So naturally, I’ve ditched the laptop when going on trips. Why, with the built-in Wifi and all the amazing apps, I will never miss a Facebook “like” or NPR’s Fresh Air podcast even for a day. Not to mention the added bonus of Angry Birds, especially at the airport.
It’s amazing, but there’s just one flaw. And that’s porn.

I’ve been on the road for the past three weeks, blazing through Europe from Istanbul to London (still two more destinations to go).

Now porn is one of those things you don’t want to check out at the airport steel computer station, or at the shared computer at a hostel, or your couch-providing friend’s laptop. Imagine how awkward!

So you are pretty much stuck with the iPhone.

Besides dealing with all the Flash limitations and navigation and maneuver issues, the wireless mobile content also proves to suck a big one, though not the way I would like it to.

For example, YouPorn is so lame, it limits how long each of its mobile content runs — one minute exactly. Basically the free porn provider assumes only 15 year olds are tech savvy and desperate enough to use mobile devices to check porn. Because there is no way a 27-year-old, sexually experienced woman can come that fast while masturbating to a four-inch video screen.

So I guess that leaves me with no choice but to be a real slut now and go pick up Euro dudes. *Sigh* The headaches of traveling.

But Wait! There’s More Like This:

• Baseball terms applied to dating and relationships
• Finally! Time to masturbate!
• Simple advice for simply miserable relationships
• Texts you WISH you could send, part 1
• Overlooked pick-up spots: The Airport

Who they are:

Identifying traits: cat/dog/horse fur on clothes and hair; talks about their pet constantly and gets noticeably jittery when conversation veers away from it; discusses their pet’s stools openly.

Why they’re single: like the baby ducks who will follow a human in lieu of a feathered mother, the Pet Proxy projects their innate need for human companionship onto their animal. This puts them in a weird spot. One the one hand they don’t really feel the “need” to be with someone; on the other, they can’t have sexual relations or any other kind of normal communication with their pet, which leaves them vaguely dissatisfied, but often not enough to make them do something about it.

Advantages: intimacy without the baggage (except for the the bags you pick up the dog shit with); gives you a living thing to care for and worry about, thereby allowing you to bury you problems like a bone in the backyard.

Disadvantages: begins to speak in cutesy ‘pet voice’ more often than normal human voice; smells weird; growing reliance on pet as a security blanket means they have to bring them everywhere they go (you’ve seen people with cats on leashes.)

What they can do about it: partner up with someone who is also a pet freak on your level, or is such a softie they will also obsess over your little munchkin; give the pet to your parents for awhile and see how you change or if you can stand yourself alone; come to terms with the fact that pets are purely entertainment, like a Walkman, and allowing them to take over your life is akin to, uh, turning into a giant Walkman.

But Wait! There’s More Like This:

• Types of dysfunctional daters: the Dissmiss-u-lator
• Reason #1 (guys): you've been sissified
• Overlooked pick-up spots: The Airport
• Types of dysfunctional daters: the Irksome Ivy
• Guest post on "Digits"

We’re in the middle of wedding season, and with the NY Times Vows section busting at seams with newlyweds, LITD enlisted friend and substitute teacher Denny DelVecchio of Your New Bad Habit to help grade a few. As we know, sub teachers are always lenient to  bad students, and Denny is no exception – enjoy it while you can, miscreants.  – .ed

Who’s that knocking on Denny’s door at the unholy hour of 11:45 am?

Oh, Denny Dance almost forgot that he owed Love in the Dumps a column this week. Fine. Let me slip into something a little less snug and fishnetty and I’ll get right to it.

There, that’s better.

As a man who once foolishly took a shallow but bitter pull from matrimony’s joyless decanter , I feel uniquely qualified to serve as judge, jury and sexecutioner when it comes to the oft-doomed nuptials of others.

And this week’s installment has a little bit of everything. So slip into the wedding dress your mother bought for you last year at Filene’s Basement “because it was a fabulous goddamn deal, I mean what ungrateful little brat turns her nose up at a $79 wedding dress that her own mother wrestled away from a stinky old Robitussin-swilling hag from Queens just so her only daughter can look like a princess if she can ever trick someone into loving her long enough to put a ring on her finger” and party along with Denny.

Welcome to love’s sloppy embrace, Lucas and Louise. Hopefully you appreciate Denny’s recent wedding gift of free divorce/dissolution counsel, courtesy of Jacob S. Maroni, Esq. (Think of it as passion’s little insurance policy.)

Oh Dear Lord, where do I take my first savage bite out of these delightful oddballs?

The bastard lovebaby of Andy Samberg and Jets quarterback Mark Sanchez, Farrell is an accomplished wordsmith, with a preternatural ability to take a formerly optimistic, well-adjusted reader and transport them into the type of bleak emotional abyss enjoyed only by unfortunate souls who have been on the business end of a meandering, self-indulgent Dave Matthews jam session. Christ, I’ve seen deeper cultural truths in a book of Mad-Libs. Or maybe even in this morose, ass-wipe worthy joke of a rag.

