Yeah she's cute, but could you handle all the responsibility?

Occasionally on college campuses you will spot a student walkin’ a pooch, but those incidents are few and far between. Since college is mostly about studying hard and partying along the way, most students don’t want the responsibility of caring for someone other than themselves – especially a four legged friend. That will poop in their shoes.

My boyfriend recently adopted a mutt from the local pound. He knew he could give her (Shyla) a good home with his off-campus house, and since then the two of them have been on adventure. While part of the time (OK – most of the time) the antics brought on by Shyla seem like they were written straight out of Marley and Me, it is hard to deny the cute, active sweetness of an eighteen week puppy playing fetch and snuggling up next to your feet.

Just as anyone who has ever had a dog knows, pups are all-encompassing hard work. There is the whole process of getting the dog acclimated to living in a house: potty-training, keeping them out of the trash, getting them used to walking on a leash… Honestly, getting a dog to “sit” isn’t as easy as it seems, so patience and a little bit of loving care is important too.

Oh, and if house-breaking a puppy isn’t enough, there is also the importance of grooming and professional pet care. You thought getting a manicure and pedicure at the local nail salon was expensive, try $15 for a dog groomer to just cut your pet’s nails. When you’re not grooming your dog, it is crucial to its health (especially as a puppy) to have regular vet visits – costing up to $100 or more at a time. Having a dog takes a lot of focus away from yourself, which means a lot less money for the seasonal (or daily) shopping tips.

But even though it is expensive and trying at times, having a dog can be a rewarding experience. Yeah, even if it leaves a little puddle by your bed.

Not sure if a dog is for you, at least while you’re in college? Let’s weigh the pros and cons. Read More »

"Oh, you have a girlfriend now? Awesome."

Fact: 100% of girls, always, look like complete sh*t at the gym. While I’m the exception to many rules, I am not the exception to this one. So you can imagine my horror, my utter horror, when I ran into a guy I used to date at the gym yesterday.

[To recap: we casually dated for about three months, during which we completely acted like a couple, but were not labeled as such. Why? Because he “doesn’t believe in relationships.”]

I asked him how he was doing, and he said school was good, blah blah blah, his girlfriend just got a new job, blah blah blah…WAIT WHAT?! Girlfriend? But…but when we were dating he said he didn’t believe in relationships! That monogamy was a sham! That labels ruined things!

My initial reactions were:
1) Jack him in the face.
2) Wait, you can’t throw a punch. Kick him in the balls.
3) Why was I not girlfriend material? Read More »

While trying to figure out a topic for this week, I thought about all of the questions people ask me, the relationship girl:

Did you come to college looking for a boyfriend?
Do you not like dating or hooking up?
How did you know he was the one?

Personally, my relationship isn’t very clear cut. We still don’t really know when our anniversary is. It all started out with the girl living across the hall from me freshman year asked if she could set me up with one of her friends from high school. He came over and we watched a movie with a bunch of our friends.

The night ended with me and him making out on our mutual friend’s bed.

We hung out a few times that week but he ended it by informing me that he wasn’t looking for a girlfriend. I didn’t see or hear from him for 3 months after that! But once I did see him again, we became friends with benefits (for lack of a better term). Neither of us wanted anything serious, and I was perfectly fine with it. I liked kinda/sorta having a guy, but I also liked the idea of not being tied down in college. Read More »

This Week’s Article: How To Trick Your Girlfriend Into Marrying You on ehow.com.

This week’s article explains how men can trick their girlfriend into marrying them. I think we can all agree tricking someone into marrying you is not a good idea, and I’m not sure why some guy needs to rope some chick into being his wife, but I never claimed to understand the mind of a man. If I did, well, we wouldn’t be here, would we?

Let’s see what these “men” have to say.

EHow says: “When you learn how to trick your girlfriend into marrying you, then you don’t have to stress going after the women of your dreams. Now all you have to do is find her and play the game until your wedding day.”

I say: Well, that explains it. Men need to trick women into marrying them so they don’t have to deal with being rejected by people they actually like. Awesome. Way to go, guys. I think it’s safe to say than any sane woman should never, ever marry someone who is “playing the game,” but some guys just play it oh. so. well. Especially thanks to guides like these ones. Read More »

So you managed to find yourself a keeper. You’ve been together for a substantial amount of time, the big L word has long since been exchanged and you two are pretty much inseparable. You are one smitten kitten. You’ve even got the guy using the words “our” and “future” in the same sentence. In fact, you two are so annoyingly in love, that you’re spending way more time at his place than at your own.

At this point, you’re starting to question the practicality of paying rent on a place you barely see, but at the same time, moving in together is such a big deal.

So then … what are the pros and cons to that complicated middle ground that is ditching the girls and moving in with your man?

Pros:

You have a chance to see what married life would be like. It’s a scary thought, but that’s where lots of college relationships go, right? Can you balance the chores? Do you manage money the same? Can you tolerate his tendency to put empty milk cartons back in the fridge? It is essentially a test drive on all (ALL!) levels of compatibility, which is great because if that test drive fails, you can go your separate ways without having to formally divorce.

