoled into coming to meet her to help her lug the thing home. "He says I'm a prat and he hates me" she said as she got off the phone. I said nothing. Well, I said "I'm saying nothing" and said nothing else as advertised.

You see, this is the thing you miss when you're The University of No Girlfriend. It's not so much... well, you know, that, it's the being able to tell someone that they're a prat and you hate them in the full knowledge that you don't and that they know you don't.

J showed me the dinner service, or at least the picture of it on the box.

"It's for my ex-flatmate. It's exactly what she needs at the moment, it'll be really handy if she moves in with her boyfriend."

"If she moves in with her boyfriend?" I was intrigued. Buying gifts for people is a splendid thing, of course, but buying someone a dinner service on the grounds that they might need it if they possibly move in with someone seems a bit, well, previous.

"Well, he's a really nice guy, but she's not sure about whether to move in with him because he looks like an ape."

"He looks like an ape?"

"Well, he doesn't shave that often and he's got long hair and he just looks a bit like an ape."

Questions sprung to mind at this point, but I thought it best to make my excuses and leave. Still, if the Apeman can pull, maybe there's hope even for the flabby likes of The University of No Girlfriend after all...

2004-01-14T23:49:00.000Z

"SEX DISEASE TIMEBOMB" screams the board outside the Evening Standard vendor's hut. Whenever I see anything like this I like to imagine that people really are carrying around little explosive devices inside of them that might go off if they, I don't know, have too much sex, or sex with someone they shouldn't, or some other sort of naughtiness that I cannot contemplate at this moment in time.

I'm never sure whether or not I should be smug when I see things like this. "Ha!, see, I knew my policy of not being able to persuade anyone to sleep with me would pay off sooner or later. Now you've all got sex disease, possibly, and I haven't. Ha! Again!" It's fooling nobody, is it? And then I remember that it's a sensationalist headline in a crap newspaper and therefore to be taken with a huge pinch of salt, and feel even more fed up.

2004-01-07T23:47:00.000Z

I had intended to have a proper go at this this year, but I've spent most of the year to date being ill. Which isn't a terrific start to the year, but is quite useful for being the University of No Girlfriend because it reminds you of what you're missing out on. It's all very well and good having your mum ring you up to see how you are, but... well... it's not the same, is it? You want someone to tuck you in and bring you Lucozade and snuggle up to you and catch the germs so that you have to do the same for them, not this struggling on manfully trying to maintain your independence business. I'm all for stoicism but this is ridiculous.

Bue we're here now, and it's time for...

The University of No Girlfriend: Term 2 - The Reckoning

... you see how I use the scholastic motif, even though this means that the first term would have lasted about six months which would be rubbish and all the kids would rebel. Anyway.

So what have we learnt so far? (University, term, learnt, geddit? Oh, never mind.) Well, nothing much, to be honest. We've learnt that internet dating can be just as perilous for the sweaty social inadequates who are supposed to thrive on these things as the attractive normal people who are supposed to be at risk from them, that you should always avoid obsessing over someone else's girlfriend, that families can be embarrassing but you knew that already and that women who describe themselves as "bubbly" need to be avoided. But this was just the start. Because this is...

The University of No Girlfriend: Term 2 - The Reckoning

... not that I've actually decided what's going to be reckoned. I have no idea what's going to happen over the next few months, let alone if any reckoning is going to be necessary. But it sounds quite good, and that's a start.

Oh, and I didn't get off with anyone over the busy Xmas/New Year party season, but then you probably guessed that. Onwards and upwards and all that.

2003-12-01T17:41:00.000Z

Harry Hill's TV Burp, last week, on Gay Dates For Straight Mates or whatever the programme is called:

GIRL ON VIDEO: I'm very bubbly and lively.

(Cut to H HILL behind his desk)

H HILL: Bubbly! Now, what bloke ever had on his list of things he's looking for in a woman 'bubbly'? Another word for 'bubbly': annoying.

AUDIENCE: (Cheering, laughter and applause)

See? I was right.

