The three-day rule sucks

Hi

Sat, July 24, 2010, 12:33PM

From: „William I” wingham@ux.edu

To” leylar@ux.edu

Hi Leyla,

(Assuming I've got the right Leyla, we met on the 173.) Shall we meet up some time next week? I didn't want to wait until the next time we bumped into each other, since that might not happen.

William

When Robert Kahn and Vinton Cerf invented the internet, they surely did not think about the number of problems their invention would create in relationships. The internet might be one of the greatest inventions of the past century, but when it comes to it, and even to the telephone, men and women do not know how to use it. There is an unwritten rule that Western men always seem to follow: "Wait at least 3 days until you call/email." This rule drives me crazy for several reasons, the most important of which is that if you're interested, you should go for it and let that woman know that you are interested in her and would like to take her out, instead of playing it too cool and appearing like a total jerk who already has ten women in his hands and is too busy to see an eleventh.

American men need to understand once and for all that waiting less than three days to contact a woman does not make them seem desperate (on the contrary, we women think it is very cute when men call us immediately in a trembling voice to ask if we are free "for coffee"). Women hate being contacted after days - after all, do you still expect us to remember you? We get date invitations almost every day, we don't remember a man we've met for the first time last week. And when asking us out, what matters is what you say and how you say it: keeping it short, trying to seem calm and secure, and yet having that tint of shyness or anxiousness - we like to know that we can already raise some emotion in you.

We are only two Leylas in College here. Unfortunately, he emailed the right one. But he doesn't know that yet, so maybe I can play with him for a bit and pretend I'm the other Leyla.