Category: love and dating

Lyft in Love!

Busy weekend on Lyft! Last night’s lessons:
-stop driving at three or you’ll wind up in
Compton at 5:30 AM
– exotic dancers will sometimes rob you in your sleep in Thousand Oaks and scale a gate to get in my Lyft and complain about not being able to smoke in my car

Lyft Adventure Part 1:In Love in Lyft

I picked up a cute, fairly drunk guy at 2AM in downtown Pasadena, and he was texting someone while he gave me an address. We picked up a cute, fairly drunk girl and the magic began.

Guy: Let’s go to (name of bar)
Me: Uh, I think they’re closed, it’s 2am.
Guy: I think it’s open?
Girl: I just think I’m a…real easy going person.
Guy: I know, I know. I try to live in the moment.
Girl: You just..have to.
Me: Guys, this bar is closed.
Guy: (to me) oh! Let’s go to (restaurant.) Have you ever had a conversation this amazing happen in your cab before?
Me: (dryly) A Tinder date? Sure.
Guy: Noooo we met at a club.
Girl: You just came up to me and asked me to dance, and I couldn’t turn you down!
Me: OK, I’m sorry to say this restaurant is also closed.
Girl: I don’t even need to eat. I’m good.
Guy: OK, we’ll just go to In n Out and get a shake.
Girl: It’s like, you just…you took down all my roadblocks.
Guy: I know, I know. You told me.
Girl: All my defenses, just gone.
We get to In n Out. It is also closed.
Girl: OK, I guess…take me back to my place?
Me: OK.
Guy: Naw, we can get out here.
Girl: Oh…OK?
Guy: My house is right over there. We can hang for a little while and get another car later.
Me: OK, here we are then.
Guy: Isn’t she just so cute?
Me: Yup. Here we are!
Girl: I just can’t believe how strong we vibe on each other.
(Moments pass. They’re just sitting in my car talking)
Me: You guys…can you go fall in love in someone else’s Lyft?
(I find this hilarious. Nobody thinks it’s as funny as I do.)

Remember, kids: Love is embarrassing but it’s ok if you’re both doing it, it’s like wearing white pants or doing the hokey pokey- but nobody thinks it’s as great as you do. Please be safe and use rideshare when you’ve been drinking and you want to pick up your after-bars-close date. Also, get the fuck out of my car.

Lyft Adventure Part 2: at 2:30 AM I picked up another call in downtown Pasadena. I waited at the address for a few minutes and saw no one, and a bar was emptying out across the street so I cruised it to see if my fare was there. After another minute, he walked across from the first spot, waving at me and pointing at his phone and making an angry “you’re an IDIOT” face about having to cross the street and I just thought “fuck this”, cancelled his ride and peeled out. He was a big douchey bro with black ink sleeves and a backwards baseball hat. I did not want to drive him to Azusa. Felt so good.

Japan’s Not Sexy Anymore

To the outside world, Japan is known for being sexy.

The women of Japan are considered the world’s most beautiful, and it’s the home of crazy street fashion, host bars, and Hentai pornography.

However, 25% of Japanese men are still virgins at 30, so many that a new word has emerged for them: yaramiso, which means “30 years old and haven’t done it.”

If there’s anything the Japanese believe in, it’s being on-the-nose with slang.

Even men with prior sexual experience aren’t having much sex- 50% of Japanese men who’ve had sex before haven’t had it in a year or more. Women’s numbers aren’t far behind.

This has deep repercussions throughout society.  The population has dropped by 1 million people since 2008.  There are now concerns about Japan’s ability to support their aging population.

Even stranger are polls reporting that many Japanese people don’t want to have more sex. 1 in 5 men cite extreme dislike for sex, and 46% of Japanese women 16-24 want no sexual contact at all.

It’s worth pointing out that Japan also has the third-highest suicide rate in the world.

So- what’s killing the Japanese sex drive?

1. Money.

In the money-flush 80’s and early 90’s, there was plenty of dating and premarital sex, but the economy took a sharp downturn in 1995. How does that affect getting it on?

When young people can’t afford to live on their own, sharing an apartment with your parents puts a damper on your dating life. In Tokyo, most teens don’t even have cars to make out in! Chew on that, America!

