Single in Sydney: After a great first date, Sarah’s getting a second ... or is she?

SARAH’s left feeling like a contestant on The Bachelor after her latest date saw a cocktail bar turn into a walk to the station ... but she’s shocked at what happens next.

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JOURNALIST Sarah Swain has been single (but dating) for longer than she cares to remember. That’s because it’s tough out there, as any single will tell you, so to bring hope to others across the city, she’s sharing her no-holds-barred adventures on the Sydney single scene every week.

A Bachelor-style date

“I’m at the bar, sitting ... at the bar”

“Which bar?”

“Um, the one you said.”

“You went up some stairs?”

“Um, no? I think I’m in the wrong place ...”

When I finally stumbled into the bar I was supposed to be at, I was pretty impressed.

Bulletin Bar’s one of those secret spots hidden up a sign-less flight of stairs.

It was just a shame I didn’t read the directions I’d been sent by my date very carefully.

Luckily, it wasn’t too embarrassing, and the barman nodded in his direction when I arrived.

He was a guy I met on Tinder — a fellow expat with amusing chat who’d even passed the phone screening process.

I mean some blokes are just completely useless.

Is ‘Brexit” really a worthy chat-up line nowadays? Picture: AFP Photo

Maybe I was seeing this date through rose-coloured glasses?

My latest Tinder openers include one from a guy who simply questioned; “Brexit?” and another who asked: “So what did you wrote about?”

Another said: “Let’s see if we can’t turn a few drinks or dinner into a story or two. Thursday?”

Honestly!

Anyway, our chat had gone from Tinder to messaging and then we’d talked on the phone.

And I was fairly hopeful.

Even though, mysteriously, I’d had to wait two weeks until he could meet.

Still, he had a handful of children, so I guess that’s fair enough.

And it all went pretty well.

As well as having plenty to chat about, he was also taller than me, which was a welcome treat. Well, except when he bent down to show me his balding patch which I’d have otherwise not noticed.

Anyway.

We worked our way through the cocktail list, and our life stories. Even the bad bits. Well, some of them.

I was open, honest and flirty, just like all the dating experts have told me to be — and he responded.

We had seemed to have that illusive thing the dating experts always tell me about; “a connection”.

Or at least the possibility of one.

You know, like what they’re always talking about on The Bachelor.

Oh I’ve got SUCH a connection with you, Ritchie.

Nah Richie actually I don’t want your rose, thanks.

Ritchie seems to have “a connection” with all the best looking ones — has anybody else noticed that?”

However, I blame the last Red Carpet Martini for me taking up his offer to walk me to the train station — via his office.

Which wasn’t near the train station at all.

And no it wasn’t an invite to do something inappropriate on the photocopier, he just had to collect a bag or something.

And, I mean, it wasn’t quite as bad as the time I ended up in Kmart with a date, but it was pretty weird.

Anyway, after a quick kiss goodbye at the station, I thought there might be a second date.

And so did he, it seemed.

He messaged me early the next morning to say thanks for a “wonderful” evening.

He added that he'd like to see me again, but that he didn’t know when and to “bear with him”.

And I felt all smug like a Bachelor girl when she is presented with a rose (which for the non-viewers, this is the reality TV way of saying you're staying ‘for next week’ either ‘cause he fancies you’ or ‘cause you’re good telly’. Rarely both.)

I had made it to the next stage, with somebody I wanted to see again!

Bachelor contestant Keira Maguire has been quite the character. Picture: Toby Zerna

I mean, I have learned not to get too excited, but I admit, I had a tiny little smidgen of hope for a second date.

And he carried on messaging the next few days too.

But after a week of daily idle chat, there was no mention of another date.

After that, he disappeared for a two days.

So, I decided to just say what I thought — Keira-style (I’m totally getting my hair cut like her, by the way).

“Are you going to live in my phone, or will I see you again IRL (in real life), as the kids say?” I joked.

And do you know what?

He snatched the rose away.

Ripped it from my grasp, pulled the petals off, and stamped on them.

And I complain about blokes not being honest — well, this one would get a gold medal for honesty.

Because he was going on a second date, that very night.

JUST NOT WITH ME.

We all got a rose! We are all very smug. Picture: Supplied

He explained in a text that he’d been out with “a lady”- after we'd met- and was “seeing her again tonight.”

And he added: “If tonight goes well I’m going to want to see her again,” he said.

Isn’t that what he’d said to me?

I mean, he added that he didn’t know “what the rules were these days”.

And I’m not saying he was the perfect bloke for me, with an ex-wife and handful of children either.

But I felt a bit like an eliminated Bachelor contestant after the rose ceremony, sitting forlorn, in the back of a black car, heading home. Alone.

Thanks to The Billion Roses

Remember the ‘dating guru’, Andrew Mashiko? He’s running a workshop in Sydney next week, called The Relationship Detox. Tickets start at $19.