1. I met literally anyone involved in EA and became friends with them in the last year. My donations had always been a very set-it-and-forget-it style. Something I thought a little bit about maybe once a year and then put on autopilot - like my 401k contributions. And, akin to my 401k contributions, I knew there was community and controversy over those related choices (Bogleheads, anyone?), but didn’t feel I had anything in particular to contribute to their discussion so largely ignored. About a year and a half ago now I moved to a new/old city, made a bunch of fresh connections, and just due to like, homophily / elective affinity, I started to encounter extremely interesting people, who I clicked with deeply, who conspicuously all were affiliated with EA.

2. I calmed down on AI X-risk. For a while, if you’d asked me what my P(doom) was, I would have said a crazy high number. But nowadays I largely think that this was almost entirely due to my conflating my other sources of stress and anxiety with my pessimism. Like a depressed teen who says “why bother applying to college, I’ll be dead by my mid 20s anyway”, my isolation and financial worries had me saying “what’s the point of working on my social network and my career if the AI is gonna turn us all into paperclips anyway”. It was cope, it was bad, and I hope other people don’t fall into a similar trap. It didn’t even motivate me to work in AI safety - just to watch Robert Miles videos and re-read “AI 2027”. Nowadays I do think that, like, technical AI alignment is much more promising and that being paperclipped is looking more and more like it shan’t come to pass, but I am made of meat and these evaluations are so intrinsically tied to my sense of happiness and belonging and social safety that they can’t be trusted.1

3. Increased sense of general agency. Agency is a metaphorical muscle that I had been gently working out a little bit at a time, through things like living alone, going on self-dates, going to meetups and clubs where I wouldn’t know anyone or parties where I would only know 1 or 2 individuals. The progress was measurable but, I assume from the outside, unbearably slow. Then Claude Code came around and it felt like someone injected literal steroids and HGH directly into my Agenticus Maximus. All of a sudden, huh, yeah, I CAN just do things and the things I want to do are SAVE THE ANIMALS and CURE MALARIA and how can I do that? well Claude says networking and learning at a local EAG is a good first step and so do my friends.

So, what did I learn at EAG x DC?

1. The community of people in EA (at least at this event) is MUCH more skewed towards global health / democracy preservation / animal welfare / biosecurity / community building / etc. and away from ‘All AI safety all the time’ than I thought it was. These subcommunities are absolutely flourishing, with plenty of evidence-backed practices and heart.

2. Basically every one of these cause areas is more talent-constrained than money-constrained. They’re kinda sloshing in money, somehow2? And they really do need all kinds of talent. As a ML engineer (with a data science, math, cognitive science background) I could actually contribute not just with money, but with brainpower. And, contrary to my previous belief, not just in AI safety research or via a significant track-switch. Especially something like animal welfare / alternative proteins needs AI / ML people and currently has an extremely limited pool to draw from.

3. We’re closer than ever to eliminating airborne disease via far-uv!

4. Community building in EA is Real and Not Fake work. For not that much effort, I can (and will!) meaningfully contribute to the EA community in Philadelphia and that will be both fun and have tremendous returns. Stay tuned for event announcements! Speaker series + dinner parties + game days incoming.

5. There’s a massive reputational problem that I’d only barely been aware of. People who are altruistic and, ya know, take effectiveness into account are avoiding the term effective altruism like the plague. They say things like “outsized impact” now to avoid the association with tech bros and AI doomers. I was warned that publicly associating with this group might carry hazards. But I prefer plodding along, oblivious, wearing my heart on my sleeve and letting other people decide how to feel about me from as much information as they can.

6. Oh noooo I’m going to have to separate my professional internet presence (and actually beef that up) and my personal one. No more using the same account to flirt and to encourage people to give up chicken-meat. No more diary entries about my sex life at the same URL as kidney donation thoughts. No more suspiciously empty LinkedIn account. Haven’t decided the exact new schema yet, but this is the first time I’ve actually CARED in my bones about something professional rather than just seeing it as a way to get a paycheck so stay tuned

7. Networking events aren’t quite as bad as I feared because the masking expectations were mostly self-imposed. I don’t have to wear button up shirts and high heels - I am an engineer and I wear jeans and sweaters and this is both more comfortable and accurate signaling. My mental framing of professional networking shifted from ‘give everyone a firm handshake and smile and talk about your professional achievements with words like synergy’ and much more towards being myself and befriending people regardless of their professional interests and just trusting the kismet

In conclusion - I made friends, I made leads, I made new stars in my starry-eye’d outlook. Maybe you can too!

