Monkey Business

In trying to forget Senor Boldon I dated some very peculiar men. My date with the forensic psychologist is memorable, for all the wrong reasons.

I met him online, we emailed each other for a while. He seemed terribly straight-laced and conservative. He objected to my mild and infrequent swearing (puriant cunt), he didn't drink, he liked fishing, he was a vegetarian (I never understood how this squared with the fishing). His first couple of emails were sweet and grammatically correct. I thought his job sounded pretty interesting. I agreed to meet him.

Being an old-fashioned girl I left the decision of where we should meet to him. I regretted this when he suggested Hartlepool. His rationale was it was equidistant between our two towns. I thought a gentleman would have made more of an effort and travelled further. I also thought he should have chosen somewhere a bit more elegant. And, I worried that a date with him would be as thrilling as a date with Cardinal Hulme: no swearing; no drinking; no meat and all in monkey-hanging Hartlepool.

I was late for the date. I am not proud of that, I am normally so fastidious about timekeeping that I am hours early for everything. I got directions from my elderly Uncle Stan, they were completely wrong and I ended up at the opposite end of town. Forensic Psycho looked rather stressed and anxious when I finally arrived. I think I knew as soon as I saw him that there would be no chemistry between us. He was wearing orange cords and a cheesecloth shirt. His hair was quite long and mullet-esque. He looked like a Blue Peter presenter from the '70s.

Over my Greek Salad starter I decided to quiz him. I knew he had split up with a long-term, live-in partner a couple of months prior. But he had also mentioned a brief fling after that, one that he never wanted to talk about. As he seemed so conservative I wasn't expecting any sordid revelations. I prodded a little and he confessed he had met a woman online, and immediately invited her round to his place. This was a mere week after his long-term partner had moved out. He claimed the next few hours were 'a blur', as for once he had been drinking. He claimed to have passed out and when he 'came to' he found himself performing oral sex in the garden. He went on to boastfully and lasciviously claim that his lady-friend was 'screaming her head off.' He then began to regale me with detailed descriptions of other sexual activities he got up to that night. This was over the starter. On our first meeting.

As the date progressed he demonstrated an almost David Brent-esque ability to say the wrong thing. During the main course he declared

' Oh, by the way. I am not looking at your breasts, I'm just nervous.'

Before quite unnecessarily adding

'Anyway, I am not really into breasts. . . . I mean, yours seem very nice and quite big, but I prefer legs.'

By now I was just desperate to get away from the scoundrel. For a psychologist he seemed to be totally inept at reading people. He seemed to think the date was going well.

'Of course,' he sighed, 'I know I am going to have to share you with your dogs.'

When the evening was over he offered to walk me back to my car. I tried to dissuade him, but had no luck. As we approached my beloved Ford he proclaimed,

'Ah! A Ford Focus. Look at it! Ha! Ford cars really are pieces of shit aren't they?'

He then proceeded to chase me round the Focus in an attempt to grapple with me. It was pure Benny Hill. Thankfully, I was 100% sober and was wearing my trusty ballet pumps and I swiftly out-maneuvered the seedy, cord-wearing cove. I locked myself securely in my 'piece of shit' car and scuttled home.