5. A lost wallet and/or clutch. This is particularly disturbing because it is usually the first thing that hits you in the morning, well before you’ve had any time to nurse the hangover you earned. It feels very similar to being on a deserted island that smells strongly of vodka and lime. You are cell-less, cutting off contact with the outside world. With credit card whereabouts unknown and no proof of identity, you are left defenseless against fraud. If you are underage, there is the heavy burden of finding a new fake i.d. The brand new lip gloss and powder from MAC that you inevitably JUST bought are gone forever. Worst of all, your dear, loyal, and perfectly fashionable clutch will never be wedged into your armpit for pictures or table dancing ever again. R.I.P. Limited edition Coach Python and Boucle clutch. You will be missed.

4. The guy you went home with. Okay, last night this guy was h-o-t! He was witty and charming and so attentive to your needs; not once did he let you have an empty glass! Whether you met him at the pre-party, the bar, or on the way home (never a good sign), this dude – who seemed like a great idea at the time – is now nothing more than a big (or worse, tiny) mistake. Often, this error in judgment will use trickery and promises of rides on his family’s yacht to get you home with him, but come morning all he can offer is a ride home…if you’re lucky. High-tail it out of there and head to the nearest health clinic to make sure all he has given you is a bad memory.

3. Bar-Dancing Induced Injury. An injury caused in part by your favorite jam is highly unsettling; it feels like betrayal. Unfortunately, though, being hammered enough to hop on the bar and shake your shiz with the shot girls is begging for disaster. One minute you’re on top of the world (bartop) doing the drunk girl dance; the next, you are falling in slow motion into a sea of A/X clad gentlemen. While that group of guys was immobile for the last 5 minutes trying to look up your skirt, they have swiftly parted, allowing you to fall directly onto the floor. So much for chivalry. The only up-side to this drunk-tastrophe is when the bar staff take pity on you and set you with straight shots of Ketel One.

(Note: This mishap will always occur a day or two before a major event (like graduation) where you will then be forced to explain your injury to your grandparents.)

2. Hitchhiking. Only the biggest and baddest of theme parties (and the most alcoholic hunch punch) can inspire such stupidity. The problem with being both extremely intoxicated and too impatient to wait for a cab is that it often results in severe underestimation of distances, which can lead to the (incorrect) assumption that everywhere is within walking distance. While you saw nothing wrong with stumbling down a busy street’s sidewalk dressed in lingerie, angel wings and 4 inch pumps on a 38 degree evening, a kindhearted stranger did. He rolled down his window and had you at “Um, are you okay? Can I take you somewhere?” After hopping out of his car and wastedly thanking him (and God for letting you make it out alive), he sped off into the night with your angel wings.

1. Getting Arrested. While it seemed completely appropriate to hit on the hot young cop outside of the bar last night, this morning all that attraction has turned to regret. Despite his insistence that he was working, and that you should probably run along to the nearest Taco Bell and head home, you couldn’t resist to ask “Why, is there a plobrem occifer?” Cue his disgruntled and older partner to walk over, demand I.D. and arrests you for being drunk in public. Those hilarious comments about “ASS-aulting an officer” and your demands to have “Officer McChiseled-Abs” cuff you instead probably didn’t help your case, either. Use your one phone call wisely, because if you call your still-groggy girlfriends in the morning, they will most likely be laughing to0 hard to take you seriously.

It didn’t really occur to me at all that I should have been jealous or angry or even concerned, and my girlfriend seemed just about as intrigued as I did when I told her about the tall, silent, fairly attractive guy in the corner of my Shakespeare class.

Ogling is a tricky little subject. The problem is that just because you now have a girl doesn’t mean every other gal and/or guy instantly ceases to be attractive. Hot people still exist (thank God), and there isn’t some magical on/off switch that makes you think your girl is the hottest one on the planet (not that this is a bad thing to think).

It also kind of complicates matters that ogling when you’re in a girl/girl relationship is one of the things that’s VERY different from the way it is in a girl/boy relationship. It depends all on your significant other’s personality, of course; I’m not gonna say that ALL girls are okay with ogling and ALL guys are against it. For me, though, I’ve never had a boyfriend who entirely appreciated me leaning to the side and checking out that one guy’s amazingly shaped ass or that girl’s near perfect rack. My girl now is totally okay with it. So what’s the big deal?

