Category Archives: dating

Ten Dating Mistakes People Make

las vegas

Dating kind of sucks sometimes, especially when you do that thing when you think, “Wow, I’ve just ruined everything.” Here are 10 Dating Mistakes People Make. Most of these I have done. No one is alone here.

10. Forcing conversation.

mad men don draper i love puppies gif

It’s so easy to do this one. I think all of us want to avoid awkward silences, but we all know that trying to make something less awkward only makes it more awkward. So many times I tell myself, “Don’t be awkward. You’re fine. Just be breezy.” But that usually makes it worse.

9. Analyzing every text.

man who fell to earth bowie gif

Some people don’t have their phone glued to them like you do. Some people don’t text as often as you do. Some people don’t like to text as much as you do. Thus, some people do not put in a lot of thought into their texts, other than to get pertinent information across. Do not break down 300 characters into a 5 paragraph essay.

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The Bachelorette Is The Craziest Show Ever

desiree brooks break up the bachelorette

The Bachelorette is the weirdest show on TV right now, and if you’re missing it, you need to catch up, because I can’t even describe the surreal level of weirdness that is happening on this seemingly stupid and fluffy television show. This season has been one of the most dramatic, and saddest. Because for the first time ever, we’ve seen real torment about what it’s like to simultaneously date twenty-five men and the pain that comes from having to turn down twenty-four men, and on the opposite side, the overwhelming fear and uncertainty that comes with a woman who is dating twenty-five men and wants you to marry her at the end of a staggeringly short two months.

I’m taking about Desiree and Brooks. To sum up: our perpetually on the edge of tears Katie Holmes/Rachel Bilson hybrid, Desiree Hartsock, is the bachelorette and with one episode left of the season, she’s made it clear that only one of these men is the man for her: Brooks Forrester. But Brooks Forrester is the only person in the history of this franchise to say, “This is fucking crazy, I’m not getting engaged to a girl I’ve had four dates with, known for two months, and spent maybe a total of sixty-five hours with.” Well, not in those exact words.

To recap the season up this point, Desiree has had to deal with:

  • A guy who brought his kid on the premiere episode and used him to paint himself as a doting dad so he would have a shot at the next Bachelor (“Hollywood, you missed your opportunity — a single dad from Texas” he said, when Desiree rejected him.)
  • A guy who already had a girlfriend.
  • A guy who wanted to stay on the show so badly he fake cried and manipulated her into believing that he also wasn’t looking to be the next Bachelor.
  • A cringe-worthy rap video shoot with Soulja Boy, in which she and the Mr. Desiree hopefuls had to put on stupid costumes and rap about the show.
  • Two guys who dumped her.

The first one to dump her, Brandon, did it while she was on a date with another guy. No doubt egged on by the producers, he decided right then and there that he wasn’t feeling it to the point where he had to dump her right now. So with a camera crew following him, he found Desiree on her date with Chris, pulled her aside, essentially told her that her feelings for him were stronger than his for her, and left back home for the USA. Desiree cried and poor Chris, still on their date, was left to cheer her up.

About Chris: he and another guy, Drew (who is probably gay), are “madly in love” with Desiree. They, among Brooks, are in the final three. Throughout the show, almost to the end, Desiree said that she likes these three guys very much, and that she’s falling in love with all of them. But then host Chris Harrison, the Olmec (giant stone head in Legends of the Hidden Temple) of the show asked her if there’s anyone in particular she’s really in love with. He asks this of every Bachelor and Bachelorette; they’re never actually expected to answer. They usually deflect the question. The Bach/elorettes never admit to being in love with anyone until the finale, otherwise why would they keep the show going? But Desiree announced, “I’m in love with Brooks.” Stunned, Harrison said something like, “Well should we just pack up and go home?” He asks her, “Has Brooks told you he loves you?”

chris harrison the bachelorette

Pictured: giant stone head.

Zak, Chris, and Drew all told Des that they loved her. Again, they’ve each gotten maybe three dates with her and over the span of two months, while she was dating several other men. Brooks was the only one not to declare his love. “He doesn’t need to,” Des said confidently, 100% kidding herself. “I know how he feels. He doesn’t have to say it.”

