I’m busy wrapping up a term paper for one of my classes, so I don’t really have time to update FBC today. But, because I love you, I didn’t want to leave you empty-handed. So, instead, I leave you with Lenny. What better (or sexier) present could there be?

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Pssst! FBC on Nerve today: בייַ מיר ביסטו שיין (To Me, You’re Beautiful)

When I was in high school, I used to have a crush on a man who wore a big gold pinky ring. Yes, I said it. The man wore a pinky ring. And, I liked him. A lot. Okay, so, I ignored the pinky ring for as long as I could. Then, eventually, I told him: “You know … that pinky ring? It kinda looks a little goofy.” His response? “My dad gave me this ring just before he died.” (Needless to say, I felt like a total jackass.) Okay, so, today’s Manly Monday topic makes me think of that guy from high school and other men who wear man jewelry. Do you dig men who wear pinky rings? Do man earrings (mearrings) turn you on? Does a man wearing a big flashy watch make you want to flash a smile in his direction? Fess up and tell me: Do you like it when men wear jewelry?

[Pssst! Wanna hear about my second date with the Right-Winger Gunslinger? FBC on Nerve today: "Is That A Gun In Your Pocket, Or Are You Just Happy To See Me?"]

UPDATE: I had a great time on Friday night! Big drippy kisses to the folks who came. Six hours!! My liver was VERY angry at me on Saturday morning. It’s probably a good thing that we didn’t continue on to 8 Mile Creek.

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Well, folks, today’s the day. Welcome to Friday. As you may or may not know, I’m hosting a tiny little reader appreciation happy hour of sorts tonight. I frequently post “Reader Appreciation Day” updates here at FUNKYBROWNCHICK.com to thank everyone for reading my blog and/or linking to my site. (Look to your left and scroll down the category list until you get to Reader Appreciation.) Tonight’s little shindig is a little different because it the event off of the website and into the bar.

“Single. Sexy. Blogging.”™
Friday, May 4 at 6:00pm
http://upcoming.org/event/173838/

I’ve been blogging here at the FBC for almost as long as I’ve lived in New York — two years now. And, I’ve met quite a few amazing people via this blog. When I was in Belfast, I met one of my favorite readers — Nics from Much Work Ahead. Even though I’ve never met Mitch from On The Rant Again, I used the FBC to hook him up on blind date or two. But, there’s many more of you out there. And, some of you live right here in New York City. (I know this because my site meter tells me so.) Maybe you read my blog. Maybe you don’t. Maybe you were a guest on my internet radio show (Dating Roadkill), or maybe you were present for my first on-stage performance ever — the WYSIWYG Talent Show. In any case, really, it’s been a good two years with you guys.

So, if you’re free tonight and you’d like to come to the reader appreciation day happy hour, you’re welcome to drop by. Again, this is very informal. No Evite. No RSVP. If you can make it, just show up. If you can’t make it, no worries — we’ll just drink your beer. Oh, that reminds me … Thanks to an absolutely lovely Irishman (you know who you are) everyone’s second round is on the house from 6 - 8ish. So, happy friday, happy reader appreciation day, and I hope to see you at Single. Sexy. Blogging. later this evening.

Okay, so, I’m online reading an AskMen.com article titled Be The Cockblocker. “[If] another guy comes in and crowds your play, you’ll likely become frustrated and irritated,” says Gary Jackson. “Have no fear though, there is a last-ditch effort you can employ if you really don’t want to give up and find another target: You can become the cockblocker.” Man, I don’t even know where to start with this article. It’s a HILARIOUS read. Quite comical. Basically, the crux of the article seems to be this: If you wait too long to approach a woman, another man might beat you to the punch. But, don’t let this spoil your night — just go ahead and still make a move anyway. And how, pray tell, does the article suggest that a guy do that? Well, for example, just walk up and offer to buy the pair a round of drinks. The article’s author suggests: “a cosmo for her and a glass of milk for him.” (Maybe I like assholes, but I actually think that would be pretty funny.)

Anyway, the article does make me wonder: When it comes to dating, are men more competitive than women? My curiosity about this very question compelled me to ask Mystery Man (MM) to share his thoughts. MM tells me that he has (unfortunately for me) started dating this woman, right? Well, MM’s really close guy friend is a *total* flirt. So, MM tells his guy friend that he doesn’t want him to flirt with his woman when he meets her, right? What does the guy friend say? “I can’t promise anything. What if I take one look at her and discover that she’s the love of my life?!?!” I tell MM, “Your friend is a jackass. You’d never hit on *his* girlfriend, would you?” MM’s response? “Depends. I mean … you know … What if she’s *really* hot?”

Men. Can’t date em without heartbreak. Can’t stab em without going to jail. But, anyway, back to my original question: When it comes to dating, do you think men are more competitive with each other than women are? Or, do you think it’s the other way around?

If I had a dollar for every time that I heard the phrase “you’ll find the right guy when you least expect it,” I’d be a very rich woman by now — or, at the very least, I’d be able to pay off all of my credit card debt. But, here’s the thing about that phrase: I’m not even sure if it’s actually 100% true. Does love find you *or* do you have to make an effort to find it? I don’t know. I guess I can see both sides. On the one hand, I think that love has to find you. Afterall, nothing can chase a possible date away quite like the sweet smell of desperation can. The *more* that you’re on the prowl, the *less* likely you are to find a date, no? But, here’s the other side of this … Don’t you have to create a space in your life for the things that you’d like to have? You know, like, don’t you have to: save money if you want to go on vacation; work out if you want to lose weight; and, leave your apartment if you want to meet a date?

Let’s stick with dating for now.

