You're Never the Exception

I read the book He's Just Not That Into You many years ago and loved it. A few years later, the movie came out and my friends loved it, too. One important moral of the story is to remember "You're always the rule—never the exception." Meaning, as much as you think you are that one girl that's going to get the fairytale romance...you're more than likely not and just wasting your time on some loser, when you could be finding the right guy/girl. Yet, even after watching the movie—all my girlfriends were convinced they were the exception.

A friend posted one of my favorite lines on Facebook recently, "Remember, the only reason he can miss you is because he's choosing, every day, not to be with you."

I decided to post the entire excerpt from that part of the book, because it explains my situation way better than I could at this point, and when I read it, it felt like a good kick in the ass that I needed. This lesson applies to guys and girls, so I hope all my male readers take note, too. I mean...it was written by a man. I know it's long, but read all of it. You won't be disappointed.

Read on my friends.

"Cut your losses and don't waste your time. Why stay in some weird dating limbo when you can move on to what will surely be better territory? Don't want to hear it? Fine. Here's the answer you're looking for, "Hang in there, baby. He's not the loser everybody's telling you he is. If you wait and keep your mouth shut and call at exactly the right time and anticipate his moods and have no expectations about communication or your own sexual needs, you can have him!" But please don't be surprised if he dumps you or continues to drag you through a completely unsatisfying relationship.

He is a man made up entirely of your excuses. And the minute you stop making excuses for him, he will completely disappear from your life.

Men, for the most part, like to pursue women. We (men) like not knowing if we can catch you. We feel rewarded when we do.

Don't let the "honeys" and the "babys" fool you. His sweet nothings are exactly that. They are much easier to say than "I'm just not that into you." Remember, actions speak louder than, "There's no cell reception where I am right now."

Calling when you say you're going to call is the very first brick in the house you are building of love and trust. If he can't lay this one stupid brick down, you ain't never gonna have a house, baby. And it's cold outside.

He will always be able to play the "friend" card on you. He only has to be responsible for the expectations of a friend, rather than the the far greater expectations of a boyfriend. He's got the ultimate situation: a great friend with all the benefits of a girlfriend, whom he can see or not see whenever he wants to. He may be one of your closest friends, but I'm sorry to say ... as a boyfriend, he's just not that into you.

Beware of the word "friend". It can often be used by men or the women that love them to excuse the most unfriendly behavior. Personally, when I'm picking friends, I like the ones who don't make me cry myself to sleep.

I don't want to be "sort of dating" someone. I don't want to be "kinda hanging out" with someone. I don't want to spend a lot of energy suppressing my feelings so I appear uninvolved. I want to be involved. I want to be sleeping with someone I know I'll see again because they've already demonstrated to me that they're trustworthy and honorable -- and into me.

You can't blame a guy for having feelings. You love someone, you break up, you still have feelings. Thank God for that really. But having feelings doesn't mean you have to have sex.

Every man you have ever dated who has said he doesn't want to get married or doesn't believe in marriage, or has "issues" with marriage, will ... rest assured ... someday be married. It just will never be with you.

Everyone wants to be loved and needed, particularly by the person who just broke up with us. I understand. What could be better than hearing from the man who just told you he didn't want you in his life anymore ... his sad, wistful, "I miss you so much" voice on the other end of the phone? It's validating. It's exciting. It's irresistible. But resist you must.

My friends all say I should stop talking to him, but I think he misses me, and I like that. I miss him. I feel if I stay in touch with him, it will remind him of how great I am, and eventually he will realize that we should be together again.

A man who wants to make a relationship work will move mountains to keep the woman he loves. If he's not calling you to tell you he loves you and wants you back, it should only be because he's showing up at your new residence to do it in person ... if he's not doing any of that, he may love you, he may miss you, but ultimately he's just not that into you. Stop taking his calls and let him know what it's like to live without you.

Don't be flattered that he misses you. He should miss you. You're deeply missable. However, he's still the same person who just broke up with you. Remember, the only reason he can miss you is because he's choosing, every day, not to be with you.

I was seeing a guy for about a month. He broke up with me, saying that he didn't feel like it could be something serious. I understood and took it well. He wanted to know if we could still hang out as friends. I said sure. Now we get together and go out and then come back to his place and have sex, just like we did before. (But now, we're "broken up.") He's really, really cute and I love having sex with him. I also think he must like me if he can't stop being around me. And I think it's kinda cool -- all pressure's off and we're having a great time together. I've decided that I think it's fine and I'm not going to call his attention for the fact that we're actually dating. Except for the fact that we broke up.

