Tag Archives: interracial-dating

Eat Your Heart Out, Courteney Cox!

7 Nov

Cougarism seems to be all the rage these days doesn’t it? I can’t read a magazine or a newspaper without seeing an article referring to it. Even this morning’s London Metro had an article saying that TV shows such as Sex And The City and Cougar Town are inspiring older women to buy more sexy underwear. The survey was done by Debenhams lingerie dept (blatant PR story) but you get the point, Cougars are obviously cool!

 

Cougar, for those who don’t know, is a slang word for women of an older age (ahem) who likes to pursue younger men (Other popular terms – cradle snatcher, cradle robber) aand thanks to shows like Cougar Town (starring Courteney Cox) and high profile celebs Demi Moore, Halle Berry, Madonna and Sam Taylor-Wood with a penchant for younger men, the word ‘Cougar’ has now gone mainstream.

The reason this is on my mind at the mo I because I look way younger than my 33 years and I tend to attract younger men. Prime example, I’ve been on PlentyOfFish.com for nearly 4 weeks now and other than a near miss with ‘MR PAYG’, the first guy to official ask me out on a date is a 25 year old. That’s 8 years my junior! Whenever I join dating sites I specify that I’m looking to meet guys between the age of 30- 38yrs old so to say I was a bit skeptical would be an understatement. Also my little brother is 25 in November, so it just seems a bit wrong! But with it constantly being drummed into my head that younger guys can be good for you, I figure why the hell not just go with the flow? I mean, he’s cute, he spells properly (I’ve developed major online dating spelling ‘OCD’ btw) and he’s approached me in a more polite and confident way than any of the 30-something guys I’ve been talking to. So yes, it is official peeps, I am going on a date with a 25 year old guy.

I’m in good company it seems, there are are even dating websites that specialise in catering for Cougars and their ‘young meat’ fetishes. There’s ToyBoy.com, CougarDate.co.uk and DateACougar as well. Yes, my dears, these sites are actually for real!

These days it’s all the rage and there’s no shame in it either! Why not, older men have been picking up younger girls since the beginning of time and nobody bats an eyelid. Sugar Daddies aren’t ashamed, in fact, don’t they boast about their ‘catch’ to their friends. I think that us women should do the same thing. We still got it going on, ladies! Hooray to Cougar Power!

Celebrity Cougars

 

- Demi Moore, 47 – married to Ashton Kutcher, 32

- Courtney Cox, 45 – married to David Arquette, 38

- Halle Berry, 43 – in a relationship with Gabriel Aubry, 34

- Madonna, 52 – on/off relationship with Jesus Luz, 23

- Sam Taylor-Wood, 43 – engaged to Aaron Johnson, 19

- Eva Longoria Parker, 35 – married to Tony Parker, 27

- Elizabeth Taylor, 78 – engaged to Jason Winters, 49 (GO LIZ!!)

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Are We The Ones To Blame?

7 Nov

Anyone who has read the blog for awhile will know how much I love Twitter. I’ve written many blog posts inspired by Twitter, just for starters - I Heart New York, 20 Awesome Things About Me and most recently The Modern Matchmaker July Challenge (a challenge which I failed at, btw). This post is also inspired by Twitter but slightly different to the others, this one is inspired by a BAD Twitter experience.

Following the aftermath of things crashing & burning with East End Boy, I used Twitter have a bit of a rant (as you do) and this resulted in a woman who I’d never spoken to before deciding she was going to enlighten me and tell me everything that was wrong with my behaviour towards men.

According to this woman, I need to give myself a reality check and take a good hard look at myself. According to this woman, men’s behaviour is caused by women. Apparently, I am the one to blame because I chose him in the first place. I chose him because I am in repeat mode and I am not learning. The same thing happens to me over and over again for a reason. I need to look at myself and not at others.

 

She pissed me the hell off. There may have been a hint of truth to what she was saying (lord knows the same crappy shit keeps happening to me) but, who the hell did she think she was? She doesn’t know me. She doesn’t know a damn thing about me. I bet she hadn’t even read the blog post to familiarise herself with the situation before adding her two cents worth.

I got into it with her. Another Tweeter, Kim, got into it with her too. She told us both that we need to understand our behaviour and that we ‘project’ something in us that is reflected in men and the way they act. She made my blood boil even more so when she told me to stop getting defensive and told me “listen to yourself, where the FUCK have I blamed you?” (errr, about two tweets ago, beyotch), it was all I could do to not ram my hand through my computer screen and throttle her.

Men’s behaviour is caused by women? WTF? Are men not grown-ups responsible for their own actions? She’s saying that women are the ones who cause these cowardly men to not have the balls to let us know they’re no longer interested?

