Lucky Number 7

It turns out that I was much more bothered about the outcome of the Speed Dating fiasco than I'd given myself credit for. I wasn't interested in any one of the guys I met, but once the time came to rate people, I suddenly wanted them all to find me attractive. Conceited? Possibly. I wouldn't have even contemplated going on a date with them, I just didn't want to be rejected by people I wasn't interested in.

Did I get any ticks? Well, yes, I did. You have the option to tick for friendship, for dating or for both. Of the 21 other guys that were there, 5 of them ticked me for friendship and 2 for dating. In order for me to find out who had ticked me for what, I had to also tick them, so I played a bit of a detective game by ticking some just to see if they ticked me. For the ones that didn't, they'll now think I was interested in them, but at least I know which ones were into me.

I spent the best part of the day checking back in to see if anyone else had ticked me. All this for a bunch of blokes I didn't even fancy. But still, I wanted them to fancy me, though!!

What was most baffling was, despite his rancid drunken behaviour, Doormouse managed to get 9 ticks in total, 3 of which were for dating. But he called those men c*nts! Maybe that's what I should've done.

Next Step? If any of them email me, I'll email them back, but I'm certainly not going to instigate any contact myself.

Conclusion? It was fun (I think), but I wouldn't sink to that level again. Back to the drawing board, I think.

And no, the skin cancer man didn't tick me. And neither did the Yank.

How Many Ticks?

So, I am still alive after the Speed Dating event. I say 'alive'; I mean 'painfully hung over'.

Me and Doormouse got to the club just before 7pm - having stopped off at the pub for a bottle of wine between us - and we ran to the bar to get a couple of drinks. I knew at this point how the night was going to progress. We were given stickers with a number and a letter on - I was the first so I got 1A. Within about 20 minutes, everyone had arrived and so we had to sit at our allotted tables. This was when it dawned on me that I was about to sit and chat to 20 other guys I didn't know. I was glad to have a drink in my hand.

My first date was an American chap who was over here on business. He was so boring that I can't remember anything else that he said. After three minutes - although I wouldn't be surprised if it was actually three hours - a whistle was blown and we had to move on.

You do 7 dates, have a break, 7 more and another break and then the final 7 followed by more drinks if you want to stay. In between dates, you're supposed to jot down their name and a brief comment so you can remember them the next day when you go online and tick which ones you're interested in. For my first date, I called him 'The Yank' and the comment was 'Boring'.

Of the 21 guys I spoke to, I'd say I was not in the least bit interested in any of them. Some of them were OK, but others not so.

One guy obviously felt that I was also boring as halfway through our date, he got his phone out and started to send a text to his friend. Another guy sat down at the start of the date and then asked if he could move on to someone else before the time had even started. But my favourite has to be the lovely and jovial Keith who, when I asked him what he had done that day, said that just before he'd come along, he'd found out that his flatmate had skin cancer. Not sure that's the kind of information you want to hear on a date.

As for Doormouse - he got so drunk, I had to hold him up during the second break. He was falling all over the place and shouting "C*nt!" at everyone who would listen. Towards the end, we ended up having a date together too and when I asked him what he'd been putting on his card about the others, he realised that he'd not actually written a thing.

So, today is the day of reckoning. I'm just about to log onto their website to see if anyone's ticked me for friendship/dating or both.

I wonder whether Doormouse will get any ticks????

Nervous Much?

Hmm, I am very much on edge this morning. As usual, I've managed to sign myself up for something that I didn't want to do and now the hour of reckoning is approaching, I want to throw myself out of the window.

Doormouse has been trying to get me to go to a Gay Speed Dating event for months and foolishly, I finally gave in. Why? I really don't know.

He says that it'll be 'funny' and 'hilarious' and 'it'll give us something to talk about for ages'. I think it'll be 'horrific' and 'uncomfortable' and 'it'll make me want to peel my own skin off'.

He also reckons that aside from 'having a laugh', there's the possibility that we might actually meet some decent guys. I can only shudder at the kind of men who are going to attend a gay speed dating event at Turnmills on a Tuesday evening.

In my head, I'm hoping that Will Young and Jeremy Sheffield will be there and they'll fight over me and I'll end up taking them both home.

Of course, the reality is it'll be a room full of sad, lonely old mincers with acne and breath issues.

I hope I make it out alive!

Embarrassment Central

OK, well the working week is drawing to a close and I couldn't let that happen without mortifying myself before I've even got to my desk.

