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July 8, 2008

Questionable quote of the day

Funky Brown Chick's friend on finding the right guy:
“You want too much and you don’t act like you’re looking for a longterm relationship. Every other woman in the world has figured it out except you. You gotta ‘date down’ if you want it to last. That’s the secret. The guy has to be less hot than you. Stay away from the attractive boys. Go for the good guys.”

“What about the attractive boys who are good guys?” I ask optimistically. “I know guys like that.”

“No you don’t. They don’t exist. You only think they’re nice because you don’t know them that well.”
I'm all about not having pie-in-the sky ideas of your mate, but i'm not sure beauty and kindness are mutually exclusive.

Your thoughts?

(Cartoon courtesy of Mr. Oblivious)

Posted by Maryann James at 11:17 AM | | Comments (4)
                    

June 25, 2008

Swinging and polyamory, oh my!

I'm running behind today, folks. First day back at work is always a little hard, sloughing through the piles of e-mail, catching up with co-workers... but you don't want to hear the excuses! You just want the news!

Well, speaking of inbox messages, Liz Kay of the lovely Consuming Interests blog, forwarded me an e-mail press release about LoveVoodoo.com, which is billed as "your adult lifestyle dating site." Aimed at people who are interested in everything from swinging to casual dating to fetish to bukakke (I had to look that last one up; I'll refer you to Wikipedia for that one. I'm blushing just thinking about explaining it.), the makers of the site are pressed to assure you that swinging was not just for your hippie parents in the 70s. Swinging is alive and well.

Non-monogamy does appear to be on the minds of many lately, perhaps with the start of CBS' show called Swingtown. Psychologist Dr. Belisa Vranich wrote about polyamory over at the Huffington Post, where she questioned our assumptions about monogamy. "Does a monogamous marriage equal a good marriage?" she asked:





Continue reading "Swinging and polyamory, oh my!" »

Posted by Maryann James at 2:40 PM | | Comments (5)
                    

June 24, 2008

Love prospects up in smoke?

It's been nearly six months since the statewide smoking ban and I'm curious: Has the limits on smoking affected anyone's mojo with meeting people?

This thought came up a little while ago as my friend and I walked past a man, smoking a cigarette outside, as we exited a bar. "He's cute, but he'd be cuter without a cigarette."

That started the (rusty) wheels turning in my head: She possibly could have met him in the bar, sans a cigarette, if he was able to smoke inside. (She could have met him between cigarettes.) And what about social smokers? Are they less social now that they don't have the freedom to bum (and smoke) a cigarette from someone inside the comfort of a bar?

I've been ecstatic since the smoking ban, since I have never really had the urge to light up. But what about those who do? We've had plenty of stories on how the smoking ban has affected businesses, but what about love lives?

(Photo by juandpaola at stock.xchng)

Posted by Maryann James at 4:00 PM | | Comments (3)
                    

Hottie clarification

Yesterday, I asked where you could find a hottie in Baltimore. To which BaltAmour reader Don replied:
So just normal looking guys are not suitable for impromptu make out sessions? And what is the criteria for being a "hottie"?
Let me clarify: When we went out Saturday, there was a dearth of men. So much so that we saw the same group of women (sour-faced, at that) at Ixia and at Brewer's. (Perhaps they were on the same man-search as us.) Most of the men were attached. And if they weren't, they were simply not their style.

So. The criteria for a hottie? Obviously unattached. Uncreepy. Clean clothes. One man's attractive is another man's oogly, so I'm not gonna get into specifics. AAAND, I'm not just asking for places where you can find an eligible man for a girl to make out with, I'm also asking for places where guys can find eligible girls, where guys can find eligible guys and where girls can find jumpable girls. (And I'm not talking about Power Plant Live at last call.*)

So help me out! Give me your ideas and I will post the best five on Friday.


(Photo by jimreilly at stock.xchng)


_____
* You know what I'm talking about. That annoying tendency for certain folks to be willing to love ANYONE once they've gone past their drinking limit.

Posted by Maryann James at 11:30 AM | | Comments (7)
                    

June 16, 2008

More macho movie messups

I've found another film to put in the messed-up movie files: The Godfather. I was watching the movie yesterday with Boyfriend and a friend who had never seen it before. I love the movie. The drama, the strategy between crime bosses, the funny phrases -- yes, even the violence -- it's riveting. However, I'd seemed to have forgotten how Michael Corleone treats Kay Adams like crap!

What do I mean? Let me break it down for you:

Continue reading "More macho movie messups" »

Posted by Maryann James at 12:15 PM | | Comments (5)
                    

June 13, 2008

The power of three

One of the bloggers I regularly read, New York-based Funky Brown Chick, recently admitted that she had a menage a trois. OK, admitted is not the right word -- she wasn't apologetic or previously secret about it, she was up front, unabashedly frank (and happy) about her threesome.