His dearest Louisa, who herself appears to have sprung from the fertile loins of Karen Allen and Bridget Fonda is, like Denny, an artist of some import. And, as fate would have it, a current classmate of mine.

According to the announcement, the bride is keeping her name. Denny wholeheartedly concurs. Louisa is a lovely name.

How about the in-laws?

The newest Mrs. Farrell’s elegant mother is now President of the prestigious “Bedford 2020 Coalition.” Unfortunately, nobody has broken it to Mrs. C that the world is going to meet a harrowing, premature end sometime in 2012.

She is married to a man named Winthrop B. Conrad, Jr. Denny’s not saying anything about him because I learned long ago you simply don’t fuck with people with names like Winthrop B. Conrad, Jr.  Tom Cruise found that out the hard way.

Homeboy’s moms and pops are a nurse and school director, respectively. If you can make something funny and/or interesting out of that, drop Denny a page.

Denny’s Final Verdict:

Although I so badly wanted to sentence these two to an awkward, sexless honeymoon in Vermont, followed by 18 months of Wedded Hades trying to “out pretentious” each other, I have come to the conclusion that they’re potentially fairly dope youngsters who are likely going to have a long and sweet life together tending to the goats by day and yielding to passion’s sweet fruits by night.

FINAL GRADE: D, for Denny Approved!

A hearty DelVecchian congratulations to Lu-Lou and all of their myriad beasts of the field.

Engorged With Love,

Denny DelVecchio

But Wait! There’s More Like This:

• Grading the Vows: Dayani, Traugott
• Grading the Vows presents...Who Wears the Pants?
• Grading the vows lookalike contest
• Grading the vows: Ku + Rubin
• Grading the Vows: Grossman, Baron

But Wait! There’s More Like This:

• Video in the Dumps - Kobe fan is a true LITDer
• Baseball terms applied to dating and relationships
• Saturday funnies: hipster dating, scene 1
• Saturday funnies: cowboy hip-hop
• Video in the Dumps: Justin Long & Mike White Get Gay Married

But Wait! There’s More Like This:

• You (got no more) mail!
• En limbo
• Simple advice for simply miserable relationships
• The enemy that is your phone
• 10 ways a girl knows her love life is boring as all hell

Baseball season is in full swing (har har), and even if you don’t like it you can’t help but appreciate our pastime’s terms and sayings. More than any other sport, baseball has such a fun, creative way of putting complicated plays and situations into words. We thought it would be a helpful exercise to apply these terms to another complex, unpredictable facet of life – dating and relationships. A start to the list follows with links that help show term in baseball action. I’m sure we’re missing quite a few; just add ‘em to the comments and soon we’ll have an index to be reckoned with. Play ball!

1. Fielder’s choice - that rare, rare situation in which you can choose between multiple suitors of decent quality. Of course, 99% of the time you end up dropping the ball anyway, resulting in getting charged with an….

2. Error - a blatant mistake that often tips the scales out of your favor, or is a factor in your self-destructive relationship patterns.  In baseball, in error is unforced – ie. not caused by an opposing player; the situation is the same here, that is, you only have yourself to blame*.
* in lieu of blaming yourself, you can and should blame your parents.

3. Foul ball - applies to kissing. A foul ball is either an attempted make-out kiss that gets rejected or a make-out kiss that’s bad for any number of reasons (foul breath, foul technique, foul noises, etc.)

4. Wheelhouse - in baseball, when a pitch is thrown inside of a batter’s comfort zone, usually leading to a hit, the pitch was thrown “in his wheelhouse”. In this case, if a person is in your wheelhouse they are your “type”, usually physically. So if you’re into guys with skullets, and you’re friend is setting you up with someone with one, they might say, “he is SO in your wheelhouse!”

5. Sacrifice fly - sleeping with someone you generally wouldn’t just to get on base and break your dry spell.

6. First base - making out (guys and girls)

7. Second base – hands on breasts (guys); hands on butt (girls)

>  Stealing second (successful) - when, after pushing the guy’s hand away several times, the girl finally lets him touch her boobs without interruption.

> Stealing second (unsuccessful) - when, after repeated attempts to touch breast, the girl gets fed up and tells the guy to get lost. Out!

8. Third base – HJ (girl); FF (guy)

9. Homerun – sex.

10. Grand slam – sex that includes more than two people or involves animals of any kind.

11. The bullpen - the bullpen are your reserve pitchers who are generally not good enough to start the game but will help out when the starter is struggling or worn out. In this case, your bullpen is the second tier love interests you call up when your first choice isn’t working out for whatever reason. A good bullpen is readily available and will understand when you need to send them back.

But Wait! There’s More Like This:

• Dating scorecard for women
• Sunday Morning Comin Down, part 3
• What to expect if you date: a professional paintball player
• List-less: 12 Things Not To Say In Bed
• Sunday Morning Comin Down, Part 2

All my life, I’ve dated Gregs (cranky intellectuals who need a laugh and my impulsive behavior as a sidekick on the dirt road to F-U-N) – until last year, when I dated Ben.

Ben was living on his own planet, where people only cared about organic vegetable gardening and hiking with friends, where wine flowed like water, where traveling was church and where girlfriends were a burden. There were no rules in Ben’s world and I eagerly stepped in, ready for vacation.