But we, the audience, we know how Brooks feels, and we saw that awkward moment where he gave it away with a look. Earlier on their date, Des cheerfully suggested they come up with adjectives to describe something in between “like” and “love” — no doubt she thought this would take the pressure off of him to say “the L-word.” At dinner, she proudly announced her “adjectives.” “There’s stepping. [Then] skipping. [Then] jogging. [Then] running. [Then we’re at the] finish line.” Never mind that none of these are adjectives. The girl is relying on the simplest of metaphors, and possibly the worst; she may as well say, “I am running after you.” When Brooks asked, “So where are we?” she pauses and at the same time she says, “I’m breaking into a run” he says, “Jogging.” Des didn’t acknowledge his lower tier, but we saw the surprise on Brooks’ face. “Running?” he said, trying to keep his eyes from widening to the size of moons. “That’s…good.”

SO here we are, part one of the two part finale, and this is brand new, never before have we seen the show structured like this, by which I mean, it’s not a game anymore. We see Brooks go home to get advice from his mom and sister about whether he should propose. He tells them that Desiree is perfect and what he’s looking for — she checks off all the boxes — but he doesn’t know why he can’t feel love. They stare at him. “If you don’t feel you love this girl, you shouldn’t propose,” says his mom (to paraphrase.)

Well duh, right? But this is The Bachelor/ette world, where it’s expected by the end of the show that there will be a proposal. Because it’s a show. It’s a game. People are eliminated every week until there is a “winner.” But unlike other reality competition shows, there is no cash prize. This reality competition show does not want to acknowledge that that’s what it is. Though Chris and Drew said they are ready to propose to Des right there and then, it’s because they’ve been brainwashed by the entire experience. Brooks is the only one who has stepped back and said, basically, “This is insane.”

brooks the bachelorette break up

He goes to Antigua. Desiree gushes about how excited she is for their date. It’s going to be a romantic day of sailing, and at night, she’s going to ask him to spend an evening with her in “the fantasy suite.” Being in the fantasy suite is the one time during the whole show that the couple can be together without cameras present. And yes, bang. They can bang. And they should, unless they have their own personal reasons against having sex before marriage, but they really should know each other intimately before getting engaged, because that’s what this is, this is your last chance to have sex with someone before you ask them to marry you, and typically, that’s not how people have relationships. But of course none of this show is typical.

Thus Brooks, who must feel like he’s taking crazy pills, came to the decision that he must break up with Desiree, because he isn’t in love with her and isn’t ready to propose, and he doesn’t have any more time, because we are nearing the season finale of a TV show.

Des, so excited to see Brooks walking towards her, immediately knows something is wrong when she sees his face. “What’s wrong?” she asks.

And then we are treated to the most awkward break-up in all of television. Because this is real. No one warned Des about this. Brooks doesn’t want to begin the conversation until they sit down on a bench that is approximately 300 fucking miles away from where they are standing, or at least that’s what it feels like. Once they sit down, it becomes clear that Brooks has no idea how to break up with someone. Des doesn’t understand what he’s getting at until she asks, “How do you feel?” and his pause goes on forever, and she knows, and then he says, honestly, “I want to be madly in love with you…” and trails off and she starts sobbing. He doesn’t even need to add “but.”

He tries to make it better by saying how great she is and he doesn’t know why his feelings aren’t as strong for her as he would like and then she drops the bomb, “I love you.” He’s shocked. “Why didn’t you tell me that earlier?” he says, voice cracking. “Because I couldn’t,” she cries. I’m assuming she means that she was pressured by the producers not to tell him, but who knows really. “You’re the only one I love.” This breaks him. And we see them sobbing on the bench, holding each other, until she pushes him away, begging him not to touch her because it hurts too much.

desiree bachelorette brooks break up

Neither of them want to leave this bench, they are clinging to each other for dear life. There is no soundtrack, there is just the sound of sobbing. He finally suggests they get up, and they walk away. “I guess you’re leaving” she says, emotionless. “I don’t know what to say,” he says. He keeps apologizing. “Don’t say you’re sorry,” she responds. “It makes it worse.” “I’m sorry,” he says. She stops and for a moment you think she’s going to turn around and smack him.

