So, readers I have dipped my toe in to the murky water of internet dating again. When will I ever learn? It’s a dodgy world of players, chancers, the emotionally vulnerable, the deluded, the desperate and the fibbers. Somehow, you have to try to sift through all these undesirable weeds to find a decent one. I still believe there are a few diamonds in the rough, but need the secret formula to  smoke them out.

Entering this for the second or third time, I have become more discerning in what I want from the multitude of dating sites out there.

Five months ago I was full of high hopes when I joined a particular site, one I had heard anecdotally had been a great success for many people. It is the sort favoured by left-wing broadsheet readers in medical, legal, creative and media professions. I thought “here’s the place to meet an intelligent, interesting chap, who could debate the world’s issues and hopefully read up on witty seduction techniques!”

I was wrong. The majority I came across were pretentious bores – writing clever lists of their interests, saying things like “I prefer Waitrose to Aldi” or “My date must be able to discuss Nietzche, appreciate Schumann’s Piano Concerto in A Minor and know the difference between a Bordeaux and a Merlot.” Well, either that or a good 20 per cent of them pretended they were 20 years younger than their actual ages; and as I have always suspected those of my own age are looking for younger fillies to make babies with and to massage their egos.

There was also a long period when nothing happened at all. I got bored flicking through the almost identical lists of hobbies and “thanks for stopping bys” and seeing the pop-up messages from old men, saying they were 49, when they were actually 69.

So, after five months wasting my time – the old corresponding-with-someone-who-disappears-after-a-couple-of-weeks thing and two dates with one guy, who was lovely but with whom I had nothing in common – I decided to defect.

Now I am back on one of the biggest dating sites around (I am not naming any of these places, by the way). In just a couple of weeks it has been like moving from the Outer Hebrides to Times Square. Around eight people ‘view’ my profile every day, I receive a couple of messages a day and, when life is hectic enough with the daily routine, it’s impossible to keep up. There is still a need to sift out the diamonds, but at least here, there is more choice and not all the decent ones live 200 miles away.

I have been here, before, though and know there are many, many chancers – with higher membership, there’s a higher twat rating, a higher number of kidders and a higher number of delusionals who think they can pretend to be younger, better looking and more interesting. So we will have to wait and see.

Life was so much simpler when there were more crowded rooms to stand in and find someone’s eyes to meet…