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By Lady Bee, June 13, 2011 6:00 am

Photo by Dan Grebb via Flickr

Imagine the scene….

A balmy February evening with a luxurious yacht skimming along the water. On board are couples in love. To surprise Jane, John has two tickets for this Valentine’s Day moonlit cruise around the harbor.

On the drive to the dock, John remains tight lipped, frustrating Jane. She anxiously clutches the bouquet of her favorite flowers, wondering what he has planned for her, but knowing that whatever it is, she will like it. He just knows her so well.

They board the yacht with the other happy pairs and then settle together hand-in-hand at the railing, leaning out to the waves as they disappear from view in the boat’s wake. The lights of the city sparkle in the distance, and the sea air blows a gentle caress across Jane’s face and through her hair.

John takes Jane’s hand and leads her to the centre of the deck. Then, he gets down on one knee in front of all the passengers, pulls out The Box with The Ring inside and says, “Jane, I love you, will you marry me?”

With a squeal, she cries, “Yes!”

He rises, slips the ring onto her finger, and immediately, she wraps her arms around him and covers him in kisses. A round of spontaneous applause breaks out on the yacht, and the other couples cheer and whistle. She basks in the good wishes and attention of her fellow travelers–the adoration, the love, the romance.

It could not have been more spectacular if she had planned it herself. It was perfect….

Oh, please! Give me a break from such sappy romance!

I can see you rolling your eyes now. It sounds like the absolute worst movie cliché from some cheap popcorn Romcom or a film about a Season in a Famous City that will remain nameless. But incredibly, it’s not. My cousin was proposed to in this exact manner. She really couldn’t have been happier, and for the record, she has been married for three years.

Continue reading 'No Romance For Me, Please'»

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By Rick Allan, April 18, 2011 6:00 am

Image by MoPo.ca

I met Ramona in Vegas.

We only spent a couple hours together the night we met. Yet, neither of us had ever connected so deeply with another human being in such a short period of time.

We didn’t even have an actual conversation until I called her a few weeks later. I was so nervous, I felt like I was back in middle school calling a crush for the first time. I invited her to come down to San Diego the next week.

All the giddy little school kids in the world had nothing on me the morning she arrived. She went in for the kiss, and I awkwardly hugged her. I stumbled over my words. I couldn’t even hold eye contact with her.

I finally managed to relax, and the rest of the day couldn’t have gone any better. I loved being with her, and yet, I was uncomfortable being myself around her. Her presence made me want to be more than just myself.

A week later, she came to see me while I was in Los Angeles, and we went out to a bar with some friends. I was suffering from a cough, and without so much as a hint from me, she got up and returned a few minutes later with drinks for us. Smiling, she said, “I asked the bartender to make you something for your throat.”

It was such a simple gesture, but it meant the world to me.

Later that week, I went to see her, and while we were lying in bed, those three little words almost slipped out.

Whoa. At this point, I was afraid I might be falling faster than she was, so I backed off. I decided I’d try to get her to chase me. Because back then, I still thought that if a woman were interested in me, she would pursue me, too, right? Continue reading 'If I Chase You, I May Fall For You'»

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By Miss Bonnified, March 28, 2011 6:00 am

Photo by Chris Craymer

Clyde and I are getting married. This means I’ve suddenly turned into a wedding planner. In case you’ve never gone through this process before, allow me to say that it’s a special kind of pain.

Fellas, be prepared to see a whole ‘nother side of the woman you love enough to hand over a small mountain of cash in return for a sparkly rock.

Ladies, be prepared to come over to the dark side.

By “dark side,” I mean the peculiar kind of pain wedding planning inflicts. There’s so much that goes into planning something as intricate as a wedding, but the weirdest part is… I like the pain. This also makes me wonder if I’m secretly into S&M, but am just in denial.

The whole process starts taking on a life of its own. It very quickly consumes your every waking thought and moment. You become obsessed with things you never once gave a rat’s ass about. Things like table linens, chair covers, different kinds of freaking cakes and their design.

Do you know the difference between thermography and letter press typography? I do now!

Don’t even get me started with flowers and flower arrangement. Who knew there were so many different kinds of flowers??!!! And why do they cost so much?! [Throws a fit.]

So here’s the best piece of wedding advice Clyde got from his coworker and shared with me.

There will be no talking about wedding stuff after 10 PM.

Period. End of story.

At first, I was like, “WHY?! *ROAR!

There’s so much stuff to do!! Why can’t we… oh. I get it.” Continue reading 'How To Save Your Relationship While Planning A Wedding'»

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By Dennis Hong, March 14, 2011 6:00 am

For months after Julie and I broke up, we chose to remain friends.

Yes, it was a mutual decision.

No, really.

Stop rolling your eyes.

This is not another rant about being stuck in the Friend Zone.

We still cared about each other, and we still enjoyed each other’s company. We just realized that, romantically, we weren’t all that compatible. We were like peanut butter and bacon: You love ‘em both. Just not together.

We continued to hang out fairly regularly, though. In fact, we joked that we were kind of/sort of still going on dates. Except that they didn’t end in anything physical….

