Busy bee

I had three new clients yesterday (lovely lolly) which will keep me busy for some time; the lull that always occurs at the start of the new financial year was helpful this time around as it gave me a bit of space but as things start picking up again I’m going to find it more difficult to be a social butterfly; another element to the juggling act – though I must admit I love being this busy and ‘in demand’ as it were.

Yesterday evening I met ‘J’ who lives close by (small world; turns out his ex is my actual next door neighbour), but he was really down with work-related stress so we talked a lot about that and a range of health and personal problems he’s having. I’m quite concerned about him, but I don’t know him very well so it was a bit draining trying to say the right thing and explore his problems without pushing him or saying the wrong thing. I’ll have to try and catch up with him soon to see how he’s getting on. He said he was still feeling rough today when I texted him.

To be honest, though, I was hoping for a lot more of last night, in terms of indoor sports, so I did the usual thing of jumping online and seeing what was happening. OK. I keep jumping on these sites as a backup, and then feeling a bit foolish later. It doesn’t help, so I need to stop doing that I think. Or being a bit cleverer about it. But today I'm meeting 'T' in a nice bit of south London, and we'll see how we go, so hopefully this afternoon might be a bit more fun.

Also yesterday, as soon as the time was right I sent tall handsome ‘L’ a (really duff) message;

Hi [tall handsome ‘L’],

It was a real pleasure to meet you on Thursday.

I had a great time and although I probably was a bore who only stopped talking long enough to change the foot he had in his mouth, I really would like to see you again. I do find you very attractive and charming; and should we meet again I may even pluck up the courage to kiss you (if that is something you think you might like).

To that end would you like to go out for dinner maybe Friday, Saturday, or Sunday next week?

I really hope to hear from you soon.

Mike.

Followed up with a text a while later;

Hi there. I hope you’re having a good weekend. I’ve sent you a message via [the site where we met] but as I’m no good at this I thought I’d send a text too, to say it was great to meet you and I hope to see you again.

The reply: He just wants to be friends. Shiiiiiiit. That's really really awkward; probably going to cringe about it for ages. Still, I've never been deterred by public humiliation before (if I had been I'd have gone to work in a remote lighthouse many many years ago), so I said OK, let's be friends. We'll see if we ever meet up again!

Shiiiiiit.

Mind you, I'm laughing as I type this so I guess I'll survive.

In the meantime next week is looking quite busy; ‘V’ may come over on Monday, and on Wednesday I’m seeing ‘B’; Thursday is the rescheduled date with ‘D’. I also have ‘M’ and ‘E’ who I’ll each see at some point in the week after (couldn’t squeeze them in this week, you see). I have an exam that week too, so I think this will have to do.

All in all not overly much to be disheartened about; I have decided, despite it all or perhaps because it all, that I need to work more on my self-esteem and get my head in gear because I’m not going to get any better at this without a bit more oomph/va-va-voom/je ne sais quoi/er... thingy.

What this means is I’ll be back on the diet tomorrow (with a vengeance), paying more attention to my oft-neglected friends and maybe even finding a bit of quiet time for myself at some point. Ooooh. Sounds divine.