3rd-party Hook-up No.1 – Once Beaten, Twice Sharp!

  

My friends were beginning to get worried about my newly acquired reclusive personality. No boyfriend, nothing… from home to the office and back home. On weekends, I stayed indoors sleeping the hours away. My life became soo boring, chai, no be small! My friends concluded that I needed an “intervention” ASAP. So this time around, Ola came to the rescue. One of his brother’s friends had been disturbing him to hook him up with a babe; he thought I would be a good match for the guy, so he staged the hookup. Make e no be like say... I shaa obliged to at least meet the bros.

His Stats

Before we met, and although I couldn’t really be bothered, I had to ask Ola for simple details just to form interested. Ola described him as light in complexion (erm….not my type I like me some brown sugar), of average height, outgoing, cool and a consultant. I didn’t bother to ask further questions about his personality and why he couldn’t find a girlfriend by himself.

The Connection

Since I was not interested and was just doing it to get my friends off my back for a while, I of course, didn’t want to add the dude to my Blackberry Messenger. So I told Ola he could give him only my mobile number. He called three days after Ola gave him my number and he sounded cool on the phone and very eager for us to meet. And yeah, he did try to form 'pho-neh English' for me but I ignored that bit. I don't buy into guys that 'form' abeg; I no be learner naa.

The First Date

We finally hooked up after work on a Friday to watch Columbiana at the Silverbird Galleria. It was a fantastic movie (no free advert though) but we didn’t get to talk much during the movie. After the movie, we decided to have a late dinner at Barcelos and we spent most of the time talking about the movie, undergrad days and about ourselves. He talked so much about himself, his car, trips abroad etc. and in my mind, I was like “okayyyyy...!!”. Well, I got a little bored after a while and we finally decided to leave. He offered to drop me at home but I rejected and took a cab instead. For all its worth he did put me in a cab and paid for it (e try small).

....

Although the first date wasn’t bad, I was just too busy at work to accept his subsequent date invitations but he kept in touch via phone calls (most of which I often ignored). After about four invitation denials, I accepted to go with him for his friend’s get-together. Thank God I did, 'cos that was where God actually saved me from unnecessary trouble.

The END

You know for some funny reason I was actually looking forward to the party (I guess Baba God just wanted to open his yansh, pardon my French); I even called my friends to come help me pick out what to wear (please don’t rub it in). He picked me up at home and didn’t stop gloating and complimenting me. I was taking it all in and I enjoyed the attention, to be honest.

The party was at a lounge and the setting was cool; lots to eat and drink, DJ blasting cool jams. He introduced me to his friends and sat me down while he gisted with some of them. While seated, I saw my brother’s friend walking towards me. So I stood up to say hello but he pulled me by the hand and dragged me outside. I was confused so I asked what the problem was. He was furious... To cut the long story short, this bobo was engaged to a babe based in UK! My brother's friend knew the guy and his fiancée very very well.

I became weak!

I managed to keep cool but not for long. I called Ola immediately and in between fury and disappointment; I managed to give him the gist. Ola promised to call his brother and get back to me. The five minutes it took for Ola to call me back felt like an hour. (Meanwhile, “loverboy player” was inside looking for his trophy given to him on a platter of gold). Ola confirmed it; loverboy was indeed engaged; what insolence I thought. Ah well! Thank God I found out this early.

And guess what I did next? I went back inside the lounge, picked up a drink from the waiter and as loverboy was coming towards me; with a smirk on my face; I poured the drink on his head, turned around and left him dripping of Cosmopolitan. (Erm... I didn’t actually do that but I wish I had lol). What I did though was to take a cab home and never picked his call again. I did respond once to his numerous text messages with this “I hope your fiancée realizes soon enough that she’s engaged to a lying smelling pig”; and with that he never called or texted me again.

Lesson Learnt:

*Couple picture source: www.madamenoire.com

Hook up of Life!

 

Ok now, am going to tell you guys this amazing thing that happened to me after having had series of hook up experiences with plenty bobos…

You see it was about one year… one year after my boyfriend of two years broke up with me and left me destabilized. Through about four months after the break up, I had to undergo what I call the "iREACT" stages of break up (Initial REsponse, ACceptance, and the Transformation and healing)… more on this in a later post. The transformation and healing stage got me going all spiritual about my relationship life. I had to pray and fast for wisdom in choosing a life partner. I got counsel from older and mature friends. One in particular advised that I have three lists: one for the mistakes I made in my previous relationship, another for the minimum requirements for me to start dating again and the third for the minimum qualities/requirements any prospective partner MUST have before I would consider dating him. I had taken all the advice and armed with these, I knew exactly what I wanted and would be able to recognise it when the time comes.

I knew I needed to meet new guys. I knew I needed to make more male friends, but I didn’t know how. I had never been a keen social network person….was never into Facebooking and Tweeting like most of my friends, but because I needed to meet guys, I began opening my mind to expanding my social network. I needed correct hook ups and dates (harmless dates o!). With my crazy work schedule, the best way to meet people without having to worry that they would turn out to be nose-digging serial heart breakers was through hook ups from trusted friends.

