Hello Dategirl,

Frequently, it happens that I will be at a party/club/friend’s house/whatever and will wind up talking to a woman who I seem to get along well with. Eventually she offers me her phone number, and I call her a day or so later. So far, so good—right? But better than nine times out of 10, I’ll get her answering machine, and all messages left (with my phone number!) will stay unreturned.

Now, if she wasn’t interested in me, she wouldn’t have asked me to call. So obviously something changed during the next 24 hours that made her reconsider. But what? They can’t ALL be meeting someone better the very next day.

When asked, a pretty fair number of my male friends admit that this happens to them, too, so it’s not just me. I can’t bring myself to buy their “women-are-just-nuts” explanation; can you shed any light on this?

Tired of Machines

P.S. In case you’re wondering, I’m 33, tall, have a good job, dress nicely, and don’t look like a geek. I’m also polite, well educated, easy to talk to, decent looking, and have a lot of interests.

Dear Tired,

I know scads of perfectly charming men that this happens to on a regular basis, and I don’t get it either. I’m a straight shooter, and if I give a guy my actual phone number (as opposed to that of the local house of detention), it’s because I want to rub up against him naked in the very near future. But some women (and men too, probably) have a need for volume. Their self- image rests solely on being desired by another. Women seem to be more often guilty of this than men—I could go into the various sociological reasons for this kind of behavior, but really, who cares? Some broads are just bitches.

Which brings me to last night. Some friends and I arranged to meet at a bar and then head over to our friend Rico’s surprise birthday party together. My boyfriend and I are knocking back a couple when Rico strolls in, dressed to the nines. Turns out he’s meeting the woman who’s throwing the party at the same bar—but it quickly becomes obvious that he’s under the impression that they’re going on a date. We excuse ourselves and head over to her loft. I’d never met the hostess before and was surprised to note that she was approximately half Rico’s age, rather obviously insane, and very foxy, clad in a low-cut, tight black leather dress. We warned her that Rico thought this was a date. She shrugged it off, not even considering the implications. She picked up her phone and dialed his mobile, instructing him to meet her at her place instead. We all stood foolishly in the dark while she took the elevator down to fetch him. The wait was interminable. We knew he thought he was on his way to a birthday blow job at the very least! But instead he was treated to a roomful of his dumb friends shouting “Happy birthday!” Then he got to watch as his “date” spent the rest of the evening hitting on my boyfriend (his close friend). Because my man resisted her charms so winningly, I resisted the urge to slap her into another age bracket. The birthday boy was a trooper and handled it with more grace than I would’ve been able to muster. I reiterate, some broads are just bitches.

Back to the future: My advice for you is that you march on over to Kinko’s and get a supply of cards printed with your name, phone number, and e-mail address on them—sort of like a business card, but for the business of looooove. Keep them simple; do not advertise the size of your member or your fondness for anal intrusion (that sort of information can be revealed in good time). Then the next time you find yourself chatting up a young lovely, slip her one of your cards and murmur that you’d love to buy her dinner (or latex panties) sometime and hope she’ll give you a call. Then go on about your life. Maybe she’ll call, maybe she won’t, but handing out a card is far less humiliating than leaving a stammering message on some stranger’s answering machine (see Swingers). And as for The Rules girls, who don’t believe in calling men, well, you don’t want some manipulative throwback anyway. Good luck!

Bitch and/or jackass trouble? Write Dategirl at dategirl@seattleweekly.com or c/o Seattle Weekly, 1008 Western, Ste. 300, Seattle, WA 98104.