A girl walks into a bar….

So when it comes to Internet dating you have to remember that very famous line, you have to kiss a lot of frogs to get a prince. After learning the hard truth that most men lie on their profiles I took each profile I looked at with a pinch of salt. But after trawling through nearly every profile I stumbled across Richard, he was 42, had his own teeth, height was on his side, already had children, could spell and who was chatty and witty. Only downside was he lived 200 miles away from me. We chatted for about a month online, the messages flowed freely and we would be online for most nights. Then it just so happened Richard was coming up north on business so he suggested that we could meet up and he would stay at a hotel near me – I look back on this and that’s where alarm bells should have been going off like no one’s business. Naturally still being new to this, I said yes.

The day came when I got to meet Richard. I still hadn’t mastered my nerves when meeting people for the first time and yet again I arrive at the pub car park with my heart in my mouth and my stress rash in full force spreading across my chest and neck – the height of sexiness.

I get out of the car and make the walk to the pub door – it was like walking the Green Mile. I opened the door to the pub and scanned the bar. I see a man stood at the bar checking the room out and looking twitchy. Our eyes made contact; he smiled and gave a little twitchy wave. My heart sank; he looked nothing like his picture and profile which stated he was over 6ft. Seriously what is wrong with people I thought.

I wandered over nervously, wondering how I could manage this situation. The conversation started something like this…

“Hi, how are you?” I said, “I’m good thanks, would you like a drink?” he said.

My mind was racing, wondering how I would deal with this, he looked nothing like his picture, I didn’t fancy him and I would have to have at least two drinks with him as he’s travelled 200 miles to meet me. “That would be lovely, a glass of rosé please. So did it take you long to get up here, how was the traffic?” I asked politely. “Er it only took me 15 minutes to get here” he said.

Now unless this guy had a private jet, it can’t have taken him 15 minutes to get here. I started to think, what the hell? Not only has this guy used a different picture, he’s lying about how long he’s travelled to get here.

Trying to move on from this I asked “So how was your big meeting today? Did it go well?” He replied “What meeting, I had no meeting” our drinks arrived and I took my glass nervously shaking like a leaf – this guy was a total imposter or was he just a mentalist who had short term memory loss and had forgotten he’d travelled 200 miles for a meeting up north?

Then he then went on to say “I have to say you look different from your picture, your picture doesn’t do you justice” I felt like replying, you definitely don’t look like your picture mate and believe me you’re no oil painting.

This is when I felt someone watching this awkward meeting, I turned round to see a 6ft man laughing his head off, at first I made nothing of it, I turned back around and then I had to glance back. This is when I lit up like a Belisha beacon; the stress rash must have spread from nought to sixty in one second flat. The man smirking at the bar was Richard; I’d actually manage to introduce myself to the wrong man who was also waiting to meet someone he’d met online for the first time. I immediately had to say to the wrong man “Oh god, I’m so sorry, I’m not here for you, I’m here for him. Do you want some money for that drink you’ve just bought me” the wrong man looked highly embarrassed and shook his head. I think at that moment in time he wanted the ground to swallow him up as to make the situation even worse all the bar staff were watching and laughing at us. It felt like we were in a horror movie scene. I then quickly shuffled over to Richard and made my polite awkward introduction. Thankfully this misunderstanding quickly broke the ice and I was laughing hysterically about it when we sat down with our drinks.

So how did the rest of the date go? Well I broke the two drink rule and I suggested I could drive us to a local restaurant – madness I know but he didn’t seem like an axe murderer. The conversation flowed, the time passed quickly and I didn’t spend my whole time thinking when can I escape. After dinner I drove Richard back to his hotel and there was an offer to come in for another drink. Naturally being the naïve person I was I said politely “I would love to but it’s Monday night and I’ve got to be up at 6.30am tomorrow, so I will have to take a rain check on that as I need my beauty sleep.” Richard then got out of my car and left.

After that initial meeting I emailed the next day to say what a lovely time I’d had but had no response, I waited a day, no message, another day, still no message. After a week with no message, it had suddenly hit me – the invite back to the hotel was no formality, it was an offer of a shag. I bet that was the most disappointing 200 mile round trip for Richard – I think he will be checking out the more local matches on the dating site from that moment on.