You get to see a side of him you might not see otherwise. You see him on his bad days, his good days … you’ll see the real, honest to goodness HIM and not just the “him” he shows you on dates and such. Read More »

Before I had sex for the first time, I always wondered what it would be like.  Would it be special, like in the movies and teen dramas on the CW? Who would it be with? When would I know when I was ready? My first time was far from special, and then it was over, and I was no longer a virgin.

Since then, I’ve gone through additional partners, some serious boyfriends and some one-night stands.  I’ve had good sex and bad sex.  I’ve had some freak-outs, too.  Here are some things that I really wish I had considered before that not-so-steamy night in the backseat of a Pontiac Sunbird. Read More »

I have a confession to make. You can judge me all you want, but I’m coming clean:

I cheated on my last boyfriend.

No, it wasn’t a long, torrid love affair. It wasn’t kinky sex with a Jeremy Piven lookalike. In fact, there was no sex involved. All I did was make out with a co-worker. But still, cheating is cheating, so tonsil hockey still counts in my book. It also counted in my boyfriend’s book. And it counted in his sister’s book…and she was the one who witnessed the fiasco.

It was innocent enough; I didn’t intend to cheat. I wasn’t emotionally attached to my co-worker. We just got blackout drunk at a bar and swapped saliva for about half an hour.

The next morning, I woke up feeling like I’d done something wrong. Yup, I had. My boyfriend’s sister asked me if I remembered making out with “Frank.” Immediately, my heart sank. I got dizzy. I wanted to throw up. My mind started racing a mile a minute, as is standard anxiety-attack protocol. Why would I do something like that with Frank, a guy I had absolutely no interest in, when I was happy and in love with her brother?

A lot of people will disagree with me for saying this, but cheating can be hard on the cheater. I was ashamed of myself, I cried, and I regretted doing so many shots the night before. What’s a cheater to do when they’ve crossed the line with someone else? Read More »

Dear Engaged Friends,

So, congratulations! Have you picked a date? Done the dress shopping? Gone cake tasting? Picked the esteemed members of your bridal party? Great! So if we could take a minute to shift the focus over to me? Yeah.

You’re freaking me out.

Early, early, early 20s are not a time when the general “you” should be worried about marriage, especially when I can’t even decide whether I want to go to grad school or work or what. And yet, you’re kind of making me think I should be worried. I mean, isn’t everybody in the dating game right now, yourselves excluded? Aren’t most pople our age single? Don’t you know that marriage is supposed to be forever and divorces are really expensive and, frankly, so are weddings (especially on the east coast—eep)?

And also, are you going to get all judgy all of a sudden? I’m still the delinquent “single friend” who can’t land a boyfriend for more than a couple months at a shot, I have no life direction as yet (but we’re hoping, any day now, for an epiphany)… Are you going to keep giving me that “I’m judging you without trying to seem that way” look while continually asking how my dating life is going? Because I can tell you already: I’m really not going to meet anyone anytime soon. I’m pretty sure I’m bad at the dating game and I probably can’t even find someone to commit to being my date at your wedding to keep me from looking as alone and pathetic as I apparently am…

No, it’s fine. I’ll be at the bar, don’t worry about it.

Wait; you are having an open bar, aren’t you? Read More »

Lately there has been a lot of talk of Promise Rings as a sort of pre-engagement commitment. I just can’t seem to grasp this whole trend.

A promise ring?

Maybe it’s all the religious hype that typically surrounds them, or maybe I don’t understand what the promise is, exactly (a promise to love each other? To save yourself for that person? To not cheat or stray?), but they just don’t make sense to me.

I thought being in a committed relationship meant all that already, so why a promise ring?

People have told me I’m unromantic and cold, but here’s the thing: I’m not unromantic. I’m a realist. I believe people fall hard and then get hurt hard. I also, however, truly believe that people do fall in love, but I don’t think all the hoopla is necessary in order to prove or show it.

I, personally, don’t think it’s necessary to use a piece of jewelry to prove your love for someone. Some may argue that the jewelry is a symbol of your love, but I think actions and emotions expressed are sufficient enough. My boyfriend and I love each other, but a ring isn’t what I need in order to keep our love in my heart. Read More »

I, like many others in their low twenties, have a few friends who are married. That’s fine with me—they were obviously willing to take that step, so more power to them. It does, however, weird me out a little bit.

I’ve never really felt like I have a biological clock ticking, or that I need to do something dramatic (read: get married) before I hit 30. I don’t think my hitched friends necessarily felt that way, either—I think the time and the person were just right for them. But still, as each year passes by and I have birthday after birthday, I think to myself, “People get married at this age. People get married at younger than this age. How is that POSSIBLE?”

I consider myself a pretty mature person. Sure, occasionally I will do something like pick up a hot steel pan without an oven mitt just because I think I can do it, and then I will predictably get burned. But my life isn’t generally like that. I pay all my bills on time, I can be trusted to get back to people, and I’m responsible. Why, then, do I feel like I’ll NEVER be ready to get married? Read More »