After receiving enlightenment on the Ladder Theory, I use to think that men and women couldn’t truly be friends unless they were somewhat attracted to each other. Actually, I still believe it’s true, with very few exceptions, but most of my friends and family members I had talked to disagreed on the subject. Most of them said I shouldn’t be so anal and that I shouldn’t assume every guy is out to get one thing. So, I decided to play by their rules when a guy had approached me last week (not really, but I did try).

I was at school, sitting on the benches while trying to call the theater arts teacher until someone tapped on my shoulder from behind and asked if he could interview me for a class project. I answered, “Sure, why not?” He then sits across from me and asks me some intrusive questions related to dating, and sure enough, each of my answers turned into a discussion.

During my “interview” I learned a few things about my interviewer. He’s like a chick, and he even admits it. He likes romantic movies. He read “The Notebook” once and cried at the end. Chick, much? I think so.

At the very end of our conversation, he jumps up and says, “Man, you’re like a dude!”

“That’s it? That’s your conclusion? That’s great…”

“Well don’t take it as an insult, I’m the chick, remember?” He looks at his cellphone then puts it back in his pocket, “Well hey, I better get going, but I really enjoyed talking to you, and thank you.”

“Yeah no problem.” I shake his hands. “Nice meeting you.”

“Actually, mind if I get your number?”

“For reference? Sure!” We both laugh. He hands me his blackberry and after punching in my number I gave it back to him.

“Just promise me you won’t have a crush on me.”

“What?”

“I have a girlfriend,” A smile crossed his lips.

“Then why are you asking for my number?!”

“Because you seem really cool, and I’d love to get to know you more as friends.”

“Ok, I don’t mind being friends, but here’s the deal, delete my number now or tell your girlfriend that you asked for my number.”

“Yeah, ok,” he nodded, “I’m really open with her.”

The following day, he called my number.  Feeling rather uncomfortable about the situation, I screened it, and then text him, “Can’t talk at the moment, what did you want?”

He replies, “Just wanted to say hi ”

Phone number deleted.

Sorry, but is this still me being paranoid and all-up-in-the-ass or does that really sound shady? ‘Cause I’ll be damned if my boyfriend did that.  Maybe guys and girls can probably be just friends, but really, I think it can be easily misinterpreted as something more depending on the situation.

I ended up meeting another guy prior to that, who also wasn’t single. We had gotten along as friends that we ended up talking on the phone. I knew he only saw me as a friend, and only as a friend, because flirtation was never really implicated on both ends. The only problem now is…well…I’m the one who’s starting to develop a little crush.

Maybe the real question to this blog isn’t “Can guys and girls really be friends?” rather it should be “Can Tiff really be friends with guys?” :-/

1. When I was little, I once drank a whole travel size bottle of mouth wash. I believe I was a little tipsy afterwards. And I believe my farts and burps smelled of minty freshness.

2. My first physical fight happened when I was six years old. My opponent, Michelle Tran, and I both wore adult sized boxing gloves. My memory of the incident is still clear as day. I remember the people who were watching and rooting for us (my older siblings and mostly our neighborhood gangbangers who made us duke it out), I remember where the punches were thrown, and unfortunately, I remember that I lost.

3. When I was four, my older sister thought it was funny to joke around by pretending to suck my brother into our vacuum. Since I thought what I had witnessed was real, it lead to my intense fear of vacuums that lasted for over ten years.

4. I had a pet African Grey Parrot named Ruby. I loved her! She would say a lot of things, even weird things, things that were never taught to her such as, “help meee!” She also liked making noises that sounded like she was coughing up a loogie (I have brothers). Ruby had a near death experience when I, accidentally, chopped her finger tip off with a nail clipper (I was cutting her nails and ended up going too far). She lost a lot of blood and her cage ended up looking like a brutal murder scene. I felt bad and her piercing bird-scream still haunts me to this day.

5. One of my earliest Internet friends was Jenalyn, whom I met on an networking website for kids called Freezone. When we were little, we both started making websites that is no different than my website today. All of the layouts were created using photoshop, and it also had an online diary, which is now called a blog. We met, literally, a decade ago, and we still keep in touch sometimes (via Myspace), and you have no idea how grateful I am for that.

6. The first zombie film I ever watched was “Night of the Living Dead” at the age of four or five, and I’ve been fascinated with zombies ever since. Prior to that, I had the proclivity to reenact the scene in Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” where the chick runs to the abandon house and frantically shoves the furniture in front of the doors and windows, but only to find that it was no good when the zombies started crashing in. That has always been my favorite part. Epic.

7. In 1997 I founded The Dolphin Club, and in 1998 I co-founded The ‘N Sync Club which had a whopping total of two committed members.

8. Five years ago. Favorite haircut:

9. Five years ago. That haircut was forever destroyed by cutting it into a nasty mullet (thought it was a good idea at the time):

10. The very first time I said “fuck” was around the age of four. I was overhearing an action movie my sister was watching that had a lot of “fucks” and “fucking” in it. Funny thing is, that paricular word caught my interest, and even though I had practically no idea what it meant, it had given me the idea to yell, “Fuck my dad and fuck you!” during the film. When my sister heard it she shrieked and asked, “What did you say?!!?” And at that very moment I knew it was a word not to disclose in front of the adults, but rather to share with my classmates.