(2) Intermediate

Welcome to the 20th Edition of the Carnival of Dating Advice, bringing you the web's best on dating, relationships, psychology... the works.

This time around, we have an eclectic mix of articles, ranging from how-to advice to a piece on delving into the subculture of Suicide Girls to the role of sex (and lack thereof) in the fraying of relationships. There's even a rather farcical post that I think you'll find fitting for the holiday (April Fools' Day, that is).

On with the carnival...

In the post on indirect game, Dave asked the following about flirting at work and in other non-anonymous social situations where romance may not be the focus of the gathering at hand:

“Hello Chase,
there's something about indirect rapport I'm not sure you've covered and it might be interesting. Very often and especially with girls whom you're likely to meet again - colleagues, fellow students etc. - it seems to me going true indirect could make sense (while still being sexy that is, but not saying "I'm kidding, I just thought you were cute" which is in fact direct but just delayed 3 seconds) because it allows the girl to pretend she didn't know you were seducing her. She can then tell herself (or her friends) that she's completely innocent and didn't help you or make it easy for you. On the other hand, directness and indirect direct polarize reactions so it can easily become awkward if you have to see them on a regular basis afterwards. Maybe you could add a few words on this.
Dave”

It's a tight rope to walk - how do you express interest and flirt with colleagues and coworkers without being so obvious about it that you risk an ugly rejection or a (decidedly non-professional) label as the office flirt?

I'm going to focus mostly on work situations here, largely because we've already covered the classroom (see: "Cute Girls in Class? Stop Flirting and Start DATING"). As with that article, the topic here is going to be not just how you can flirt with (a modicum of) subtlety, but also how you can actually make something happen.

Because, while flirting is undeniably fun in its own right, taking that coworker you've been flirting with for months for a hot date or a roll in the hay is a lot more fun.

Today I want to talk about a strange and confusing topic for a lot of guys - namely, getting mixed signals from a girl.

You know what mixed signals are: one moment, she's flirty and warm with you, and you get excited, thinking you're getting somewhere with her. The next moment, she's cool and aloof - and you're really not sure what happened.

Then, out of nowhere - BAM! You're back get warm, flirty behavior from her.

So does that mean she likes you, or does that mean she doesn't?

Please let me welcome you to the 19th Edition of the Carnival of Dating Advice - bringing you a sampling of the best pieces on dating, relationships, psychology, and more.

This edition we have a number of psychological perspectives, including one on resilience, and another one on the blinding effects of love, plus several more; and we have a pair of posts on breaking up (including one with a bit of humor), one on testing your relationship for strength (or weakness) prior to a major commitment, and one on how the issue of attraction changes for women as they pass from their teenage years into young adulthood.

On with the carnival...

We now present the 18th Edition of the Carnival of Dating Advice... now fully legal (age of consent joke there), bringing you some of the best articles on pickup, dating, seduction, psychology, relationships, and other fun, related things from across the blogosphere.

This name of the game for edition's articles is "practical" - from Jon Rhodes's piece on spotting a liar, to Liz Leia's piece on spotting gold diggers, to Sulagna Dasgupta's on spotting which men are interested (for the ladies, that is), you'll be walking away from today's collection of articles with your antennae pricked and your senses trained to interpret all manner of different signals from the people around you.

Without further ado then, on with the carnival...

Lately, the team and I have found ourselves moderating a lot more negative comments on the site than usual. Some of these are from people who believe that seduction is wrong, but a growing number are from people who believe that it's impossible for men to learn how to get women because all women are bitter women who simply aren't interested in men.

It's kind of a strange but interesting viewpoint. On the one hand, clearly SOME women are interested in men, since there're a little over 7 billion of us human beings on the planet. If you look around at the sheer volume of human beings around you - all products of a man picking up a woman at some point in his life, having sex with her, and impregnating her - you start getting the feeling that at least some women somewhere are open to meeting men. At least a couple billion of them, anyway.

On the other hand, I realize that there are some jaded women out there. I see the terms "bitches" and "feminazis" thrown around a good bit as examples of terrible people who make men feel bad about themselves. But, honestly, I have a really hard time meeting any women like this in real life - for the life of me, I don't know where all these "bitches and feminazis" who hate men actually are.

And even if they really exist... I only have one question for the guys who are so upset about them: who said you had to date those girls?

One of our female readers commented the other day on the article "I Don’t Chase 'Em, I Replace 'Em," about not waiting around for women who aren't interested / are pushing things off indefinitely, saying:

“Matt's letter suggested that you cut a woman off if she won't sleep with you on the first date... that cuts out a lot of good women, including me! If all guys thought like this, I'd never get a boyfriend (or laid) again!
(also, it should be noted, many men claim they 'won't date' a girl who will have sex on the first date, so you can't blame us for taking it slow)”

The topic is one that's been brought up a number of times by male and female commenters here, and done so in a variety of ways. Because the general advice for men on Girls Chase is contrary to conventional advice (i.e., take women to bed as lovers fast, not slow), it tends to provoke excitement in some, but confusion, questioning, or ire in others.

So - when should you have sex?

We've discussed the process of women's attraction expiring for men who fail to move things forward fast enough, but are there other reasons a man ought to take things fast with women he likes, and not slow, as the advice from the mainstream instructs?

And what about for women - is it better for women to make men wait, and if so, how long?

Today, I'm exploring both sides - so buckle up.