They keep walking. He says something like, “I thought maybe you had similar reservations I did, that you were confused too” or something and she snaps, saying she did have confusing feelings, because, “I didn’t want to share my heart. I wanted to give it to you” thus revealing that this whole time on the show she’s just been going through the motions while dating everyone else. He realizes he’s made it worse. He has no idea what to do with himself. They hug and she says “stop” and she turns around because she can’t watch him leave. She walks back to the bench of doom. Then he paces, sobbing, saying he didn’t know it was going to be that hard and that, “I didn’t want to let her go…I didn’t expect to feel that.” Does this mean that he’s falling in love with her? That her revelation changed his feelings? You better believe that’s what the producers will convince him. He’ll most likely be back, and they’ll reunite and it will be edited like a Nicholas Sparks movie, and this moment of raw emotion will be pushed aside until the show ends and they break up for real.

So why the hell did I write this much about an episode of The Bachelorette? Because this was the most painful fucking thing I have ever seen on reality TV, and this includes every time someone got their nuts smashed on Wipeout. For once we have the “real” in reality. This feels like my break up. I’ve had this break up. Because this part has nothing to do with the show, this part has to do with feelings, that horrible crunching feeling in a suddenly empty space in your stomach when you realize for the first time that someone you are in love with isn’t in love with you. She must have known it, or she wouldn’t make the classic excuse for him, “he doesn’t need to tell me he loves me, he says it without saying it.” We’ve all said that at some point. We all really wanted to believe it at some point. But thankfully, millions of people weren’t watching us prepare for such an epic car crash at the finish line.

desiree bachelorette crying

 

Image credits: screenshots of The Bachelorette, via Hulu, ABC

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Lying about having a boyfriend.

benicio del toro vogue

 

Two days ago I lied about having a boyfriend. I don’t do this, ever. This is one of those things I do not like to do. I do not want to feel like I have to lie about having a boyfriend to get out of an uncomfortable situation. Before I get to this story, here is an example of a situation in which I could have lied about having a boyfriend but I didn’t.

I was in Las Vegas in May, walking around with some of my dearest blogger friends, when we were approached by two men. One guy went right up to a friend of mine; the other went to me. This man stopped me and said, “Can I ask you three questions and you answer honestly?”

“Does this one count?” I deadpanned. He paused. He didn’t get it. So he asked again, “Can I ask you three questions and you answer honestly?”

When in Vegas, right? “Okay,” I said.

“One. Do you have a boyfriend?”

Really? “No,” I said.

Immediately he got right up into my face. “Two. Do you find me attractive?”

Without hesitation I said, “No.”

That got him to step back. “No?”

“No.”

“But it’s my birthday.”

And then, because I’m too polite, I actually felt bad for the guy, and wanted to apologize, even though he was the one who invaded my personal space. I asked to see his ID for proof, as if that even mattered, as if it even mattered if he was lying about his stupid birthday. I think that was my way of apologizing, somehow. He showed it to me for about two seconds. “Look,” I said, “It’s not very attractive when a man gets in front of your face and demands to know if you think he’s attractive.”

“It’s fine. I was just asking.”

“What would have happened if I said yes?”

My friend told me. I guess her guy was more attractive than mine. Turns out, if you say “yes”, the third question is, “What do I have to do to get you to kiss me?” Charming, right?

They eventually walked off, pretty soon after I made it clear that I wasn’t kissing anyone, and the whole event felt kinda weird and icky. “Why didn’t you just tell him you had a boyfriend?” people ask, when they hear this story.

“Because I shouldn’t have to do that. Because I should be able to be strong enough on my own and don’t have to pretend to have a man to provide some sort of imaginary, invisible protection. I don’t have a boyfriend and I don’t feel I have to lie about that.”

But two days ago, I did.

There’s a liquor store down the block from me, so yeah, I pop in there pretty often. And not just for liquor. They sell Diet Coke by the can for seventy-five cents. That’s just good business. Because I’m nearby and because I’m in there a lot, the guys who work there have started to recognize my face. They’ve always been nice, helpful guys so it seemed like a bonus to be recognized as a frequent customer.

Once, one of the men working there — and the only one on shift at that time — completely threw me off when he asked me, “Do you live down the street?” I paused. “What?”