2003-11-01T22:39:00.000Z

I'm sat in the office listening to one of my workmates quietly argue with her boyfriend about a trip to the cinema. For 20 minutes. She's moved beyond the 'trying to be reasonable stage' and moved on to a mixture of exasperation and veiled insults. She's even resorted to swearing, which I don't think I've heard her do in about 18 months of working with her.

There are times when I think that maybe I'm better off out of it after all.

The workplace! Were this a better page, frequently updated by someone who cares deeply enough about the subject to be able to write on the topic of nobody fancying him to not get a bit depressed whenever he does so, I would probably know where to look for statistics to prove that 27% of people (or however many it is) meet their partner in the workplace, but this isn't a better page and some half-hearted stabbing around in Google hasn't revealed anything. Nonetheless, I'm sure I recall reading some statistic that suggested that lots of people meet their partner in the workplace, and I'm jiggered if I'm going to let not knowing the facts get in the way of a good tale. Oh, all right, there's no tale involved, I just wanted to excuse myself for the risible amount of updating of the page.

I once tried fancying someone I worked with. It went very, very badly. Being hopelessly besotted with someone who isn't the slightest bit interested in you is bad enough, without having to see them every day. Particularly when, what with them being splendidly nice (which is the reason you became helplessly besotted with them in the first place - well, alright, that and them being horribly, horribly attractive anyway) you can't even feel slightly grudging towards them or convince yourself that you never really liked them in the first place. And so I swore off the workplace as a good place to meet someone, for the sake of my sanity if nothing else. Oh, every now and then I pass someone in the corridor and feel the urge to take a second look, but I know I must resist. Which makes me feel all the worse when I do take a second look and spend the next couple of hours feeling really guilty about it.

2003-09-01T17:34:00.001+01:00

Family gatherings are always awkward. The immediates are fine, it's just the extended family that are the problem. All they hear about you (from my mother when they speak to her - they don't call me, which, lovely people though they are, suits me fine) is that you're getting along all right and none of your limbs have been lost in a threshing accident or anything, and so they're prone to asking questions that you really don't want to answer. "When are you going to settle down?", they say. Me, I'm perfectly settled in my little flat surrounded by my stuff and generally doing what the hell I like, but that isn't what they mean.

The situation is exacerbated when the reason for the gathering is some sort of event borne out of a relative's blossoming relationship - say, a wedding or a christening. Then the questioning becomes even more pointed. "So is it going to be you next?" they say, perhaps pointing out that all of the others seem to have managed to get themselves some sort of ring on an appropriate finger now, or "it's about time you had some kids, isn't it?", perhaps going to point out how many they had at my age and resolutely ignoring the fact that by and large there tends to be another party involved and that I'm not of the correct gender to think about going it alone.

So what do I say in response to this sort of thing? "Well, er, not really" I say, and then try and steer the subject as far away from the thought of marrying and reproducing as possible. Not that I have any problems with either of those things - perfectly good way of going about things if you can manage it, but I'm not sure that I'm well-adjusted enough for it all. Possibly I could proclaim myself to be The University of No Girlfriend and thus hopelessly removed from all that sort of thing, but I'm not sure they'd quite understand, somehow.

2003-08-01T22:13:00.000+01:00

What? Oh, there you are now. So where were we ?

Oh, yes, I was about to admit that maybe I was stretching the truth slightly about internet dating. You see, the thing is, when I tried it the other, er, month, it was my second go on one of the things. I'd been on one before. For several months, in fact. I'd had all sorts of bitter experiences and yet I tried again. This all goes to show what an innocent and optimistic soul I am.

No, I'm not completely desperate, and if you're going to take that attitude you can jolly well go and read another page instead.

Anyway. I say "all sorts of bitter experience", but to be honest the bitter experiences totalled three and I only say "bitter" for effect, even if the fact that I feel the need to relay them now probably means that I've not really got over them. The first came within days of initially joining, when it became apparent that the girl whose details were so enticing that I signed up to the thing in the first place responded to my little note to her by leaving the system entirely. Naturally I decided that internet dating wasn't for me and tactfully withdrew.