The key, the most important, the most VITAL thing you need to have in your relationship is mutual understanding and respect; and that doesn’t just apply to checking out other attractive members of your species. It applies to everything. If you’re worried that your girl is upset because you peeped at that one guy’s oh-so-pretty eyes or you’re worried because your girl did the same, for God’s sake, talk to her!

The best part about being in a relationship with women is that you don’t have to scramble up the gender wall to relay messages back and forth. She’ll understand, especially if she and you both know that neither of you mean any harm. If she doesn’t – and this applies to my straight girls, too – there is a very legitimate chance that you may not have the strongest of relationships.

In closing? Yes, I do think it’s okay – and healthy – to check out other birds’ plumage when you’ve already got your own mate.

Just be careful.

Explanation:

My friend, I’ll call her “Alyssa”, works in finance. So obviously, all of her co-workers are hot men. She’s kept things platonic there since she’s smart and now these cute money-makers are her pals. This means we all hang out on a semi-regular bar-going basis, thus allowing male/female attraction to develop.

Now my roommate, “Kelly”, has had her eye on one of these fellows for a while, and the two of them have been flirting for months. So it was only a matter of time before they wound up in bed together.

I mean, I wasn’t surprised. But Alyssa, well, she was kind of pissed.

This is something I can understand if a) Alyssa told her not to go there or b) Kelly knew Alyssa had a thing for the dude she bedded. But neither scenerio applies.

Alyssa hasn’t been blind to the obvious liking these two have taken to each other. She’d seen the flirting, the touching, and it never seemed to bother her. But now that something has actually happened between them, there’s been an explosion. And she and Kelly are in a massive fight.

Obviously, I’m trying to stay out of it. But as an outsider, I can see what’s really going on here: Alyssa has a secret crush on her stud of a co-worker.

I know all of this will blow over. The boy/girl drama always does. But the lesson learned is, don’t mess with any co-workers because that work/pleasure dynamic can be a tricky one, especially if there are emotions no one’s talked about.

In a recent conversation, the topic of male strippers came up (actually, this topic comes up in more conversations of mine than you’d think). Being the kind of girl who’s seen Chippendales a few times, I didn’t see anything wrong with hot guys dancing (kind of laughably) in almost no clothing. To me, it’s just one of God’s many gifts.

A friend of mine, however, saw it as the exact opposite. In her opinion, male strippers not only emasculated themselves, but ruined their attractiveness level by attempting to attain the ideal hot guy persona: shaved chest, oiled body, and perfectly manicured hair.

I was shocked and horrified. Male strippers may be hilarious, but denying their hotness seems like a sin. Besides, most people don’t bat an eyelash when it comes to chicks taking off their clothes.

What do YOU think?

“What?!” she yelled. “What are you saying?! Don’t say that! Nobody’s too attractive for you! You’ve got a complex, I swear…”

After getting her to calm down, I brought it up to another friend of mine. “He was totally amazing” I told her, “but I just think…you know how you can be talking to someone, and the whole while you’re thinking, ‘this guy is just too cute’?”

“Oh, totally” my friend chimed in, her eyes going large with recognition. “I totally know what it’s like to talk to someone who you think is too good-looking.”

So, there it was; two different people with two completely different opinions when it came to who’s in our league or out of it.

It’s pretty common knowledge that women aren’t all about looks when it comes to picking a partner. While I don’t think any of us would say no to an amazing body or smile, a lot of us look for humor, drive, and personality before perfect features. Men, on the other hand, have been known to be all about the hotness (at least initially).

With this in mind, it seems quite possible that there are more men “out of her league” than women out of his. If a guy isn’t dripping with adorableness, but has an amazing personality, he has a better chance with most hot women than an average girl with an awesome mind has with most hot guys.

What do you think? Can anyone ever be out of anyone’s “league”? Is it easier for guys to compensate for less than movie star looks? And if so, doesn’t that sort of suck for us?

Have you ever felt like you’re not “hot enough”?