There's a new guy working in our marketing department called William, but I call him Mr Sexy Delicious. He wears amazing fitted suits and looks very dapper. He holds a pint like a real man and he has the air of a Premiership football player about him. Obviously, he's so far from interested in me it's laughable.

However, that doesn't stop me admiring him from afar. If I knew how to conduct myself in such situations, it'd be fine, but I don't.

Earlier on in the week, I was coming out of the toilets as he was about to go in. We could have easily manoeuvred around each other with no problem, but I got flustered, bumped into the door and then apologised. He laughed, said "sorry, dude" and walked past.

Yesterday as I was coming out of the kitchen, we had a similar incident, except I was going in to the kitchen as he was leaving. Again, I couldn't let it go without making a prat of myself and almost fell onto the water cooler and again apologised.

This morning I was soaked right through because my umbrella had broken, I had a giant overnight bag as I'm staying out all weekend and I was struggling to get my security pass out of my back pocket at the front door. He comes breezing past in his Saville Row finest, a mist of Chanel Allure above his head, takes one look at my red face and rain-soaked hair sticking to my forehead and grins.

After I'd convinced the security guard that I do in fact work in the building, I then had to get in a cramped lift right next to William. It was really difficult fighting the urge to hurl myself at him to tell him I wanted to marry him.

If he doesn't think I'm mental, he must be blind.

Is it possible to be in love with someone you've never actually spoken to?

Beware Monkeys carrying Powder

I have a friend, Doormouse, who is equally fabulous and equally searching for a boyfriend, so we decided to hit the hot new gay bar opened in Greenwich at the weekend.

Before I went, I looked at some reviews online to get an idea of what we were letting ourselves in for. Most of the reviews had been written by people who had been regulars of the pub when it was just that - an old pub in Greenwich. Since the cosmopolitanisation of the town, coffee shops and gay bars have appeared all over the place. These people weren't overly keen on the new style of Powder Monkey.

As these were not our kind of people, we thought we'd probably enjoy the 'young attractive' bar staff. Well, the boys behind the bar were pretty enough, but none of the reviews had mentioned the excessive quota of lesbians in vests at the pub.

Dykes aside, the three-storey pub was fine, but not brilliant. There was only one toilet (which had urinals shaped like lips - fabulous!), which meant during mid-dance, you'd have to navigate all the way to the basement to take a leak (or have a fumble).

There was no fumbling for me or Doormouse. It may have something to do with the fact that rather than dancing seriously, we spent most of the night trying to 'out-Janet' each other with versions of all our favourite Ms Jackson routines. Oh, and then there was the point when I fell up the stairs with a cider in one hand and a sambuca in the other.

We both tried it on with a guy called Pete at the end of the night. Pete claimed to be straight, but neither of us believed him. I made sure I took Pete's lady friend's mobile number so I can hound him through her later in the week.

Powder Monkey? Not interested.

Avoid Blind Dates Like the Plague

Straight people assume that if you're young (ish - recently 27) gay and living in London, you're having the time of your life.

Saturday nights milling around Old Compton Street, getting chatted up by dozens of moxuals, falling into Shadow Lounge after one too many Flirtinis and ending the night by taking home a Latino lovely called Luca for some hot man on man action.

Well, some of those things have happened - remember me, Luca? You still have my watch - but life as a twenty-something homo in the greatest city in the world isn't as glamorous as my straight friends seem to think it is.

While I'm all for some casual fun, I'm really just looking for what my straight female friends are looking for; that rarest of beasts: Mr Right. He's got to be pretty strong to put up with me, but I'd treat him well and he'd experience some very flexible moves.

My friends know how I feel and they have, bless them, tried as best they can to help me out.

When I say 'help me out', I actually mean 'set me up with the most ridiculous men ever born'.

The most recent example of Horrifying Blind Date Hell was a certain young chap called Sonny. The set up was the same as usual: my female friend had a friend and she had a gay friend and wouldn't it be great if we all got together for a light-hearted evening to see if the two of us hit it off etc, etc.

As it turns out, he was as mad as a box of frogs and twice as boring. The evening was one big disappointment and it came to a head when he fell over drunk in the club and started to do what he would classify as break dancing, but what I would call 'having a wild turn'.

I sashayed away from him and gave my friend a stern look. She was no match for Cilla Black.

Straight people. Why do they assume that a gentleman of the lavender persuasion will fancy every homo on the planet and can turn a blind eye to a personality disorder?