30 Dates, One Year On … Miss Twenty-Nine

To round off three months of 30 Dates boys returning to the blog to tell us about their past year, I figured it was time I did the same!

It’s my birthday.  If I changed my name every year, I’d be Miss Thirty-One.  But it’s my blog, and my rules!  And so I will remain Miss Twenty-Nine until I’m Mrs Someone or Other! 🙂

Most of you know the twists and turns my life has taken in the past year.  I’m not going to lie, it’s been one of the most surreal and incredible years of my life.

This time last year I was celebrating turning 30 with two good friends at the Chateau Marmont in Los Angeles.

I returned home the next day, realising en route what a prize A bell-end Henley Boy really was!

My Challenge was over, but the blog continued!

In September last year I was contacted by Guardian Soulmates.  I’d attended an event they ran at Vinopolis, and had come away rather unimpressed.  Instead of reacting badly to my review, they asked me to come and write for them.  By November I was speaking at their singles events, and in February of this year I was offered the job of Soulmates Blog Editor.

The role for the Guardian opened up a whole new area of journalism for me.  I began interviewing celebrities – the Hollyoaks cast, B*witched, comedians, Lucy Watson …

The more this blog grew, the more opportunities began coming my way.  Nowadays I’m contacted on a weekly basis by TV production companies, dating companies, magazines and publishers – all presenting different exciting opportunities.

At first I tried to guide the direction my life went in, and then I realised the best thing to do was to see what opportunities came my way.

A few months ago I ended up at a journalists’ dinner in the St Pancras clock tower, and beside me sat the Business Manager of Time Out.  Two months on, and I’ve just agreed to work for the magazine!  One of my favourite publications in London. 🙂

I’ve been on Channel 5 News, Radio Four’s Woman’s Hour, and my dating advice has been published in the Guardian, the Observer, The Independent and the Times.  Just this morning I had a meeting with a really big brand of workshops, about starting a series of Dating Talks.

And from all of my dating experiences was born the idea of the UK Dating Awards, which in part has become the Challenge which replaced the 30 Dates Challenge this summer.  Today is the final day that Dating Companies, Professionals and other Bloggers can enter the Awards, and it’s an exciting, but scary, foray into the world of entrepreneurship for me!  In November I will host the UK Dating Industry’s first ever Awards ceremony – and I’m basically doing the entire thing all by myself!  Sink or swim!

Back in June I gave up a really well-paid banking role to take a gamble on this crazy life! A life where every day is different, and I never know what’s coming my way.  After a full year falling in love with London, I finally moved to the capital almost a year to the day to the start of the original Challenge.  And so far I’ve loved every minute of London life.

To put the craziness of my life into context, a week ago, I was on the Last Leg on the Friday night, Woman’s Hour on the Monday, and then the following Friday, an article about me appeared in the Evening Standard.  That evening, Toby Anstis (the guy from CBBC when I was a little kid!) added me as a friend on Facebook??!! And then one of the B*witched girls took a photo of me in the ES on her commute home, and posted it on MY Facebook wall.  Talk about role reversal??!!  Some of my favourite soap stars private tweet me, and I can now send emails to people I’ve watched on TV all my life, asking if I can interview them!  Mental!!!

As for my love life…  Well since the creation of this blog, there’s only really ever been one guy who inspired and excited me to the degree that I thought we might have a future together.  As regular readers will know, I fell far too fast for Mr SC.  It all seemed like a fairytale.  I met him when I least expected to, hungover and dishevelled from the night before, on New Year’s Day 2014.  Within minutes I realised I fancied him.  Within an hour or two, I knew he was just as excited about me.  And for a few short weeks it was all really rather cool, until the reality of Sandhurst military college came along and wrecked any chance of a relationship.  And what’s gutting is I’m pretty sure it also wrecked any possibility of anything happening later down the line.  Which is a shame, as I think if we’d met each other at some other point in time, I might have ended up becoming Mrs SC eventually.

But everything happens for a reason.

And I needed to be single (and probably a little heart-broken) to kickstart all the incredible opportunities I’ve had this past twelve months.  This year has seen the blog develop into one of the biggest dating blogs in the world.  And I honestly don’t know where it’s going to take me next.

So I guess we all just sit back, and see where the next year takes me!  And yes, I know I didn’t answer the same questions all the boys did about the last year …

But I will answer one question.

What have I learned in the last year?  That for me, the right thing to do, is often NOT the safest option!

Carpe Diem!

Miss Twenty-Nine xxx