With the number of potholes at the moment, it's hard not to notice something as everyday as a path from A to B. You need to pay attention so you don't bust a tyre.

But if we wind back to a time before the excess rain turned the capital into some weird dodgem game, did we still have a weirdly high level of investment in our roads?

The reason I ask is on one lazy Sunday afternoon catching up on trashy TV, I found myself watching Love Triangle, the new dating show on Stan from the same creators as Married At First Sight.

The premise is six singles are put in touch with two other singles each, and after a few days of connecting (or, potentially more to the point of this column, flirting) they decide which one they want to meet in person and start a relationship with.

And while during this period they have no idea what each other looks like - and they can't even offer a description - they can use that time to talk about pretty much anything else. Anything.

It's a process not unlike online dating and in the real world, some may opt for starting a healthy debate about pineapple on pizza or whether Die Hard is a Christmas film. Others will just stick to the standard getting-to-know-you questions. But it seems the Canberra contestant on the show, Belinda, had a slightly different approach. She took a different road, so to speak.

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Belinda decided to use Canberra's road quality as a talking point with Sydneysider Yannick. And to anyone outside of Canberra, it may come as a bit perplexing. Why would your flirty banter include the words: "Come to Canberra, we have good roads?"

I mean, aside from the fact that text alone immediately indicates how long ago the show was filmed - because of the aforementioned potholes - it was also obviously left in by producers for storytelling reasons. To paint a picture of the person on the other side of the text.

Yannick certainly made up his mind because of it.

"The girl-next-door that you kind of marry, that's the vibe I get from her," he said. Which sounds great, except for the fact Yannick thought that was too basic.

While it is an odd topic for flirtatious banter, I am here in defence of Belinda, because without fail, every time I go to Sydney I will comment on how bad the roads are. It's one of the reasons I hate driving in Sydney, and every time I return to Canberra there's a quiet relief to be back on great roads.

Would I use it next time I'm flirting with someone from across the border? It's not the first thing I would think of, but perhaps Belinda is on to something.

If a potential date is not feeling it, if they think an appreciation of Canberra's roads means someone is too basic, then it saves you wasting your time on someone who doesn't appreciate the feeling of driving on superior roads.

So, yes the roads should be fixed to save Canberrans from busted tyres, but also for those singletons who need to use a "but how good are those roads?" next time they're on a dating app.

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