But being around a through and through Darma, someone so close to the KRAZY end of the spectrum didn’t further liberate me (like I expected), instead it turned me into Greg. After a while, I didn’t recognize myself.

Ben and I didn’t bring out the best parts of each other, but rather drove each other to personality extremes. But I learned something incredibly valuable from the experience: I am Darma and Greg. And I’m looking for someone who is also a bit of both; someone who doesn’t mind my wacky ideas, love of astrology and naive idealism, but also likes that I have a career, life goals, and strive for a comfortable lifestyle.

Now think about your relationships; are they are constantly bringing out your “erratic entertainer” (Darma) or your “voice of reason” (Greg)?

I’ll venture to guess that the best relationships are those in which one person doesn’t over-perform either role but can step in with good old-fashioned advice or a spur-of-the-moment pick-me-up when need be; where spontaneity and practicality walk hand in hand. But maybe that’s just my Greg talking…

But Wait! There’s More Like This:

• The T.J. Maxx Principle
• How White People Date: Chapter 2
• How White People Date, chapter 1
• Post text analysis: to bar, or not to bar
• Dumped on email: a death letter analysis

I am not a writer, but I often play one in bars. That is to say, sometimes I bring my notebook to drinking establishments and “write” in the hopes of generating interest from a fellow patron (hopefully female), who might inquire into the content of my scribbles.

Scribbles is the key word here – I have practiced the art of illegible chicken scratch lest they see the empty words and discover my fraudulent scheme. Ambiguity is mystery, and that’s what I’m going for. This works better in Los Angeles than in most other cities, because the only writers there are movie writers, and are therefore glamorous and rich as apposed to the lonely, broke, and socially awkward “print” set that resides largely in New York and other depressing cities like Vancouver.

So whenever I’m in L.A. I always bring a notebook fresh stocked with hand crafted scribble and make my way to the singles bar. It’s a crude analogy, but the practice is not unlike fishing.

Yet my most recent trip was a troubling one, so much so that I’ve retired from the fake writer game altogether. My black uni-ball pen and weathered notebook shall go into storage until my (future) son is fifteen – a good age for a young man to lose his virginity – at which time I will bequeath them to him.

So what happened? Let’s stick with the fishing metaphor: my bait caught a piranha instead of a scup. She came out of nowhere, drunk and wild, forcing herself between me and the person next to me.

“Whatcha writin’, Hemingway?”

Her opening was in fact the desired response, but she was not the desired object (please note, I do not objectify women, but my poor writing skills often paint me in a corner and I have to call women things like “objects” and “harlots”.)

“Oh, just some experimental fiction,” I barked back. “And the name’s Golden. Cliff Golden.” The experimental fiction tack was a new one, and I saw this as an opportunity to test it out.

She was nonplussed. “Ya know I’m a writer too. Gimmie that!” She grabbed my precious uni ball and notebook, snapped it open and whipped through the pages until she landed on an empty one.

“Please be careful,” I said, under my breath.

For the next half hour she proceeded to fill every blank page with her musings. It was an awful experience, akin to a parent watching as his kidnapped child is tortured. The darkness of her drunken soul polluting my pages, I simply sipped and sulked. Here are some excerpts, scanned from the actual notebook:

Sweaty and seething, she finally dropped the pen. “That’s all I got right now,” she said breathlessly. The door had cracked open and I made no hesitation to take my leave. But a crafty prisoner must charm the warden to assure a clean getaway, and the situation needed closure. I placed my hand on her faded arm tattoo, which was either Alfred E Newman or a Gaelic symbol, and looked her in the eye: “Thank you for sharing these.”

She grasped the hand holding my notebook, nearly penetrating my soft, freshly manicured skin. “Wait!” she screeched. “I want to write you a personal note.” She hovered over the notebook for another fifteen minutes while I sat uncomfortably, glancing nervously at the many available women in the bar, wishing I were explaining the merits of experimental fiction to them. “It’s plotless,” I’d say, “but comes together in a way that’s much more satisfying.”

The notebook flipped onto my lap, the corner hitting my balls just enough to give them a slight ache. “Don’ ferget me when ya make it big!” she rasped. “I’ll find ya!”

With that she gave me a sloppy kiss on the lips and left her perch, moving onto the guy reading Absalom! Absalom! four seats down.

But Wait! There’s More Like This:

• Dating Doh!nt: online edition - pictures of you with a wineglass
• Saturday funnies: hipster dating, scene 1
• Guest post: lying online
• 5 ways to not act interested in a girl while on a date
• Reason #1 (guys): you've been sissified

But Wait! There’s More Like This:

• 5 ways to not act interested in a girl while on a date
• Video in the Dumps Daily
• Video in the Dumps
• How to date when you're broke and jobless
• Saturday morning funnies: the 1989 Chrystal Light aerobics championship

But Wait! There’s More Like This:

• The world's saddest text
• Post text analysis: to bar, or not to bar
• Post Text Analysis
• A desperato gets blocked
• A watched pot eventually boils