This means that courting couples must visit love hotels, hourly hotels of varying levels of cleanliness and quality, just to have somewhere to be alone.

2. Social Shame.

Men whose careers don’t produce enough money to raise a family are shamed and emasculated.  The Japanese also have a cultural fear of failure, and may prefer not to try to pursue relationships for fear that they won’t work out or they’ll be rejected.

3. Work.

  The Japanese are working harder than ever, with 22% of people putting in more than 50 hours a week, and 200 people per year dying of karōshi, or overwork: dying of strokes or heart attacks on the train to work, or on the job.
  Single people have no time to date.  Married people get home too tired to have sex with their partners, and with personal time at a premium, many single people prefer not to, in their perception, “waste” time on relationships with others when they could be pursuing other interests.

4. Replacement.

Some of the quirky inventions of Japan designed as substitutes for human contact could be contributing to the problem: virtual girlfriend games, pillows with women printed on them, sex dolls, and pornography- all options where one’s sexual and emotional needs are met on your own schedule. Some men have married their pillows and dolls, saying goodbye to human relationships forever.

What can we in the West learn from the East, and how can we do better?

Americans are getting married later (27 for women, up from 21 in 1964) but losing our virginity around 17.  Most of us aren’t worried about having sex before marriage.

We’re having lots of sex, even if we’re not always having lots of relationships, with over 50% of New York single year after year.

Japan’s overworked, solitary citizens make our phone-spawned hookups seem warm, old-fashioned and romantic by comparison.

My advice on not turning Japanese, I really think so:

Stay connected. Stay empathetic. Keep up with friendships, with family, with current and ex-lovers.  

Use technology to get and stay connected- but not to replace connections with people.  What is life for, but connecting and communicating and sharing with other human beings? We may be in a divisive election year, we may have social problems, but please- let’s not start marrying pillows.

– See more at: http://www.lovetv.co/tokyo-death-sexy/2/#sthash.T4pKR6Z6.dpuf

Men, Your Dating Pics Suck!

Men, your dating pics suck!

Why is your ex in your photo? That sucks.

Why are you on a car? That looks stupid.

Why are you holding a fish? That straight sucks.

Why don’t you have any decent photos of yourself?

Let us help you to help yourself.

Lyft Update #340501: The Time A Girl Wanted to Break Up with her Fella because he used Lyft Line:

Picked up a nice drunk couple from a bar, they were on a Lyft Line so I headed to pick up the next person.

Girl: You’re going the wrong way.
Me: Oh, we’re gonna go pick up Nicole real quick!
Girl: Who the fuck is Nicole?
Guy: Oh, honey, I did Lyft Line
Girl: What the fuck is Lyft Line?
Guy: It’s like Uber Pool.
Me: Save a couple bucks, reduce traffic!
Girl: You cheap FUCK.
Guy: Hon, are you really mad? We’re not in a hurry…
(a few moments pass, we talk about other stuff, having fun)
Girl: Why are you going east?
Me: We’re…gonna pick up Nicole real quick?
Girl: Who the fuck is Nicole?
Me: She’s..the next rider on the Lyft line?
Girl: What the fuck is Lyft Line? She sounds, sorry to say this, like a c*nt.
Guy: Um…don’t say c*nt?
Girl: And you can ignore him. He’s never even been in a threeway. I’ve been in like thirty.
Me: That sounds like a real calling!
Girl: Plus, he’s the only dude I’ve dated who hasn’t wanted to move in after six months! What the fuck is that?
Guy: Uh.
Me: (Trying to lighten the mood) Well, those other dudes were codependents! I’ve dated guys for six months before I put their names in my phone!
Girl: WHAT the FUCK are you SAYING I want to GET OUT
Me: Oh, here’s Nicole!
Girl: Hi Nicole, where are you going?
Nicole: To No Vacancy!
Girl: Oh cool that’s a cool place to go to get fucked by a 27 year old guy with no job
Nicole: OK?
Me: Ok, you guys are almost to your destination!
Girl: I don’t wanna go to his house. Can you drop me at my house (gives address)
Me: Well…I can’t actually change destination on lyft line, because, you know, we have to head near where Nicole is going.
Girl: You cheap fuck!
Me: (Last attempt at humor) No fighting in the cab!
Girl: I don’t want to go to his house EVER AGAIN!
Guy: (whispering) are you serious right now?
Girl: FUCK YOU YOU CHEAP JEW FUCK. AND FUCK THIS DRIVER. AND NICOLE THERE’S BAR LUBITSCH IT’S A GREAT PLACE TO GET FUCKED BY A RUSSIAN DUDE.
Nicole: I don’t think I’m looking for that.
Me: (silence)
Me: (SFX screeching brakes) OK here you are! Thanks so much!
(They get out, fighting because she wants to break up with him for doing rideshare)
Nicole: What the fuck was that
Me: Sorry, I know!