This guy is brilliant. He goes out with you, dates you, breaks up with you, then continues to sleep with you, which basically absolves him of all responsibility toward your feelings. After all, you're not going out anymore. It's genius! It's diabolical! He should be writing a book! In fact, I bet this guy could get his own little cult going if he wanted to. And let me guess, you'd be happy to sign up for that as well. For the record, this guy doesn't "like you so much that he can't stop being around you." Because here's what guys don't do if they can't live without you: they don't break up with you. This guy is seriously not into you, it's crazy. The only way you're going to figure out how into you you are ... is how fast you get rid of him.

It's very tempting when you really want to be with someone to settle for much, much less -- even a vague pathetic facsimile of less -- than you would have ever imagined. Remember always what you set out to get and please don't settle for less. These guys exist because there are a lot of women out there who allow them to.

Hey girl. Put down the penis, put your clothes back on, and go directly to your best friend's house. Do not find an excuse to stay. Do not think that because of all the crazy hotness of it all, it now means that you're meant to be together. Yes, break up sex does seem like a good idea, because hey, it's nice to have sex with someone you have these dramatic feelings about. It makes it all, well, dramatic. But now you know. It confuses everything and makes you separate sex and emotions. So now you don't ever have to make that mistake again. Got it? He's into the very-bad-idea-that-masquerades-as-a-good-idea, breakup sex. Over and out.

Don't underestimate the power of sex, even with someone you've been doing it with for a very long time. Especially with someone you've been doing it with for a very long time. Breaking up means not seeing them again, which also implies not seeing them naked again. It might be tempting to forget this pearl of wisdom, but just remember, it's still called breakup sex. No one has yet to rename it oh-my-god-the-sex-was-so-good-we-got-back-together-again-and-lived-happily-ever-after sex.

He's sniffing for something better, and when he doesn't find it, he gets lonely and comes "home." It's not that he's so into you. It's that he's so not into being alone. Don't give him the chance to break up with you for the fourth time. (Even the idea of it sounds beneath you, doesn't it?) Reset your breakup maximum to one and move on.

Deciding to get back together with someone is a complicated and difficult decision. Just remember that the person you are getting back together with is the same person who, not long before, looked you in your beautiful face, took full stock of you and all your qualities, and told you that he was no longer in need of your company.

Don't confuse being classy with being a doormat. Classy is walking away with your head held high, graciously, and with all dignity. Being a doormat is offering to drive him to the dentist for his root canal.

Breakups, I've heard, are supposed to be just that. Breaks. Hard, clean breaks. No talking, no seeing, no touching ... keep your hands to yourself. The relationship is over. Half the people I know move after a huge breakup, and frankly that makes perfect sense to me. You're not supposed to sleep with the guy who just broke your heart a week ago. Fine. Next time I'm in this situation I'll cry. Stay in bed and wail. Go to the gym if I can. Call all my friends and burden them with my misery. Sleep too much. Cry some more. See my therapist more often. Get a puppy. Do whatever I have to so eventually I can move on.

Breakup sex still means you're broken up.

Cut him off. Let him miss you.

He doesn't need to be reminded that you're great.

There's a guy out there who's going to be really happy that you didn't get back together with your crappy ex-boyfriend.

The reason it's so painful when someone disappears is you have to face the fact that the person you loved had probably left you a long time before he grabbed his coat and scrammed. The part part is realizing that he was lying to you, in some way, before the moment of vanishing.

Don't give him the chance to reject you again.

No matter how powerful and real your feelings may be for someone, if that person cannot fully and honestly return them and therefore actively love you back, these feelings mean nothing.

Being lonely ... being alone ... for many people ... sucks. I get it, I get it, I get it. But still I have to say that yes, my belief is that being with somebody who makes you feel crappy or doesn't honor the person you are is worse.

Life is hard enough as it is without choosing someone difficult to share it with.

You deserve to be with someone who is nice to you all the time."

Never the exception,
K

Where Less Than 110% Gets You

I realized where I was a year ago today and immediately knew what it was that I've been wanting to write about the past few days.

A year ago, at this moment, I was in the car with my Mom and Grandmother heading to the airport in Nashville.

Mom was about to have a stem cell transplant.

I was flying to Seattle to welcome my ex-failance home from Afghanistan.

My emotions were being pulled in more directions than you could ever imagine.

But this day reminds me about how I always try to give 110% in relationships.