Thank God for good friends and their connections loll! Trusted friends and colleagues at work volunteered to hook me up and I kept jumping at the offers like a rat would on cheese (or does that happen only in cartoons? loll). I was a little doubtful and scared of what to expect on such blind dates and it almost got me forming uninterested and acting conceited, but am glad I didn't sha, because I learnt plenty plenty… my friends, men are a bunch of characters! I tell you.

After having "hooked-up" and dated series of guys over the months, I began to get seriously frustrated with finding my dream man. It seemed the whole world was filled with sooo sooo wrong men. One of the relationships particularly got me disappointed in men… the guy turned out to be something else after a few weeks of dating. He couldn’t even pretend for too long. Imagine! Anyway, I will give you the gist in subsequent posts.

 

Now back to the matter......

Titi had been one of my closest friends back from Unilag days. We often gisted each other about our relationships and shared great gossip times together loll. She decided to help me with another hook up and it was with her cousin! She buzzed the guy and set up the hook up by giving him my number (of course I no fit dey call man for the first meet up naa kilode! Na so I desperate reach ni loll.) Although Titi tried keeping much details about the guy from me, she gave the basic info and said she’ll prefer I discover the rest myself. We are both from the same tribe, but he worked and lived in Port-Harcourt. “Okkkk ooooo! I hear you o,” I had told her. I had to force myself to be patient and wait for the guy’s call. So the dude finally made the first call two days after Titi gave him my number. He had a calming voice and was quite funny. He spoke intelligently too. It was too good to be true. Az in…. "na so I go just jam correct set dude…just like that? Na lie joor…filmtrick toh badt,”, I kept thinking to myself with mixed feelings. He called everyday and we spent  hours and hours on the phone. After about two weeks of constant communication I asked if he had a Blackberry phone (BB). I just had to see this guy’s physical qualities before falling for him abeg…. I no won fall finish only to realise that he has frog eyes and rat ears or something loll. Fortunately, he had a BB, but before adding him to contacts I quickly changed my dp (profile picture) to one of the least attractive of my photos. Loll…I don’t even know why I did that sef hehehe.

So we were connected on BBM and gbam! He turned out okay….in fact more than okay sef. He was handsome but with big ears which I could overlook loll. He looked settled, and I allowed myself to relax a bit….but I still had my fears since we all know picture especially BB DPs can be deceptive. Photoshop had caused many babes and guys heartbreaks on hook ups over the years naa.

We got talking on phone… pinging on constantly during the day and speaking at lengths at the night. We talked about everything...likes, dislikes, hobbies, past relationships, preferred number of kids, best kissing position, secrets, fears, and all your church mind can imagine :-D

Three months later, one would have thought the “initial gra gra" (I call it I.G.G i.e. initial excitement) would have reduced yeah, but nope! We were absolutely smitten with each other. I felt I knew all about him. It was kinda weird, especially as I was yet to see him.

He finally got some time off work and flew in to Lagos to meet me. I was super excited and nervous ehnn… I even fell ill and took a day off work (lmao it wasn’t a small something). We were to have dinner at a posh Chinese restaurant in Victoria Island. I had fixed my new soon to be "one-nation" Brazilian hair and the 30minutes I spent on my make up was well worth it. I however did not want to be overtly dressed, rather wanted to look perfect but like I did not try too hard. So my make up was minimal but perfect (check!), my hair was well made and perfect (check!), my gown was new, cute and chic (check! check!) and I avoided heels and wore my lovely new sandal (check! check! check!). I made sure my sister dropped me off at the restaurant so as to maintain the ‘fresh out of AC’ look. Trust me, as I entered that restaurant, hmmmnn I could bet my BP was at a critical level.

 
I remember details of what he wore from head to toe. A well-ironed purple fitted shirt which happen to be my favourite colour, tucked into good fitted jeans and nice black belt rocked on nice black loafers, with a matching and cute black fedora hat which I toyed with and wore at some point during the date. His mushy smiles made me blush uncontrollably all through the date. He was good looking (*am love struck* hehehe) even more so physically and that did not help my blushing state much.

We had a great dinner and the date was the deal-sealer for me. My friends, that night as I slept with a smile on my face and a sweet feeling in my heart; I knew that it was the beginning of something right and a romance of a lifetime.

This story is supposed to be the conclusion of this blog since it was the final successful hook-up I had (leading to a successful relationship) after series of hook up experiences which I will be sharing in my subsequent posts. I am making this my first story because I want to let you know that hook ups do work, and it may still work for you even if you’ve had some hook-up mishaps in the past. So, before picking and treating each of my bad hook-up experiences I thought it would be great to share the story of success first.

In addition, here is my grand list of Lore's Lessons Learnt:

So tell me, do you believe that a hook up can lead to a lasting relationship and even marriage?

Talking about Hook ups! …my dear, I’ve done plenty.

 
My search for true love led to so many hook ups… and many break ups. A lot of the guys were ridiculous, and some left me delirious. Yes, a few actually did break my heart, and well, life’s lessons are never lost. Thank God I finally found true love.

You may not believe in hook ups and you may not believe in true love; you may even have gone through so many break ups, but be it for laughs or for leisure reading, just make sure you learn from my own mistakes, or at least pick some tricks for that blind date, or even some pointers to make that hook up right.

Follow, enjoy, drop a comment and send me your hook up miss or hit stories.

Most importantly, take a cue from the memoirs of a hopeful romantic in her search for romance and true love.

This is how the story goes....