Every now and again I need an ‘old git’ moment. You know: ‘why is the world so different’, ‘nostalgia was so much better back in the old days’, ‘who needs more than three tv channels anyway?’, I prefer to watch football in black and white cos that’s when Spurs win’.

Dating. Courting. Going out. Pulling. Boyfriend. Girlfriend. Ladyboyfriend. It was all so simple, so easy, so… just so ‘there’. You saw someone, you liked what you saw, you approached, you ‘chatted up’, you got blown clean out the fucking skies and never spoke to another opposing gender person for the 4 years of intense psycho-therapy it took to rebuild your self-confidence.

What was so hard about that?

Ok, there was a degree of crashing and burning, some minor humility in rejection (not that I’D know about that) but generally it only happened in a drinking environment anyway, so all forgotten by the time you offer to buy the next babe a babycham. And as soon as she said: ‘nah, I’d rarver ‘ave a pint’a bitter, fanx’ (I grew up in the East End; we didn’t need bottles of Bolinger and Michelin stars) then she was ‘my new girlfriend’. There was no pause, no delay, no months of agonising over status. She was ‘mine’. For better or worse. Generally worse, but not normally for very long anyway, so who cared?

But it was rewarding when you weren’t rejected. It felt fantastic. It was exciting. And it was fun.

The other day I read an article about two guys who are starting something ‘new and imaginative’. They’re going up to girls in the street and actually asking them out for a drink. Like in words. Face to face. No texts, emails, instagramming, snapchat or tinder. I mean; how fucking inventive is that???? What will they think of next?

Love at first sight has been replaced by ‘like’ at first view online. Dating, like so much in contemporary life, is done online, via screens. ‘Check out the tits on that’ has been replaced by ‘look at this app’. Its awful. Where’s the frisson? The charge? The giant step into uncharted territory?

Its all become too calculated, too organised, too clinical. Before you actually have a conversation with anyone you know their entire history, their cv, prospects, lifestyle, dating and sexual experiences and their favourite coffee shop. Even though it could all be made up and there’s some 90 year-old pervert on the other end of the photo of Harry Styles. Or of Taylor Swift.

So get out there. Be brave. Be bold. Be reckless. Rejection only hurts every time and in a massive, soul-destroying way. How bad can it be?

Happy chatty sunday

A xxxx