Wait.

Okay, yes. They were exactly like many dates I’ve been on.

I was fine with that. We both knew that muddling the boundaries we’d established wouldn’t be a good idea. So, we continued our platonic dates, going out to dinner, chatting about what was going on at home and at work, slipping into deeper conversations about our lives… our hopes… our fears….

That’s when I had an epiphany.

I was totally getting screwed in this arrangement.

In recent years, scientists have discovered that the hormone oxytocin is responsible for feelings of attachment in women. Most notably, oxytocin is released when a woman orgasms. This explains why women have a more difficult time having casual sex. When they orgasm, their brains release oxytocin, which reinforces their emotional attachment to the man they’re with.

So, it’s not that women don’t want to have casual sex, or that they don’t like casual sex. It’s just that women often have a difficult time keeping it casual.

Continue reading 'We Weren’t Having Sex, But I Was Still Getting Screwed'»

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By Katie Gard, February 14, 2011 6:00 am

Via www.strangezoo.com

I’ve never been a huge fan of Valentine’s Day. Yes, I always said that back in the days when I was perpetually single. But surprisingly, my take on the whole thing didn’t really change after finding myself in a serious relationship, then engaged, then married.

The cheesy cards, the naked Cupid butts, the hearts… oh god, the hearts. I abhor hearts. Anyone ever notice that the shape kind of looks like a naked Cupid butt? I think they planned it that way.

Yes, that heart butt is disturbing. Isn’t it?

Even when I was a little girl, I was never really into hearts. I didn’t draw them to dot my i’s, and I certainly didn’t buy any heart-shaped jewelry. A high school “boyfriend” once bought me a heart-shaped necklace. I wore it (I mean, come on, the gesture was sweet), but I didn’t enjoy it.

The only kind of hearts I really like are the edible chocolate ones that come in accordion-crinkled paper cups.

But anyway, my (very unoriginal) point is that, not only is V-Day far too commercial, it’s far too forced. It squeezes everyone into a one-size-fits-all heart-shaped box of torment, and I’ll be damned if Kurt Cobain didn’t know exactly what he was talking about when he wrote that song.

So one year, after Justin and I got engaged, I suggested we get each other goofy gifts for V-Day. Since we had an upcoming wedding and honeymoon, there would be more than enough romance to keep us swimming in gag-worthy giggles and meaningful looks and candlelit dinners for the remainder of the year.

In a stroke of what I deemed to be sheer genius (and five years ago, it wasn’t being worn by every other guy you passed on the street), I bought him this shirt: Continue reading 'The Valentine’s Striptease That Almost Broke My Neck'»

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By Jasmine Curry, October 25, 2010 6:00 am

She's got a huge red flag. Why are you ignoring it?

I just went to a friend’s wedding. Instead of jumping for joy that someone else was joining the club, though, my husband and I found ourselves thinking, “oh, no. They have no idea what they are in for.”

I shouldn’t be such a pessimist. This particular couple is incredibly compatible. But, there have been a string of divorces in my circle recently, and I think it comes down to one issue:

Ignoring the red flags.

All three of the girls I know whose marriages are ending have said the same thing: “I always felt like I was having sex with my brother.”

Ouch! If that’s not a red flag, I don’t know what is. So, why did they all ignore the flag and get married, anyway?

Perhaps it’s the need for stability. For some reason, we as a society think that if we are married, life can begin (those who think that life ends when you get married notwithstanding). Most agree that getting married means we won’t be alone ever again. And I mean ever. Like, if we need just one moment to ourselves, we are probably not going to get it. Ever.

But, we think we need to be with someone. And so, we get married… even though we know that we really want children, while he has made it clear that having kids is off the table.

Perhaps we ignore the red flag because we are getting older and thinking, “well, we want the same things, have the same goals, and it’s high time I get married before my window of opportunity closes.” So, we rush to have the wedding and start having children… only to discover that our atheism doesn’t fit with his desire to raise our children in a church.

Or maybe some of us just aren’t any good at being single. So, we look the other way at what we think isn’t that important. We tell ourselves that relationships are all about compromise.

The problem is, the red flags don’t go away. And if we don’t stand for what is truly important to us (and perhaps we didn’t even know just how important it was at the time), we lose not only ourselves in the marriage, but potentially the marriage, itself. Continue reading 'The Curse Of The Red Flag'»

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By Katie M., October 18, 2010 6:00 am

Katie and Kevin

Yes, folks, here she is. The inspiration for countless posts, the coiner of the term Sneak-a-Date, and clearly the person with the smallest ego on this blog. The one, the only, Katie!

Except, I guess technically with Dennis, there were two Katies. Anyway. I was the first, and I think that should count for something.

Now, I realize that all of you are probably salivating for some salacious gossip from the gal who’s seen Dennis without his shirt or the rest of his clothes. But, I’m saving that for a future post (see how I cleverly lure you into reading me again?) and instead starting with the end–with the part where I find my perfect match, fall madly in love, and walk down the aisle in a charming white dress.

It’s a really boring story.