She gets kudos from me -- I've always joked that I don't have the multi-tasking ability for such an activity, but I'm also kinda serious. But she's young and single and interested ... why not?

There were lots of kudos and reminisces on her blog, but according to Funky Brown Chick, the real-life reception wasn't quite so warm. Just as she was open enough to admit to the deed (but was also careful to mention that didn't mean she wasn't selective about her bedmates), others were just as willing to admit their disdain:

Continue reading "The power of three" »

Posted by Maryann James at 4:14 PM | | Comments (3)
                    

June 12, 2008

The joy (and confusion) of text

According to the AP, Nevada Gov. Jim Gibbons has gotten into romantic and political trouble -- over texting. Gibbons, who is in divorce proceedings, was called out by his wife for sending more than 860 text messages to a married woman that she says he's infatuated with and who he says is just a friend. Why the political trouble? Because he sent them on a state phone.

Apparently he missed the same memo that Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick missed: Texting can come with a price.

I just wrote about how a certain cell phone can help your love life, but there's also a dark side. Texting can get us in a lot of trouble, especially when it comes to relationships, possibly because it's so easy. It makes it easy to arrange for a hook up, it makes it easy to break up and it makes it easy to say those things that you otherwise may feel so awkward saying. It's the electronic version of Dutch courage.

And Lord help you if you've had the alcoholic version of it too.

I have a friend who went out with a guy, went home, and then suffered through text message after text message of him trying to convince her to come over and watch a movie, share a bottle of wine, etc. She eventually ended up ignoring him. That would never happen on the phone or in person.

Perhaps that b commenter was right: Maybe cell phones do wreck relationships.

(Photo by buzzybee at stock.xchng) 

Posted by Maryann James at 12:01 PM | | Comments (3)
                    

June 10, 2008

iPhone love

Since everyone's all excited about the cheaper, cooler iPhones that are coming, I figured I'd drop some knowledge on how the iPhone can help your love life.

1. It's a conversation starter. This will probably become less true as more and more people get them, but I've had plenty of strangers start up conversations with me because they see my phone.
2. You get instant cool points in your favor. It's like having a nice outfit or reading a good book.
3. It shows your personality. From your photos to your bookmarked sites to custom ringers to the music you choose to put on your phone, it shows what you like to read, what images you enjoy and what music you like.
4. There's plenty of ways to find like minds. There's ipling, where you can find people in your neighborhood and your city who are iPhoners, send messages to each other and, if there's an electronic spark, you can become real-life friends. There's also iDating, Dating DNA and other i-friendly connection sites.

Of course, I'm biased. I did love my iPhone so much that I ended up naming it Baby.

Posted by Maryann James at 11:15 AM | | Comments (6)
                    

June 5, 2008

And you thought your date was bad

I've been in a weird, distracted mood all week; Either it's due to my post-Sex and the City haze or the nine straight days of work. I haven't figured it out yet.

Either way, in my distractedness, I forgot to mention a gem of an e-mail I received earlier this week from BaltAmour reader Michael. "Without reading your bad date list, I can top it," read the subject line. He explained that he was catching up on blogs in his reader (for shame Michael for letting it get so out of hand!), he ran across my bad dates post and just knew he could top it with at least two stories. I share them below.


Continue reading "And you thought your date was bad" »

Posted by Maryann James at 3:40 PM | | Comments (4)
                    

Forget words, try pictures



Youniverse, which apparently has been around for a while, has launched a new aspect to their site today, a dating questionnaire based completely on pictures, or in their words, your VisualDNA (a screenshot of the first question is shown above). From there, you are given a dating type (mine was Bashful Blusher), a chance to see how your choices compared with the most popular ones and a shot at connecting with other people similar to you.

It reminds me a bit of OKCupid's design -- do some fun quizzes, compare with others -- but a little bit more put together. The design is cute and clean and the other quizzes -- love, travel and well-being are a few -- are just as addictive.

The quizzes themselves are a bit hit-or-miss, in my opinion, but Youniverse does seem to have created a fun, different, breezy way of finding new people. I enjoy that you can narrow people down by personality type, age and gender, as well as levels of commitment, anxiousness and playfulness. I don't enjoy so much that the most you can narrow down by location is country.

Anyhoo, try it out and let me know what you think.

Posted by Maryann James at 12:01 PM | | Comments (0)
                    

Putting the lie in online dating

A woman wrote to one of my favorite dating experts, Evan Mark Katz, about why curvy women don't get much play on dating Web sites. 

