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Dear Breakup Girl,

There is this great guy, nice, funny, and, okay, hot. Let's call him historyboy. We're both in grad school, different programs, but have friends in common, take some of the same classes, hang out. He's swell, I start thinking, maybe he's especially swell to me because he's interested in me. And I never think such things. But, there are little things that make me think he might be interested in being more than bowling buddies. And I'm not alone in thinking this, the various friends I have observing the situation see the same little signals. Then I convince him to go out dancing with some friends of mine, and he proceeds to ask out one of my female friends in the backseat of my car. D'oh!

What gives? I can't imagine that he didn't know I was interested, I mean, I was giving off little signals myself. So I guess the question is, how do you know if the nice guy is just being nice, or being NICE. He helped me break into my apartment after my purse got stolen and would have stayed over to protect me from masked bandits, for cripes sake! Was I maybe too much of a pal? ie getting and giving all those Simpsons references? I begin to think that we should all wear color coded outfits -- blue means "I like you, as a friend," red means "I LIKElike you," black means "ugh, get away from me, you troll."

-- Museumgal

Dear Museumgal,

He helped you break into your apartment? Damn! A Nice Guy with Bad Boy appeal. I completely understand why you're also wearing green for, "Whaddaya mean, 'who's my friend?'"

And yes, this is an excellent counter-example to the Nice Guys who complain about being perma-friends: what happens when the tables -- the ones they helped build -- are turned?

Still, I'm not sure your color-code plan would work, 'cause the Nice People would be all, "but I can't wear black, that's too mean!" and we'd be back where we started. As are you, right now. But don't obsess and rehash, Museumgal. I doubt you actually did anything ill-advised (not like you should have been giving "What Dreams May Come" references instead); I'm sure you did/interpreted the best you could (just look at the folks who are like: "S/he ignores me, forgets his name, and I think s/he moved without telling me. Do you think s/he likes me?"). Go out dancing in your favorite color, and one of your friends' Nice Guy friends is sure to ask you out for a Chutney Squishy.

Love,
Breakup Girl

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