Imagine Mara, Dev, and Priya are moving into a three-bedroom apartment for $3,000 a month. The rooms are not identical. One has big windows and almost no closet space. One is smaller but has an en-suite bathroom. One is closest to the door and gets the least light.

The obvious first instinct is to split evenly: $1,000 each, everyone picks a room. This falls apart fast. Priya, who got the en-suite, knows she got a good deal. Mara, in the dark room, with less ability to pay, knows she didn’t. They’re paying the same amount for demonstrably different situations. The resentment is slow but it is coming. 6 months later, over what should have been a small infraction with Priya not taking the trash out in time for the garbage truck that week, Mara totally blows up at her, calls her spoiled and stuck-up and undeserving, and their friendship never recovers.

Rewind.

The better approach is to price the rooms differently — the total still has to be $3,000, but the split between rooms should account for their actual differences. The problem: how differently? Priya cares deeply about natural light. Dev would pay a premium for a private bathroom. Mara just wants to minimize her number. These preferences aren’t the same and they’re not written down anywhere.

What you actually want is a split where each person, looking at what the others are paying for the other rooms, thinks: yeah, I’d pick my room at my price. Where nobody is eating breakfast across from Dev’s bathroom door thinking I should have pushed harder for that one. This is the formal definition of “envy-free” - nobody would trade their situation with anyone else’s.

For two people, there’s a classic protocol: one cuts (in this case, assigns prices to the rooms), the other chooses1. For three people with three different rooms and prices that have to add up to a fixed total, it’s not obvious that an envy-free solution even exists, let alone how to find one.

Sperner’s Lemma

In 1928, Emanuel Sperner (German, mathematician, not so far as we know having any housing disputes) published a result in combinatorics, the branch of math that deals with discrete structures: counting2, graphs, tilings, things you can reason about without calculus.

The setup: take a triangle3. Subdivide it into a mosaic of smaller triangles. Color every corner of every small triangle using three colors, let’s call them red, blue, green, with these rules: each outer corner of the big triangle gets its own dedicated color, corners on an outer edge can only be one of the two colors at that edge’s endpoints, and interior corners can be anything. (Interior corners have more freedom. This is their one win.)

The claim: no matter how you color, as long as you follow those rules, there will always be at least one small triangle whose three corners are all different colors.

That’s Sperner’s Lemma. The proof is a counting argument — not especially hard, actually, for something that ends up doing this much work downstream. (I say “not especially hard” meaning: hard, but the kind of hard where once someone walks you through it, you can almost convince yourself you would have seen it. Almost.) Sperner published it as a stepping stone to something in topology. He was not thinking about roommates.

Seventy-one years later (Spongebob Narrator Voice)

In 1999, Francis Su published “Rental Harmony: Sperner’s Lemma in Fair Division” in the American Mathematical Monthly.

The connection he made: the space of all possible rent splits for three rooms- e.g. “room A costs $x, room B costs $y, room C costs $z, and x + y + z = $3,000” - has the shape of a triangle. Each outer corner represents an extreme case where one room pays all the money, every point on an edge is two rooms have a cost and the third is free, and every interior point is some specific all-non-zero split.

Triangulate that space. At each vertex, ask the question: given these prices, which room would each person want? Label the vertex with the answer4. Under assumptions about preferences that are both mild and very plausible (roughly, if a room is free, someone would want it) this labeling satisfies exactly the conditions of Sperner’s Lemma.

Which means there’s always a tiny triangle in the subdivision where Mara, Dev, and Priya would all name different rooms. As you subdivide to finer and finer triangulations, that rainbow triangle shrinks toward a specific point. Thus, a specific price split where each person would independently choose their own room over the others must exist.

Sperner guaranteed a solution to the envy free cake (or apartment) cutting problem in 1928, without knowing he was doing that.

The Tool

At this point you are probably wondering if I’m going to make you triangulate something.

The New York Times published a calculator that implements exactly this. You enter the total rent, the number of rooms, and each person answers a few questions about which room they’d want at which price. The algorithm runs Sperner-style triangulation on their preferences and outputs a suggested price for each room. If everyone answers honestly, the result is envy-free by construction.5

The next time you’re standing in an apartment arguing about whether the sunnier room is worth $200 more a month, know you don’t have to argue. There is a website. It has been quietly implementing the consequences of a 1928 combinatorics proof this whole time.

The algorithm doesn’t know or care what anyone earns. But it does take seriously the preference to pay less. If Mara is working with a tight budget, she can express that consistently, by every time she’s asked which room she’d want at a given price split, gravitating toward the cheapest option. The algorithm respects that and finds her a lower price point, even if the room isn’t the nicest.

