Simon Amstell: The Dating Game

“My technique with someone I like is basically just hope I run into him again.”
This segues into a story of a summer walk with an unnamed friend, a confident man who strides through life, demanding and winning girls’ phone numbers. When Amstell points to a young man that he fancies, his bold friend approaches, insisting that they join him and his companions for a picnic. Amstell is mortified. “Get his phone number,” the bold friend orders. Squirming, he does. “Call him now and see him tonight,” the friend insists. Amstell, gulping down his fear, “grabs the moment” and, in doing so, gets laid.
“That was Russell Brand,” he tells me and we both fall about giggling. Who else could it be? Russell Brand teaching Simon Amstell how to pull. Don Juan with Prufrock as his wingman. “He showed me how to feel that fear and do it anyway,” he says.

Simon Amstell in The Times.