A couple of months later the site started sending me the same sort of "hey, come and see all the great new people who have signed up!" sort of message that I was complaining about before, and so I reluctantly took a look, saw someone who sounded nice, sent her a message, she wrote back, and a correspondance began. She seemed sweet and funny and as ill at ease with the entire business as I was. After a few weeks, she suggested meeting up. I said that I would like to, trying to suppress any hint of over-excitement.

I never heard from her again.

A couple of months after this I found myself looking at the site again, for reasons I cannot even begin to fathom. And there was someone whose little profile thing made me smile and so I sent her a message, and she sent one back, and a correspondence began. Mostly this consisted of trivial but intriguing questions as we tried to puzzle each other out, and eventually she suggested that we meet up.

(You'll notice that I never do the suggesting that we meet up. This is because... well, because I didn't want to seem too pushy. We're heading towards the word "desperate" again at this stage, so we'll close the bracket here.)

And so we met up. Nowhere fancy, just somewhere quiet and out of the way. She was, as advertised, small and attractive and clever and funny and good company. I was, as advertised, not tall and attractive and that, but I felt I did surprisingly well given how awkward I can be in these situations (which, rest assured, is terribly awkward). We seemed to get on well. There no n awkward conversational lulls. She had quite fantastic eyes. We parted on good terms. A couple of days later I sent her a message saying that I'd had a good time and why don't we do it again some time. She replied with a festive greeting (this was in December, you see), and after that I never heard from her again either.

And the reason I mention all of this is that I saw her for the first time since the other day. On a commuter train. She lives a couple of stops down the line from me, you see, but I'd never seen her on a train before. At first I wasn't sure if it was her - our previous meeting had taken in a darkened street and a moodily lit pub, and in the cold (well, warm) light of morning I couldn't be sure at first - but I caught her eye and I decided that it was definitely her. I said nothing. Getting a train at 8am is difficult enough without trying to start conversations with anyone, let alone people who you met once and who never contacted you again. And yet there are so many questions. Well, one question - "couldn't you have at least let me know that you didn't want to see me again instead of me spending January wondering if you were going to get back to me?" - but I'd imagine I probably wouldn't have liked the answer much. I can take the rejection, honestly, but it's at least nice to know that you're being rejected.

Well, it's not nice to know that you're being rejected, but you see the point.

2003-07-01T23:32:00.001+01:00

People often stop me in the street and say, "hey there, The University of No Girlfriend, if you haven't had a girlfriend in so long you must be pretty damn desperate by now".

Actually, this never happens. People stop me in the street and say "could you spare a minute for the homeless/the disabled/deprived children/Midget Amazonian Table Monkeys" or whatever, but I tend to politely tell them that I'm very sorry but I really can't stop now. Nobody stops and says what I said in the first paragraph because nobody knows that I'm The University of No Girlfriend, because nobody knows what The University of No Girlfriend is and even if they did they wouldn't know that I'm it.

But they might if they did and they did, and if they did and they did and they did then I'd just shrug and say "well, not really". Because I'm not. Well, I am some of the time, but not most of the time. I suspect I've gone beyond desperation, in the same way that you might go beyond being tired one night when you can't sleep. You know that feeling where you've gone beyond being tired and you feel completely awake, despite it being 3am and you having been awake for 20 hours or so? That's me, that is. In the girlfriend-less sense, anyway. It's actually half past 11 and I am quite tired, but that's probably only going to confuse matters.

Of course, despite this proclamation of not being desperate, if a fairy godmother popped out of my box of Coco Pops one morning and said that I could anything I wanted, I'd almost certainly say that what I wanted was someone really nice to be my girlfriend, but I'd at least be a bit non-committal and pretend I couldn't think of anything first. But that's not the same as being desperate. Is it?