This is meaningfully fairer than splitting evenly, or even by square footage. An envy-free split at least accommodates the reality that people are working with different budgets, without anyone having to disclose their income or make the conversation weird.

Why this should matter to people who fund things

In 1928, Sperner was not solving a widely applicable fair division problem. He was doing pure mathematics — mathematics motivated by questions inside mathematics, with no obvious application outside of it. He needed a combinatorial fact to prove something about topology. He proved it. He moved on.

Seventy-one years passed before it became “useful”.

This pattern is not rare. G.H. Hardy wrote an essay in 1940 essentially bragging that his work in number theory was so abstract it would never have practical uses. RSA encryption — the math behind HTTPS, banking, every secure message you’ve sent today — is built on the number theory Hardy was talking about. Non-Euclidean geometry was developed in the 1820s through 1860s to settle a purely logical question about whether Euclid fifth axiom was actually necessary. Einstein needed it for general relativity in 1915; the math was just sitting there, waiting. George Boole published “An Investigation of the Laws of Thought” in 1847. Every computer ever made runs on his algebra.

Somebody follows a question because the question is interesting. Decades pass. It turns out to be load-bearing for something we hadn’t invented yet.

I don’t think the lesson here is that pure math should be funded because it’s secretly practical. That framing still asks mathematics to justify itself on somebody else’s terms. The more honest version is: usefulness is genuinely hard to predict in advance, and curiosity has a better track record than directed application when you’re playing the long game.

So follow the weird thing. The interest that doesn’t obviously connect to anything, that you can’t quite justify on a spreadsheet. Not because it’ll secretly pay off someday — maybe it will, maybe in seventy years, maybe never — but because “will this be useful?” is genuinely a bad filter for what’s worth thinking about.

Embrace your whims. They have a better track record than they look.

Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow is a 2022 novel by Gabrielle Zevin. It was recently recommended to me by my boyfriend, who had previously recommended me two others that I had found interesting enough but not /that/ engaging, so I had similar expectations going into this one. What pushed it to the top of my list, though, was realizing that Zevin also wrote “Elsewhere”, her 2005 Y.A. speculative fiction novel about the afterlife, that I read at about age 10 and was totally obsessed with. Obviously a lot changed in my life between checking out her earlier work literally from my elementary school’s library and today, but the second endorsement from my younger self bumped the rec to the top of the list.

In short - I loved it. I haven’t felt this in love with a book in a long time. The plot follows two video game designers / programmers and has a lot to say about the nature of creative work. Though I’m not a game designer, I am a software dev who plays a lot of games, and it felt deeply relatable to me in a way that other creative-type protagonists (writers, painters, musicians) wouldn’t be and hasn’t been. One of the two main characters, Sadie, is a brilliant and deeply ambitious woman working in video games when that was even less common than it is today. She deals with sexism, a mix of real and imagined. She has an ill-conceived, toxic, but decidedly not abusive relationship with her professor slash mentor that was extremely important for her growth as a person and as an artist. The other protagonist, Sam Masur, is disabled (though he doesn’t like to think of himself this way) and deeply traumatized (again, he would never say such a thing). The book does a really interesting job at contrasting the two’s struggles in a way that never directly tries to compare magnitudes. Each of them has significant flaws but is, ya know, trying. I like to think they each have more good than bad in them.

Besides the plot and characters, I also really liked the way that Zevin writes. It feels very factual to me, kind of anti-flowery. It felt like she understands how STEM-brains see the world - facts, lists, being highly aware of one’s own certainty - in a way that feels comforting. Though I see it in my real life connections, I don’t usually see that in books, because being an author is not a very STEM-brained profession (and the few other authors I know with this quality are not very good at writing). One example might be Zevin’s extremely common use of “said” instead of other words in a dialogue - a habit young authors frequently have beaten out of them. But it’s so clear here that this is not the mark of inexperience, but a signal of “learn the rules so that you can break them”.

But don’t confuse factual with unemotional or cold! There are extremely moving, emotional scenes littered throughout. You feel that for each character, their career and personal triumphs are your joys, their setbacks and shame your own.

If you have even a moderate connection to video games, commodifying creative work, or ratfic, I recommend this book. If you have read it, I’d be eager to hear your thoughts and discuss.

Part 1

So I vibe coded a claude skill that would pull this information from the amtrak website for me automatically, and present me a list of train options for a given travel day, departure, and destination that lists not the cost of a direct ticket, but the cheapest possible way to ticket for a particular train. It went through each possible intermediary stop, made sure it was checking the same train number, and compared the direct train X: a→b price with every possible (train X: a→c + train X: c→ b) price.

