In a new weekly feature, Her.ie goes behind enemy lines to see what it’s really like to be single in Ireland. From speed dating to making speedy escapes, our no-holds-barred blog will follow one girl’s attempts to venture into the dating jungle, play the field and share any wisdom that she finds along the way.

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To say Josie is polite is an understatement. She’s the epitome of a lady and we love her for it. Unfortunately for Josie, it also means when she’s asked out on inappropriate dates, she doesn’t have the heart to say no. Even when she’d rather eat her phone than pass over her contact details. The date from hell started when Josie was out with a few girlfriends on a night out in Cork. She was sipping on a few glasses of wine when she was approached by a man who claimed to know her friend. Josie sat nodding politely and as he wasn’t the most unattractive man at the bar, she was happy to engage with his chatter. He then asked for her number as she was leaving and thinking it had been a while since she was on a date, she happily obliged. What Josie didn’t realise was that she’d given her number to a Class A CREEP. After a few days of texting, Josie was asked out by said mystery man. Being a man of mystery, he asked to meet her off Patrick Street where he guided her to a pub. Sitting in a snug, Josie had just got the first round in when the creep decided to seduce her… by dropping a hand. Forget conversation, wit or any attempts at getting to know her, a grope in the dark was a much more appealing option. Or at least to him it was. Josie, who is strictly non-PDA/ non-groping in the dark, wasn’t loving her predatory date in broad daylight of a Friday evening. Downing her glass of wine and clocking the fastest way to make an exit, Josie started making excuses to leave. How would she be able to leave without offending anyone? It was then that Josie came up with the genius plan. Excusing herself, she stood up to leave and explained she had to run to an engagement party with the girls. His reply? “Can I come too?” Josie started getting visions of a stage five clinger and waving goodbye, mouthed something about being ‘girls-only’ before jumping in a taxi. When he text her later that evening, she was sure to reply to say thank you. And good luck. Under no circumstances was he to believe that there was an option for round two… or at least that’s what you’d imagine. When he kept texting her, relentlessly, Josie couldn’t understand how he wasn’t getting the picture. She wasn’t responding and he wasn’t getting the message so she decided to man up and let him down gently… in her usual lovely Josie way. What she wasn’t expecting was the least gentlemanly response ever: “Well, do you just want to be lovefriends?” It was the first time we had heard this interesting choice of phrase but she wasn’t in doubt of his intentions for long as he decided to sweeten the offer with some picture texts… of sample positions. Our favourite part of the story? When Josie ran into him at an event a couple of months later, he decided to walk up to her… to tell her how rude she’d been. Josie, thankfully, is now dating a man who is worthy of her and he also likes to wait until they’re in the bedroom before he tries it on.