I did whatever it took to take care of him while he was gone and be the ONE person there when he came back. I tried to do all I could for my mom and spend as many moments as possible with my her and take care of myself in the meantime. Even though things didn't work out with him, I never regretted giving my best.

That's what you have to do to make a relationship work and since I've been single I realize how many people are scared, don't want to or don't know how to. You have to want to give 110%. There can't be 50, or 70 or even 99 percent. If you're not all in—then what's the point. That's no fun for either person and relationships are supposed to be fun. You're supposed to want to spend more than normal amounts of time together and just enjoy the "fresh car smell" stage of the relationship. You're supposed to be crazy about each other and it's totally acceptable.

You can't just be willing to give 110%, but you have to open yourself up to receive it. If you're not in a place where you don't know what to do with the love and passion someone is giving you, it's not going to work either, because that person will feel rejected and used. Then, you'll end up drunk and breaking up on MLK Blvd. and wake up the next morning, still not sure why, but Facebook confirms everything.


I recently attended my sorority sister, Lyndi's wedding. It was never a question of "if" these two would tie the knot, but "when." These two are the perfect example of marrying your best friend and two individuals that give 110% if not more to each other. Congrats guys!

The Crazy Neighbor Lady With No Pants

This morning, I had my first terrifying "living on my own" experience. At my dollhouse apartment, I have a nice little porch to myself, that also has a gate that leads down some steps to the backyard. At the bottom of the steps, you can just walk directly onto the property behind ours and head towards the main road. I've never felt unsafe in my apartment, but not long after I moved in, I noticed the gate on my porch was being left open. I realized someone was probably using my porch as a cut through to get to that road and lazily leaving my gate open. I didn't love the idea, but I wasn't too concerned, just curious who it was.

This may be TMI, but I'm telling you anyways. When I'm getting ready for work, the apartment tends to get super hot and stuffy so at this point in my routine I'm half dressed...shirt on, but no pants.

While mid-routine, I was my kitchen making breakfast while chatting with a friend and noticed to white blurs run by my window in the crouched position onto my porch. I ran the 2 feet to the living room window and peep out and see a kid who is still crouched down and from this position it looks like he's trying to steal my chair. The next few thoughts race through my mind:

1. Someone else is with this kid, because I know I saw two blurs. Is it a kid or an adult?
2. I'm getting robbed and I really don't know what to do about it.
3.. Do I open the door now or put on pants and then attack?

I immediately decide if I take the time to find pants, this kid will be gone—and no one is stealing from me, even if I'm scared out of my mind right now.

So I fling open the door (trying my best to keep my waist hidden behind the door) and yell, "What the heck are you doing?!?!" I see the other kid is halfway down the stairs and I'm pretty sure the other saw me peep out the window and was scared to move after that.

They looked to be anywhere form 8 to 10 and in shaky voices informed me they were just cutting through and asked me if that was okay. I tried to laugh (still hiding my no-pantsed self behind the door, but I'm pretty sure he knew what was going on) and told them that was okay, but that they had just scared me.

So now the mystery of my porch runner is solved and all the neighborhood kids are telling each other about the crazy lady next door with no pants on. Only me.

Have A Funky Friday

While writing my 1,500 word article for the day is super thrilling, I really need to use my lunch break to write about something less...work-ey.

I must say, I'm one lucky gal. I've got the best friends a girl could ask for and there's more than about 20 of them I can call on at any time. They've really been there for me this week, without hesitation. They know when I need a funny g-chat, an emoticon rant, or when I just want to walk into Sing It or Wing It and sing a "here's what I think about that" kind of song—and they're willing to do any of the above. If you don't have friends like this in life, you've missed out.

After an interesting pedicure experience, I was quite sure my week couldn't get any weirder.

My friend Todd told me I'm a "shit-magnet". I don't totally disagree after this weeks events.

While in pure bliss from this pedicure, I hear a woman walk in and start yelling. At first I think she's joking around with the owner, until I finally realize he's yelling at her to leave or he'll call the police. Apparently, she has some dementia issues and keeps forgetting when she gets manicures and is convinced they are taking her money...go figure. As our nails are drying, two rather attractive cops show up to take the statement and they were rather smiley at us. When I passed them at the red light when we left, I think for the first time in my life, I considered doing something to purposely get pulled over.

After the craziest pedi ever, two friends called wanting to buy me a beer and ensure my sanity was still intact. I really didn't want to because the past two nights didn't consist of much sleep and I was definitely starting to feel the reprocussions.

