Shortly after moving to the City, I went on a date with a girl I had picked up at a gallery in SoHo. Naively, I had reasonably high hopes, as it was a second date, and the first (a safe early evening drinks date) had gone remarkably well.

We went to Zocalo, a trendy Upper East Side Mexican joint, and the evening actually started off fairly smoothly. Until, that is, the waiter didn’t bring chips quickly enough. (Shock! Horror!) The girl proceeded to not only bitch out the waiter, but actually yelled at the manager as well. The manager. Over chips.

Clearly, there was no relationship potential with a girl this incredibly high maintenance. But I figured I could be mature and polite and make it through an otherwise relatively pleasant dinner. Wrong. Things went from bad to worse, as apparently a few margaritas were not a good way to calm the girl down. By the end of the evening, we were actually asked to leave the restaurant. That would be a first – I had never been thrown out of a restaurant before.

Of course, I had also never been at a restaurant with a girl who threw a plate of beans at the waiter’s face. Dating in New York is never dull.

Last night, still in Palo Alto, I headed out with a friend to grab coffee at University Caf

For years, I thought that ‘love’ was just the far end of the ‘like’ spectrum. If I was dating a girl and really enjoyed spending time with her, really liked her a lot, I would start to ask myself, “am I in love? Is this enough ‘like’ to push me all the way into ‘love’ territory?”

Then, about a year back, I fell in love. I mean, Love with a capital L. And I realized that ‘like’ and ‘love’ were two completely different things. Getting emails from this girl would knot my stomach. I’d lie awake at night thinking about her. Whole poems, whole songs worth of lyrics, suddenly seemed relevant and personal and amazingly true.

Six months later, due to age difference (she was reaching the point where we’d walk by a Baby Gap and she’d unconsciously veer towards the door) and geographic distance, we broke things off. Which, while sad, was the right thing to do.

But now, when I go out on a date, I’m looking for something completely different than I was before. Not a girl I really, really like. Not a girl I can try and convince myself could be the one if I would just stop being so selfish or commitment-phobic or whatever else. But a girl I could love. Really love.

Which, frankly, makes dating in New York rather tough. The Big Apple is a lonely city, one with an overwhelming singles scene that makes the comfort of ‘really, really like’ a hard thing to give up. Even if, in the search for Love with a capital L, it’s the right thing to do.

With marriage apparently now on my peer group’s horizon, I’m faced with a double dilemma: first, finding the right girl; then, coming up with an exceedingly charming and original way of proposing. Increasingly, it seems, any potential fianc

Just as I’m celebrating the nearing end of the intensive ballroom dance course into which I’d rather unwittingly been dragged (a grueling three hours, twice weekly), a lithe and remarkably attractive young French woman in my class asks if I’d consider continuing on in private lessons as her partner.

There are few exercises in psychology so perversely fascinating as meeting your ex-girlfriends subsequent boyfriends (or, as in at least one case, subsequent girlfriends); it is, inevitably, a wonderful glimpse into the workings of both her mind and your own.

Earlier this evening, having dinner with an about-to-be-wed friend, I repeated a scene that’s become distressingly common over the last twelve months:

Her: You know, back in high school, I totally had a crush on you.
Me: Wait, really? In high school I totally had a crush on you.

I mean, what the hell, fifteen-year old me? How were you so entirely clueless? How did you possibly drop the ball on so many prime booty opportunities?

Partied like a rockstar yesterday evening with with the wonderful Ms. Brown (who is every bit as cool in person as her blog might imply), until getting kicked out of the closing champagne speakasy (at 1:00am) and then the closing Irish pub (at 4:00am). Not one to kiss and tell, that’s all I’m saying.