I know what I think, but what are your thoughts? Are women guilty of  ’projecting’ something that determines the way a man acts? By not ‘projecting’ ourselves in the right way are we inviting them to act like complete assholes? If guys make us feel crappy should we turn around and look at our own actions? Or, like my Twitter friend Judy, do you think it sounds like the sort of excuse douchebag men use in domestic violence situations – “but she made me do it!”

Share your thoughts…

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Technology: Encouraging Laziness In The Noughties

7 Nov

Last Saturday I did something I hadn’t done in months. I partied. I partied hard! I got my hair did, got dressed up and danced all night long. It was also the perfect opportunity to mingle. Yes, I know a club isn’t the best place to meet Mr Right but hey, it might be a good place to meet Mr Right now…right?  So I worked it out. Sexy LBD, four inch heels, freshly done hair and rocked my brand new MAC Viva Glam Cyndi lipglass. I was ready to GO! There were tasty men in abundance, but typically, the guy I ended up talking to was a friend of my friends.

He seemed funny enough and was a friend of my friends, so how bad could he be? A small alarm went off in my head when he asked for my BB pin but I managed to deflect the question and change the subject.  Closer to the end of the convo, he asked if we could keep in touch, I said sure but that I didn’t even know his name. Small alarm number two went off when he took my phone to input his number. When I reminded him that I still didn’t know his name, he said “YF”.  I didn’t quite hear, so asked him to repeat it. Get this, he’d actually saved his number in my phone under the name ‘YF – Your future‘. No seriously, he actually did. I thought it was cheesy, not at all as smooth as he seemed to think it was and that it came off as something he uses on all the laydeez. (**Sidenote: Fellas, this kinda cheesiness really isn’t impressing anyone. Just sayin’)

 

 

Anyway, I rolled my eyes, laughed it off and got back to dancing up a storm with  my girls. I crawled in at 5am and after a few hours sleep, woke up to a text sent at 5.44am “U get home safe babe send me ur pin“. I’m going to ignore the  spelling and (lack of) punctuation because it’s kinda nice he asked if I got home safe but, there he goes with the BB pin business again.

I was busy with a friend so didn’t get around to replying straight away. I got another text from him around 5pm, “Babe send me ur bb bab“. By now, any slight interest I had in  him has been totally squeezed out of me. Two missed calls  later (I didn’t answer, just because I didn’t want to). I sent a text saying “Sorry I’ve just seen your missed calls. I’ll give you a shout during the week, busy with friends right now. Catch ya later”. The cheeky bastard’s reply was  ”I only asked 4 ur pin is tht so hard“.

All of this had me thinking, am I being SO unreasonable? Is it wrong that I wasn’t impressed all he wanted to do was get acquainted using BlackBerry Messenger? Am I too traditional/old school in wanting a guy to make the effort to get to know me by actually picking up the phone? Don’t get me wrong, I love BBM and I use it all of the time… with people I already know. Get to know me first. Show that you are capable of making an effort. It’s impersonal. It’s lazy.  It’s an excuse to not pick up the phone and call. Mind you, the fact he came off as being a sleazy a-hole probably didn’t help. Just sayin’.

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Book Review: Finding The Perfect Pair Of Jeans

7 Nov

A couple of weeks ago, Twitter friend JustSewTired suggested a book she thought I should read. As soon as I Googled it and saw that the author, Andrew G Marshall, is a marital therapist with RELATE – the UK’s leading counselling charity – I just knew that this was a book I needed to buy.

The cover blurb:

  • Are you tired of casual relationships and playing ‘the game’?
  • Do you want to settle down, but can’t seem to find the right person?
  • Have you just come out of a long term relationship, or had your heart badly broken?
  • Do you worry that nobody will love you again?

If any of this sounds familiar, you may have fallen into the Single Trap. You are not alone. For the first time ever, the number of single-person households in the UK us about to outnumber those with families.

In this book Andrew G Marshall draws on his 25 years experience to help readers to free themselves from the trap and to find ever lasting love (hmm, we shall see). I’ve only just started reading, but already I  am finding his take on ‘the single epidemic’ to be extremely interesting. He likened it to choosing the perfect pair of jeans. No really, he did!

An excerpt from the book:

Barry Schwartz, Professor of Social Theory and Social Action at Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania, believes that unlimited choice is just as bad as no choice and could be at the root of our high levels of unhappiness, dissactisfaction and depression. He got the idea for his groundbreaking book, The Paradox of Choice , when he went to buy some jeans. He had wornd out his old favourite pair and simply wanted to replace them. Instead, he was offered easy fit, relaxed fit, baggy or extra baggy. Did he want them stone-washed, acid-washed or distressed? the assistant asked.  While the professor looked at her blankly, she asked if he wanted zip or button fly and faded or regular. It is easy to laugh at an academic out of touch with fashion, but when it comes to dating we are in exactly the same dilemma. The internet provides almost endless choice – with countless dating sites each boasting thousands of members. If you are prepared to travel, there are literally millions of people waiting to meet you. Our gut instinct tells us that this is a good thing – surely, we are increasing our chances of a date. But could our guts be deceiving us?

