The Boat-Man

After everything that happened with the Wedding-Boy and a couple of other things going badly for me at the time, I naturally needed a little pick-me up. Cue, internet dating and The Boat-Man.

Now I needed a lift and what better lift is there than a bit of attention so I decided to upload a profile to a London based dating website. I figure that I'm going to be moving back to England next year and its always good to put the feelers out so to speak and I just wanted to see whether I would get any interest.

Its been so much fun! I've had quite a few responses and I've really enjoyed having an online flirt. You have the ability to add people as favourites, basically creating a shortlist of people that you think are hot or want to keep an eye on. If you want to message someone you have to pay to sign up. Now don't laugh but I was having so much fun that I signed up for one month so I could reply to some of the messages I'd received.

So, I got an email saying that this guy had added me as a favourite, I'm thinking, hey I'm doing well at this, nearly 30 people have shortlisted me now. I look at his profile and it says a little bit about himself followed by "AmyJoanne if you are out there, send me a message". My username is AmyJoanne and I'm thinking, hmmm this is bit strange, I wonder if he meant to write that in a message to me rather than broadcast it to all of the online community. So I sent him a message asking whether what he had written in his profile was supposed to be a message to me and he said that at first he was a free member without the ability to message people so he thought he'd give that way a go to catch my eye. Anyway, we message and I like the way he writes and he seems pretty cool, perhaps a little too optimistic but taken with a pinch of salt he's ok.

I mention that I'm next back for a weekend in November but in Liverpool. After a few emails we've arranged to meet up on the Sunday afternoon as he has work to do up in Liverpool on the Monday. He calls me that week and we speak on the phone for almost two hours - crazy!

I'm playing it a little cool though, not going to get all caught up in it like I did last time with the Wedding-Boy, but how ironic, a month prior to this I was traveling to Liverpool for a date and now someone is doing it for me!

So, we met at Liverpool Lime Street (I appear to be making a bit of a habit of meeting boys there...). I was wearing nice slim jeans (not too skin tight) with my favourite brown work-man boots, a blue checked shirt and a new black jacket. I admit I was looking pretty good, hair was sitting well, skin glowing and eyes were sparkling. The Boat-Man showed up looking totally English complete with dark brown cords, white collar-less shirt, green v-neck jumper and a Barbour jacket (he was just missing the Hunter wellies!).

We walk to a pub which he knows of, very nautical, there was even a sailor eating in there complete with uniform and hat. We have a drink there and he tells me a bit about himself. We talk about where we grew up. It transpires that he comes from a very nautical family where his family runs a shipping company, hence the Boat-Man name. His father is Norwegian and he spent three years living over there and did his military service there in the navy.

After our drink we take a walk to the docks and went to see the Shakleton exhibition at the Royal Maritime Museum. The whole time the conversation is flowing quite nicely and there are no awkward moments. After the exhibition we crossed the docks to a little wine bar/shop. He seems a really lovely guy and as a date I can't really fault it. He did seem a little keen for my liking and I don't know whether that was because I was being deliberately guarded. I was very adamant with myself that I wasn't going to get carried away with it all after what happened with the Wedding-Boy. I feel like he may be putting all his eggs in one basket by going on a date with me where as I'm happy to be out dating a variety of people and am messaging about five guys on this site. Don't get me wrong, I was my natural flirty self but think I sent some mixed signals over by being a bit guarded. He said that he deliberately said some things to me on the phone prior to meeting just to see what my reaction was. For example, he mentioned that we might have an excellent date and that I'd want to go back to England to get married (to him). I said it didn't happen two years ago and it would be very unlikely to move back just for love.

I walked him back to his hotel and quite trusting of me I guess, I walked him up to his hotel room. We had a snog and he was a bit cheesy with some of the lines, saying that he had dry lips and how he wanted some of my lip balm and then proceeded to kiss me. Now not being a particularly romantic person myself, that's the kind of thing that makes me giggle but in a mocking way but he didn't seem to be phased by that. In fact, I think he said that he liked my slight sarcastic, take every thing with a pinch of salt tone. It was clear that he was hoping that more would have happened, I suppose me going up to his room didn't help, but I told him that I don't put out on a first date, well he didn't need to know about my previous Liverpudlian experience.

So after a couple of snogs, he walked me out to the reception and I left to get a cab back to where I was staying. We said that we'd see each other for a second date when I'm next back although, this was now over a month ago and its been a while since I last heard from him. He's very nice (although perhaps a little bit too try-hard), and he seemed to like me which is good. So I guess we'll meet when I'm next back and see how it goes from there.