The Advantages of Being Single

The advantages of being single are frankly not taken seriously enough. More likely to be seen as platitudes or ‘keeping your chin up’, reasons for enjoying the single life are actually life enhancing, good for the soul and blissful respite for those recovering from a difficult past relationship. So let’s here it for the advantages of being single!

1) Being free from arguments, other people’s moods and the silent treatment. You are free to enjoy any mood of your own choosing! It can actually be revealing to find out what you are like temperament wise left to your own devices. And if you’ve been through a tough time, now is the time to let your poor nerves heal.

2) Not always having to worry about what you look like or having a bad hair day.

3) Watching what you like on TV. And the main TV of the house as well!

4) Having the time to have a life of your own. Always had a hankering to learn how to scuba dive? Do it. If you fancy something a bit more sedate then check out your local evening courses. You can salsa, crochet, appreciate wine or cook soufflé until your heart’s content. It’s your time! I should probably also add start up a blog to that list. :)

5) Doing things on the spur of the moment. I’m guilty of not making the most of this one actually. But if you want to do anything from taking yourself off for the weekend to just giving up on the housework and settling in to a DVD and a glass of wine, why the hell not?!

6) Daring to be different. Sometimes it’s hard to believe this seeing as other - well meaning enough - people seem to feel so sorry for you. But daring to be on your own, to not succumb to the pressure to rush into the next relationship, any relationship, is the braver choice.

My Market Value

I honestly don’t think I’m that shallow when it comes to finding someone right for me. My past boyfriends have not been the most handsome guys in the world and that never mattered to me. But sometimes it is disheartening to come face to face with how someone views you, where they see your ‘market value’ being these days. By someone, I mean a friend. And by market value, I mean realising that because you are in your late thirties and single, any old guy will do. I’ve been introduced to a guy a few times now (not very tactfully either) who is the last person in the world I’d ever consider going out with.

I’m shocked, genuinely shocked, to find myself put in the path of someone who, 10 years ago I would have raised eyebrows at going out with! And in case you think I’m dismissing a lovely personality, all this has been taken into account - I’m really not.

The Disadvantages of Being Single - My Top 10

The disadvantages of being single are surprisingly well known to those in a relationship. Or so it would appear anyway as I am seemingly constantly reminded of them. It’s why I have become so fond of social gatherings! Here are some of my favourite disadvantages of being single. Feel free to add some of your own:

1) People thinking your ‘love life’ is an acceptable topic of conversation without boundaries or limits or respect for your private feelings. Having to answer the question ‘why?’ regarding your single status - as if you’d know.
2) Being approached by married men but given a wide birth by single men. Not just odd, but also great for the self esteem!
3) Going to weddings on your own. Talk about rubbing your nose in it.
4) Not being able to go to the pub/a movie/a restaurant pretty much when I like.
5) A disadvantage of being single that confuses me more than anything is how you suddenly become regarded as having always been single. I noticed this happening within weeks of my last major break up and it was like I may as well have been 5 years old for all I knew about relationships.
6) Not having as much money as those in couples.
7) Having no one on your side when you’ve had a bad day. Or anyone to run big, life changing decisions by.
8) Being used to bolster the self esteem of women who are in a relationship. They do this by endlessly going on about how lovely their partner has been to them, safe in the knowledge that you have no come back. An abuse of your friendship at worst, just plain boring at best.
9) The big, fat question mark that hangs over your future.
10) Always having to do the washing up.

Actually aside from the emotional aspects, I’ve made the disadvantages of being single all seem pretty trivial! Next post, let’s see how immaterial I can make the advantages of being single.

Cooking up a bit of Romance

Believe it or not, Jamie Oliver has branched out into the dating market with his new venture. Apparently he wants to help those who love food to love each other. Despite how that sounds, it’s not dating for the overweight but is in fact bringing those with a shared interest in cookery together, a dating site for foodies. Personally, I can’t think of anything worse but this is because this is yet another area that I’m an incompetent idiot in.

