I’ve now had two work trips to London, long enough to run nearly 80 sets, face a few blowouts, have some dates and bang a slag.1
My last trip out there was in November 2021, after which I drew up a comparison of London with NYC. All of those observations hold, though this time around I brought some minor improvements to my daygame. After visiting Colombia, I was able to break out of the bad habit of always teasing up in my sets, and I’m now more comfortable opening indirect in such a way that it’s blatantly clear to the girl that I’m hitting on her.
Combining my numbers from last November and this July, these are my running London stats:
| Approaches | 77 | % | 1 in x | multiplier |
| Contacts | 6 | 8% | 12.8 | 12.8 |
| First Dates | 3 | 4% | 25.7 | 2.0 |
| Lays | 1 | 1% | 77.0 | 3.0 |
The numbers above are wack, absolutely bonkers I tell ya. There’s a sizable gap in my efficiency between stages. Though it could take another couple hundred sets or so to get stable long-term averages, the point stands that I need to talk to nearly 13 girls just to get a number. That part is inline with my NYC stats, except that in London numbers appear to actually mean something for me. Despite being few and far between, half came out on dates. And one of those lucky dates got to spend a night at the Breeze Inn. I don’t believe my texting and dates are significantly better than my daygame as the stats would suggest, but rather the random nature of our craft combined with my own experiments of amping up polarity in set are leading to girls selecting themselves out of my reach. In principal, there’s nothing wrong with that delusion narrative; but in practice, going nearly 20 straight sets without a number weighs on my vibe, especially when more than a handful could be a blowout. Although, none of that really matters when I have a freshly-marked lay in my spreadsheet. Speaking of which…
Back in November, I opened a girl wearing fluffy boots with a fur hat and a short skirt. Cold, but sexy. That was more or less what I said in the open. She didn’t give much eye contact and was distracted fumbling with her phone, but she was giggling. In fact, I think she took a call in the middle of the set. It was short, she had to run. I didn’t expect much from it, and initially I was right.
She didn’t respond to my feeler until a month later. We pinged back and forth a little. Enough to keep her in my mind, but not enough to generate any expectations.
That changed after I landed in the Kingdom of England. I pinged her and suddenly the lead picked up steam. She seemed on, I just had to get her out and have good logistics.
I chose Be At One as the first venue since it was near my hotel, which serves fancy cocktails under obnoxiously loud music. We had a drink as she rolled a ciggy. She was all smiles and pleasant, mostly biting on light and fluffy conversation topics. Mostly yellow lights to my touch and flirting. I bounced to a second venue which ended up being an old-people’s hotel bar so we walked right passed and looked for pubs. As I was to learn, most pubs close around 11p, so she convinced me to check out Soho. I was reluctant since I thought there to be only dance clubs around, but ultimately relented because I couldn’t find anything better on Google Maps closer to mine. She coaxed me along by saying “just one place in Soho, then we can go wherever you want.”2 We ended up at O’Neils. It wasn’t crowded when we got there, the vibe was more social and chill, and the date sped ahead. In fact, she started gaming me. She touched and asked about my ring, necklace and bracelet, and even seeded the bounce back with “you gotta show me some of that country music you’re talking about”! That was a green light if I’ve ever seen one. We had another drink then unhurriedly made our way to my hotel, where she went after the minibar for wine and beer. I didn’t escalate again until after settling in with the drinks and Chris Stapleton playing in the background. Just seconds after making out, the clothes came off. After doing the dirty deed, I asked her when she knew that we would have sex. Her response: “when you asked me out ‘for drinks’. I’m not dumb!”. What a sweet, little lady!
I decided to get one last run at this before leaving London so invited her out on my last night. She initially agreed, then hit me back with an arraignment request:
What can you do, a slag’s gonna slag! And god bless all of them. Maybe she figured that since I brought her my hotel in Mayfair that I’m flush with cash, not realizing that was on the company dime; I’m too cheap to pay for seat upgrades on my flights, much less an arraignment. She texted me an hour later for podcast recommendations as though nothing happened. It’s possible she wanted another night at the Breeze Inn. I texted her back the next day to bring closure to our little tryst suggesting she listen to Jocko Willink, because what young women doesn’t want to listen to a podcast about discipline and jiu jitsu? Needless to say, she didn’t respond.
I also had a very nice date with a Filipina that moved out to London 6 months prior. Things went generally well, though at one point she asked “so how would this work? you don’t live here right?” I told her I come and go for work, trying to ease her mind. She generally accepted my escalation, but held the line at a kiss, until the very end of the date when she squeezed my hand in the moments our lips touched. Unfortunately I never heard back from her. I prefer these kind of girls. I don’t mind a second or third date with them and aim for a little relationship together. Believe or not, but Breeze is a romantic at heart and likes to do the relationshippy things, just without the relationship part.
Stamping London with a lay after nearly 80 sets in a total of 4 weeks, all the while working a regular job, is certainly something I’m proud of. I find myself quite fond of the city also for it’s history, architecture, entertainment, food and, of course, the daygame community.
I got in sessions with Thomas, Oscar, Wolfe and Mikey. Solid lads, but heavy drinkers by my two-drink standards. They all follow the general principles of LDM: build value and deliver it in a way that undeniably emphasizes male-female polarity. I expect I’ll reconnect with them on continental Europe before seeing them again in the UK.
I noticed again with these guys that they apply a pre-approach filter to their sets. It’s a luxury they can afford on a good day where you can approach 1-2 sets per hour.3 We don’t very much have that option in NYC. If I were to apply the same filters in NYC, I get maybe 1 set every 2 hours which is inefficient and annoying enough, but the real issue is that it feels like AA. Sure, I’ve got my weasels and I’ve accepted that, but I feel like I’m going backwards when I spend a session out there with 0 approaches. It’s a real bummer on that esoteric vibe that’s so essential to success. I conveyed this challenge to Wolfe over a session, and how my vibe can suffer if I don’t approach. He insightfully replied that at some point, we have to trust our subconscious to apply that filter for us, and accept the case when there are no sets about. It’s not uncommon to spend 2 hours without opening in London, then suddenly approach 4 sets the next hour. They may very well come in waves. Breaking away from philosophical reflection on a hot summer’s day, we later each approached a lesbian. His gave him flirtatious banter. Mine wanted to educate me on gender ideology. We can theorize all we want, but at the end of the day “they’re all slags”!
Coming back to my stats, I don’t have a clear explanation of why I do so much worse in NYC. I’ve been thinking about it a lot, and the best I came come up with is that London is more international. There isn’t a monolithic culture that pedestalizes women while hawking ideas like toxic masculinity. I asked some of the foreign girls I approached about visiting NYC, and they told me that getting a visa is tough. Whether for english language immersion or tourism, it’s just not easy. One girl told me that just to get a tourist visa, she had to show two years of employment. London wins the diversity factor by providing the path of least resistance.
I think I’ll be back in London Town next year, but it won’t be from a flight out of NYC. My time in this little town meets it’s end as my lease just expired. As hard as I tried to become a civilized, mortgage-holding homeowner, I’m instead becoming a vagrant adventuring rambler. I’ll start in Latin America and work my way over to Europe.
See you guys on the other side.