A lot to be said for the Folk world. Clubs, sessions, festivals, ceilidhs. Ceilidhs are a great mixer, you get to touch without hidden agenda. It can say a lot. And judging by the care one has to greet some folk couples with - mixing is definitely a theme.

Of course if you have been doing these things for some time the catchment cohort may be familiar and unless the assemblage are "new" it may not be as exciting.

But like the Mudcat - it pays to lurk and find out the situation before revealing yourself.

What I found with newspaper ads and latterly internet was that there is a lot of text (rehearsed, considered and sometime delusiary) but the visuals are poor to non-existant and the visuals are what we have evolved to react to.
Ya can't buck nature without a downside. Get and mingle.