Simon Cowell Need Not Apply

I'd hate to be a judge on the X Factor. Telling someone to their face, in public, in front of millions of viewers, why they just won't work out, takes some doing. How do they sleep at night? I can’t even do it in private. Choosing a tenant is getting worse, fraught with emotion and guilt, hand wringing anxiety, how to break the news - over the phone? by text? email? Will they get over it? OK, it’s not quite that bad, but nearly. In many cases, they’ve gone off and found something else in the meantime, but I’m left with two candidates that I’d like equally but differently, it's X or Y Factor.

I've cut off viewings since Thursday, when a handsome prospect turned up, a Dr Kovac of ER lookalike. Funny, it was Valentine’s Day. And, much to my surprise absentee boyfriend turned up in person with an actual card, chocolates and best of all, his presence. He and CC#2 got busy talking about exams or something serious, while I showed Kovac around and learned his story. He’s from Latvia and only in Ireland a week, working in IT and not enamoured by the commute from Drogheda to D14. Who would be? With a wife and 5-year-old daughter back home, The instinct to help him settle here, do the good Irish welcome thing, was activated. Having part of the co-op board here was a good sign I thought, I won’t have to decide this on my own.

So far, so good, except the lovely puppy-eyed girl is also anxious to move in and then there's the ideal travelling tenant who is taking his time making up his mind. Put to the co-op board, they are suddenly all for the girl, never having seen her. I level a charge of bigotry at CC#2. ‘I’m not showing him around Dublin, I’ve got exams to do. And stop going on about how great it would be to have a cultural mix,’ says he. I appreciate this does not show him in a great light, do men get jealous of other handsome men?

AB wasn’t going to be around for V-night, so several cups of tea in the kitchen had to suffice and a dinner scheduled on the horizon.  Instead, my friend, a gifted jewellery designer and mother of a special boy, who is on his first break from mom this week, suggested supper a deux. Let’s call her Clarice, (no fava beans or chianti planned) forgot it was Valentine’s night. I expected howls of laughter even if I did get through to the popular wine bar near the Shelbourne. ‘Table for two? No problem.’ 

Now, is that the recession or receding romance?