2003-06-30T23:57:00.001+01:00

I'd weaned myself off the dating page. At first I'd checked it every couple of days, then every now and then if I couldn't think of anything better to do, then not at all. It all seemed a bit pointless. Oh, there were people who looked interesting and charming and funny and generally lovely all round (if you can assume such a thing from a short blurb on an internet dating page) but try as I might I couldn't work out what on earth to say to them, and the "Hello! I don't know what you're supposed to say to people on these things, any ideas?" approach I'd adopted with the couple of people I'd sent messages to really wasn't working. It seemed too much like attempting to chap someone up, and I've never been any good at that either.

And then, as if they'd spotted that I wasn't looking at their page enough, they started sending me their newsletter, with little mugshots of the most attractive young ladies who'd recently signed up. Just in case I was able to resist this, the top of of the newsletter reads "Hi! Still single?" I mean, why not go the whole hog? Why not say "hey, still lonely and desperate? Still sitting at home on your own, masturbating at anything on TV that offers the merest hint of tit and bum? Well, here's some attractive and well-rounded young women who wouldn't be interested in you if you were the last man on earth"? It's not as if it's going to put people off.

2003-06-25T23:21:00.001+01:00

The girl at the station stands just along the platform from me. She rides in the carriage in front of the one I go for - I suppose it must be more convenient for the exit at the station she gets off at. I don't see her every morning, just when I get the later train, although I wouldn't base my decision on what train to get on a need to see the girl at the station. There are a whole range of factors which determine what train I get in the morning - what time I get up, how early I feel I need to get to work, whether I cut myself shaving and have to spend ages stemming the flow of blood, how long it takes me to choose a shirt to wear, whether I have any breakfast, whether I spill my breakfast down me and have to get another shirt - but I'd never decide to get a later train just to see the girl at the station. That would be dangerous.

The girl at the station's age is difficult to determine - some days she looks like she might not be older than 20; other days she looks as if she could be, I don't know, mid-20s or so, although that may be wishful thinking on my part. It depends on what she's wearing, really. And how wishful my thinking is on that particular day. I want the girl at the station to be in the same position as me, you see. I want the girl at the station to be in her mid-20s, single, noticing the bloke stood just down the platform from her some mornings and desperately trying to work out some way of starting a conversation with him, but not knowing how to because that sort of thing Just Isn't Done, before forgetting him as soon as the train comes in to whisk her off to wherever she goes to every day. Boyfriends? Girlfriends? Vows of celibacy? I haven't really considered this in that much depth, because that would be dangerous.

And the really odd thing is, no matter how available the girl at the station might be, she's as unobtainable as anyone I might ever come across, because despite the fact that she's there every day I can't drag myself out of bed early, there's absolutely no way to start any sort of conversation. What can you say to someone on the platform of a station at 8.15am? "So, you're getting the train then." "Do you come here often? Every weekday? Gosh." I doubt that even the fevered minds behind the highest of high-concept romantic comedies or those novels that women read on trains with pictures of flowers and non-threatening girlies and bright colours on the cover could think of a decent opening line, let alone someone as hopeless at the chatting-up business as The University of No Girlfriend.

So, what I'm saying here, ultimately, is that last week was a bad week to start a new page, and rest assured that in the meantime I haven't started a great new relationship or anything, so that's alright then. (Except it isn't, but you see what I mean.)

2003-06-17T21:35:00.001+01:00

So I put my details on an internet dating page. It seemed like the right thing to do, the sort of thing where you initially think "well, there's no harm in trying" and come to regret it within a matter of minutes. Initially it seems great - there's lots of people to choose from, and, you think to yourself, there's bound to be someone in the same situation, someone who'll understand where you're coming from and will be unable to resist you. And because she'll be so charmed by your words she won't mind when you meet and you turn out to be an ugly, clumsy, fat git, because she'll know the real you, the gentle soul buried beneath the unfortunate outer layer.

Yeah, I know, the cynic being the romantic and all that.

The first thing to do is to scan the profiles to see if there's anyone there I'd like to write to. And through this scanning some things become apparent. There are a number of recurring themes that, try as I might to not let myself instantly dismiss someone on the basis of one thing that they've said, I can't help but do it. And what were the things that put me off? These were them. These were those. Whatever.

