epsiode 15

A cocktail and a canapé

Having still not met anyone I really liked, my friend and I had been talking about going to another singles event in London. We searched the internet and found a cocktail evening. After speed-dating and Zoo dating, this sounded like a welcome step in the right direction. The event was held in a nice bar in London, the price included a complimentary drink and canapés, and there would be about sixty people there altogether, with an even split of men and women. Well, if someone was going to go to the trouble of providing about thirty single men, then it would be rude of me not to present myself to them.
My friend and I arrived, a tiny bit too much on time so we had a cheeky glass of Champagne before we joined the party. Our names were checked off and we were given our cocktail. It was very nice, and as we sipped the pink concoction we were approached by the organiser. We introduced ourselves and she asked where we’d come from.
‘North London.’
‘Do you work there?’ she asked.
‘Yes and live there.’
‘Oh.’ Then she talked about herself in an annoying way for a few minutes before getting bored, (we were too), mumbling something about mingling and having a good night and left. My friend and I exchanged glances. At least hockey captain had introduced people to each other. Here, we were clearly being left to our own devices.
First, after our cocktail had been finished we needed to get some wine. Just to give us confidence you see. Then we were hungry so when we spied a tray of canapés we waited our turn, but they didn’t seem to reach us. Oh well, there’d be more we told ourselves.
Suddenly I felt very awkward, and I was glad I wasn’t alone as I looked around the room. There were more women than men (of course), so all the men seemed to be standing, daring any poor woman to approach them and unless we were prepared to, there was nothing we could do. Apart from sit down, drink wine and bitch, of course.
There was a Tamara Beckwith wannabe, who had come with a friend who seemed to be dressed as a witch. They attempted to mingle before giving up and retiring to the corner to smoke and turn people into frogs. There was a man who had brought his housekeeper with him (complete with mop), OK, I might be exaggerating but they sat in another corner looking thunderous, before leaving early. There were the wrap dress twins, who seemed to be doing quite well. One had blonde hair, a black and white wrap dress with a large pattern and knee length black boots; the other had dark hair, a black and white wrap dress with a small pattern and knee length black boots. The fact their boobs were almost hanging out seemed to make them rather popular. Suddenly a man approached us, only to practically shove me out of the way to talk to another man.
I decided that as none of the men seemed desperate to talk to us, I would talk to some of the girls. One girl said that she’d been to three cocktail evenings, and had only had one date which wasn’t even very good.
‘Why do you keep coming?’ I asked. She looked confused and shrugged. The other had been going along for much longer without success. I commented on the fact there were far more women than men, and they both said it was normally like that. I was baffled.
‘Have you noticed that there’s no more canapés?’ My friend hissed. She was right; the one tray seemed to be the only tray. We were destined to be hungry and alone.
As the evening progressed and my friend and I resisted the urge to leave early, we were approached by a man. He was about seventy, clearly gay and told us that he was there to make-up the numbers. He then drew our attention to another gay man. We felt so much better.
Following him we did speak to some men. One cute guy approached us at the bar and said that he aimed to speak to at least ten women that night; we were numbers seven and eight. Anyway, it was all going swimmingly; he worked in publishing, I was a writer. He was writing a book, and it was damn good (according to him of course).
‘What kind of books does your company publish?’ I asked.
‘I don’t know. I’ve only been there three days.’
‘Oh and what do you do?’
‘I’m doing work experience.’ He then skipped off to woo numbers nine and ten.
We were then approached by a Piers Morgan look-alike. He announced in his booming voice that he had been sent to ‘vet us. I demurely told him to ‘f*** off.’ My friend thought she heard him tell someone else that he was also there to make up the numbers. Now, I have to say if I was choosing men to make up the number on a straight singles night out for thirty and forty something’s then I would ensure they were:
straight, or able to behave as if they were
not over fifty
able to keep their bloody mouths shut
We finally admitted defeat and still hungry, ended up in a burger place wearing our cocktail dresses and heels. We shared a burger and chips. Then we debriefed.
Final man count: Four. Apart from old gay man, Piers Morgan, and work experience boy there was also a guy carrying a large man-bag. When asked what said bag held, he replied tetchily; ‘the kind of shit men carry,’ before going off to talk to another man. About normal man-bag content, one hopes.
No one made any attempt to introduce us to anyone else, and hardly any to introduce themselves to us. Were we hideous? No, but that situation made us feel as if we were. We had paid to stand in a room like a couple of idiots and be largely ignored. So, perhaps we should have been more confident and approached the men but that’s not always easy, especially when you have to trample over about forty other eager women to do so. The organiser should have done something; after all, there’s no way that we’re going to pay good money for a cocktail and a canapé served up with humiliation ever again.

Next Week: Accidental Internet Date