Confidential to Aaron: You’re a nice dude and I think you can do better!

When “hey sup” is not enough: How To Talk To Women Online

This week, a girlfriend and I got a heartfelt, funny, sincere and personal message from the same guy, and we discovered it was the same message.

Many thanks to my anonymous friend Zeke Shandy for this excellent question:

“After ten years of internet dating, I’m still, I guess, awful at it.  How do I break the ice with a woman online?”

There are as many different approaches as there are women in the world.  I’d like to offer some advice based on my own internet dating experiences.  Not showing off, but I’ve been single a lot.  Lots and lots.

OKCupid released a study last year claiming it’s a numbers game, and the best bet for men is to send as many messages as possible.  They claim that blasting “Hey, how are you?” to five hundred women will get more first responses than spending the time to actually try to connect with fifty women.

Is It A Numbers Game?

  This is lazy: a person who is putting forth the absolute minimum effort annoys me.  This also includes “Hey.”  “Howdy.”  “What’s up.”  “How’s your weekend.” That approach employs the math of internet dating: trying to attract as many potential mates as possible so that you can sort through them later. 

I am a proponent of an old fashioned idea that you might like someone because you found their personality attractive, and you don’t wish to go on 500 dates with people who just ask how your weekend was.   

This week, a girlfriend and I got a heartfelt, funny, sincere and personal message online.  We discovered it was the same message.  I know the internet makes it feel like there are infinite numbers of single women to talk to, but there aren’t.   We called him on it and he said I have to send too many messages to women, I can’t write them all individually.  Well, ok, perhaps our bots can date?

Check out these do’s and don’ts!

DO: Mention what made you smile in her profile.

This is lots easier on sites like OK Cupid and Match.com with its questions and essays than it is on Tinder or other visual-based apps- where it’s easy to make initial connections, but hard to maintain ‘em.  After you’ve established that you’re both people who love standing in front of painted angel wings, where do you go from there?  Get her talking about an interest you have in common!

DON’T: Write a five paragraph essay mentioning your thoughts on every single thing in her profile

This feels slightly stalkery and also responding to it will feel like work.  Keep in mind that we’re probably tapping out responses on phones while waiting in line for coffee, so brevity is good!

DO: Make it clear that you’d like to connect with her.

I get a lot of super non-committal messages.  If you don’t want to talk to me, don’t.  Easy!

DO: Ask her out if you enjoy talking to her, and feel like she is responsive to you.

After a couple of days of back-and-forth but no plans, I’ll stop responding.  I’m a person with a finite amount of time on this earth and I can’t spend it telling twenty people how my weekend was.

DON’T: Get mad if she doesn’t want to give you her phone number.

I’ve had a ton of trouble with this, but if I haven’t met you, I don’t feel safe giving you my number.  Please respect my boundary.  I know not all men will text with crazy abuse and dick pics, but it happens enough that I established a policy.

DO: Be positive and fun.

If you’ve just started talking to someone, it might feel fun to immediately talk about the terrible experiences you’ve had on the dating scene, or how you specifically DON’T like something in her profile.  I don’t know where to go from there.  There’s so many ways to make a conversation fun, so try one of them!

GIVE SOMETHING TO GET SOMETHING: 

Try and ask a question that you’d be interested in hearing the answer to, and then write something back when she responds!  If you just respond to her last message “OK” , don’t be surprised when you don’t hear back.

DON’T mention her attractiveness:

 I assume if you’re writing me, you think I’m attractive.  Having a stranger dwell on your looks, particularly your body, is off-putting.