No seriously, it is. From the standard first-date pasta dinner at an oh-so-moderately priced restaurant, to the follow-up phone call precisely three days later, the whole thing was fraught with a by-the-book dating tranquility that you’d expect to find only in, well, books.

Although, before you get the wrong impression, I should mention that, for our honeymoon, we ran with the bulls in Pamplona. We are not always dull. Nor are we always wise….

Anyway, before all of this serenity hit, I admit my dating life was not what you would call, in a technical sense, sane. It was full of questionable hook-ups, midnight rendezvous, and tangled on-again, off-again relationships overlapping so frequently that even I occasionally lost track of whom I was dating that week.

The stable relationships had their turmoil, too. When I was in them, I found myself asking a never-ending series of questions: Is this the right person for me? Should we move in together? Get married? Get a goldfish? I used to think that this kind of commotion was just part of being with someone. After all, people always said good relationships were hard work. Continue reading 'The Ex-Girlfriend Speaks Up'»

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By Dennis Hong, October 4, 2010 6:00 am

When it comes to sexuality, many people believe that humans are unique in the animal kingdom: we feel love, we’re psychologically complex, we form long-term monogamous bonds.

Well, science calls shenanigans.

According to scientists, the similarities we find between animals and humans actually reveal some of our most basic instincts, and monogamy isn’t necessarily one of them. Take a look at these five animal behaviors with uncanny parallels to humankind:

1. Males are naturally polygamous, while females are naturally monogamous

This first tidbit of insight is drawn from a study by sociobiologist Robert Trivers, in his seminal work titled, “Duh.”

Natural selection is based on the principle that parents pass on their traits to their offspring. Any heritable traits that enable an individual to produce stronger or more offspring will spread from generation to generation with greater frequency, while those that result in weaker or fewer offspring will gradually be extinguished.

Instinctively then, animals behave in such a way as to maximize their chances of producing offspring, because these are the behaviors that get passed on. That tingling sensation we feel in our nether regions when we see an attractive member of the opposite sex? It’s just our body’s way of prodding us to procreate.

Continue reading 'Monogamy Is A Load Of Crap'»

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By Meg Pierce, August 23, 2010 6:30 am

Photo by nattu via flickr

All my life, I’ve been looking for that guy—the one I can tell anything to, the one who totally gets me. The guy who is handsome and charming, with a gorgeous smile. We can talk all night, but we don’t always stay up just talking. I can curl up in his arms, feeling loved and contented, as my mind slips into pleasant dreams.

So, is it any wonder that when I find that guy, I feel myself falling rapidly, intoxicatingly in love? The mystery for me, though, is why isn’t he falling in love with me? In fact, not only is he not falling in love, he isn’t even considering a romantic relationship with me. Seriously, how am I still in the friend zone?

This lesson hasn’t been easy for me to learn. In fact, it’s taken me several relationships to realize where I have gone wrong. So, why do I make the same mistake and fall for the friend? And how do I keep from repeating this folly over and over again?

I think one problem is that I don’t have that “list.” You know, the sometimes-hypothetical, sometimes-literal inventory of items people keep for what they’re looking for in a mate? I’ve never made one. I have a general idea of what I want, but these vague guidelines tend to be mutable. Rather than the guy fitting the ideal of what I want in a man, what I want mutates into the shape of the person I care about.

Perhaps if I sat down and considered what traits should comprise my soul mate, I might have a better chance of knowing when the person I’m with fits me, instead of me trying to fit the person I’m with.

Meanwhile, these guys I’m falling for do have a list, and a very specific one. And, while I listen to their stories about their relationships, I sometimes hear only what I want to hear. If I don’t measure up exactly to their description of the perfect woman, I figure we can work out the details later. Continue reading 'He Loves Me, He’s Just Not In Love With Me'»

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By Jennifer Hamilton, June 7, 2010 9:39 am

Image by utsavbasu1 via Flickr

We get lots of generic advice when we break up. “You’ll get through it.” “You’re better off.” “Don’t worry, you’ll find the One.” But no one ever tells us how to get through the pain, the loneliness, the emptiness. Whether the breakup is mutual, shocking, brutal, or civil, it sucks.

So what do we do? Blast “I Will Survive” until our ears bleed? When will those yucky feelings go away? I think everyone has their own progression that they go through, similar to the five stages of grief. Here’s mine:

Disbelief and Denial

After my boyfriend of two years broke up with me, I was shocked. In hindsight, it was a long time coming. During the last turbulent months of our relationship, I knew we were heading down that road. He had moved away six weeks prior—a tell-tale sign of doom. But when it actually happened… well, I was shocked. It was a Sunday morning, and he had spent the weekend with me. When he left that morning, he left for good. I was a puddle. I sat in my room for three hours, knowing that once I walked out of there, I’d have to face my roommates and tell them what happened. I wasn’t ready for it to be real.

Desperation

Six hours after the dumping, I made the tearful phone call begging Mr. Ex to take me back. Not one of my finer moments. I was a ball of desperate emotion. I needed to save us and wasn’t ready to accept all the valid reasons for the breakup. Continue reading 'The Progression Of A Breakup'»