(Not that I'm saying that these things are inherently wrong or anything. They're just things that put me off. It's important to be true to yourself, of course it is, and who's to say I'm right about anything? I certainly wouldn't say that. Anyway, that's the disclaimer out of the way.)

Bubbly personalities - what does this mean, exactly? I have this image of someone who's cheerful and chirpy and giggly and ditzy and always looks on the bright side and, try as I might, I can't think of anything more irritating. Maybe it doesn't mean that at all.

Comparisons to fictional single women, eg B Jones, someone off of Sex In The City, etc - yeah, because you in your poky flat you share with three other people in Kilburn is exactly like Sarah Jessica Parker and her out of Mannequin bring brilliantly witty and clever and glamorous in huge apartments in New York. Of course it is.

Looking for someone tall, dark and handsome - what does this mean? This means that either you have a phenomenally narrow view of what constitutes attractive, or you really haven't given this a moment's thought, doesn't it? And it's no good prefacing it with "well, I know it's a cliche, but" because that's just lazy. And besides, as I am none of these things, there really wouldn't be any point in me even trying. See also: anyone looking for someone "sexy", because, well, I'm not.

Anyone over 5'8" - it's nothing personal, really it isn't. It's not that I'm scared of women being taller than me, it's just that I can't imagine I've got much chance really, even if they don't state that they're looking for someone tall. Which they usually do. Bah.

Claiming to be "sexy" - haven't we established by now that what one person finds "sexy" is likely to be entirely different from what the next person finds "sexy"? So what are you saying you're like by claiming to be "sexy"? That you're attractive in a horribly obvious way, all short skirts and poking your tits out as far as possible and that? That you really fancy yourself something rotten and believe yourself irresistible? And yet here you are advertising on the internet? Erm, no thanks. See also: overly glamourous photographs, particularly ones involving either swimwear or pouting.

Spelling errors - now, I can accept the odd typing error - we all make them. And I realise that not everyone is good at spelling and that this has no bearing on what sort of a person they might be. And I realise that not everyone is as anal as I am about checking these things. However, spelling the name of the town you come from just isn't right. I know Streatham isn't a particularly glamourous place, but that's no excuse for spelling it "Steratham". No way. See also: using multiple exclamation marks (clear sign of a diseased mind), using "2" and "4" instead of "to", "too" and "for" (ok for something with limited characters, confusing and pointless when you've got the whole of the screen to fill up), GSOH (yeah, right), claiming to have a bubbly personality and spelling "bubbley" wrong (awful on so many levels).

Anyone who mentions their star sign, or mentions what star signs they're attracted to - actually, that bit about things being inherently wrong was a lie. "I'm a typical Libran", you say? So you have exactly the same characteristics as approximately a twelfth of the world's population, you say? Hear me now: astrology is bollocks. Basing absolutely anything, whether it's who you talk to via an internet dating site or, well, anything else you might do (such is my incomprehension of the whole business, I cannot think for the life of me what sort of choices someone might make based on their star sign) based on astrology is a remarkably stupid thing to do and I hate you.

So, having unfairly dismissed the vast majority of these no doubt charming young women in a particularly brutal fashion, I finally find someone I want to write to. She's got a cute wry smile in her photo and her little blurb hints at intrigue, at a dry wit, at being everything you could possibly want in, well, in a new chum at the very least. And not only does she not reply to my little note saying hello, she disappears forever within a couple of days. So much for that, then.

2003-06-13T23:35:00.001+01:00

It's lunchtime. I'm crossing the road. Being a dangerous and reckless fellow, I've decided not to walk the couple of yards down to the crossing, and instead I've nipped through a rare gap in the traffic. I'm keeping my eyes on the road in case anything comes speeding through, but nothing does and I make the kerb without having to break into an unseemly scamper. As I step up the kerb, I notice someone looking at me. The moment she realises I've spotted her looking at me her head snaps in another direction. She's got shortish dark hair and is wearing a black top which I can't describe properly because, well, I've never had a girlfriend and as such have never had cause to know what type of material it might be. It looks nice though. She looks nice. And she's giving me the eye.

