‘Auf wiedersehen, petting zoo’

I am not an attractive man. I look like the bass player from OK Go if he lacked the upper body strength to hold a bass guitar. One day I hope to be famous enough that people will tell him that he looks like a strong Martin Pilgrim. Despite being aesthetically challenged (to use the correct term), I go on a lot of dates. I’m a dating machine. Which is what I call a calendar. Which is what I use to keep track of all my dates.

To be more specific, I go on a lot of first dates. To be even more specific, I go on the same first date over and over again with different people. I go to the same place and I tell the same pre-prepared jokes. Meet at The Canteen at 8, tell that story where I accidentally mention that I’ve met Russell Howard at 9, in bed (alone) watching Aesthetically Challenged Betty by 10. It’s Groundhog Date. The only difference between me and Phil Connors is that at no point do I consider becoming a better person.

My perfect system was thrown into disarray recently when a girl invited me to meet her at a local petting zoo on a Sunday afternoon. I was initially reluctant. It would mean preparing all new jokes. I’d have to think of a natural way to link pigs to Russell Howard. In the end I agreed though. She seemed nice and I had no Sunday plans other than possibly watching The Good, the Bad and the Aesthetically Challenged on Netflix.

………………………………………

Read more: Martin Pilgrim: ‘Why I hate summer in Bristol’

………………………………………

I arrived five minutes early and leaned nonchalantly against a fence, hoping that my aloofness would make the animals respect me more. Most of the customers were fawning all over them, but not me. I was playing hard to get. I don’t care how fluffy your face is, if you live in a petting zoo you’re in a service industry and I’m the customer.

Time dragged on and it began to dawn on me that my date might not be coming. I decided to walk around a bit. I was the only person there alone. Because it was the weekend, the place was full of young families with children. As the old saying goes, I stuck out like the bass player from OK Go at a petting zoo.

To make matters worse, all the animals seemed to be coupled up. There were two sheep, two goats, two dogs (this was not a big-budget zoo), and one strange man. I felt like a creepy stowaway on Noah’s Ark, telling all the animals that I had a gal back on land and then showing them a picture that was clearly cut out of an old Debenhams catalogue.

People saw me petting solo and regarded me with suspicion. Parents decided that I was a threat to their children whilst actively encouraging them to befriend a goat. I’m used to being seen as a weirdo, but not by people who have just driven somewhere to touch animals for fun.

………………………………………

Read more: Martin Pilgrim: Adventures in A&E

………………………………………

It got me thinking about how we treat single people. It is still socially unacceptable to be alone in a great many situations. I realise that there are far more marginalised groups in the world than the romantically challenged, but we do come off badly by some measures. Did you know, for example, that the average two people earn 100 per cent more than the average one person? This is a staggering discrepancy. Couples also have twice as many arms which is useful for tennis and counting all their money.

Popular culture constantly portrays being single as something to be fixed. I can’t be the only person who thinks that Hugh Grant seemed happiest during the first 10 minutes of About a Boy. His life was just haircuts and smiling. About a Man Doing the Same Stuff Forever is a less catchy title but I would’ve enjoyed it. (Sadly the average two people buy twice as many cinema tickets as the average one person so Hollywood will always cave to the couples lobby.)

After 45 minutes I decided it was time to go home. It seemed wasteful not to use any of my pre-prepared animal jokes so I whispered, “Here’s looking at you kid”, to a nearby goat as I left. I began walking home and realised that I was feeling surprisingly good about the whole thing. I’d never been stood up before and I always imagined it to be crushingly humiliating but, in fact, I’d had quite a nice day. The sun was out and I’d got to touch some animals for fun. As I neared my house, I got a text from my date. She’d forgotten our arrangement completely and was very apologetic. I replied, telling her not to worry, and that we could reschedule for another day.

I’m going to invite her to the Science Museum next week. It’ll be nice to finally meet her, but a part of me hopes she doesn’t show up. I want that big glowing plasma ball all to myself.

Martin Pilgrim is a stand-up comedian

Read more: ‘How I almost ruined Christmas’