Speed dating wasn’t fast enough meeting the Baroness

There was a young man called Ramon
who was tired of being alone.
Imagine his stress
when a man in a dress
blew him kisses and followed him home.

How many of you have encountered a man dressed up like a woman? Aha! Fortunately it’s only happened once in my life ? so far.

A few years ago I attended the first ever speed dating event held in South Africa in Melrose Arch. I read on a website that an SABC3 was going to record the evening’s events. So I jumped at the opportunity to be on tv ? I mean after all who does not want to be on tv? Normally I don’t do skydiving or bungee jumping but doing this was a very big thrill for me.

How speed dating works is as follows: you normally have 10 guys and 10 girls. The girls sit down on tables and the guys rotate after 5 minutes so they are guaranteed to meet all the woman ? as you know this does not always happen in a bar.

The Baroness Coral von ReefenhausenAnyway I moved around on a few dates and low and behold I faced the Baroness. The camera crew swooped in to capture the moment. As I sat down and she/he extended her hand, ?Well, well, well… aren’t you a handsome fellow…? Why thank you was my quick reply. ?Tell me…Ramon…where would we go on a first date..,? was her next question. This is where I had to think really, really fast. ?Oh maybe we’d go on a picnic, so we have lots of time to talk and get to know each other.? Those 5 minutes felt like an eternity with the Baroness.

My next speed dating event was a huge improvement. Popular Johannesburg radio station 94.7 Highveld Stereo ran a special competition for Valentine’s Day 2005, which turned out to be the biggest speed dating event ever. We had over 50 people and you could smell the excitement in the air. Because of the amount of people we were split into two groups, and Fastdate, hosted the function. This lead to use being split up into two groups. Now as I entered the building going upstairs where the event was taking place. I was followed by a gorgeous girl with a big smile. She had a certain energy about her, a girly, bubbly type, which so many women over 30 seem to loose. As we reached the 2nd floor, a table full of small champagne bottles waited for us. I grabbed mine without a straw as usual. This girl, Lauren, took hers and innocently placed the straw in hers. The gas in the champagne reacted and almost like a volcano this thing erupted….”Oops! I did it again”, Was the expression on her face and she giggled her shy hello. We hit it off later on and I left the venue with a kiss and a her cellphone number tucked safely in my back pocket. So in fact I broke the rules, because I didn’t bother completing the speed dating forms, evaluating all the other women.

If you’re keen on trying speed dating start by download my speed dating ebook, The ABC of Speed Dating.

Download LinkedIn Lessons ebook

This week I’m expanding my LinkedIn connections. This has become a ritual that I undergo every two or three months. What I do is I identify a group of people and I invite as many of them to connect with Ramon Thomas on  LinkedIn, the top business social network.

Anyway, here’s the problem: Business social networking is something I truly believe in and have a lot to say about. So rather than posting is here, I’ve decided to put it into a downloadable PDF document and you can download it LinkedIn Lessons. I highly encourage you to pass it around. Give it away, offer it as a download or just point people to this blog post. It doesn’t matter. And there’s nothing “covert,” here, too. I just want to get this off my chest. Rants or raves? Post them below. I’d love to hear from you. Anyway here’s Social Networking in Plain English…

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