“Do you live a few houses down?” Now. I’ve gone over this before. I feel, like many other women, that I suffer from over-politeness/unnecessary apology syndrome. I’ve been breaking out of this (see the above Vegas story.) But once in a while, I don’t think fast enough, and out of fear of hurting someone’s feelings or causing someone to get angry and call me a bitch (not like that matters at all, which I realize, but is part of the whole syndrome), I answered this man with, “Oh, I live very, very far down, a few blocks down.” I didn’t need to do that. I didn’t need to say anything. But because I go there so often and because it seemed like he had an idea of where I lived, I chose to give a half-truth.

“I saw you go into a house right down this street.”

Okay, that was fucking creepy. “No,” I said. “That’s my friend’s house.”

“Oh?”

“Yes. I go there a lot.”

And that was the end of it. I remember thinking, damn, I wish I’d specified the gender of this imaginary friend. I wish I’d said, “he” and “his.”

I’m now going to get to the boyfriend thing.

Two days ago, that same guy was working there, but he wasn’t alone, there was one other guy working the counter with him. Everyone was friendly and nice and then one of them (the non creepy one) said, “That guy you’re always in here with, is he your boyfriend or your roommate?”

Immediately I decided that this was not when I wanted to tell the truth. I wanted to lie. Full-on lie.

“He is my boyfriend. I stay over there all the time, so I guess he’s my roommate too!”

Yup, I went for both. Boyfriend and roommate. The guy who asked laughed good-naturedly. But the creepy guy…that wasn’t good enough for him.

“I saw you go into a house two houses down from here,” the creepy guy said.

This really, really bothered me. He knew exactly where I lived, and the way he shared this information did not feel like a fun, conversational “howdy-ho neighborino!” Ned Flanders exchange. This felt weird and I didn’t like it.

“That’s where my boyfriend lives. I stay with him all the time. It’s my boyfriend’s place.”

The bastard wouldn’t let it go. “Your boyfriend?”

“Yes. We live close enough so I am with him all the time. It’s his place. His.” And that’s it, I was fucking done with the conversation.

Now, as for the guy they’re asking about. Not like it matters to the story, but we’re dating. We hang out a lot. Is he my boyfriend? No. Is he my roommate? No. Want to guess what I did as soon as I hurridly walked home?

I texted him, “From now on, whenever we are in [name of store here] you are my boyfriend, we live together, and you have a gun.” I told him the whole story.

“Got it,” he said.

So, because of some weird dude at a liquor store, I felt like I needed to make up a boyfriend. I don’t know if I can go in there again. And unfortunately, for the owner and for me, it’s a good liquor store. Very upscale, huge wine collection, up until now great employees, and they also sell those night-late essentials like toilet paper, and also Advil and coconut water AKA my hangover kit. But I feel like I can’t go back in there without my fake boyfriend. I feel like we have to go in there, arm in arm, talking very loudly about how much in love we are, how I’m moving in, and how he’s a very jealous man with a baseball bat in his car. I wish they sold condoms behind the counter so that we could go up there and I could say, “May I please have a box of condoms, for me and my boyfriend, who is standing right here, for us to use to have sex with? We have sex. Because we’re boyfriend and girlfriend. We’re going to go home to his house and have sex. My boyfriend is going to have sex with me after this. So we’d like to buy some condoms, please, shopkeep.”

I don’t even know if that would deter this creepy guy. I have no idea what he’s thinking. I’m not seriously concerned for my personal safety. I don’t think I am in danger. I think this guy thought I was pretty or whatever and doesn’t know how to talk to women and doesn’t realize that he’s fucking creepy. Or maybe I’m making excuses for him because of the syndrome.

What I know for sure is that I wish I didn’t feel the need to lie. I wish I didn’t feel uncomfortable about the idea of going back there alone. And I really wish this creepy guy didn’t know where I live.

Goddamnit I need a drink.

 

Photo: Benicio Del Toro and Sara Foster by Bruce Weber for L’Uomo Vogue via Beniciodeltoro.net

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On Taylor Swift, love, marriage, and the great unknown.

taylor swift no make up

Taylor Swift. Taylor, Taylor, Taylor Swift. Swifty ole Tay-tay.

Dear, sweet Taylor Swift. You’ve taught us so much about men and break ups and bleachers. But you still have so much to learn — as do we. And we’ll all figure it out together. Don’t dismay, dear Taylor. We get you. Lots of us have been there.

the beatles

We are never, ever getting back together.

