Archive for November, 2011

If you are only friends with females, and you are not a female, that is very weird. I am just now today learning this. Though I have a lot of male friends, most of them don’t live in the same city as me because I moved back after college. Therefore, most of my friends here are not male. That explanation really does not explain why I have a lot of female friends. It only explains why I don’t have a lot of male friends. I think I attract female friends because I am a giant woman. By giant, in no way do I mean I am a tall or heavy female! What I mean is I’m one of those guys who is too sensitive and nonthreatening and stuff. You know? I always apologize for things and don’t mind going to any movie, even if it has Kate Hudson and isn’t Almost Famous. However, not even I was able to force myself to go see Bride Wars.

Anyway, I have been dating a girl for about a month and everything is going great. However, she mentioned early on that she was a little trepidatious about my closeness with other females. Is it not normal to go to dinner and a movie with a person of the opposite sex if you are not dating them? It’s not? See, I am still learning the rules. Apparently, it’s not. No, apparently, that is the strict definition of ‘date’. That actually explains the time that married woman refused to go to a friendly dinner and a movie with me.

Are you still friends with an Ex? I’m not, and I never have been. Not because it necessarily ended badly but because I just had no desire to hang out with someone I used to be romantic with. I shared things with this person, intimate things — be it emotional confessions or something more in the physical sense — and I don’t feel the need to hang out, and I don’t understand people who do. So many TV shows have exes hanging out: Friends, Seinfeld, Happy Endings, Grey’s Anatomy, even CSI and Law & Order. It’s just not realistic! A flow chart trying to keep Private Practice hook-ups straight looks more like a spider web, and these people work together too? Yeah right! It doesn’t happen, and it shouldn’t happen. Do you really want to be sitting around with a bunch of friends and be discussing your dating life with your ex? No. When you bring a new date into the fold, and you’re making introductions, how are you going to deal? You can’t lie, but the truth will make everyone uncomfortable.

Some exceptions: you went on one date and didn’t even kiss because there was absolutely no chemistry or you dated more than ten years ago but for less than a year.

It might seem weird to close the door on someone you were involved with, but what can they contribute to your future? Shut that door and leave the past in the past. The only thing you need to take with you is the lessons you learned from that relationship.

People think they want to date and marry someone that they’re similar to, but really you want someone different who will balance you. My husband and one of my close girlfriends are very similar in how they deal with stress and they joke around that if they were married to each other they would never speak. They both feel that they need spouses such as myself and her husband to balance them out.

If you both like all the same things, life will get a little boring. I love football and my husband loves basketball so we’ve both taken the time to learn and enjoy the other’s sport. My husband loves UFC so that’s something he gets to do with his friends, sans wifey. I love sushi, and I go with my friends for a girls night out.

So don’t rule out another single just because you don’t like all the same things or have the same hobbies, instead celebrate your differences, teach other about your interests and enjoy maintaining some independence.

I’m thankful for my amazing husband and our spectacular child. I’m thankful we have jobs, a roof over our head and food in our stomachs. I’m thankful for our health and happiness.

I’m also thankful that four years ago when I was husband-less and child-less, I still found things to be thankful for on Thanksgiving. If you’re single this year, make sure to take some time for introspection and appreciate what you do have rather than harp on the things you don’t have (i.e. a spouse). It could be your job, great friends, a nice relationship with your parents and siblings, a new car, your health and well-being, whatever. Not only should you make a list of those things, but you should write it down and read it whenever you get too wrapped up in the dating game and forget about the things that are going great in your life. Finding your Beshert at this very moment is not the only thing that’s important. Remember that.

Though I have lost a considerable amount of weight over the last several months and am of average weight for my equally average height, my body still thinks that I am a fat man.

By that, I mean it is still curvy in all the wrong places. I inexplicably still have man-boobs. When I was at my heaviest, I also noticed that my stomach made a weird-shaped bulge right over my waist. My waist was regular sized, and my stomach was regular sized (for a ten-foot-tall man). It wasn’t just a fat man’s bulge. It is difficult to explain without photos, but I am not going to post a photo because you are so nice and innocent and there’s no reason for me to scar strangers for life. Also, I never took a picture of myself as a fat man. That was one decision I will take to my grave as the smartest thing I have or will have ever done.

Anyway, my body doesn’t know I’ve lost any weight at all. I can’t jog for more than three feet. I still get winded and sweaty whenever I eat more than a rice cake. Okay I’ve never eaten a rice cake. They have no smell, and I am suspicious of anything lacking in aroma. This is also why I never trusted scented candles.

Most importantly, though, that awkward bulge on my stomach is still there. I can’t really explain why, nor have I seen it on another person. I’m sure that if I actually went to the gym, I could work it off somehow, but I refuse to go. I’ve lost 74 pounds without having to exercise and am I damn sure not about to start now. Having said that, my weird stomach bulge remains. Thank goodness for T-shirts. My normal-sized hand would not be big enough to cover my stomach-sized stomach.

However, through the help of shirts, I have been able to sustain more dates than I was able to half a year ago. I now know more than ever that if a girl doesn’t like me, it’s now slightly more likely that she doesn’t like my personality. That is strangely comforting.

Look, I know its tempting.  I know the curiosity might sometimes drive you mad.  I know you are even excited to talk to all the new potential dates you have.

But you need to stop checking your email so many times a day.

Especially those of you who have become more advanced at online dating and learned to successfully date people at will.

For starters, whether you are a guy or girl, popping up as logging in every hour will lower your value and make you look desperate. People who are attractive have lives outside the dating world and get around to their emails when they have a chance.