DON’T start with sexy talk:

Sexual attention is not welcome from a stranger.  I know my friend Zeke wouldn’t do it, and you shouldn’t either.  I know it feels like a compliment to tell a lady you’re thinking about motorboating them tits, but it isn’t.

I know internet dating is hard.  It can feel like work.  It’s hard to share a little of yourself with another person, but it’s the only way to get any good out of it. Ultimately, we’re all here to connect and learn and have good experiences!  Good luck, Zeke!

Anyone with a question can DM me on Facebook or Twitter, where I am @badiniadones!

– See more at: http://www.lovetv.co/how-do-i-talk-to-a-girl-in-2016-the-internet-edition/3/#sthash.ndChtkQI.dpuf

 

Make Mine A Make Out! from LOVE TV

Look, almost everyone likes sex.  Presidents and college students and married people all like it  and think it’s great.  But whatever happened to just making out?

In the beginning, there was kissing.  Lots and lots of sweet, hot, open-mouthed kissing.  And it was good.  We’d walk around in a daze after hours of it.  And then we moved to second base.  And lo, it was also pretty good.  Bras were stuffed under couches, not to be seen again until moving day.  Slowly, a bunch of kids who knew next to nothing about baseball moved towards a home run- and many of us never looked back.

Look, almost everyone likes sex.  Presidents and college students and married people all like it  and think it’s great.  But whatever happened to just making out?  You know, getting hot and heavy, kissing until your mouth is all tingly and puffy, feeling hands inching ever closer towards the edge of your bra- it’s fun and super hot!

Kissing Feels Great:

Kissing reduces cortisol, a stress chemical in the body.  Fifteen minutes of kissing measurably reduces levels of cortisol in academic laboratory make-out tests.  Kissing and making out releases all kinds of feel-good chemicals and hormones, including oxytocin, the love drug.  That makes making out a natural painkiller, and it also bonds you to a new person or an established partner.  Men like kissing because it’s a way to introduce more testosterone into women’s systems, which makes sex even sexier.  Women like kissing men because it’s a way to assess their appropriateness as a biological mate.   We’re usually looking for people whose genetic makeup is dissimilar to one’s own, which makes for stronger offspring.  Kissing and pheromones transfer a lot of that information about another person- unfortunately, kissing can’t help determine whether one still uses a skateboard as their main mode of transportation.

Kissing is Intense:

Kissing is done with one’s eyes closed, not just because it’s a social norm, but because kissing provides so much great information and stimulation it’s better to cut down on visual stimuli- also, because while you’re kissing, your partner probably looks like they have one big eye in the middle of their forehead.

It’s Low Risk:

For single people, kissing and making out packs a lot of the same heart-stopping thrills as sex, but without the downsides of one-time hookups- there’s virtually no STD or pregnancy scares, and it’s not as embarrassing to run into someone you made out with once at the Trader Joe’s.  If you’ve just started seeing someone, think about making out a time or two before you start having sex- you’ll be more comfortable with each other and probably have even more fun building intimacy and looking forward to the main course.

It Makes Sex Hotter:

For couples, making out makes sex hotter- building anticipation and just having fun with each other.  Try making rules- set a ten minute timer that’s only for kissing, then another timer that’s only for touching each other, and so on- by the time you get to sex you’ll be completely bonkers and have a wonderful time!

It’s Portable:

Making out can be done with your clothes on, or mostly on, so you can do it in a car or in a gazebo, in a movie theater or methadone clinic, or lots of places it wouldn’t be that great to have sex.  It’s not polite to do in a Denny’s, but many have.

In closing, the next time you’re with someone you’re into, consider making more out of making out!

– See more at: http://www.lovetv.co/make-mine-a-make-out/2/#sthash.LWPRjl8h.dpuf

My Last Alcoholic

My Last Alcoholic

I don’t like to say that my family is all alcoholics, but we have pretty strong numbers.  My grandfather was dead at 45, his liver rotted through, leaving behind a small family and a whole town of party buddies who thought he was really great.  It’s an established fact that alcoholism runs through families.  It doesn’t necessarily breed other alcoholics, but it breeds codependents and nurturers and excuse makers and people who seek out alcoholics as partners.