I sat there smugly but then thought… we can do better.

Part 2

Thinking of flights.google.com… multi-leg trips, with a layover at a station, were presented as options in their list. Why not something similar for trains? I spun up a feature where instead of just comparing single-trains, it would search for pairs of train tickets (train X: a→c + train Y c→ b) where the arrival time at c + your specified minimum layover time (default 15 minutes) was earlier or equal to the departure time for train Y, and similar logic for a maximum layover time. So if Amtrak 118 gets into New York at 1:35pm and Amtrak 82 leaves New York at 2:12pm, that’s a 37-minute layover - totally doable, and sometimes cheaper than riding one train the whole way.

I sat there smugly but then thought… we can do better.

Part 3

I showed this to a friend of mine, who mentioned something about NJ transit having cheap, reliable trips between trenton and new york that I might be interested in taking instead of amtrak. I had totally forgotten - more types of trains than just amtrak go between these stations. If I wanted to truly present all the options, I should consider multi-train trips across different rail-organizations, as long as they share stations. I expanded the claude skill to include 4 more organizations1 on the Northeast corridor - MARC, SEPTA, NJ Transit, and Shore Line East. These trips wouldn’t even involve web scraping - they’re regular enough with deterministic enough pricing that we can just keep their information in a resources folder and update it every few months or so.

Sometimes the cheapest way from point A to point B isn’t Amtrak at all — at least not for the whole trip. MARC will take you from DC to Baltimore for $9 (Amtrak wants $40+). NJ Transit does Trenton to Penn Station for $15-21. These commuter trains literally stop at the same platforms. You just walk off one and onto the other.

So now the question isn’t “what’s the Amtrak fare?” It’s “what’s the best combination of tickets across multiple agencies that gets me from here to there?” And that’s a surprisingly fun problem to solve.

Part 4

So here you go. You tell it where you’re going and when, and it scrapes Amtrak’s website for live fares across every reasonable split point, looks up commuter rail schedules and fares from pre-built GTFS data, matches up connections with actual layover times, and lays everything out in one table so you can compare.

It’s not trying to force you on to the cheapest option. Sometimes the $48 direct is worth it over the $26 option with a transfer. The point is you should know that choice exists.

For example, I searched New York to Philly on a Tuesday evening. Direct Amtrak ranged from $15 to $180 depending on the train. But NJ Transit to Trenton plus a $5 Amtrak leg came out to $26 with a 25-minute layover - and some of those $48 “direct” trains were actually $44 if you just bought two tickets and didn’t get up from your seat. The tool found over 60 combinations I never would have checked manually.

If you’re curious about the guts: the commuter rail data comes from public GTFS feeds - the same data Google Maps uses. A build script downloads schedules from MARC, SEPTA, NJ Transit, and Shore Line East, filters them down to NEC stations, and spits out a JSON file with every trip and fare. The Amtrak side uses Playwright to interact with amtrak.com like a regular person would2, then pulls the fare data out of sessionStorage. It’s all open source if you want to poke at it:

https://github.com/cynnamon-gh/Rail-Arbitrage

The NE Corridor is one of the busiest rail corridors in the country, and they assume no one was willing to do the work to find arbitrage-pertunities. I was surprised no automatic such tool already existed, so I built one. I hope you find it useful, but even if you don’t, at least I will.

The essay laid out this elegant little model. Three variables: sex ratio at birth, population growth rate, and the average age gap between spouses. Plug in the numbers for Orthodox communities (high birth rate, men marrying women 3+ years younger) and out pops a female surplus. Simple demographics, no cultural hand-waving explanations required.

My mathy brain lit up. I love when social phenomena turn out to have tidy quantitative explanations. But then I thought: wait. Does this apply to secular America? What do the numbers actually say here?

The tension I’m trying to resolve

Here’s something that’s bugged me for a while. I genuinely believe men and women aren’t that different from each other. Similar distributions of intelligence, ambition, kindness, extraversion1. I get annoyed when people attribute every behavioral difference to the Essential Gender Nature.

And yet. The heterosexual dating market feels asymmetric in ways that seem non-arbitrary.2 My single female friends are picky because they can afford to be. My single male friends are grinding - optimizing profiles, reading dating advice, treating it like a skill to be developed. There’s an energy of scarcity on one side that I don’t see on the other.