Second, you will find yourself slowly sitting at your computer day and night, endlessly writing emails.  This will lead to online dating fatigue.

Solution:

Check your mail twice a day and that’s it!  Once in the afternoon.  Once late at night.  Respond to every email at once.  Then shut the computer, log off, and resist the temptation.

The benefits:

No matter how boring life gets, you will have something to look forward to twice a day!

I am writing on the following topic because I have exhausted all interesting topics, and if I continue with exponentially more boring posts about myself, I will divulge into a five paragraph post about the most effective way to eliminate back hair (laser removal).

Before I found out about 100hookup®, meeting women online was a lot more difficult, and dangerous. I was in the tepid water that was America Online®. Please keep in mind that AOL® has claimed to be a lot of things, but ‘dating site’ has never been one of them. It was a mecca when I was first introduced to the internet. It had magical ‘Channels’ that allowed you to, for example, order a pizza online while simultaneously listening to music! I know! This was unbelievable. This was 1997.

By 2003, I still had an AOL account because I think my mom forgot to cancel our subscription. After a break-up, I turned to AOL on late nights when I couldn’t sleep. I went to what sounded like trustworthy chat rooms like ‘BBW in Texas’ and ‘One Night Stands’. My innocent mind had, for some reason, thought that BBW stood for Boisterous Black Women, and I was totally into that. For some reason, chat rooms always seemed infinitely more entertaining at 3 am. This time also coincides with the time that the shadiest people on earth were also in these rooms.

I found one of these women, and we chatted for several months. She lived in the same city as I did, and we agreed to meet. However, she decided to come visit my dorm days before our meeting date. This particular afternoon also happened to coincide with a time that I was experiencing an allergic reaction to my Clearasil® pads. Remember Clearasil? Gosh this post is so nostalgic.

So my face had broken out in red spots, which was, ironically, what Clearasil claimed to cure. These red spots, though, were more like itchy hives. I had forgotten that I had them on my face when I answered my door. When I opened it, what I saw in front of me was a horrified young woman pretending to not notice the welts on my face. “Hi there!”, I said. This began one of my top ten most awkward three hours of my life.

We walked around campus, and she kept a good distance from me. After lunch, we went up to my room to watch a movie. My roommate was still asleep and we sat on the bed because I didn’t have a couch. After the movie ended, she darted for the door and did not say a word. That was one of the worst dates of my life.

First dates are a lot like job interviews, except the asking of the questions SHOULD go in both directions. Sometimes we’re so nervous and scared of the awkward silence that we fire off question after question. If you find yourself doing all the asking, make sure you’re giving your date enough time to ask you a question in return. And if you’re doing all the answering, than make sure you stop your date and let them know that you’d like to ask them questions and get to know them as well.

But what’s worse is when someone asks questions that sound like judgments instead. You know your date is looking for a specific answer and will judge you if you say the wrong thing. Such as: “It took you how long to graduate from college?” or “You eat shellfish/pork?” or “You like gangsta rap?” or the worst “Why are you still single?” these questions are worded in a way which sets you up for failure. Obviously this reflects worse on the interviewer than the interviewee (and you probably don’t want to date someone so judgmental anyways), but it doesn’t feel good when you know your date disapproves. There’s absolutely nothing you can do to change them, but you can do a few things for yourself: don’t take it personally and make sure you don’t ask questions in that manner yourself.

Bringing a date around babies is a great test to see what kind of instinct they have. Bringing a date around pets is another good way. If your date doesn’t want to hold the baby or pet the animal, then you’ll need to question why. That is, if you want to have babies or pets in your future (if you don’t then it’s a perfect match!). But most people are looking for a family of some kind in their future, and finding someone with a natural instinct and comfort around babies and animals is important. So once you get to the point of having to decide whether you want to get serious with someone, take them around your friends who are already settled down and see what their vibe is in a house with 2 kids and a dog.

This Week’s Top Three Tweet-Worthy Events From Jews Who Make News

1. Ashton & Demi Headed For Divorce Court

Demi Moore is ending her marriage to Ashton Kutcher, she told the Associated Press Thursday. The two actors were married in a Kabbalah wedding ceremony in September 2005.

Moore, 49, and Kutcher, 33, have increasingly become tabloid fodder in recent months as rumors swirled about Kutcher’s alleged infidelity.

Kutcher tweeted about the divorce on Thursday saying, “I will forever cherish the time I spent with Demi. Marriage is… https://bit.ly/sbz0Qa.”

 2. People’s Sexiest Man Alive List Includes Just One Jew

Bradley Cooper scored the coveted top spot on People Magazine’s “Sexiest Man Alive” list with nine other Hollywood hunks scoring honorable mentions.

However, actor Josh Charles was the only Jew to make the list. Charles joked about his new status via Twitter, “Guess I should put down this steak sub & hit gym.”

Currently starring in The Good Wife, Charles has also had roles in several films from Dead Poets Society to Four Brothers. Other celebrities on the list include Ryan Gosling, Joel McHale and Justin Theroux.

3. Jack & Jill Tumbles… Or Does It?

Even if no one is laughing in the theater, it looks like Adam Sandler will be laughing all the way to the bank! Sandler’s new movie Jack and Jill received a phenomenal mauling from critics when it opened last weekend, but it was a huge success as far as the box office goes.

Jack and Jill managed to open in the number 2 spot, with $26 million. Immortals came in first last weekend, raking in $32 million.

Larry King came to the rescue of his fellow Jew on Thursday when he Tweeted, “Forget the critics. Jack and Jill is a funny, funny movie. Al Pacino is hysterical. You’ll love it!”