So, anyone following this blog from the beginning will know I’ve had a big year.  From broken soul to a hopeful re-entry into ‘life’.  Marathons run, travels overseas, tentative first dates.  What I haven’t mentioned is the forced unemployment.  Nope!  No panic, it was quite the blessing in disguise.

You see, I was paid to leave a job that I had hated for nearly five years.  Thank you, thank you, thank you!  It was about two weeks before I left for China which suited me just fine.  It left me able to finish my training wherever and whenever I liked.  Perfect.

Yes I still have bills to pay but I have enough of a leeway for about a year – if I’m careful.  Nice!  This is after all perhaps the last chance I will get to have some time off before I retire.  Unless I win lotto in the mean time – and that’s never going to happen if I don’t buy a ticket. (note to self, buy lotto ticket)

So what have I been doing with my time since I’ve been back you may ask?  Checking out potential dates of course.  There’s an abundance of online dating sites and ample opportunity to spend all day, every day, chatting online to strange men.  And it’s with great mortification that I admit I may be addicted.

Addicted to finding love.  Again.  Which I guess is a good thing.  It means I’ve still got hope that I will one day find The One to share my life with.  So it is with high hopes but no expectations that I comb the online profiles for potential candidates.

Can any guy out there please tell me WHY you think a photo with your sunglasses on and not smiling is in any way supposed to attract a potential mate??  I don’t want to date someone who looks like a criminal, with or without sunglasses.  Just SMILE for heavens sake!  This is supposed to be fun. You’re supposed to be flirting.  Show me your best pearly-white grin and flash those eyes at me.  You can tell so much from a persons eyes.  Teeth?  Well, that’s a bit of a personal thing.  I like a decent set of knashers on a bloke.

There is a set of fellas though that will always do themselves a massive disservice by not having a profile picture at all.  Yes, it’s shallow judging each other by how we look, but it’s also a big part and parcel of who and why you fancy one person and not another.  It’s certainly not the be all and end all but it helps if you are physically attracted to someone.

Now I know I’m not everyone’s cup of tea.  And yes it is bitterly disappointing when you get turned down by someone you find attractive.  But it works both ways and in a pub or club they likely wouldn’t have held eye contact or come over to talk to you, so I can’t be disappointed if I don’t get a positive response from them online.

Likewise that bloke without the photo, or easy-to-see face shot with a smile, should NOT be offended if I am not interested in them.  These sans-photo gents often go hand-in-hand with a profile that is either not filled out at all, or offers minimal, or even untruthful information on the person.

Who do they think they are kidding??  Me?  Nah-ahh!  If they haven’t made an effort on their profile in order to attract a mate and I have, why should I take them seriously?  Am I supposed to be sucked-in by their mystique?   Am I supposed to be the one who carries the conversation by asking a thousand questions that could have been answered if they’d filled out their profile properly?  Is it a test to see if I’m going to judge them?  Well guess what, I AM JUDGING YOU.  We are judging each other.  That’s the whole point!  That’s why we’re here.  We are trying to find the perfect person to fill the (job) vacancy in our lives, partner for life.

Yes it’s a job interview.  Albeit with a few different selection criteria, but a position vacancy none-the-less.  Sure, there are going to be many different people that we could have a relationship with.  We could fit our lives together if we worked at it.  But for me, there needs to be some amount of natural ease with how I fit and feel with someone I intend to share my life with.  That’s not to say it would always be peaceful with no arguments or disagreements, no bad moods or times when one or the other of us would be walking on eggshells for a moment or two.  No relationship is perfect. But on the whole, the partnership should feel comfortable.

This is how I felt about my last relationship (obviously he didn’t and that’s evident in my previous blogs) and how I’d like to feel again.  I live in hope.  I scan the profiles with eager eyes.  Will I find ‘the one’ today?  Will I take one look into those eyes and feel the spark that everyone talks about?  Will he like me back?

It’s really all just a game.  One with which you have to take a pinch of salt – or an entire bucket if past experience serves.  You need a tough skin and a fabulous sense of humour.  Some days I know I can’t handle it.  I shouldn’t message people back if I’m going to be rude – which really is just telling it how it is, some people lack common sense and/or don’t think before they speak/write.  It’s a dance.  And some days I have two left feet.

It’s been a few days since I last looked for my love online.  The anticipation is building.  I wonder how long I will hold off?  Addiction can be a fickle thing.  Some days I can’t hold it back, yet on others, I have it beat!  As a woman I see these ebbs and flows coincide with my hormone fluctuations.  When I have my cranky-hormonal-pants on, woe betide any bloke who attempts to hit-me-up with a ‘hey sexy’ or ‘hi’ and nothing to follow, or no photo, or who has evidently not read my profile.  But catch me on a good day and there’s every chance I’ll be doing my darnedest to make that connection we all hope for.

What sort of day am I having today?  Well, let’s just say if you can string a sentence together using some basic grammar and have a smiley photo with a twinkle in your eye, hit me up!  Let’s make a date for an ‘interview’.