In an interview with Wonderland magazine she said: “I have no idea if I’m going to get married or be single forever […] Relationships are like traffic lights. And I just have this theory that I can only exist in a relationship if it’s a green light.”

I had to double check every single episode of Sex and the City to make sure that Carrie hadn’t already used that simile. Aiden’s light was Kermit green. But Big’s light was yellow. And I didn’t know how long I could sit in traffic.

None of us know but most of us know that none of us know, you know? I went to a palm reader once and she told me a man was going to buy me an apartment and that I used to be Marilyn Monroe. She didn’t know. And I knew it.

young marilyn monroe

My landlord told me I resemble Marilyn Monroe. Marilyn Monroe is of course known for her long brown hair, small boobs, and signature Phil Collins t-shirt.

There’s a certain excitement and wonder that comes with not knowing who we’ll meet or fall in love with or marry or when. And there’s also a certain dread and fear about it. And I think most of us fall somewhere in between — that is, those of us who want to find love andwant to get married, because not everybody does. Does it seem like society forgets this? Does it occur to anyone that maybe the reason Taylor Swift always seems to talk about her love life is because everyone always asks her?

taylor swift press conference

“Just for once I wish you people would ask me about the national deficit.”

I think a lot of young women of our generation don’t feel pressured to get married just yet. I think the main pressure we feel is from our parents to move out of their houses and find “real jobs.” Whatever, dad, majoring in playwriting seemed like a great idea at the time. I was living in New York in the village; it would have been stupid not to. (While typing that sentence, it took me three tries to spell playwriting correctly, true story.)

So I don’t feel pressured to get married. But I do feel pressured to find love and claw my way out of singledom. And I feel that pressure is from one person only — me. And I don’t know why. I don’t know why I can’t be 100% happy with myself. When I have a job I love, I’m frustrated with my love life. When I’m single, I’m frustrated with my career. Why do I link the two? What the hell is wrong with me? My friends say I should act my age. What’s my age again? What’s my age again? (I think the problem is that I break out into Blink-182 lyrics, even in writing.)

blink 182

Say it ain’t so.

Dear, sweet Taylor: who cares if you’re single forever? I mean that in an empowering way. Why do people care? Stop asking Taylor Swift about her relationships. SHE TELLS US HERSELF. She tells us in every song.

The goal shouldn’t be to get married or to avoid being single forever. And I think Taylor realizes that. I think we all realize that, but sometimes we forget. We forget to stop looking forward and take a look around us where we are, right now. We don’t know what will happen and we don’t have to know. Repeat after me: we don’t have to know. And just a reminder that as hackneyed as it is, single or married, we should love ourselves just the way we are.

billy joel piano show

No clever conversation though. No one wants to work that hard.

 

Photo credits:
Nina Leen, Bill Ray, J. R. Eyerman, for LIFE Magazine.
Photo of Taylor Swift from Splash via “I Mean What?”. Blink-182 by Featureflash. Billy Joel by Anthony Correia.
Originally posted at Hello Giggles.

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Just Some Things To Think About On Your Next Date

pin up 1940's

What if your date brings a lamb? Or eats a lamb? Or is a lamb? What then?

What if you ordered something really delicious and your date ordering something very average and you feel bad for them but at the same time you’re just full of disgust and annoyance, because why the hell would you order anything but melted cheese on top of something?

What if you were on a dinner date and suddenly someone came up to you and said, “LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, MICHAEL BUBLE!!!” and Michael Buble was behind you playing a piano and you were like, oh this is cool, and then you go to a bar after your date and then the same person comes up to you and says, “LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, MICHAEL BUBLE!!!” and Michael Buble was behind you playing a piano AGAIN? I think that would be too much. Am I wrong?

And then let’s say you’re at this bar, and Michael Buble is playing, but you don’t really care about his music, but your date does. Which one do you ignore? Michael Buble or your date?

What if you just don’t fucking feel like putting the accent on the “e” in Michael Buble’s last name?

What if you never find the person who wants to do happy hour with you? What if you invite them to happy hour and they say yes, but they don’t believe that happy hour starts at 3 PM? What if they think it doesn’t start until 5? Or 6? What the hell will you do then? Are you even thinking about stuff like this? You should be.

