Would you dare do it?

Who'll carve the chicken?

Not that I’m intending to, but suppose I joined a dating agency. Two problems: (1) Apart from being married I’m not tempted. (2) If I simply imagined the event – fictionally – I would be cheating: it could go anyway I chose – high comedy or profound tragedy.

So I'd have to pretend I was desperate. Which is difficult; like most adults I strenuously resist desperation as a life mode. This week’s Guardian magazine carries many such encounters and most depict a civilised evening meal à deux. But elsewhere I read that many such manufactured dates end badly.

Down to basics. It’s not just me, there’s my algorithm-chosen partner. Who could quite possibly be desperate too. Hmm. I see why that could end badly.

So, suppose I, or she, recognised the other’s desperation and sought to reach out, to help? And the evening became an exercise in sociological caring. Seems unlikely, too pat.

Is there an alternative to desperation? Curiosity, say. In fact a project similar to a day out of my previous professional life. The difference being the ultimate aim: then I was after information, today I would be looking for what? Emotional expansion covering friendship as well as something more meaty.

The more I think the more I envisage a disaster arriving with the starters. My default state is to ask questions – they fill in awkward gaps. But VR, among others, has warned me that not everyone responds well to being interrogated. Nor do they respond enthusiastically when urged to ask their own questions.

Having started this hare (It’s a phrase they have in the Airedale Beagles, qv) I’m maliciously attracted towards a hilarious short story treatment. Fictional but funny. Perhaps I could discuss that over the dinner table. Offering to share the byline.