Like David Blunkett once famously said about “bottling” the magic of over-performing faith school comprehensives and ejaculating it all over plain, old state schools, I wonder whether there is something  that can be mined from ITV’s Saturday night television’s behemoth Take Me Out and in doing so, utilised in a the real world.

For the past year I have been hopelessly single. Whilst there is a warm feeling of liberation attached to this, I have been left devoid of the simple traditions that come when chatting-up the opposite sex. I feel like a Vietnam veteran who has come back home to a new world where the rules have changed. That and the fact I’m also a bumbling mistake of a person. For instance, just the other day I was preyed upon by a satisfactorily attractive but predatory woman who attempted to speak to me on the dance floor. The word ‘sexy’ was fired at me which alerted me to the possibility of a smooch with said party. However, as she ebbed closer to my personal space I freaked out, instinctively pointed at my friend and proclaimed, “ Isn’t he a great dancer?” Puzzled, she left into the sea of gracelessly dancing bodies to look for another victim. Was this a microcosm for human interaction today or have I been out of the game too long? I think a heady concoction of both if I’m being truly honest.

So I began looking meticulously through compendiums of psychological study with regards to what the 21^st century man and women want from each other but found nothing. I went on hundreds of speed-dates but I was sure that I wasn’t getting the real low-down on courting. I even interviewed elderly widows and asked them their definition of romance. Still nothing. Then, I realised, it was staring my right in the chops. The answers have been there for a while now. As I lied in a pond of my own vomit and self-deprecation I could hear the tinny sounds of a studio audience. I could hear a gentleman with a strident Bolton accent asking single men to ‘reveal’ their inner-souls. I could hear women from across the length of the breadth of the country analysing said single man with unashamed frankness. Finally, I had an epiphany. If I were to watch this show, I could listen to the inane, gargled opinions of over 30 women and understand what their summation of what a man was. And in turn, I could see how a man deliberates when he has the choice of more than one woman at his disposal. Like Joseph Conrad, I was going to launch myself headfirst into the heart of the matter, into the darkness.

I began my research by going to the London Library and borrowing the first two series’ so I could watch them alongside the current one. After a week of constant viewing, with zero hours sleep and only Carrs water biscuits and Pepsi Max for sustenance, I finally managed to see a pattern form which exposed the components and rituals of 21^st century courting.

These Are My Findings On How A Man Can Attain A Date On Take Me Out:

Apply Adhesive To The Chest And Limbs And Roll Yourself Through River Island

It’s very simple. If you do not look like a standard bloke then you have literally no chance in hell. Who could forget the white haired, white suited Gothic-albino called Whyte of the last series? He was the superstar who managed to knock 25 girls lights out with his opening line: “Hi Ladies. My name is Whyte and I’m from Brighton.” Worst still, when his talent was ‘being OK at wailing a bit of Joe Satriani-style ejaculate from a guitar’, it was too much for the poor ladies and he was promptly removed from the studio.

Now, he was an obvious candidate for a ‘lights out, all out’ moment. It was written in his gene-pool. However, 99% of the ‘talent’ that comes out of the Love Lift is dressed in the cast-offs from the male members of Geordie Shore. I’m talking plunging V-neck T-shirts, Carrot chinos, god-awful bright white Lonsdale trainers and, if you’re lucky, a shit blazer. If the man comes out in a blazer he’s basically bagged himself a date as it connotes success and, apparently, chic.  However, you do have to be a bit careful; last episode a guy came out wearing some mid-wash jeans and a grey blazer and a girl turned her light off. She said, “He’s just too trendy for me Paddy.” Luckily, a girl who was really into her fashion, the sort who probably regularly fishes old copies of Closer out of wheelie bins and reads them slumped against the wall of an alley way, felt she could deal with this man’s couture and took a chance. We’ll find out next week if it was a complete success.

Gel Your Hair To Give Yourself The ‘Every-Man’ Look

This is really an extension of the last point. The way your hair is crafted is very important. If you just turn up with gentle brush to the side you may get a look in. However, if you’re gelled to the nines then triumph is probably coming your way. For instance, if Robin Van Persie were to have a go on the show, he’d literally nail it. Yes he is the goal scoring legend of last season but he has the most god awful year-10 hair I’ve ever seen. You know what I’m talking about: the protruding violent spikes that Gareth Gates pioneered during the noughties. Anyway, women on the show seem to confuse gel with style and thus if you stick your head in an industrial sized vat of it then you should be on your way to the Isle of Fernando in no time.

