Sex for Money

I found this site that allows you to send in a week's worth of you and your partner having sex - 1 hour a day, so 7 hours total - and they'll pay you $2000. I was all prepared to hate the thing and get all reactive and feminist about exploitation blah blah blah. But I watched the short bits they have of each couple on the promotional page, and was, in spite of myself, completely and utterly charmed. These are (for the most part) really sweet people. Funny, silly, both smart and stupid.. all human. I can't for the life of me get pissed off about it.

Something else, harder to put my finger on. The simple joy and goofiness these people seem to have in their relationships with each other.. it opens a window into what a relationship could possibly be, once you scrape all that self-conscious, egotistical, judgemental crap out of the away. Is that sort of thing only possible when you're really young and in love? When we get older, do we start to expect too much out of people, and somehow suck all the possibility of joy out of everything, trying to make perfection happen?

Just wondering.

The hands say it all.... or do they?

I'm single and in a new country, starting a new life, and I've noticed some gorgeous males lately. It's LA - everything is pretty.

Whenever someone asked me what I notice 1st on a guy, I used to answer eyes. I love eyes. Blue ones to be precise. But nowadays, I notice hands first. Because chances are any gorgeous charming man my age who is straight may also be married. So I go straight to the hands and look for the ring.

There was this charming and adorable actor I met at a fundraiser. Tall, blue eyes, broad shoulders, no ring. But he did have a wife who showed up at the event moments later. I met another one. Real estate agent. Tall, blue eyes, blonde surfer hair and a flirtatious smile. No ring. But *surprise* he was married.

Why no ring?

I never got into a big enough conversation to feel comfortable asking either of them. But if any one out there has a reasonable explanation as to why a married man wouldn't wear a ring or why you, as a wife, wouldn't care if your husband wore a ring, I'm DYING to know.

See, for me the ring is a BIG part of the commitment. I mean, just don't see any reason at all why a man wouldn't wear a ring. And I wonder if a woman didn't want to wear one if it would be as much of a non-issue as wehn guys do it. Something tells me it would be an issue.

Here's the thing about the ring - it lets the rest of the women know not to waste their time flirting with you. (from a single female perspective I appreciate knowing not to waste my time).

And call me old-school or paranoid or what have you but not wearing a ring smacks of "I don't want anyone to know I'm not available"

And so if you marry me you have 2 options:

1) Wear a ring. Gold, Silver, Platinum, Tatanium, Tin foil - whatever

or

2) Get the word MARRIED tattooed across your forehead. (and you don't get to grown bangs, ever).

Am I unreasonable or old fashioned? What's up with the No Ring Trend?