A dear friend of mine, P, has just dropped a bombshell on me.

I've been on holiday in my old hometown in Cornwall for the past few days, and had gone out for a couple of drinks with P, as I only see him when I come back to Cornwall. For those of you who know the Cornish folk, anything past the Tamar bridge is classed as "up north" or "abroad". And they're right - it's a completely different world down here. I deserted Cornwall a few years ago now to go to Uni, and it was the best decision I made. P, however, believes I have become snobby now that I'm earning my own money and living in a city where life moves faster than the horse and cart pace it moves at in Cornwall.

However, despite his stubborn ways, I respect P. Years ago, we used to date. I broke his heart, but that's forgotten history now. He's a good friend of mine.

So when he turned round to me and said I was boring (albeit a drunken comment), I was very dismayed, as I've been attempting to make new friends recently and this was an attribute that I did not wish to portray when attempting to do so. We may have been talking about alloy wheels on my little 1.2 litre Corsa at the time (him for them, I against), and he told me that his reason for calling me that was only because I do things by the book, but I was still offended.

There's another reason I got so cranky about his accusation. At work, there's two groups, one of which I'm in, which are so close to each other that they may as well be one giant group. I'm good friends with the boss of the group I'm not in. The other day, he asked me what my interests were. I came up with silence. I was so embarrassed! I do have many interests, they're just in the same difficult place I'm in at the moment. I love to cook, but have no one to cook for. I love to write, but haven't had much inspiration at the moment. I did Pilates and swam, but haven't been in the city long enough to find new classes. I love to shop, but in a working environment where women are rare, male workmates don't generally want to hear or talk about that during coffee time! So I sat there, mulling this over, whilst my boss friend was waiting patiently for an answer. In front of the majority of my workmates. I'm convinced they also think I'm boring now. And when making new friends, who wants to get to know a boring person?

Life's been tricky when it's come to friends recently. For anyone who has been in a long term relationship, you will know that the hardest thing about ending it is losing all your mutual friends. Although no sides were drawn in the ending of my relationship with O, the fact that most of the mutual friends we had had originated from him, coupled with the fact that they lived in the same city as him whilst I'd upped sticks and moved over an hour away meant that the person most likely to lose touch with them was me. It's been really hard, seeing as one of my best friends was O's housemate (another P), who I miss very much.

Don't get me wrong, I've made a ton of new acquaintances since the break up, which I'm hoping in time will become closer to me and become friends. There's my two new housemates, J (male) and D (female), and I'm bonding really well with D already (J's off seeing his many women - when I'm ready to date, I'll definitely be taking a leaf out of his book!) There's my workmates, who I'm determined to get to know a lot better. And then, there's the internet dating site... However, none of these friendships are stable and long term, and I'm really crying out for someone who I can depend and rely on.

Going back to J and D for example. I haven't had the best luck over the past year with housemates. My advice to anyone looking at a live-in landlady/landlord to live with is this: DON'T! It doesn't work at all. Both of my previous housemates were live-in landladies, only children, hadn't been to uni, and had inherited their house via rich relatives/parents. The first definitely had some form of OCD (the loo roll had to match the bathroom), the second was just plain crazy (I caught her using my razor once...yuk!) You get the idea. In the villages I lived in whilst living with these head cases, I quite happily found friends, who told me that they could not live with the housemate in question themselves for the same reasons I had come up with, but even so, a part of me will always think, "What if I was the problem, not them?" J and D have shown no signs of the crazy so far, but it's still a bit nervewracking. Plus, I keep asking D out to go for drinks, and I don't want to seem overly scarily keen, or that she's the only person I have to socialise with.

I need alternatives...such as my workmates. But this has proven difficult as well! I work in a male dominated environment - generally, I get on better with men, which is why I'm really happy that I'm bonding so quickly with D in my new house. However, the problem with male dominated environments is that either a) their girlfriends aren't nearly half as friendly, or b) they start to flirt with you. Even though it's unintentional, I believe that a tiny part of making friends with men is due to mutual attraction, even if it's small. I find that I go through a stage of attraction with most new male friends - it can range from a few days to a few weeks, but it's never long until it settles.