Not only does unlimited choice make it harder to choose, it makes us believe that somewhere there is the perfect product. The assistant conferred with her colleague to try to decide what he meant by regular jeans, ‘you know, the kind that used to be the only kind’, and pointed him in the right direction. So far so good but Professor Schwartz began to wonder if one of the other options would be more comfortable, a better fit and ultimately look better on him. Somewhere in the piles of merchandise was a more desirable pair than the jeans in his hands. Previously when he had brought ‘regular’ jeans, they had become ‘perfect’ jeans as he wore the stiffness out of the fabric and they had given a little here and there and moulded to his body. It is the same with contemporary dating. We would like to believe that somewhere there is the ‘perfect’ partner, a soul mate with whom we can live harmoniously forever more. Unlike with the old-fashioned ‘regular’ partner, there will be no need for nasty rows or rough edges, but an immediate magical union. In reality, jeans and relationships have a lot in common. There is seldom and instant fit but, over time, we grow into both and before too long we would not wish to be parted from either.

I’m only 10 pages into the book but already I’m liking what I’m reading. It’s not great for reading on bus/train journeys because it involves ‘exercises’ that requires a notepad and a pen. I’ll be sure to report back once I’ve finished and will defin

 

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Time To Try Something New?

7 Nov

I’ve been thinking lately that maybe its time I open up and try something new. Obviously, whatever I’ve been doing in the past isn’t working for me. It is something that has been on my mind for awhile but when I saw the following tweet by @IamMercedez it confirmed what I was already thinking.

What if my problem is that who I’m attracted to isn’t who I’m supposed to be with? When I spoke with the dating expert and life coach last month they both asked me what my “type” was. For some reason (probably wanting to be “politically correct”?), I felt uncomfortable with being totally honest. The fact is that my “type” tends to be black guys. When walking down the street if I spot a hot guy, 9 times out of 10, he will be black or mixed race.

I went to a predominately white school and always had crushes on white boys as a kid. I won’t even start on how hugely obsessed I was New Kids On The Block as a child (who am I kidding, I still love them even as a 33yr old!) but those things aside, I can honestly say that I’ve not had a romantic relationship with a guy of the ‘caucasian persuasion’ as an adult. It’s just one of those things I guess.

I can’t help but wonder if like a Kenya McQueen, a character in a movie called ‘Something New’ that I watched recently, could be missing out?

Simon Baker and Sanaa Lathan as Brian and Kenya in Something New

In ‘Something New’ the character Kenya is urged on by her friends to try something new and to let go of her dream of the “ideal black man,” she goes a blind date with an architectural landscaper named Brian, only to cut the date short once she sees Brian is white. The two meet again at a party, and Kenya hires Brian to landscape her new home. I don’t want to ruin the film for you, so I’ll let you guess the rest. However, it was interesting to see how Kenya dealt with her own personal hang ups as well as those of her friends and family.

As far as I’m concerned, it’s no different to a guys having a preference for boobs rather than bums, or blondes rather than brunettes. I just happen to have a preference for black and brown skin. It’s what ‘does it’ for me. I can’t apologise for that!

However, I am absolutely aware that I’m not doing myself any favours by limiting myself and don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of white guys that I find attractive. Problem is… they are all famous hahaha! I find US actors Eddie Cibrian, Sean Faris, Hugh Jackman, Mark Wahlberg and Zac Efron (Yes. I’m aware he’s about a decade younger than me, but did you see 17 Again? Nuff said.) beyond hot! Oh, and I have to give an honourable mention to the UK’s own David Beckham (hubba hubba).

But, seriously. Have you seen Eddie Cibrian??

Eddie Cibrian *Swoon*

Isn’t he gorgeous? Here is another one, just because its my blog, and just because I feel like it….

Look at those dimples!

Now, the question is, how do I meet these guys? White guys don’t approach me and the places I tend to socialise at tend to have a predominately black crowd. I accept that my Mr Right could be black, white, yellow, green or purple but how will I know unless I’m open to it, right?

I have so much more to say on this subject but I’m interested to hear your thoughts. Have you dated outside of your own race? Do you have ‘a type’? Any tips, advice, suggestions? What do you think of Eddie Cibrian? Come on, I want to hear from you!

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