Tuesday, January 31, 2012

January Smilebox Update

I haven't been doing much on this blog, but I have been writing a lot on my examiner column, sticking with my "alphabet year of dating" theme. January is typically a month I don't much dating... it's cold and dark and I'd rather be home. And even though most of my "dates" have been friends rather than romantic dates, I have been getting out a lot more, keeping with my resolution to "celebrate" each letter of the alphabet for two weeks.

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Saturday, January 07, 2012

Tuesday, January 03, 2012

Alphabet dating

I've been waiting for New Years to begin my Alphabet-theme weeks and even though 2012 is only a few days old, I'm already having fun.

Basically it works like this. There are 52 weeks in the year and 26 letters in the alphabet so that means we have a new letter to celebrate every two weeks. Currently, our letter is 'A' but on January 15th, we'll switch to 'B.' My plan is to go on at least one date or do some kind of activity centered around the bi-weekly letter.

Since I'm the Boulder Dating Adviser, I'll write about the letter-themed dates and maybe even compile them for a book at the end of the year.

I already have

Alphabet dating throughout the year and A-week assignment: Assemble foods that start with the letter A.

There are also plenty of 'A'-words related to dating: Attraction, Arousal, Aphrodisiacs, Adoration, Affirmations, Appreciation, Authenticity, Appearance, Affection, Awkwardness, Anticipation... Certainly, I have an Abundance to choose from if I'm trying to come up with a topic to write about!

I did these letter-theme weeks in 2004 with Scotty and had a lot of fun with it. He was 9 at the time. Every other Saturday, we'd have a day dedicated to the letter of the week and it was like a scavenger hunt the whole day. We went to Arvada Center for the Arts and Arbys for lunch during A weeks and the Butterfly Pavilion, Boondocks, and Burger King when the letter was 'B.' It was a lot harder to find activities when we got to the end of the alphabet, but with a little creativity, we always came up with something fun. We even have a photo album that shows pictures we took during each outing.


Even though I had tons of fun finding kid activities with Scotty, I'm looking forward to applying this same concept to dating. (Maybe I'll even get to do some X-rated activity in X weeks!)Having a "letter" is a great way to make a decision about where to go on a date and to try out new places. And my first experiment with using it as a way to figure out what to make for dinner turned out AWESOME!

It really would be so much more fun if I could find other people who were playing along, though, and get some comments, ideas, or some discussion going.

I'd love it if you'd come subscribe to my examiner column and let me know all your creative dating ideas!