Girl on the Net

Sometimes I write posts to turn you on, and sometimes I write them so I can hop up on my soapbox and have a rant. In fact, I’m due to write a nice in-depth rant about fantasies off the back of the last two horny posts – a woman having a wank part 1 and part 2. But today I’m feeling soft and chill, and I don’t feel like getting into complex stuff. Today I am just writing because there’s a fun story I’ve been meaning to share for a while, and I love wallowing in nostalgia – especially nostalgia about times when I was blissfully happy and loved-up. I think the following is such a great date idea that other people might want to steal it and try it for themselves. This is the coolest date I went on with my Hot Punk Guy, and with some slight adaptations to personalise the schedule, it could be the best date you go on as well.

We meet at a train station that I don’t go to very often. He’s told me nothing about the plan, besides that it will involve walking, so I’m wearing comfortable shoes and I’m excited – I love a walk. Some of our best dates have involved us going for a chill, meandering wander. Our second date involved me picking a route, bringing a couple of joints, then showing him round one of my favourite green spaces in London. That was the date on which he thoroughly impressed me by asking what snack food I liked and bringing that, plus a six-pack of mini pork pies. Our third date, which he planned (we were great at equality), saw us geocaching around a different beautiful London park, stopping occasionally for pints before resuming the search for tiny hidden trinkets. As surely as golf will ruin a good walk, a silly little treasure hunt will improve it.

So I meet Hot Punk Guy at the station, on this sunny afternoon, in my comfiest shoes. I have no idea what he’s got in store, but as long as it involves a walk I’ll be happy. Our first destination becomes clear quickly – although I don’t know this station very well, I can tell we’re now taking a route that heads directly to a pub that I know well. It’s probably the pub in which I’ve had the most first dates during my time in London: well-connected enough that most dudes can get to it easily, only a short ride back to mine if that date ends up going as well as I hope. It is also, fun fact, the pub where I first met Hot Punk Guy – on the blind date set up by a borderline stranger. These days I can’t walk past the place without an echo of the delight I felt at turning up to see this gorgeous punk sitting at the most prominent table in the garden: politely early; easy-to-spot so I didn’t have to stress; wearing exactly the clothes I’d been primed to look for plus a shy smile and a shitload of tattoos.

“Pint?” he asks me, on what must by now be our fiftieth date or something, and of course I tell him, “Fuck yes.” We settle down with a drink and start reminiscing about the day we first got together. As I say, I love nostalgia. And getting to chat to the man I love about the day I first started falling for him is top tier date conversation, in my book. After two rounds (we’re great at equality), he decides it’s time to move on, and ushers me round the corner to a supermarket where we buy cans of beer and cocktails before heading to our next destination: a lovely London park. Perfect.

As we sit down, he pulls out two things. The first is a mini speaker, which he sets to a reasonable volume (there are other people nearby, and we’re not cunts) before hitting play on Our Album. I’m not going to tell you what Our Album is, that’s a bit too personal. But I’m annoyed that I can’t tell you because it is genuinely incredible. One of the things I found most compelling about Hot Punk Guy was his truly great taste in music – much of which overlaps with my own, but even when he recommended new music he never ever forced me to listen to stuff as a form of ‘education.’ He chose bands and singers he actually thought I’d enjoy, and ninety percent of the time he was bang on the money. That’s how he introduced me to The Singer who made Our Album. Regular readers will know that I have a terrible habit of subsuming men’s taste into my own. I’ll let them pick the music or choose the films or TV shows, because to me keeping dudes happy is usually more important than advocating for my own creative taste. I’ll either indulge mine when I’m alone or (sometimes, alarmingly) just stick my desires on the backburner completely. So as I write this there’s a tiny nagging worry in the back of my mind about the fact that ‘Our Album’ (and Our Song, which is on that album) was by his favourite singer. Was I doing that thing where I just accept a man’s music taste and let my own fall by the wayside? Was this a result of my desperation to impress men, eroding aspects of my own personality in service to the patriarc… oh no wait I just put the album on to check and it’s a stone-cold fucking classic. Genuinely phenomenal. Gets better every listen. Banger after banger after banger. Even after breaking up, I still adore this album. No amount of heartbreak could stop me from loving it with my whole entire soul. Thank fuck for that.

Anyway. Back to the park, and the story. This hot man puts Our Album on to his little portable speaker and I spark up a joint. It’s only as he gets out the second thing he’s brought along that it suddenly dawns on me what today’s plan is: he’s re-enacting our first ever dates! And I know this because the slightly squashed object he pulls from his jacket pocket is… a six-pack of mini pork pies.

I’m sure the glee is visible on my face, but just in case it isn’t I tell him directly: “HOLY SHIT!” I probably say, “THIS IS SUCH A FUCKING COOL FUCKING IDEA.”

He nods calmly, because he’s quite a fucking cool fucking guy, then lets me know that when we’re done with our spliff and our cans and our mini pork pies, there is one more item on the agenda. We’ve done date one and date two, but he’s also been researching options in the area for…

“OH MY GOD,” I interrupt eagerly. “We’re going GEOCACHING, aren’t we?”

We absolutely were.

Steal this great date idea

As I say, sometimes I write a particular blog post because I want to turn you on, or persuade you to my way of thinking. But other times I’m just writing because someone did something cool and I think more people should try it. Re-enacting the first three times we hung out was such a great date idea that I wanted to share it with you. It was simple and cheap – most of our best dates were, we’re both creative types so incredibly broke all the time – but devastatingly effective. It gave us the chance to reminisce and reconnect, and he knew how much I love wallowing in nostalgia. If you do too, I thoroughly recommend doing something like this.

You might not be able to re-create your first three perfectly, especially if you were more ambitious than two broke creatives finding new ways to dick around in parks, but you can definitely capture the essence of your first dates if you want to. For instance, if the restaurant you ate at on your first date has disappeared, pick one that serves a similar kind of food, or cook a similar meal yourself. Did you spend your first three dates going to gigs, then eating McDonald’s at the station afterwards when you were drunk and tired from dancing? You could achieve a similar thing by lining up an album from each band on a playlist, dancing in the living room then having powerful sex to the rest, before ordering McDonald’s to be delivered when you’re too tired to fuck any longer. The key isn’t that you’re doing the activities exactly as you did them the first time, the point (to my mind at least) is that you’re reminiscing about the times when you barely knew this person, in the gleeful and happy knowledge that they’re yours now.

Now that you’re securely together, your pork-pie picnic can be peppered with in-jokes where before there was getting-to-know-you chat. You can listen to ‘Our Album’ while you peoplewatch in the park. And although the first time round you didn’t want to scramble for each geocache and look competitive, now you can fight to be the first one to reach out and grab it.

I don’t expect all of you to want to do this yourselves, but I suspect enough of you reading this will be sentimental like I am, and agree that this is a seriously great date idea. I’ve been to some pretty cool places with some seriously awesome men, but this will always stand out as one of the best dates I’ve been on. You don’t need to spend a tonne of money, impress me with fine dining or unusual escapades (though those are fun too), you just need to come up with something playful and unique. And a re-enactment of the first three dates is a genius way to do this.

As I said in the piece I wrote about our break up: the times I spent with Hot Punk Guy are some of the most intimate and connected I have ever had in my life, and I’m so grateful for them.

This date is one of them, and I couldn’t resist sharing it.