 

“American Cyanamid, Girl & Lamb” by Nickolas Muray from George Eastman House Collection via Flickr.

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Sex, dating, and marriage survey of 2012. OMG.

Match.com is one of the many Internet dating sites that I’ve helped friends with; by which I mean, making over their dating profile. Because being single sucks. Or, it does for me. Most of the time. Probably because I need so much attention.

“Constantly talking isn’t necessarily communicating.” — Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

Since 2010 Match.com has done studies on singles and married people, asking them about what they want, what they have, and what they need. This year I’m bringing some of those stats to you, via Singles in America.

match.com singles america

Anthropologist Dr. Helen Fisher lead the study of 5,481 single people, spending 12-14 hours a day analyzing her data. I feel like if you’re single and/or have single friends, we all do that in some way or another. Analyzing our data, and our friends’, and whatever we need to do to feel normal.

So how do we, (and by “we” I mean 20 somethings, but if you’re over 20, I still love and adore you, ASK YOUR DAD, the implication being that I had sex with your father, it’s a bad joke), feel about marriage?

kennedy wedding

Over 2/3 of men and women in their 20’s want to get married. Can’t help but wonder what if the question instead was, “How many of you want to get divorced in your 20’s?” 82% of women in their 20s wanted to get married. 67% of men do.

Weirdly, or weirdly to me, these numbers drop in the 30’s to 78% of women and 64% of men. I thought it only went up the older you get, especially with women. That’s what the movies and the television shows tell us. Except for Sex and the City. Actually, no, wait, didn’t they all wind up married at the end? Except for Samantha I guess. That Samantha! She is a PISTOL! So why is it that the stats go down? Is it because people get married in their 20’s, get divorced and think, Fuck it, I’m buying a boat? Can anyone explain this from personal experience?

Henry Groskinsky

 

Here’s something that shocked me from this study. Really, really surprised me. Did you know that the first thing both men and women judge when they first meet someone is their teeth? I always assumed my entire dating life that it would be how fat or thin someone is. But apparently it isn’t, at least not in 2012 when this survey was taken. So good news if you’re fat! You’re gonna be fine! What do you see immediately about someone you’re dating when you first meet them? Guess what else is important to people? GRAMMAR! YEEEEEAAHHHHHHH! That’s not a joke actually.

90% of people asked, “Do you believe that you can stay married forever, to the same person?” answered yes. YES! YOU IDIOTS. THE MATH DOESN’T ADD UP. THE NUMBER OF DIVORCES IS TOO DAMN HIGH!

Melina Mercouri

OKAY, LET’S GET TO YOU SLUTTY SINGLE SUPER PEOPLE. 45% of you had a friends-with-benefits relationship that turned into a REAL THING. And Dr. Fisher says, “I’m not surprised. Because any kind of sexual stimulation of the genitals drives up dopamine which can push you over the threshold into falling in love, and with orgasm is a real flood of oxytocin that is linked with feelings of attachment. Casual sex is NOT casual unless you’re so drunk you can’t remember it.”

mod sqaudI hear you there, good doctor. Being really drunk is like time travelling. I think I just accidentally made a Dr. Who joke. And this is where she said something REAL interesting to me: “maybe we’re in a new stage of courtship.” Dude, I said this way back when I started my blog. I said this in my THIRD POST. It’s TRUE, DR. FISHER, IT’S ALL TRUE!

So what do you guys and dolls think about all of this? What are some dating or marriage trends you’ve been seeing? Do they reflect this study or are you reading this and as puzzled as Cogsworth when Lumiere cooks up one of his schemes to get Belle and the Beast together?

I think this study is interesting as hell, and I recommend you watch Dr. Fisher’s talk here. It was a livestreaming video so the quality isn’t the best, but it’s worth watching/listening to, because holy fuck, it really surprised me.

(Oh, and for all you sexters out there, don’t be too hard — omg that’s what she said — on yourselves if you’ve sexted because you are so not even close to being alone. 35% of women say they’ve done but, oh my God, we all know it’s higher. It’s such a thing now that Match made a short vid about it. Check it out below. There’s another stat in there that may or may not embarrass you.)

This post was sponsored by Match.com. As always, all opinions are my own, for better or worse.

