Dating and Not (Oh and Hi)

So yes, I have a blog. It's actually a new blog for those of you who knew about my other one. That group consists of what, 4 people? ^_^

I've actually been thinking of starting a new blog for a couple days now. I guess I've (only kind of) decided to rejoin society in a small way. Along with this I also logged on to Facebook yesterday. That being the first time since dropping out of school in the spring.

Anyway, I assume that many of you know where I am in my life...or at least think you do ^_^ Don't worry I'm getting to the topic - this actually ties in...eventually. So I'm in Rexburg, Idaho. I was at the college (BYU-I) from Sep. of last year to around Apr. of this one. During the Winter semester my depression got really bad and I was needing to get out of the whole student thing, but I didn't want to go home. As a result, I ended up dropping all but two of my classes and getting a part-time job working fast food (yuck). As time passed I ended up not going to the two classes I had and failed those. Consequently I was put on academic probation by the college. This didn't really bug me at the time as I was planning on withdrawing from school at the end of the semester anyway. Another reason for leaving was that I was going to get kicked out of school anyway for not going to church. BYU-I, like it's big sister BYU, is a predominantly Mormon school. As such, church attendance is mandatory. That is at least for the Mormons. I'm not sure what the policy is for those not of the same faith.

Thus begins a new stage in my life. Namely - life on my own. My own apartment, my own cell phone, my own bills. With these bills I needed a full time job and got one working in the local production center for Melaleuca.

Some of you may be saying, "Hey wait, what was that about not going to church?" My church attendance was enough to get by during the Fall semester, but became less and less frequent during the Winter. As I sit right now I would be considered by other Mormons (and consider myself) to be an "inactive" member. The history and the reasons for that are a story for a different day. For now that's all the background necessary for this entry. This is where I tie into the Dating and Not topic...eventually ^_^

A few of you know how I feel about relationships. For those of you who don't know - I'm not a big fan. I have a short little note on being "In Love" on my Facebook page hHYPERLINK "http://www.new.facebook.com/people/Neil_Hebbert/825873501" \l "/note.php?note_id=7104768390"ere. I was actually in a relationship not to long ago. It went well for about a week before I realized that I had no idea why I was even in it and was reminded of why I didn't like them. But I digress.

I started thinking about writing this entry when I was hanging out with some friends (3 young ladies) at their apartment Sunday night. For some reason we started watching some videos on Youtube that some students had put together; more specifically videos on dating and dating etiquette. There was one in particular that got me thinking. The video was meant to be an exaggeration of awkward dating situations, but what caught my attention were some of the things the girl in the clip said and did. (I promise I'm going somewhere with this ^_^ ) First off the girl said that it was totally a sympathy date and that she really didn't want to go. At that point I actually paused the video and told my friends that I had something I wanted to say when the clip was over. What I had to say was that you don't have to go on sympathy dates. Girls, if you don't want to go on a date with a guy TELL him so! I can't emphasize this enough. Sympathy dates are a waste of time and money, are too stressful, and just prolong and already awkward situation. Also, if you go on a sympathy date, the guy will (most likely) think it's ok to ask you out again. That's not what you wanted. You didn't even what to go on the first one!

As the video progressed the girl actually redeemed herself. At the movie theater the guy tried holding the girl’s hand, but she pulled it away. I was pleased with that. Again girls, if you don't want the guy holding your hand don't let him the first time. All it's going to do is make him think, again, that it's ok. If this happens and you do end up going out with him again for some reason, it's just going to be harder to not let him hold your hand this time around. You'll try to pull away or tell him you don't want to and he'll be thinking, "What's going on? Last time she let me." He might even ask and your answer will be...? "Um...I was just trying to be nice last time?" Come on ^_^ To me this is just common sense, but I spent most of my time the fall semester at a house of 16 girls and I was shocked at how many said that this advice of mine was just mean. Mean? Leading the guy on by going out with him and letting him hold your hand is somehow nicer than letting him know up front that you’re not interested? Doesn’t make sense to me. Trust me on this. I think I know a little more about how guys think than you do. So yeah, that's pretty much what I had on the "Dating" part. On to the "Not" part of the blog.

You were wondering when I'd finally tie that whole self-introduction stuff into the actual topic? Well here it is. So as I said earlier, I'm not all that into the whole relationship thing. Then out of nowhere I ‘ll meet someone, or multiple people, who present quite a temptation to actually try a relationship again. The demographics are against me though because the majority people, and all the young adults, I know here are Mormons. This being the case, once aware of the fact that I’m inactive, girls run screaming ^_^ Well, not really, but my dateableness (like that word?) drops through the floor. I can seem like a decent person and some will tell you that I am, but I’m not good enough. I’ll probably go to hell for saying this (meh, I’m probably going anyway), but this is the first consequence of my religious inactivity that has bothered me thus far.

This entry was supposed to be better. I guess I didn’t have my thoughts as organized as I thought I did. I actually haven’t been able to think that well since getting home from work. If I could’ve written this at work it might have been more in depth. I guess what I really wanted to do today was just rant really. Another time I’ll be more philosophical like I used to be ^_^ Another day.