DO NOT Have A Career Prospects In Academia And If You Do DO NOT MENTION THEM

This is a HUMONGOUS no no. I once saw an ostensibly decent enough guy have ten lights turned off because he said in his pre-recorded video that he was studying for a doctorate. So it’s best to not to mention a thing about academia. One girl said: “He’d just be reading all the time and not showing me attention Paddeh.” Actually, the best bet a contestant can do is not mention literature at all.

Have A Strong Relationship With Your Mom

In every single pre-recorded video, a contestant has their mom saying something schmaltzy about their loser of a son. I find this weird cos they’re basically saying, “Shag my son. PLEASE. PLEASE SHAG MY SON. OH, I BET HES REALLY GOOD AT SHAGGING” which I find a tad weird. The men appear to be still reliant on their mothers and are usually shown turning up to their parent’s house with dirty laundry and shit. The audience are supposed to be like “What a joker.”

Usually, most of the girls love this and say stuff like, “I have a good relationship with my mom too Paddy, so it’s great” or, “I don’t mind cooking for him, he’s adorable” or “I really fancy a man who is overtly suffering from a heady case of Oedipus complex.” Disclaimer: men do not do well if they have their stupid sisters saying how they will kill anyone who fucks with him. This kind of incestuous relationship is too much for the girls as they may feel threatened.

DO NOT Care About The Environment/ Current Affairs/ The Ultimate Fate Of The Universe

Always in our hearts is the walking hippy stereotype that was Andy who greeted our screens during the fifth episode of last series. Sure, he was a bit of a plonker who liked to fire-dance on the weekend and had terrible ginger dreadlocks but I guess he was morally sound due to his environmental work. However, as soon as he mentioned he worked for Greenpeace, every single one of the 30 girls took it in turns to spit in his open mouth with disgust. And rightly so, how dare he consider the planet? If you’re gonna mention your career, you better make a lot of money. For instance, two episodes previously to that, a dude said he was a ship salesman and the girls were feverishly enamoured.

Have The Arms Of A Dwayne Chambers At The Peak Of His Steroid Use.

If you’re gonna get your arms out (and you will have to if you wanna be the top-dog of Take Me Out) then your biceps better be the size of pineapples. If not, then you just aren’t man enough for the lovely ladies. John, an ugly mutant of a man who’s hobby was being a cheerleader, and therefore ripped, managed to obtain a date with our very own Bec. Remember Bec? She was from Wigan and used eye shadow like it was soon to be outlawed. Well, she fell for John’s bulky physique and didn’t mind that he had the face of a sledge-hammered Koala. Good luck to them both I say.

Constantly Say That You Are A ‘Cheeky Chappy’

It’s imperative that you appear as if you’re gonna be a right jerk to the girl you date. In terms of body language, you need to walk out as if you’re the dog’s ball sack. A lot of bluster with nothing to show for it usually works a treat. Being from Essex usually helps as girls often mistake the accent for someone who is a ‘bad boy’ character.  Also, a Geordie accent uttering the phrase ‘good banter’ is a real pay off too.

What Can Girls Learn From The Take Me Out Experience?

Luckily, most of the girls on the show don’t find it too difficult to snare a man. However, quirkiness without conventional attractiveness gets you nowhere. Case in point: Gracie. She comes out with some classic prepared one-liners, which are probably fed to her by some poor runner, but they never ever work. That said, if you’re not typically attractive and you have nothing going for you like poor Rhian from the first series, then you’ve literally wasted eight weeks of time you could have been working and thus are probably sitting in a house without electricity right now. The things we do for love, ay?

The main thing a girl needs to have going for her in order to succeed in Take Me Out is to not be a prostitute. Wait, hear me out. A couple of weeks back, lady contestant Wen-Jing Mo managed to secure a trip to Fernandos with some surfer dweeb. However, it was later revealed that she used to sell herself for sex and thus we never got to see how her date went the following week. I guess this was because, as the saying goes, ‘you can’t ever escape your past and appear on a game show if you used to be a whore.’ I’m so glad ITV made sure that the public knew their stance on not treating people that have had tough lives with compassion. Anyway, next week, ITV are set to introduce ‘Celebrity Tramp Bashing’ where celebrities such as Joe Swash and Dougie from McFly tour inner-city areas in order to beat the shit out of as many of the nation’s homeless as humanly possible. Sounds good to me.

So, ultimately, if any men are considering going on the show, heed my rules and you will go far. If you are a woman, as long as you are not the exasperating Stephanie (pictured above) then I think you will do alright. Anyway, Take Me Out seems to have reached the East as a Phillapino edition has just been released. As the country has an age of consent marked at 12 years of age, it should be interesting. I jest. Seeee ya!