Where to meet your next boyfriend: The daily commute

Public transport is a necessary evil for most of us: a means of getting from A to B with (we hope) the minimum fuss and the maximum efficiency. But for a pastime which can take up to a good two hours a day for many of us, hauling your cookies into work is criminally overlooked in the romance stakes.

Whether your eyes meet in sympathy over the sound of a fellow passenger hacking up a loogie on the bus or a jolt in the train’s braking system sends you careering into the pulsating lap of another, there are potential beaux lurking in your eyeline no matter which mode of transport you use. Forget A to B, travel from A to OH YEAH via YES, YES, RIGHT THERE without delay. All aboard.

The train
The rhythmic chugga-chugga motion of our humble train already seems vaguely sexy, doesn’t it? No? Well, it does. Go with it. Add into that the shoulder-to-shoulder nipple-nuzzling that only a packed rush hour can bring and you can have a veritable hotbed of bang potential.

Whether you’re gliding over the shiny rails of a multi-million pound express railway in London, or lolloping toward your workplace on a juddering biscuit tin on casters in Stockport, don’t miss an opportunity to pluck the fruit of Mr Right from his tree of singledom.

DO stand as closely as legally possible to your prey, no matter how empty the carriage.

DO make sure you smell fresh, clean and scented, not just out of the gym or dirty nylon sheets.

DO smile at other commuters – but not too widely, or your fellow passengers will be searching the pages of the newspaper to see whether any high-risk mental patients are currently on the loose.

DON’T be a source of annoyance. Loud conversations on mobiles, the whack of backpacks on torsos and refusals to move the hell up the carriage aren’t going to make anyone want to ‘sex’ you; your fellow travellers will be colluding to bring about your murder.

DO seek out the nearest annoying idiot exhibiting poor train etiquette, then look a little to the left or right for a hot person (these are easily spotted because of their good looks and your attraction to them) and start doing ‘sympathy eyes’. Sympathy eyes are an unspoken sign between two commuters that a third commuter is getting on their tits. Don’t forget, from tiny acorns of simmering, shared hate, mighty oaks of frenetic sex in rail station toilets grow.

The bus
Ah, the bus. On first glance, travelling by bus is about as sexy as getting your pecker caught in your zipfly live on children’s television, but if you get it right, and turn the myriad negatives into positives, you can make this work for you. Let’s turn those problems into orgasms.

BUS STOP HELL – It’s cold, it’s rainy, and you’ve been waiting for the no. 94 for goodness knows how long, but let’s just say the bus timetable was last updated in hieroglyphics. But, remember, getting wet means you’re getting sexy. You may feel soaked to the skin, but your wet lashes look bigger, your eyes clearer and your hair looks sleek and shiny (NB: this only really works for about 1.5% of guys, so, sorry ‘gurlz’ and the other 98.5% of blokes). You’ll get so much attention (from perhaps a more undesirable tranche of fetishists, admittedly) that you’ll never take a brolly with you again.

SITTING PRETTY – Competition for bus seats is even fiercer than on the train. On trains, it’s fairly easy to retain composure while standing, yet dignity takes a long weekend city-break when it comes to being seatless on the bus. You’ll be jostled and frotted in the most unappealing of ways, your ankles attacked by pushchairs and shopping trolleys. But taking a seat carries its own risks – you never know who’s going to take a pew next to you. You must make sure you get someone as hot as possible to make journey a whole lot more bearable. Sit on the upper deck and in an aisle seat, so that anyone who peers up over the top of the stairs looking for somewhere to sit will think your seat is filled. Should anyone delicious poke their head over the parapet, all you have to do is slide over and welcome them with open arms/legs/mouth. Or maybe start with a smile. If, on closer inspection, the guy coming toward you is more warthog than Warren Beatty, make sure you have your secret weapon with you: a greasy old takeaway container which you can whip out of your bag or pocket and quickly place on the seat next to you, meaning that Old Ugly Eyes will have to park his arse elsewhere.

The pavement
It’s the cheapest kind of public transport there is and most of us have access to it any time of day or night: Shanks’s Pony. Sometimes all you have to do to find your next paramour is put one foot in front of the other.

Haven’t you ever made eye contact with someone tasty traipsing in the opposite direction to you and thought ‘Damn! If only I’d stopped to talk to them’? Well if onlys and what ifs belong to people who stay at home night after night plunging ever deeper into a vat of Ben & Jerrys, not to sexy, single, go-getter types like you.

Don’t forget the old ‘look once, look back’ technique. If you catch the eye of someone in the street and equally appreciate what they’ve got to offer, walk on three or four paces and then look back. If they look back too, you are in. Don’t squander the opportunity, spin on your heels and sashay back toward them. And let your body do the talking.