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As you may have already read, Breakup Girl -- brace yourselves -- will be "away from her desk" when this country undergoes a harsh collective breakup: that is, on the cold, dark night early next month when Jerry, Elaine, George, and Kramer dump us all. So let me take a minute to get you prepared right now. Here is what you need to know:

1. I don't know about your watercooler conversations on Fridays, but rest assured, you won't really notice a big difference here at BG.com on Mondays. Despite BG's liberal use of "yada, yada, yada," other examples of Sein language are already far outnumbered by Buffy- and X-Files-isms. This is because (a) as breakups tend to take place toward the end of the week (after Voyager, before Simpsons), so BG is generally out working instead of watching, and (b) call me cranky, but I'll admit that it's refreshing to see other people having to handle relationship problems on the level of "My boyfriend has no reflection in a mirror, what should I do?" (Also, Brooklyn South references would be great, especially now that Nona and Lowery seem to be getting involved, but chris@breakupgirl.net is the only other person on the planet who even understood that sentence, so there you go.)

2. Otherwise, though, getting over the loss may take a while. Why? Because I guarantee that you will have no opportunity whatsoever to go cold turkey. You will run into "Seinfeld" everywhere: retrospectives, "Bloopers" shows, Entertainment Weekly covers, conspiracy theories, Elton John songs, yada yada yada. Be patient; give yourself the time and space to heal. Read books if you must.

3. Even though she won't be in town, Breakup Girl is STILL WAITING FOR HER FRIENDS AT MAXIM TO INVITE HER TO THE PARTY AT "THE" RESTAURANT.

4. Gentlemen, can we please let go and stop advertising ourselves in personal ads as "Seinfeld-type?" Basically, what that tells us is that you have weird, annoying friends. One of whom is your ex, who still has full access to your apartment.

5. Speaking of which, here's the bright side: No longer will exes-to-be be faced with an intimidating, even misleading, role model: the post-relationship friendship of Jerry and Elaine. They have a past, but they totally hang out! And Lord knows it's not just because they're really mature and well-adjusted. Inspiring though their example may appear, BG believes that these two may have contributed to a false gold standard/imperative about remaining friends after a breakup.

And that's why this column, along with every NBC exec, is asking:

When It's Over,
Will the Friends Thing Still Work?

Okay, let's get right into it...

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