They were relentless, like all good friends should be, so I took my grungy (but freshly painted toenailed) self to The Terminal. After catching up, they managed to get me to go to Market Street Tavern for just one drink.

That "one drink" was the best thing to happen to me all week. Holy cow. You haven't lived until you've had the Funky Monkey martini at Market Street Tavern. I mean this thing was perfection. It's also their martini of the month all month. I posted a recipe I found online so you can try it and see for yourselves or just go there and pay the $7 to make someone else do it because it's WELL worth it. I highly recommend you make your Friday funky with all your funky friends. If you don't have friends like mine, I highly recommend you find some. Life is way more bearable with them. :)


Funky Monkey Martini

2 ounces of Score Banana vodka
1 ounce of Creme de Cacao
1 tablespoon of chocolate syrup
1 tablespoon of chocolate milk

2 freezing martini glasses

The mix
Add your Score Banana vodka and Creme de Cacao to a shaker half full of ice.
Shake, shake, shake for a full minute.
Add the chocolate milk to your shaker, and give another ten shakes.
Strain your chocolate martini into the glasses.



Stay funky,
KL

Story Time

I have plenty to blog about right now. Too much to even think about, but I promise the blog that needs to be written is coming.

In the meantime, I want to hear your awful dating stories. A co-worker mentioned that she wished she could anonymously post her dating nightmares so let's hear it. I want to know your worst pick-up attempts, the most awkward first dates, the greatest break-ups, whatever you think will make others feel like they're not alone in this awful world of singledom. You can send them to my email Kerrigasskd@gmail.com and I won't include names when I post them, unless you want me to.

I may even have a prize in it for the best one. Just sayin'.

KL

What the Starbucks Barista Didn't Know

I slept all of one tossing and turning hour last night. It was a downright crappy night. 4 of my close friends got 3:30 am phone calls. I dreaded today, too because I knew it would suck. Let's just say this about my bad night, if I knew a damn thing about dating, I wouldn't have a blog called "Single in the Little City." (and the fact that my ex-failance's new fiance decided to comment on every picture of his that I ever commented on so I'd receive a notification didn't help either. The blog about that scenario is coming soon.)

Needless to say, I needed the green twin-tailed siren more than she knew this morning.

I ordered my usual venti coffee with room for cream and the guy joked, "Sorry we're out of room today." I giggled and thought, "Ok, maybe this day won't suck."

Wrong. I reached in my purse and realized my wallet wasn't there because I picked up the wrong purse this morning. I told the barista sorry and turned to walk away and she said, "Hey, don't worry about it" and gave me the coffee for free.

My co-workers and I visit this Starbucks daily so she knows I'll get her back, but the point is—she had no idea I had a bad night.
She had no idea I had no sleep or that today was going to come with an awkward, uncomfortable confrontation.

She just paid it forward with no questions asked.
She didn't hesitate for a second.

My point is, you never know what someone is going through, even if they walk around like a ray of sunshine, inside it might be cloudy, so treat people with kindness and compassion and even if you think they're having the best day of their life, do what you can to make it that much better.




KL

Why We Cheat With Ugly People

Have you or someone you know ever been cheated on and then you see the cheatee' and think what the hell? I know it's happened to me, my best friend, people who have been married before—and you can't help but wonder—why did they down-grenade?

When it first happened to my best friend no one could process how you could leave a knock-out for someone who looked like they'd been knocked out.

I caught my ex-failance' cheating on craigslist one time. No lie. I was on his e-mail account to access some hotel reservations for an upcoming vacation and found messages from girls he had contacted on craigslist looking for dates, sex, lord knows what. Do you know what people look like on craigslist? No! Because most of them he was contacting were probably men—but that's just proves....it's not looks that make people cheat—it's unhappiness, and not unhappiness with the relationship, but unhappiness with themselves.

When people cheat, we always ask the wrong question. We ask, "Well how could they do that to them with that?!?"

When really the question should be, "Why did they do something so dumb to themselves?"

Simply put...they're unhappy with some part of themselves and they feel like the thrill and secretiveness of cheating will fill that unhappiness. We all want to be happy and when we aren't anymore, some of us are too afraid to admit it, so we'll sneak around with anyone we can to find that happiness, even if we don't realize it's just going to be temporary and what's coming will be hell to pay.

So if you ever find yourself in this crap situation, don't ask yourself, "How could they do this to me?" yet ask yourself, "Why was I dating someone who was so unhappy they could do this to themselves?"