The other day, my friend Mags and I were discussing a relationship book in which the author (a guy) tells women that they should hang out at the Home Depot and on golf courses if they want to meet men. It’s a pretty straight forward argument: go where the men are and you’re more likely to meet men. I don’t wholeheartedly agree with the author. Generally speaking, I don’t think it would be a good idea for me to pretend to be something that I’m not (i.e. a golf lover) for the sole purpose of attracting a date. *BUT* I do think the author might be on to something with this whole “put yourself in situations where you’re more likely to meet a date” stuff. I mean, is it not possible to live your life — either consciously or subconsciously — in such a way that it decreases your likelihood of meeting someone? Don’t you have to make at least a tiny bit of effort to find a mate? Hmmm … I’m curious to know what you think. Do you think that love finds you, or do you have to make an effort to find it?

And, the votes are in folks! As many of you know, the winners of the 11th Annual Webby Awards — honoring excellence in on the web (i.e. websites, podcasts, blogs, you name it) — were announced today. I’m really happy that some of my favorites won: The New York Times, Cute Overload, Manchester United Official Site, FindLaw, CafePress, Best Week Ever, The Onion, CNET, and Yelp. But, I was kind of surprised to see that some of my other favorites either won fewer awards than I expected or didn’t win any at all. How could people *not* have more love in their hearts for: Nerve, P.O.V. / PBS, Digg and Salon???? But, when you think about it, it’s a huge deal to even get nominated. So, big kudos to them anyway, yeah?

At any rate, aside from keeping up with the latest Who’s Who scoop on the web, one of the other things that I really like about the Webby Awards is that they often lead me to discover really great sites that I’d never heard of before. For example, I had a lot of interest in the two sex & relationships sites. I skimmed over Sex and Science but I was kind of disappointed to find that it was filled with a lot of “attraction - is - about - biology” bullsh*t. Although not at all in the same style, I much preferred the hilariously interactive website game Make Up and Make Out. If you haven’t played it, check it out. (It’s a game that pairs heads of state to make out with each other instead of making war; so, news junkies & poli-sci folks will especially get a kick out of it.)

Hey folks. Welcome to Tuesday. Apologies for my absence yesterday. I was recovering. My friend K-Mac came in town from Chicago for a visit, my friend Raj returned from his hiatus in India and ItGirl was visiting from Washington, D.C. Hmmm … I guess that’s one of the great things about living in New York. You can’t ever really miss your friends from back home too much because they’ll always come visit. I hate long posts, so I won’t go into too much detail about this past weekend. Suffice it to say that I crammed in more activities in one weekend than I typically do in an entire month. Here are the highlights …

K-MAC’s VISIT. You may remember her from Hottie Hookup 2007. She’s a ton of fun and it’s always really great to see her. We go to MoMA to take in the new sculptures and paintings. We eat amazing Ethiopian food at Meskerem and delicious Thai food at some place that I can’t remember. We also shop in Chinatown and at the markets on Union Square. We sip drinks at some outdoor bar called Paramour or Paradour or something. And, we see celebrities including Matthew Perry and that debt fixer upper guy from A&E. (I should have tackled him to the ground, pinned his arm behind his back and begged him to help me climb out of my debt hole. But, I digress.) All is good with K-Mac’s visit. Though … It’s worth mentioning that we did have a disturbing encounter with a woman who screams at a 9 year-old boy (who is presumably her son) on the MTA, “you’re never gonna get any p*ssy in life if you keep acting the way you act.” Oh. My.

THE RETURN OF RAJ. Speaking of p*ssy, that’s a perfect segue to Raj. Raj doesn’t like p*ssy because Raj is gay. He’s been traveling and working in India for a month or so. I missed him when he was a way, so it’s good that he’s back. We hang out. We meet at HK Lounge and have a drink or two. We plan to have dinner and go dancing, but the plans are cut a little short when I dash away to meet Mystery Man. (I’ve not blogged about this guy for now, but I may at a later date.)

ITGIRL. The last time that I saw ItGirl on a regular basis, we were living in The Netherlands. She was married. I was dating a guy that I thought that I would marry. Fast forward many years to the present, she lives in DC now. I live in New York. She’s divorced and dating a man who seems to make her very happy. (He *VERY* different from her ex. And, that’s a good thing.) It’s good to see ItGirl happy again. Maaaan, she’s quite a firecracker. One of my favorite memories with her has to be the time that she almost got us arrested in some random Dutch farming village. I exaggerate slightly, but she *did* get us in trouble!

So, that’s the update from my weekend. Oh, yeah, in case you didn’t know, New York has lost another blogger. Sid from “Siddity in the City” has moved to Chicago (“Siddity in the Second City?”). Could be a permanent move. Could be temporary. Ahhhh, New York is such a strange place. People come. People go. It all seems so transient at times. But, anyway, more on that later. Right now, I’m soooo looking forward to having a nice long sleep in my bed tonight. The weekend was great. And, I’m exhausted now. This week should be comparatively low key. So, I’ve got plenty of time to rest up before my reader appreciation day this Friday (“Single. Sexy. Blogging.”) I hope to meet a few of you fabulous NYC-based readers then.

Two FBC posts in one day? Yep. It happens. Okay, so, this first one is just a quick update about Mr. Blue. Remember him? Well, I took your advice (i.e. I wrote him back and I asked about the non-smiling pictures.) Here’s what he had to say … “Yes, I do smile, but I have a hard time smiling genuinely on command. It (to me) ends up looking phony. So I smile when I feel like smiling, and that doesn’t usually happen when I’m taking pictures of myself to put online, alas.” Hmmm. I have to think about that. I see his point, but it doesn’t necessarily disprove my “no smile = sadness (or bad teeth) theory” …

At any rate, I’ll update again with a fuller post in a bit. I wanna tell you about my crazy weekend with my friend K-Mac. She came in from Chicago for a quick visit and we had a blast!