But that doesn’t stop me wondering how their conversations will go. And how far do they go on a first date?? Would it be considered too forward to share family recipes? I reckon that’s a third date matter.

I doubt I’ll ever found out the answer to these fascinating questions. I’m afraid this is another aspect of the dating game that will exclude me - and no doubt from the dinner parties that result from them getting together as well!

Ed Byrne and Weddings

I went to see Ed Byrne last night and he was predictably absolutely hilarious! It may be a cliché but laughter is the best medicine and I’m feeling pretty chipper today.


While he had a kind of theme around class and where to place yourself these days, a lot of the biggest laughs were for his piece on his wedding and the ridiculous amount of fuss that surrounded it. If this was truly to be the happiest day of their lives, he argued, shouldn’t it be the one day when tiny details would matter the LEAST?! Now , he claims, he wakes up to marital bliss every day - all down to knowing that he doesn’t have wedding to organise.

I’m even more convinced than ever that all you need for the perfect wedding is a plan to elope and a couple of bottles of champagne :)

EHarmony gets a ticking off

Ok, I’ve been looking at the news for online dating again so you can guess that things aren’t too exciting around here. I came across this a couple of hours ago - online dating company eHarmony have been rapped for misleading ads in their bid to take over the UK market for sad singletons (I‘m paraphrasing). The idea that a large company was being accused of false advertising is hardly surprising. I don’t believe anyone bolted upright in their chair at the mention of the statistic that “2% of US newly weds met via the site”. I find it more surprising that anyone fought their way through the fog of inertia to complain to be honest.

But there was something that struck me. Towards the end it mentions that it fails to point out in its advertising that in 20% of cases, they failed to find a match! What does that mean?? I’ve never looked at the service so I don’t know how it works but is this saying that 20% of all people who sign up are not fit for love? For relationships? For human interaction? I’m not remotely surprised that they fail to mention it, it’s got to be one of the scariest concepts I’ve ever heard of. And reason enough to stay away. That’s something about myself I don’t want to know.

Online Dating Etiquette

Seeing as online dating is a relatively new phenomenon, what shape do you think etiquette will take? Will it be identical to face to face dating? Should it be? Or will a new language and behaviour all of its own come in?

I’ve been talking to a number of guys online for a while now and it’s certainly a mixed set of rules. Some prefer to take their time and build up a rapport. Some propose meeting up from practically the first email. Some ask for more photos of you outright and some hold back despite their obvious curiosity. And so on. Horses for course I guess.

But I find it amusing that technology has somewhat commandeered the order of things. If there is any kind of a pattern to this, I’d say it was thus: from emails to swapping MSN addresses, to swapping phone numbers, which leads to texting first and then talking, which finally, if you have the stamina to last this long, leads to a date. Sometimes you can get through all of these stages in a day, sometimes it can take weeks. It certainly means that you have a wealth of contact details for someone before you’ve even set eyes on them.

So how instructive are all of these tools of communication for getting to know someone? The old fashioned way of meeting someone in a pub or club took a little guts. Braving rejection, you went to talk to them and tried to find something in common as you bellowed at the top of your lungs to one another. But it was pretty brief by online dating standards. You got a number or a date within the hour and also had learned whether the individual had lived up to appearances.

The other thing about pub dating was that you were likely to have significantly fewer options than with online dating and maybe this should tell us something. The techno version allows you to chat to literally hundreds of people if you so wish. But exactly how many people can you keep track of? What do you find out or remember of anyone? We talk more but do we say more. Maybe there was something more intimate about meeting someone while out, and frankly that’s saying something.

So here I start to wonder whether the aforementioned etiquette is actually more habit. Have we fallen into a new routine hoping that love will somehow fall into place somewhere along the line? Somehow, I’m a little doubtful that this will happen if we don’t use this new method with more aim.

But there is one thing I do particularly like. Much as I rarely have found the contact through technology to be particularly revealing when it comes to the positive sides of someone’s character, I have found it has weeded out a few unsuitables. There are those who can talk eloquently via electronic means but I’ve been surprised to find over the phone that they lacked that special something. I guess that at least has saved me an evening.