A pertinent question
So, there's this chap.

He sometimes does the pub quiz that my friends and I go to every week. I'd say about one week in three, and every quiz night, as I totter down the street approaching the distinctly-unglamorous old-man's-pub that I am proud to call my local I cross every available appendage that he'll be there.

I first saw him about four months ago. It's a small pub with a distinct crowd of regulars, most of whom are on the far side of fifty. I remember the first time he walked in. Cliche-ridden and cringeworthy as it is, it was full-blown teenage crush at first sight. I don't find that many people attractive, but I looked at him and my heart kicked like a frog being squeezed in the palm of a fat kid. I don't know what it is.

I've never spoken to him. Never even come close. I think if this situation were to present itself I would dissolve into an incoherent mess and slither under the nearest available door, Alex Mack-style. What generally happens is that for the first hour or so I'll be too terrified and nervous to even look in his direction. After a couple of drinks, I might glance at him for a millisecond. Sometimes I see him looking at me and then I smile. Amount of smiling and sneaking glances increases exponentially as the night wears on, and yet the farthest we have ever gone is to smile at each other, and once, when I was feeling particularly drunk and reckless, to wave at him and mouth a silent 'bye', as he left.

My friends would scoff if I described myself as a shy and retiring character (I am not one of the world's quietest souls), but of course, it's all so much bombast and theatrical noise-making. When it comes to something that actually puts my neck on the line (for neck, read extremely fragile ego) I'm a complete coward. I can't do it. I can't speak to him if we're stood next to each other at the bar; I can barely steel myself to look him in the eye.

I wish this wasn't the case, and three years ago it wouldn't have been. However, then had an encounter with an unfortunate sort (see previous QOTW whingings) which it seems has lamentably left me romantically disasbled.

The worst thing about this is, I know that in ten, twenty, forty years' time, I'll look back on myself as I am now and absolutely kick myself for not getting it together, for not taking advantage of the many awesome possibilities that being 26 and free and as beautiful as I'll ever get affords. But does being acutely and painfully conscious of this help me to get out of my seat, walk over to this chap and say something, even just 'hello'?

No, it does not.

So, I'll just stay sitting where I am, and hopefully soon this will all blow over.
(jennymnemonic, Fri 19 Feb 2010, 16:10, 13 replies)

A sad story, but one I'm sure most of us can relate to.
Only you can sort it though! Good luck anyway.
(Reverend Fister "a disciplined fuckwit", Fri 19 Feb 2010, 16:19, closed)

Next time you're both in the pub together,
when you're/he's about to leave just go up to him and say Hi, fancy meeting up sometime?
Or be mega smooth and just give him your number written on a piece of paper and walk off.
Or get monumentally drunk and talk to him.

You'll regret it if you don't.
(TheColonel, Fri 19 Feb 2010, 16:21, closed)

What I would do...
is let the opportunity slip through my fingers like so much sand and add it to the general pool of disappointment that is my life.

SO DON'T DO WHAT I WOULD DO
( Colonel Dracula Two manky hookers and a racist dwarf, Fri 19 Feb 2010, 16:26, closed)

Need more info
Does he come to the pub quiz with:

His wife/girlfriend?
A bunch of mates?
A Labrador wearing a harness?
(Vice Admiral Sir Charles Cockbrush KCB MBE DSO, who is finding it increasingly difficult to log into b3ta.com wants to duck your aunt and kick your puppy, Fri 19 Feb 2010, 16:27, closed)

I know exactly what you mean
exactly!
(Grabby, Fri 19 Feb 2010, 16:45, closed)

I've had my heart broken too
but you have to get back on the horse sometime. Say hi.
(Petite chien is going to do science to it, Fri 19 Feb 2010, 16:46, closed)

Go say hi. Do it. Spill your drink on him or crib an answer or SOMETHING.
(Your chap actually sounds scarily like a friend of mine. If it is, he needs the love of a good woman. So please do it.)

Regret what you did, not what you didn't do.
(No Eyed Deer, Fri 19 Feb 2010, 17:17, closed)

You have two weeks,
Then I release the hounds.
( Blind Meach Cautiously optimistic, Fri 19 Feb 2010, 17:22, closed)

Consider this
He may be as lonely as you.
(Le Grenouille, Fri 19 Feb 2010, 17:43, closed)

he's in an old man's pub, doing a quiz
chances are, he's not swamped with offers. he's only human, just speak to him, you may be surprised! he can only say no and, if he does, you can pretend you were drunk and you don't remember asking.
( Smash Monkey lowering the tone of the whole internet, Fri 19 Feb 2010, 18:22, closed)

seriously though....
...whats wrong with my van?
( ExactlyHowLongDoIHaveToBeHere, Fri 19 Feb 2010, 23:06, closed)

Go on Jenny
Like he said: it's the things you DON'T DO that you regret, not the things you DO do [may not be true in 100% of cases, but covers 99.9% of eventualities].

And like someone else said, he's almost certainly just as shy and love-sick as you are. Make HIS day.

My advice: write a limerick or something equally kitch about him and pass it to him without a word as you're leaving. This is GUARANTEED to succeed. Trust me.

Don't give him your phone number, as texting is shit, and phone conversations are awkward at best. MTFU and do it face to face.
(Che Grimsdale Best before:, Mon 22 Feb 2010, 9:32, closed)

(eyeroll)
1) Get one of your chums to start the conversation ?
If they manage to get throught eh first three minutes without drooling "my mate fancies you" then you'll have all the icebreakers you need.

2) Observe what he drinks, buy him a pint. (if he's drinking Bacardi Breezers resign yourself to the idea that he may be good to look at but probably not to eat.)

3) Do the brain thinky clever sums that say "If I speak to him and he vomits all over me I feel bad for one evening, If I never speak to him I feel bad for THE REST OF MUY FUCKING LIFE" and then just walk over and say
"Hi I'm Jenny, and tonight I'm the bravest girl in the room"
( DukeEuphoria Comes highly reccomended, Mon 22 Feb 2010, 17:53, closed)