50-50

Do dating agencies really work? How do you trust them to hook you up with a 'decent guy'? I've never been on a blind date, and I actually don't know many people who have. It's the stuff that only happens in movies, books, or America apparently.

Nowadays almost every website I go to, there's at least one advert telling you that they can find your true love. Others go on to promise that your true love won't be a married man in a midlife crisis. Do these things really work?

Personally I wouldn't be able to go on a date with a friend of a friend if I didn't meet that friend with the other friend in attendance. It would just feel too creepy, but then again I'm damn chicken. I know that The Star newspaper of Malaysia runs plenty of get togethers for single people, forcing them to take a day out to mingle with the opposite sex, and apparently the response is always overwhelming, but how many success stories are there, or do you go just to vie for the attention of a hundred other equally desperate men?

I don't know. I'm quite confused. The gender ratios are supposed to be equal, and they more or less are, although a one percent difference could mean an excess of 100,000 people or so, but what about the other 99%?

I know plenty of guys who haven't had a girlfriend or a long term one, but all of them actually want a girlfriend - someone to look after and share their life with. So where do all the stories about men being commitment phobes come from? Or is it the women who are scared of relationships? Or are people just aiming too high? I have no idea, but the numbers don't add up!