17:29 <banana> Friday night. It's easy to go out in this city - the drinking scene survived the pandemic, but it really is a drinking scene, and a good way to make a scene. Something Willie's been bred to avoid. She hasn't got any work left and she hasn't made any friends her age in this place. 17:29 <banana> There are options: Becoming a cat lady is out of the question, but she could read. Maybe call one of the people she's been avoiding from former lives. Or there's always the damn app. 17:32 <VoxPVoxD> Ugh. Going out drinking alone is so pathetic. Is it more pathetic than sitting at home with Campari and soda, curled up on her sofa and looking at misleadingly attractive photos on her phone? So far, she argues: yes. 17:33 <VoxPVoxD> But it's dire out there. She started pouring her heart out to Bob. There's a level of loneliness she's not prepared to contemplate, and it involves voluntarily fraternizing with other exiled and misfit monster hunters. 17:35 <VoxPVoxD> Not that there's anything in particular wrong with Bob, besides all of the obvious ones. But... eugh. And making friends at her normal job is out, because they're all middle-aged, her reports, or both. 17:36 <banana> For guys who're trying to make themselves look good and an algorithm that tries to surface the kind she'd like, it sure is easy to swipe left. There are occasional prospects, but also a succession of no-sales. 17:36 <banana> Tiny face. Toryface. Shirt that looks like it was designed by Wyatt Koch. A woman who's changed her gender toggle to try and tempt someone to the other side, which is apparently a 'thing' on Lesbian Bumble. Then 'Dave, 51, Student at All Life Has To Offer'. 17:37 <banana> A few more minutes of this might be worthwhile just to clear out the backlog of the hopeless. 17:37 <VoxPVoxD> 51?! That's Aster's age. 17:37 <VoxPVoxD> Jesus God she misses London. 17:38 <banana> This next pic's broken the rules and got away with it somehow. 17:38 <VoxPVoxD> Go on. 17:40 <banana> Sergio, 35. Senior Editor at Inchcape Productions. He looks younger in the drawing - an exquisitely hand-rendered self-portrait, coloured in light pastels. If it's accurate, he could be Sicilian, maybe Arabic. 17:41 <banana> Maybe a football player. If it's accurate. 17:44 <VoxPVoxD> Huh. Well, it is a nice portrait, self- or otherwise. And what it's a portrait of isn't bad either. 35's on the upper bound of old but not above it... Yeah he's earned a swipe. If it is a he, and not an even more inventive lesbian. 17:44 <VoxPVoxD> Honestly even then. 17:48 <banana> A connection! At some point in the recent past, Sergio's swiped right on Willie (How does her bio card name her?). That gives her immediate access to his profile, where there are real photos, but poor quality. 17:48 <banana> It's the same guy, looking younger than his age and beautifully proportioned, but his face is in shadow or the posture is off. It could be deliberate; he's apparently an artist as well as an editor, of documentary films 17:49 <banana> The general sense is of more coyness than you expect on a dating app profile, where first impressions really matter. His biography is more direct: 17:51 <VoxPVoxD> Her bio says "Willie, 26, Deputy Director at DCS". No last name, and the photo is a sort of gracefully chiaroscuro candid with her eyes dancing alight in the midst of some animated conversation. Even looking at it makes her homesick. It's not an angle of her you'll find on Google Image Search. 17:52 <banana> "A modern luddite, persuaded out of the stone age by tech that lets us make beautiful things. Looking for a human connection that cuts through the digital noise. I'd like to take your pulse and learn what makes you alive." 17:53 <banana> Maybe not that much more direct. 17:54 <VoxPVoxD> That's a bit cheesy... but in a cute way. So she sends a message: <that pretty portrait is an illegal representation. this is an outlaw match> 17:55 <banana> Sergio has 24 hours to respond. What's Willie doing around 8PM? 17:58 <VoxPVoxD> Cooking. She's used some of her Jack money to upgrade the kitchen. New fridge and oven are going to need to wait a couple of weeks for the men to come by with the hookups, but she got a very nice set of copper pots and a proper Vitamix... so it's soup day. 18:00 <banana> Sergio: <I've always felt that the principle behind the law is more important than decade-by-decade details.> 18:00 <banana> <Thank you for calling my sketch pretty.> 18:02 <VoxPVoxD> Squash, celeriac, roasted eggplant, mushroom... everybody loves soups. Her phone chirps, almost inaudible over the telly. But only almost. <what is the applicable Legal Principle here, do you think?> 18:05 <banana> Sergio: <Present the truth about yourself if you want to avoid disappointment?> He's replying pretty quickly. 18:08 <VoxPVoxD> Willie has to force herself not to do the same. Not just so as not to appear needy; thick soups like this can scorch fast. <i like that. it's an Elegant thought. do you feel like your artist's hand and eye is an indelible part of you? do you just not photograph well?> 18:12 <banana> Sergio: <I do love to draw. (More samples available upon request!) There are a lot of cameras around here, so I picked up the habit of shying away from them.> 18:12 <banana> <On the other hand, you've been captured by someone who knew what they were doing. Really attractive.> 18:16 <VoxPVoxD> <you're very kind! i'll have to convey that kindness to the photographer> If she ever sees her again. <is art what you do for a living? what does inchcape produce?> 18:17 <VoxPVoxD> <drowned pirates?> 18:20 <banana> The tenuous connection stretches for about ten minutes before Sergio returns. <Only if they're very, very short.> 18:20 <banana> <The company makes short films, about local history or anything else that will appeal to BBC2. I have a side hustle (inappropriate word; I am quite lazy) in caricatures.> 18:20 <banana> <Actually... give me a moment?> 18:22 <VoxPVoxD> <take your time. this celeriac won't puree itself> 18:27 <banana> There's another brief hiatus. It's possible that Sergio googles celeriac. What he sends Willie next is a sketch, inked in black-and-white with a little bit of blue shading. In it, she looks just like a part of the Yes Minister title sequence... if Paul Eddington had been a sex icon. 18:29 <VoxPVoxD> !!! <that is so gorgeous and upsetting and Glorious. I must possess it> 18:40 <VoxPVoxD> In ordinary times, Willie'd want at least a week of chatting to feel this gentleman out, look for rough edges (or for how smoothly he conceals them), pressure points, anticipatory tensions etc. But given the circumstances she's probably going to insist on possessing that sketch (which is almost certainly digital anyway, but his willingness to produce a paper copy is itself a good sign) over 18:40 <VoxPVoxD> coffee or drinks within a few evenings. Unless something goes disastrously wrong.