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Facebook sucks.

Carlo Bavagnoli barbarella jane fonda

Facebook. Facebook sucks. Facebook is designed to fuck you over. Facebook is not your friend. Please read my embarrassing story of Facebook horror as a warning. Do not let this happen to you. Consider this your friendly cautionary tale.

I was seeing this guy. He mentioned early on that he had an ex wife and I was like, “Fine with me, I’m not looking to turn this into anything where that means something.” I didn’t say that out loud though. I’M JUST BEING BREEZY.

Then I killed the breeziness.

On one fateful night, I’m looking at his Facebook profile, like you do, and I saw a photo of him with his ex. He mentioned that they were on friendly terms so I thought, oh, I wonder what she looks like and if we have any friends in common.

So then I started looking at her Facebook profile. Just out of curiosity. It’s not like I was doing anything weird, I was just scrolling and clicking and thinking, “Hmm, nice hair” and just being breezy.

And then I saw something horrifying. Something awful. Something that you never, ever want to see on the Facebook profile of someone whose Facebook profile you don’t want anyone to know you’re looking at.

“Friend request sent.”

Yes. Somehow, without realizing it and without doing it on purpose, I clicked “add friend.”

This was my exact facial expression:

mia farrow horror rosemary's baby

This is a still from the scene in “Rosemary’s Baby” where Rosemary sees her baby for the first time and realizes that it isn’t a human baby, but actually the devil’s baby. Our reaction was exactly the same, down to the hand clasped over the mouth.

Then I screamed. My brother ran in the room and said, “What happened?” I said, “I accidentally added this dude’s ex wife on Facebook.” He said, “That’s not bad.” Then paused and said, “Nah…that’s pretty bad.”

I immediately clicked “unrequest” but I have no idea when I clicked “request” to begin with, so I don’t know if she already saw my request.

I have a theory on how this happened: I think I wanted to see what friends we had in common, and the “friends” box is right above the line that says “Do you know blahbah? If so, send blahblah a friend request” and I must have accidentally clicked “request friend” instead of clicking on friends. Fuck you, Facebook. That’s fucking evil. That’s horrible placement.

So I’m sitting there freaking out. Because now I look like what every 20 something woman of my generation looks like that we want to avoid at all costs: a crazy fucking digital stalker. There was nothing I could do. I could tell him before she told him, but what if she doesn’t see it or what if she saw it but doesn’t tell him? Then I’m volunteering my craziness.

Assuming she saw it, I ran through all of the scenarios.

She saw it.

She saw it, and didn’t care.

She saw it, cared, and clicked on my profile.

She saw it, cared, clicked on my profile, investigated, and saw that we have her ex in common.

She saw it, cared, clicked on my profile, investigated, saw that we have her ex in common, and told her ex.

She saw it, cared, clicked on my profile, investigated, saw that we have her ex in common, told her ex, and he was horrified.

She saw it, cared, clicked on my profile, investigated, saw that we have her ex in common, told her ex, he was horrified, and they killed my family.

But who would do that, right? I’m safe, right? Right?? Right.

A few days later, the guy comes over. We’re just talking about his cat and then, without missing a beat, he says, “My ex wife told me that you added her and unadded her on Facebook.”

This was my exact facial expression:

shelley duvall the shining here's johnny

This is a still from “The Shining” when Jack Nicholson goes crazy and comes after Shelley Duvall with an ax.

This was my exact reaction before I immediately hid my face and did a sort of screechy/laughing/groaning thing while shouting, “Let me explain” and “Oh my God” in a failed attempt to be playful and cute and in an even BIGGER failed attempt to be breezy. I didn’t even TRY to be breezy. I’m just trying to imagine what I must seem to him like now. He must think I’m fucking insane. But it was an honest mistake on my part.

Please, everyone. Learn from my mistakes. Don’t do what I did, or didn’t do. Even though it’s HILARIOUS.

One thing though. I am not posting this piece of writing anywhere on my Facebook page, or my blog’s Facebook page, or on my Twitter. So if either of them see this, that means they willingly read my blog, and that’s all on them. Who’s crazy now, huh????? HUH?? BOOM! Not me. Not me at all. No way, dudes. Not me, I’m BREEEEZZZZYYYYY!

here's johnny

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