How long do I have to wear these pants?

First, my friends, allow me to apologize for the paucity of posts this week on DATE. But trust us, we've been doing research.

Lots of research.

In any event, it's time to answer that most pressing of questions, that dating quagmire which so many enter and so few navigate well: how long until we get to the nookie?

This week's poll asked you when you got naked with a prospective partner (before or on the first date, after the third date, when the time was right, or when that band of gold was inscribed and wrapped tightly around your finger).

Let me say that I'm impressed with this week's answers! Most of you said "if and when the time was right," although, in all fairness, I was kinda lopping you a softball this week.

I was surprised that no one went with "after the third date," since, as I've mentioned, this is one of the magic threes that sneaks its way into our dating culture (the three-day no call and the three-date no *ahem*).

My dear respondents: you appear to be more enlightened daters than the average! However, since this spurious piece of dating advice is still so widespread, it's time to debunk it. Once and for all, let's dispose of the sex after the third date dogma.

First of all, for many people, waiting to do the horizontal samba until after the third date seems like insanity, but they either roll with it because that's what TV and their grandma says to do, or they have sex when they (and their partners) feel like it, and then feel guilty or concerned that they've broken some magical code, a twelve-step plan they feel they should be following to dating bliss.

If I've said it once, I've said it ten thousand times, and I'll say it one hundred thousand more: there is no twelve-step plan to dating bliss. (In case you haven't noticed, you're reading the wrong blog if you're obsessed by meeting Mre. Right tomorrow and need to know how to reel hir in.)

You're looking for specifics, right? First things first, having sex before, on, or after the first date is contraindicated. Not forbidden, not breaking an elusive, ethereal moral or amorous code, just contraindicated. Again, here at DATE we like to give pragmatic advice, and this is more of the same: experience tells us that when you undress on the first date, you don't tend to get called again. Don't ask us why: we have our theories (discussion soon to follow), but this isn't science. It might be a disturbing trend, but it's a trend nonetheless.

So why no callback? Grandmothers (at least the ones who listened to everything their grandmother's said) will say it's because you've shown yourself to be too easy and the other person is going to lose all respect for you. Element of truth? Maybe. But in that case you have to rely on most people being raving hypocrites who want to be unhappy forever. (Element of truth? Good God I hope not.) After all: it takes two to make the mattress creak. If not, you may just have a faulty mattress.

All right, Team DATE, it's not the raving moralistic self-loathing hypocrisy we've learned it was. So what it is it?

The far more likely culprit is that you've tossed aside the need to get to know you better. Having sex on the first date can be a little bit like giving your full curriculum vitae plus family photos of your summers in Kennebunkport and a detailed medical history on the first date. Bottom line: if mutually agreed, there should be a reason for the person to want to see you again, to continue learning who you are and what you're about. You probably wouldn't bring family photos from Kennebunkport on a first date, would you?

Are there exceptions? Lawdy, yes! I stress: sex on the first date is only contraindicated, not verboten, not a sin, and not a 100% fatal error. But you have to acknowledge the risk, which is essentially skipping half of dinner and eating a big bowl of Ben and Jerry's.

And now we join your third date, already in progress. You've been agonizing about the whole sex thing (get off it, you've been thinking about it, and if you haven't been, again, wrong blog) because you know that if sex is going to happen, it's probably going to happen in a couple of hours. You've had two other magical, sparky dates with Mr. Present Tense and now you're ready to find out what he's like between the sheets. After all, you can only talk about Russia's aggressive action in Georgia or plummeting stock prices so long before you turn into a dripping pool of obsessed need. It's the third date, dammit, and it's time to go spelunkin'.

This is pretty nutty, too. It casts a pallor on the rest of the evening, and maybe even everything that happened before it. Sex - and wanting sex - can wrap your brain around its lacy finger and never let go. Psst: you could have done it after the second date if you felt like it.

Let's get real: after the second date, you're already talking to your friends, you start thinking about this person a little bit more often - that is, assuming date number two wasn't a total disaster. After two successful dates, you're not a couple, you're not even "seeing each other," really, but you start thinking ahead to the magical threshold that is the third date.

I'm going to preface my next point by saying that no one should ever take their model for relationships from Woody Allen movies. I think that's self-explanatory, but if it's not, go rent one. Any of them, really. At least the ones he's actually in. Woody Allen only ends up with the insanely pretty girl at the end of the movie because he gets to write the script.

However, there was one time where I think he really got it right (and incidentally, it's a film where he doesn't end up with the pretty girl at the end): walking down a beautiful New York street on his first date with Diane Keaton in "Annie Hall," Alvie (Allen) suggests to Annie (Keaton) that they should kiss now, saying, "We're just going to go home later, right, there's going to be all that tension, you know, we've never kissed before, and I'll never know when to make the right move or anything, so we'll kiss now, we'll get it over with, and then we'll go eat. We'll digest our food better." This is, in my opinion, pretty much the wisest thing a Woody Allen character ever said. (It happens right around the two minute mark in the clip below.)



You'll digest your food better. I'm not kidding. If you want to, forget this nonsense about the third date. It's a silly, moralistic proscription that hardly does anyone any good. You're willing, s/he's willing, so why are you still listening to Aunt Gertrude?

On the other hand, if you're not the kind of guy who brings a condom* to any of your first several dates with someone, you have to feel fine with that, too. Sex is one of trickiest parts of dating, and I'm talking even before it happens. Two (or more) people have to agree to do some kind of ridiculous things together in the hope that they're both really going to enjoy it. So maybe you want a full curriculum vitae, family photos from Kennebunkport, and a detailed medical history before you unzip those trousers. That's okay, too.

[*By the way: all sexually active people should have protection on them at all times. It's not creepy, it's not presumptuous, it's smart.]

Not having sex with someone soon enough to suit your tastes can make itself a deal breaker, but please refer to all of last week's posts before you decide that you have a sex rule and that everyone you date has to magically measure up to it.

To sum up: play it by ear. There is nothing mysterious that happens after the third date that suddenly makes it acceptable to have sex or necessitates that you have sex if you don't want to. As always, assert yourself in your dating communication and make it clear, if it comes to that, what your sexual expectations are.

Happy dating!