She's 5'3" and is a size 10, so she listed her body type as "curvy." But then, after a few male co-workers said they never contacted women who listed themselves as "curvy" or "a few extra pounds" because they usually ended up being more than a few extra pounds.

So what should she do? She's caught between a rock and a hard place.

Katz basically said to keep doing what she's doing -- to worry about what she can control (herself, her profile) and let go the things she can't (men who want skinny girls and would ditch a perfectly wonderful person because she has a little extra padding). Good advice.

But this raised two questions for me, one which is sort of out of left field, and the other that is more direct. I'll start with the hard one:

Continue reading "Putting the lie in online dating" »

Posted by Maryann James at 11:53 AM | | Comments (10)
                    

May 28, 2008

On sex and rejection

In the past couple of days, I ran across two Web sites about sexual experiences, one thoughtful, one funny.

The first, The Virginity Project, is a blog run by a woman from California, who collects people's how-I-lost-my-virginity stories. At first I thought it was interesting how religion was a part of many of the stories on the blog, but it makes sense -- hellfire and damnation is probably one of the only things that could possibly make hormonal teenagers pause about doing the do.

Religious influences aside, it's an interesting indirect commentary on how such a big deal is made of virginity, when in reality, many first-time experiences are not as huge of a deal. (There are exceptions, of course.)

I found the second site, How Not to Get Laid, from the previous site. There are lots of good stories on people not getting any loving, from the woman who tried to do a striptease for her husband and ended up injuring him, to the woman who had to deal with dirty baby talk.


Posted by Maryann James at 3:00 PM | | Comments (1)
                    

May 23, 2008

What women say when you're not around

Catherinette of Bridget Jones has Nothing on Me cracks me up:
  • Foxy: Have you told him we have been making fun of his name all day?  Because I am sure he will not be at all weirded out by that or anything:
  • Me: He wouldn’t be weirded out by that because I told him that I was already naming our kids and picking out china patterns.  I wonder why it’s taking him so long to respond to my email…?
  • Foxy: Oh my gosh - well he’s probably booking the church and buying the diamond that’s all.
  • Me: Right.  We don’t want to rush things so we’ll probably wait until our 3rd date to introduce our parents to one another.
  • Foxy: Good plan - you don’t want to seem to eager.
  • Me: That would be wrong.
  • Foxy: So wrong.
  • Me: And yet it feels so right.
Hee. It's so funny! So true! So wrong!


Posted by Maryann James at 11:04 AM | | Comments (2)
                    

May 22, 2008

Cultural exchange?



I was working over on the features copy desk for the first half of this week, which means it was my job to edit the singles listings that are posted exclusively online. I filed away a couple services/groups for later discussion, but this listing, a fairly new one to The Sun, I believe, caught my eye:

Continue reading "Cultural exchange?" »

Posted by Maryann James at 4:00 PM | | Comments (0)
                    

May 19, 2008

Singles stimulation

Sounds dirty, doesn't it?

One of my favorite flaks, who works for OKCupid -- yes, the folks who brought you this revealing quiz -- sent me an e-mail and press release the other day:
To boil down the release real quick, many singles spend upwards of $600 a year on online dating site subscription fees. With that money (equal to the stimulus check just sent out by President Bush) put towards other uses, singles can still stimulate their dating life by using free online dating sites and also the economy. Many singles who decide to try out online dating aren't aware that there are free options, though, so I thought it may be of interest to your readers.

Continue reading "Singles stimulation" »

Posted by Maryann James at 3:29 PM | | Comments (7)
                    

May 16, 2008

The bad date list from hell

One of my friends sent me a link to this story in MSN Dating and Personals, "5 Dates No Guy Wants to Go On."

I was excited, until I read it. It's bad, dude. It's bad. I realize this guy, Mark Miller, is trying to be funny with this list, but he relies so heavily on tired cliches that are more worn than my jeans I've had for six years (and are not appropriate for public viewing) that its NOT humorous. It's just bad.

I'll guide you through his list:

Continue reading "The bad date list from hell" »

Posted by Maryann James at 12:06 PM | | Comments (7)
                    

May 12, 2008

More on flirting

I kinda bumbled my way around last week's flirting post; here's another piece on flirting that is waaay better (and funnier) than mine, even though she only peripherally talks about flirting motivations (see: stereotypical meathead, accidental flirting).

Feel free to read the post, but for those who are too lazy to click the link, here's the funniest part:
The scene: Average and unremarkable guy who I have no intention of purposely flirting with walks towards me on his way to the bar. I note that he's wearing a navy blue version of the t-shirt I received when I volunteered for the Minneapolis Central Library opening.