I’m not an alcoholic, and my sister isn’t, but we find ‘em and we date ‘em.  It’s what we’re good at.  She is of the opinion that there’s no man in the world who’s not an alcoholic, because she hadn’t met one yet.

I can tell when someone is an alcoholic or an addict without ever seeing them use. It is my superpower, because if you are an alcoholic or addict active in your addiction,

  1. I will find you attractive.  I will feel that magical flutter in my chest that only happens in the movies and which I now associate with fear.
  1. Alcoholics will tell you the same stories over and over, and they forget the things you tell them, because they weren’t listening. They tell you things when they’re drunk and they don’t remember when they’re sober.  This is your problem.
  1. Alcoholics may brush with greatness, but sometimes they don’t seem to have achieved very much. Maybe they were nearly in a big band, or they used to be in one, or made some great art when they were younger, but now they’re 40 and call themselves a photographer but the last time they took a picture was last year sometime, or they just keep losing job after job because everyone else is a JERK.
  1. Alcoholics don’t prioritize sex. Personally, I love sex, and if I love you, I really want to have sex with you, lots of it.  Alcoholics might have sex with you if they are able to after the bar closes and if there’s no booze in the house.  And that’s abnormal.  Science tells us that healthy men will prioritize sex over food, over sleep, over personal safety- but not over addiction.
  1. Sometimes you can tell someone is an alcoholic because nothing is ever their fault. If you hang around long enough, everything will become your fault.

6. Sometimes you can tell someone is an alcoholic because they are so charming and wonderful, and when they are nice to you, it’s the most wonderful feeling in the world, and it covers you in warmth and light, and when it turns off it feels like the planet Hoth. Alcoholics are two different people. You think that once they stop drinking, the bad selfish lying part will go away and the sweet smart creative will stay behind and love you, but the fact is that the second thing is a fiction that allows the first thing to survive.  The mean drunk is who they really are.

My last alcoholic was a super smart very handsome photographer that had been a TA for twenty years and wasn’t sure what had happened. He came to visit me from San Francisco and suggested we go to a bar in LA, and at the bar in a city where he didn’t live, everyone knew his name.  So I was concerned.

We had a couple drinks and some fun chit-chat and I told him I was ready to go home.  WINK.  You know, to have sex.   And he told me he was ready to have a couple more drinks.   And I said OK.  He was on vacation.   I would like to remind you: he was super hot.

Finally, the bar closes. We go back to my house.  We go to bed.  And we started to have the first sex.  Of our new connection.  First time.  All the heat.  All the desire.  I was on top.  I looked down at this man.  His eyes were closed.  He was transported by desire.    His eyes stayed closed.  For kind of a long time.  I leaned in to check.  He was snoring gently.  He had fallen asleep.  Not his dick.  Everything from the dick back was asleep.

I dismounted, expertly, passing one leg over his body to not disturb him.

He woke up a moment later, I guess because his cock was cold.

He smiled and started making love to me again, and was looking very handsome.  His dark, beautiful eyes locked onto mine, and then gently fell closed as he fell on top of me.  He was asleep again.

You know the old saying, fall asleep inside me once, trick’s on me, fall asleep in me twice, I’m going to pull the condom off and throw it away and go to sleep.

He woke up in the morning and turned to me and said, “I’m starting to think I have a problem with alcohol.”  And I said “yep”.  And he said, “you’re not even going to pause on that? You’re just going to say yep?”  And I looked in his beautiful face and I said, “I hope you have a nice drive home.  I hope you do examine your relationship with alcohol.   I’ve unfriended you on Facebook and blocked your phone number.  You are my last alcoholic.  Goodbye.”

The blessed lesson from this experience is: I know I don’t have to ask whether someone is or is not an alcoholic.  If this article was familiar to you, you don’t either.

I don’t have to wonder what life would be like with that person.  I know what it’s like.

I don’t have to ask whether I could help them stop drinking.  I know that’s not my responsibility.

And I don’t have to keep them in my life if they don’t want to get better.

– See more at: http://www.lovetv.co/you-are-my-last-alcoholic-relationship/#sthash.XlWtzcEE.dpuf