How to be Romantic

The long Awaited Answer to Your Love Questions

Dear Freaky in Florida,

I know exactly what you're going through. This kind of thing happens all the time to people your age. But because you're young the rules are a little different.

First of all James- were you the one that asked to be anonymous? Well, its okay, nobody'll know your last name is Badia-Suarez anyway. Why the hyphenation though? You aren't married yet. We're going to fix that. First off can I say you're very lucky to write in when you did. If you hadn't you would have missed the opportunity of a life-time.

Let's start with puberty. The girl in your story judging by her height is well into the throes of womanhood. You however are what, 4 feet or so? The day will come when that changes for you. You must avoid the most common "kick-yourself-later" problem ever, the problem of ruining a good relationship before puberty because you thought you weren't interested.

All guys have a beautiful woman they've lost because they didn't do anything when they had the chance. She flirted, he ran away. Now post-puberty, that means after, she won't have anything to do with him because he branded himself a coward before things first started rolling. Now the poor guy's stuck with whatever ugly undesirable girls are left over.

My advice: Get while the gettin's good.

The best way to prove yourself to this girl is to do exactly what you don't think you should do. So I'd say, wright her a song and perform it in public. Make sure lots of people are around, that way she'll know you mean it. Instruments are optional although they do pump up your romanticness by about a thousand points so if you can't find a guitar or a clarinet, at least bring a pair of spoons or something. As for lyrics and tune be original. Don't just do that song from The Little Mermaid, I Want More, or whatever it is. Every other guy does that.

For best results use this as a template, or just copy it exactly since its worked on thousands of girls:

and bring a bouquet of flowers: poppies, carnations, ferns, anything works.

So there you go James. You might think its weird right now, but believe me, in a couple more years unless you're a really late bloomer, you'll be thanking me. And maybe that hyphenated name will get another hyphen.

Black Boiled Bottom of a Witch's Black Brew (an excerpt found on file from early 2008)

Mr. Friedman walked quickly to his front office. The man was there waiting again. This was the sixth time this week he’d been late getting back from lunch. It was fun being an executive. He got his own reserved parking space, longer lunches, and more food. He was especially happy to be getting more food. His wife was enjoying more food as well. She’d always been big, but now she was enormous. The man in Friedman’s office was the company auditor.
“Aren’t you guys supposed to come like once a year or something?” He struggled to catch his breathe. It’d been getting harder each day to make the long walk from the elevator to the front office. He tugged at his collar. It seemed tighter today.
The Long thin man in the gray suit turned around. His face was drawn out in a permanently uninterested expression. He folded his hands behind his back and glared at Mr. Friedman. Behind his eyes a seething black hatred rolled and boiled like the black bottom of a witches black brew. He swallowed and the rage subsided leaving a residue of raw disdain. “It would be so if your departmental unit was in order,” he glanced down at Mr. Friedman’s belt where his shirt was coming out from the quick paced walk from the elevator. Friedman noticed and quickly began stuffing the shirt back in, but his belt had shrunk a little from the summer humidity or something so every time he stuffed, the shirt would come back out a little more. Didn’t he have longer shirts than this? The thin grey auditor scowled. “Mr. Friedman, this is not a dressing room.”
“I know” gasped Friedman as he sucked in with all his might, “It’s a place of business.” He huffed as he quickly stuffed the rest of his shirt in around his massive belly. Once safely in, he exhaled sealing the shirt safely behind his belt. He wiped a bead of sweat from his forehead and held out his hand to greet the auditor. The black boiling hate was back.