Tinternet Dating - will it bite me in the posterior?

I'm a little bit nervous. I have my first ever internet date tomorrow.

It has taken months of verbal barrage from my nearest and dearest for me to even consider this rather extreme course of action. It could have been the way I would say yes to any bloke who worked up the guts to ask me out, or the way I started throwing my number at men I was barely interested like the Midsummer Queen on parade day, but for whatever reason those I love and respect the most decided I needed help. Serious help. Internet help.

For me, internet dating has always had a kind of aura about it, a lingering scent of the unrequited, the lonesome-heart-esque; single, (desperate) and datelessness. I know that times have changed rather drastically since internet dating began, that now it is a genuine and respectable way for single people who are either surrounded by married couples with no single friends left, simply too busy with work, or are completely over the whole 'get drunk, make out with a stranger on the dancefloor who I'll go home with and then have to do the walk of shame home the next morning in my stockings and wait for you to call me' kind of dating in the city that at best results in a few awkward dates and at worst some kind of venerial disease (I'm not speaking from personal experience on the last part of that but I've heard things on the street about how these things go down). So when my friends suggested I try a particular website (and no, I'm not going to tell you which one) I submitted with only the smallest of cringes and lamentations of how incapable I now seem to be of enticing a man face to face.

I ummed, I ahhed, I made obligatory sounds of discomfort as my friend and I, with the help of a large bottle of red (she wasn't drinking that evening), wrote my profile and selected my picture. S very kindly had her graphic designer boyfriend photoshop out the drunk man behind me in my selected photo (we felt it gave the wrong impression....or possibly just too accurate an impression) - he seemed amused by the entire process but was kind enough to do it anyway. So there we were. Locked and loaded (or at least I was after consuming the entire bottle of red by myself). Confirmation email and I was in the system. And free to browse the proffered men for myself!

What a pleasant surprise it was to find so many men with whom I would have no problem dating in real life. Yes, there were a slightly larger number of guys who looked as though they had never seen the light of day and possibly still lived with their mothers at the age of 42, but I was pleased to find at least 10 men in my first foray that I could quite happily click to 'my favourites' list. And how gratifying the next day at work to be bombarded by emails from the website to announce that I had likewise been added! (There is little better than a bit of ego-stroking early on a Friday morning when the only thing keeping you for running out into the sunshine and the weekend is a cup of delicious, delicious coffee.)

So here I am, a mere 18 hours from meeting M (a rather dishy financial analyst from Camden). And I am sweating bullets. What if he sees me, thinks my picture was much, much too flattering (it was a very good picture from my recent holiday to Greece - hence all sun-bleached blonde hair and bronzed, healthy looking skin)? What if he doesn't like me? Or worst of all, what if he doesn't even turn up?!?!?!

In seconds, I am reduced from confident, professional actress and media ................ to the spotty teenager who was too nervous to ask out the guy two doors down from me who I had been in love with for the last 3 years. Yikes. Reality shock.

Deep breath. Carpe Diem, be in the now, bull by the horns and other such things that are supposed to help but really don't.

Well, wish me luck. And if you see a slightly nervous, slightly lost-looking and slightly overdressed woman at Borough Markets tomorrow morning, spare me a thought and send some good juju my way. I'm going to need it.

For the love of Marc

I purchased these Marc by Marc Jacob Wedge sandals on Brandalley for an absolute bargain - reduced from £219 to just £61 (including postage!). With their classic lines with modish heel details I just know I'll be wearing these for many summers to come.



I'm toying with the idea of incorporating a Burberry Prorsum 09/10 look by wearing tan, ever so casually scrunched ankle socks with them to transition them into Autumn/Winter. It seems such a waste to have got them now with only the occassional crisp sunny day to allow them out!

Any thoughts anyone?

MMx