Have you ever seen that clip of where Madonna is in a really hot room and she’s being interviewed and she’s like sitting there going, “Someone get me a fan, now,” and the poor girl is really crapping herself, gives her her script to fan herself. She’s like.. I love it.
I am Justin Myers, also known as The Guyliner, and I was an anonymous blogger for nearly seven years and now I am just a blogger. I’m sex and relationships columnist for GQ online, I was advice columnist for Gay Times for five years, I have a blog dissecting the Guardian Blind Date column, and I’m gonna give you five things that may help you survive your first date. My first tip for surviving a blind date is: do not to eat. Now, not for any of those reasons like you shouldn’t be seen eating in front of someone or you don’t want someone to think you’re greedy.
Purely because you do not want to be experiencing someone’s chewing technique for the first time on a first date. You would be surprised how badly some people behave in front of food. There’s lots of chewing with the mouth open, noises, slurping, spilling things down the front, this wiping and, for example, on one date I remember I gave in and went for a burger with a guy, and things went really well and so we kissed a little bit later on, and he left a bit of onion in my mouth.
That is 100% true. I still took him home because, you know, after suffering that trauma I think I thought I deserved it. My second tip is: don’t talk about your exes. Leave your exes at the door, leave your baggage in the cloakroom when you go on the first date. I know that going out with someone is a big part of your life and obviously your ex will have had an effect on you and your ex is probably the reason that you are actually on a date in the first place.
I do think when you go on a date you should be moving forward, and not looking too far back. I’m not saying the topic of conversation should be avoid exes completely, obviously you’ve got a holiday with them, you might have travelled with them, experienced lots of different things with them, but relationship talk, the nitty-gritty about what went wrong with your ex is just not for a first date. Look to the future, not the past. Who cares about them anyway? My third tip is: don’t get too drunk.
Have you ever seen that clip of where Madonna is in a really hot room and she’s being interviewed and she’s like sitting there going, “Someone get me a fan, now,” and the poor girl is really crapping herself, gives her her script to fan herself. She’s like.. I love it.
I am Justin Myers, also known as The Guyliner, and I was an anonymous blogger for nearly seven years and now I am just a blogger. I’m sex and relationships columnist for GQ online, I was advice columnist for Gay Times for five years, I have a blog dissecting the Guardian Blind Date column, and I’m gonna give you five things that may help you survive your first date. My first tip for surviving a blind date is: do not to eat. Now, not for any of those reasons like you shouldn’t be seen eating in front of someone or you don’t want someone to think you’re greedy.
Purely because you do not want to be experiencing someone’s chewing technique for the first time on a first date. You would be surprised how badly some people behave in front of food. There’s lots of chewing with the mouth open, noises, slurping, spilling things down the front, this wiping and, for example, on one date I remember I gave in and went for a burger with a guy, and things went really well and so we kissed a little bit later on, and he left a bit of onion in my mouth.
That is 100% true. I still took him home because, you know, after suffering that trauma I think I thought I deserved it. My second tip is: don’t talk about your exes. Leave your exes at the door, leave your baggage in the cloakroom when you go on the first date. I know that going out with someone is a big part of your life and obviously your ex will have had an effect on you and your ex is probably the reason that you are actually on a date in the first place.
I do think when you go on a date you should be moving forward, and not looking too far back. I’m not saying the topic of conversation should be avoid exes completely, obviously you’ve got a holiday with them, you might have travelled with them, experienced lots of different things with them, but relationship talk, the nitty-gritty about what went wrong with your ex is just not for a first date. Look to the future, not the past. Who cares about them anyway? My third tip is: don’t get too drunk.
Now, I like a drink and when I used to go on dates I would drink a lot because I was very, very nervous, but I do think while it helps to lower your inhibitions and maybe makes you open up a bit and be a little bit free with yourself, if you get too drunk first of all you can’t remember whether the date went well or not the next day – unless you wake up next to them, of course. You might…I don’t want to say put yourself in danger because that sounds so over the top, but maybe you’ll make decisions that you otherwise wouldn’t have made, whether it’s going home with them or whether it’s deciding to cut the date short. The main reason not to get too drunk on a date is because you do want to present the very best version of yourself, and you have to be honest, none of us are the best version of ourselves when we’re drunk.
For example on one of my dates I got a little bit excited and carried away because the conversation was quite stilted, so I drank three pints of lager probably a little bit too quickly, went to the toilet and got a text from my friend and was kind of drunkenly texting back about how the date was going when really I could have just said the word “badly” over and over again, and because I wasn’t paying attention I wet the front of my jeans. I wasn’t weeing into the toilet, I was weeing down my own trousers, and I had to go back to the date and claim that the tap in the bathroom had been very enthusiastic and it overflowed under sink, and really I was sitting there in my own wee. He wanted to come home with me.
Can you imagine? I must have looked really good that night. My fourth tip for a first date is about arrival. Don’t be late.
It’s not acceptable to be late under any circumstances, unless there’s a major natural disaster or your train gets delayed. If you are going to be late then send the text, please. If you don’t have their number I think it’s best just not turn up at all than be late, to be honest. Don’t be too early either because you only wind yourself up sitting there worrying you may drink too much before they arrive.
My ideal time for arriving to a date is precisely three minutes early. I mean, in my world if you’re three minutes earlier you’re actually on time. So, three minutes early, there’s a chance that I’ve got there before you because there’ll be a bit nervous and edgy about being late, so you get to make an entrance and make sure you make that entrance. Also, if you do spot them pretend you haven’t seen them.
Wait for them to come up to you. It’s sexier. So my final tip for a first date is: don’t worry! So many people turn up to dates a bag of nerves, and that’s completely natural, but if you’re worrying throughout the day you’re not really concentrating on getting to know this person properly. I know that there are lots of anxieties around going on a date: will they want to see you again; will they think I’m boring will they think I’m ugly?
Probably all of those things, but the best thing about it is that you have no control over it, so it’s actually pointless worrying. All you can do is look after yourself and make sure you present the best version of yourself, but don’t worry if they don’t want to see you again on a second date because you have absolutely no idea what’s going on in their life. They may and…I, actually, no, they definitely think that you’re too good for them, and that’s why they don’t want to see you again. So just own that. The dating arena is very scary, some of us are gladiators and some of us are the lion, but remember it’s fine.
You’ll be great. Good luck, and remember: gin and tonic is a perfect first date drink because it won’t meant you too gassy. I looked back at some post of someone who’d filmed me doing my speech at the launch and I just looked like a thumb in a really expensive shirt.
That’s what I’m saying. That’s bullshit. I don’t even believe that. Right.
That’s even more disgusting somehow. Yeah, I don’t come across well in that story