I met a great guy, S, on a graduate programme we were doing together. He had a fiancee, who he clearly loved to bits, and he couldn't stop talking about her. After the event, S and I stayed friends, and met up for lunch every so often. I'm older than him, and definitely a lot wiser, and liked giving him advice on life, the universe and everything! Unfortunately, S's fiancee did not see the same benefits to the friendship. After accusing me of breaking up with O to get with S (which hurt in itself), she obviously hates me. I've never met her. I had words with S, as I didn't want to be in that position, but he hasn't handled it well and been behind both of our backs in the process. So I've given up on that friendship. It's not worth causing trouble.

My closest friends at work are J, who's lovely (but again it's awkward asking him out for a drink to get to know him as he also has a long term girlfriend, and I don't want to go down that road again), A, who's great fun to hang out with (I've been having feelings I can't explain for him in recent weeks - more on that later!), and then there's the very gorgeous, but totally-not-right-for-me M (more on him tomorrow). I love hanging out with these guys when I get the chance, but I don't want my social life to depend entirely on work as well!

I don't really get why I feel this way. Throughout school, you made friends with people you met at school. Through Uni, you made friends with people at uni. So naturally by this theory, your next group of friends are likely to come through work. Why do I feel so awkward asking my workmates out for drinks? Why should it be a problem wanting to get to know them and their friends, so I can expand my friendship circle?

Also at work, there's my dear T. He's not in my department, but we've been friends since our interview days. We're becoming closer, and definitely moving towards the more stable friendship I'm looking for. However, his intentions have changed - he's started flirting with me. A lot. O used to accuse him of fancying me (although they never met). T is absolutely lovely, and a real gentleman, but as much as I have chewed over a relationship with him and how great it would be, I just can't bring myself to fancy him. I'm hoping that we move deep into the "Friend Zone" before the flirting becomes a real issue...

I made a real mistake throughout Uni - I got into a relationship too early on. I missed out on the major bonding which occurs through uni. When that relationship ended, I got into a new long term relationship with O. That left me with a total of two really close uni friends, the rest, yup, you guessed it, acquaintances. One is C, the other is (another..) T. Unfortunately, T and C are both talking about leaving the country for the land of the free, so I can kiss goodbye to keeping those friendships close within the next year or so. It's a shame - I love both of them to bits. I know all their tricks, and as far as male and female relationships go, our relationships are pure friendship. It's comforting.

So, onto Plan B. About a month ago, I joined an internet dating website, stating clearly I was only looking for friendship. Once I'd filtered out the weirdos, I met some fairly decent guys on there. I'm still chatting to them, and I have to admit, the site is kinda fun. I'm even thinking of meeting up with some of them. But then what happens if I introduce them to other friends? What am I going to say when I'm asked how we know each other? Don't get me wrong - I have no qualms against internet dating. I'm just worried (seemingly TOO worried) about what other people think. So I'd prefer to find the majority of my friends (and, eventually, dates as well) through a more conventional method...

University T swears by evening classes. Whilst crying on the phone to him the other night about my lack of stable friendships and my great deal of acquaintances, he told me this would be the untapped resource I was looking for.

So I've made a plan. To join as many evening classes as I can in the hope of finding new friends. It would also solve the "What are your interests" issue. I've googled and emailed Pilates classes, dance classes, art classes, yoga classes, and many more. I've also tapped the resource of extreme sports (surfing, snowboarding and skydiving), although the latter could be due to my fascination with the beautiful M at work.

Perhaps things aren't as bad as I think. Perhaps I'm overreacting to this, and in time, I'm going to be regretting having so many birthdays to remember. Looking back at what I've just written, I seem to be more worried about how people perceive my new friendships than whether they would make me happy. Alongside my plans to make new friends in the city, I've also got a bunch of acquaintances I knew in the city before I moved here. Uni T's brother lives in the city, which will be good, as when Uni T buggers off to America, I'll have a replacement! I also have a couple of female friends, both friends of friends from my last two houses. It's just waiting for these friendship foundations to blossom into proper relationships that's put me so on edge. I feel at the moment that I'm always the tagalong to other people's complete and happy social circles, always the one asking them to do things rather than the other way around, and that if I make one wrong move, the friendship will be so new to them that it will be easy for the other person to cut me out of their life flawlessly. I guess only time will tell. I'll keep on planting seeds for now.

Til next time,

FPB