Me: Hey! You're wearing a library shirt!
Guy in library shirt: I am!
Me: I have the same shirt. Mine's red, though.
GILS: Well how 'bout that? This is the first time I've worn mine.
Me: I wore mine to bed last night.
GILS: (...)
GILS: I think that's a little TMI. (Smiles, walks away.)

Posted by Maryann James at 2:06 PM | | Comments (1)
                    

Love the accent!

This rant from the Angry German in Esquire is priceless. As a German living in America, he unloads about Americans' bias toward accented-folk, particularly the Brits, and particularly when it comes to sex appeal:
Women seem to take the English accent as an aphrodisiac. I can say, "Hey, I work for an investment bank, have my own place, and write a column in Esquire magazine" and get no response. Whereas butt-ugly Mr. Winterbottom to my side says, "Hey, I am on parole and need to buy some coke -- care to help me out?" As long as he says it with a Brit accent, it is guaranteed that she will go home with him and fund his cocaine addiction.
I will not hesitate to admit that an accent is incredibly appealing. I remember squealing with one of my friends in  college when gave me the details on a promising love interest: "She's cute AND she has a British accent!" There's something about people who call elevators "lifts" and bathrooms "the loo" that makes them automatically cooler. (OK, I call bathrooms the loo too, but I don't sound half as cool as a Brit. Even when I try a British accent, it somehow comes out Southern. Don't ask.) Perhaps the James Bond movies have brainwashed us all to think British = hot, suave and cool?

However, an accent will get you only but so far -- Bad teeth? Out of here. Are you a jerk? No thank you. 

Posted by Maryann James at 1:30 PM | | Comments (2)
                    

May 9, 2008

What's my flirting motivation?

The other night, while out with friends the other night, we got into a somewhat heated conversation about flirting.

It started because I mentioned that Boyfriend is a Flirty McSmiley, to which he begged ignorance. He's just a friendly guy, he said. Ignorance or no, his friendly behavior -- mostly to people in the service industry -- comes off as flirty, I said, which I find hilarious to watch. (He swears he's not a smoothie, but it's so funny to watch him pour on the charm.)

But then the tables were turned, which is when it got interesting: Sure, he may flirt to smooth the edges with the lady at the front desk or the waitress who's serving his food, but it's still low-grade compared to women, the men of the group said. What about women? Women are way more confusing, because they flirt for a number of reasons, many of which have nothing to do with the man you're flirting with. Among the reasons:

Continue reading "What's my flirting motivation?" »

Posted by Maryann James at 10:21 AM | | Comments (3)
                    

May 5, 2008

Are outgoing girls out?

I'm cribbing off of iVillage today because the answers surprised me, and, well, I wanted to check back on their work.

In the Love section, they asked two guys, one described as "A Career Man," and another described as "Life of the Party," whether men prefer shy and reserved women or outgoing women.

Though Life of the Party hemmed and hawed, he basically said that men prefer shy girls. Men like the challenge, they both said.

Is this true? Sure, personality and looks count, too, but given two identical women, apart from their introversion/extroversion, does the introverted woman get the guy?

Posted by Maryann James at 12:40 PM | | Comments (6)
                    

Is monogamy dead?

According to Marguerite Fields, a junior at Marlboro College in Vermont, monogamy is a rare bird these days for college students. In her essay, she details the string of men she's been involved with, from those she was just interested in, to the men she messed around with, to dates -- but never boyfriends. According to Fields, the lines are so fuzzy these days that people shy away from THE line into Boyfriend.

It's an interesting idea, which leads to some funny stories:

So, a few days after the chat with my mom, when I found myself downtown drinking tea with my friend Steven, I asked him what he thought about dating. He has a long-term girlfriend, and I was curious how he viewed their relationship.

“The main thing,” he said, “is I don’t mind if she sleeps with other people. I mean, she’s not my property, right? I’m just glad I get to hang out with her. Spend time with her. Because that’s all we really have, you know? I don’t want her to be mine, and I don’t want to be anybody’s.”

I sucked my teeth and looked over at the next table, where two men sat opposite each other. One looked over his shoulder and gave me a closed-mouth grin.

Steven explained that it’s not a question of faithfulness but of expectation. He can’t be expected not to want to sleep with other people, so he can’t expect her to think differently. They are both young and living in New York, and as everyone in New York knows, there’s the possibility of meeting anyone, everywhere, all the time.

I'm sorry, this is crazy to me. When I was in college, though there were plenty of swinging singles who preferred to stay that way -- especially men, who had their pick at a school where they were outnumbered by at least 2:1 -- but there were also plenty of people who were willing to stick with one guy or girl. And that didn't mean just until they saw someone else who caught their eye.

Of course, perhaps my perspective is a little skewed. At that point, I was dating mostly women (I k