Or is she? The little guilty snap of the head the moment she realises I've spotted her is something I recognise, because I do it enough myself. But then, maybe this is all wishful thinking on my part. It's not as if there's a long record of women (especially ones that are quite cute) finding me desperately attractive, and that's on a good day, not a sunny one where my cheeks are likely to be quite ruddy. And fond as I am of the slightly crumpled shirt I have on, it's not as if I'm wearing anything particularly striking, So maybe she's mistaken me for someone else, or she's particularly impressed with my road-crossing technique, or she wasn't looking at me at all.

This is all evolution's fault. We really should have developed some sort of system for being able to detect this sort of thing. And science has let us down as well. They faff around with these namby-pamby advances in medical technology and all that, when what we really need isn't important life saving devices, but some sort of little antenna that can be welded to the head at an appropriate age - about 13 or 14, not too early just to be on the safe side - that detects these things and bleeps frantically whenever you see someone you like the look of. Just think how society would be improved!

Well, just think about how society for useless people who assume nobody fancies them would be improved! Provided people's antennas went off at them every now and then. Obviously if you had someone who never had alarms go off at them then they'd end up feeling lonely and miserable and tormented and spend their time weeping quietly in corners. (Although weeping girls = vulnerable = cute = beeping, so maybe that would be a good thing.) And there'd be blistering arguments among couples whenever one of their antennas goes off at the wrong moment, but I'm sure after a while people would become accepting of these slight problems, and anyway this is The University of No Girlfriend and we don't care about couples. Dear me no. (Actually we should do that - the rules of The University of No Girlfriend: No 1 - Couples? Pah! Yes, that would be good. Bit obvious, maybe, but them this whole thing tends towards the bleedin' obvious, so that's not necessarily going to be an impediment.)

So, to conclude, I probably should have just felt pleased that someone cute might have fancied me instead of analysing it to death. Such is the lot of The University of No Girlfriend.

2003-06-12T23:30:00.001+01:00

Who we are and why we are here

First thing first; there is no we. The University of No Girlfriend is a one man operation. And so there'll be no more of this talking in the plural or whatever the hell it is, because that would just be stupid. Well, at least for the purpose of this little opening statement anyway. I suspect the "we" will return sooner or later, because... well, because I think it's quite a funny conceit. There doesn't have to be another reason, does there?

Who am I? Well, to be quite honest, I don't want to say too much - not because I'm anyone you know or care about, but because, well, I'm wholly unremarkable. Some bare bones: I'm... well, put it this way, on the internet dating page I left my details on the other day (more of which later) I suggested that I was looking for someone aged 23-29, non-smoker, appearance and race not an issue. Extrapolate from that what you will. I live in the suburbs of London. And that's really all you need to know. I'm just some bloke.

Why am I here? Well, we're probably going to have to split that into two as well:

Why the University of No Girlfriend

Because I don't have a girlfriend. Because I've never had a girlfriend. Not a proper one anyway, nobody I could say of "look, look over there, that's my girlfriend that is" and not worry that she might come over and tell me off for saying such a thing. And because I decided that maybe I might quite like to have a girlfriend, although saying that makes it sound like I've decided to buy a new printer or something. I think my motives here are for the right reasons, but I haven't quite worked out how to express them. This may be half of the trouble.

Why do a weblog about it?

Because I thought it might help me if I vented this out somewhere. I thought it might help me sleep, at the very least.

I suspect that this is going to get horribly cranky and misanthropic. I suspect that, no matter how I try to avoid it, it's going to get rather whiny and self-pitying. I'm hoping to high heavens that it doesn't get terribly misogynistic - I'm hoping some sort of alarm is going to go off in my head if such a thing occurs so that I stop myself before I do something I know I'll regret. I suspect that the bits I think are terribly amusing will cause anyone who inadvertently stumbles across the page to shake their heads at the wretchedness of it all. I suspect that in a couple of weeks I'll decide that this was a bad idea and delete the page immediately.

For now, however, we remain the University of No Girlfriend.