This isn’t the first time I have written about the advantages of being a single parent. One of the big advantages if you are co-parenting, (and there aren’t many advantages so you do have to make the most of them) is that you get a free babysitter on a fortnightly basis. On Friday night, primarily to do some research for you all (honest!) I went to the Victoria and Albert museum (V&A) and their themed night on the Future of…
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I have been thinking a lot about data and algorithms recently. After a disastrous date a couple of weeks ago I have been thinking that I might need to change my approach to the whole dating problem. I have been wondering: Can data find my future husband? What kind of algorithm would I need? I turned to Google, the oracle, the harborer of all knowledge, intelligence and a whole heap of useless and distracting information and false facts and I…
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Last Friday I went on the second worst date I have ever been on. We both swiped right on Bumble. He was fairly chatty. Some of his early questions were a bit deep and direct considering that we’d never met; he asked me why a partner might want to split up with me. I found this a curious question, but I answered because I have an aversion to small talk and sometimes you just have to cut to the chase. …
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I have wonderful people in my life; does it matter that I haven’t found The One ? It happens all the time. By the time we reach our thirties our group of school friends, or university mates is replaced by a husband or a wife. We move out of the city, where our closest companions have lived in close proximity for the last five years, to the suburbs or to the country. Our city lives are replaced by suburbia and…
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I make no bones of the fact that sometimes I would quite like to have a boyfriend. Only sometimes though! Secret single behaviours are those weird things that people do when they are alone, away from the prying eyes of the public and away from the ears of those who may condemn or criticise. My secret single behaviours include sitting on my own on the sofa eating dark Lindt chocolate and drinking wine in the evening. I am not sure…
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My phone vibrates in my pocket. It’s a notification from Bumble, the Tinder-style dating app where women message first, “you have a new connection”. The dopamine hit lasts a mere millisecond. I am not the first to talk about Tamagotchi dating. Internet dating is like trying to keep a Tamagotchi alive. I open up the match to find that Andrew* has three photos (of which two are clearly selfies) and has stated that he is 6’2” in his bio. Nothing…
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People are no longer leaving love down to serendipitous encounters. Instead they are actively looking for it. Dating apps abound. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Snapchat all provide opportunities to find ‘love’. But has social media killed romance ? All information about a prospective date is laid out before us. Name, age, height, occupation, an inspirational quote and a few posed photos make up a typical dating profile. Once swiped off the screen, our prospective date is replaced by another, and…
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Let me share some intimate truths. Pregnancy and child birth left me with piles. I fart more often. After a three course meal, I look like I am three months pregnant again because my stomach muscles aren’t what they were before I carried a baby. I am pleased to say that my pelvic floor is still in very good shape. I can happily bounce around on a trampoline and keep all of my urine in my body. That’s an achievement. …
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When I ditched the dating apps at the beginning of the year, I told myself that I would have three months off and then I would re-open some of my accounts, potentially explore some different apps and start swiping again. Oh, the delights of dating like a millennial! Now that these three months are up, I am just not sure I can be bothered. Online dating apps are so bloody boring, conversations can be so tedious, meeting these guys…
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When I deleted all of my dating apps on 2nd January this year, it wasn’t a bad date that made me do it. Nor was it the dick pics (don’t panic, clicking on that link won’t show you a dick pic), or the fact that I had been ghosted…again. It was the sheer overwhelming mundanity of it all. I was spending hours swiping left on Tinder and Bumble. I would end up going to bed really late having just wasted an…
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