I’ve always been a little uncomfortable with this observation. It pattern-matches to redpill nonsense about “sexual marketplace value” and I don’t want to lend credence to that framework.3

This came up recently when I wrote about why I stopped asking men out. I’d spent a while believing the feminist math - if women ask men out more, we get better outcomes! I tried it. It selected for passive men who let me do all the work4. So I shifted to a more traditional approach: signaling interest clearly but letting men take the visible step.

The response was... a lot. Comments and DMs telling me I was being a coward. That I needed to GROW UP and accept that getting what we want requires DOING UNCOMFORTABLE THINGS. That this was embarrassing. That I was making excuses.

Here’s the thing: I agreed with them for years. I *was* that person, telling other women to just ask men out already. The switch was illuminating, which is why I wrote about it.

But something about the pushback bothered me beyond the tone. It was treating a behavioral pattern as a character test. Women who don’t adopt male courtship strategies aren’t just making a different choice - they’re failing at virtue. They’re cowards. They lack maturity.

What if that framing is completely wrong? What if the asymmetry I observed isn’t about courage or effort or who’s Doing The Work? What if it’s not about gender differences at all? What if it’s just... math?

Three numbers

The dating pool imbalance in the U.S. might come down to three demographic facts.5

1. More boys are born than girls.

   For every 100 girls born in the U.S., about 105 boys are born. The CDC tracked this from 1940 to 2002 and found it consistently between 104.6 and 105.9. That’s roughly 80,000 extra male babies per year, every year. It adds up.

2. The birth rate has been declining.

   Births have dropped about 2% per year since 2015. Each year’s cohort of babies is smaller than the year before.6

3. Men typically partner with women a couple years younger.

   Pew Research found that husbands and wives are about 2.2 years apart on average (2022 data). This has shrunk over time - it was 4.9 years in 1880 - but it’s still there.

None of these facts are controversial. The question is what happens when you combine them.

Why the age gap matters

If everyone dated someone exactly their own age, the sex ratio at birth would be the only thing affecting the dating pool. 105 men per 100 women, a modest male surplus, end of story.

But the age gap means you’re comparing different birth cohorts. A 30-year-old man dating 28-year-old women is competing against men born in his year for women born two years later.

In a declining population, earlier cohorts are larger. More babies were born 30 years ago than 28 years ago. So there are more 30-year-old men than 28-year-old women.

In a growing population, it flips. Earlier cohorts are smaller. Fewer babies 30 years ago than 28 years ago. More 28-year-old women than 30-year-old men.

The shidduch crisis happens in growing populations where men marry younger women. The male surplus happens in declining populations where men date younger women. Same formula, opposite inputs, opposite outcomes.

(Yes, 2.2 years is just an average - plenty of couples are the same age or have the woman older. But the average captures the center of mass of who’s competing for whom. As long as men are, on average, partnering with younger women, the dynamic holds.)

Running the numbers

I wrote a little Python script to play with this.7 Here’s what falls out:

With U.S. demographics, there are about 110 men for every 100 women in the dating pool. That means roughly 9% of men mathematically cannot find a partner, even if everyone paired off perfectly.8

The growth rate is the biggest lever. It can swing the ratio from 94 to 117 depending on whether the population is growing or shrinking.

Does this match reality?

The model predicts a ~10% male surplus in dating pools. Is that what we actually see?

Pew Research data shows that among young adults (18-29), about 63% of men report being single compared to 34% of women. That’s a huge gap - but it’s partly because men and women in that age range aren’t dating each other. The 28-year-old women are dating 30-year-old men, who aren’t in the 18-29 bracket.

The Institute for Family Studies re-analyzed the data accounting for age gaps, and found the real gap is closer to 10 percentage points - which lines up extremely well with the model.9

Other signals point the same direction with various magnitudes:

• 61% of single men are actively looking for a relationship or dates, compared to 38% of single women

• Single women are more likely to say they’re single because they “have other priorities right now”

• The online ecosystem of male dating advice, self-improvement communities, and yes, incel forums is vastly larger than its female equivalents

None of this proves the demographic model is the whole story. But it’s consistent with a world where men face more competition and women have more options.

Incentives, not character

If different places have different demographic splits, you’d expect them to develop different cultural norms around dating.

Jacob Falkovich explores this in his essay The Skewed and the Screwed (a personal favorite of mine). When one gender is in oversupply, the other gender gains selectivity. This has a significant hand shaping courtship norms and political attitudes about relationships.

The Orthodox shidduch crisis and the secular male surplus are the same phenomenon pointing in different directions. In Orthodox communities with high birth rates and large age gaps, women face more competition and the culture develops norms around that (shidduch coaching, pressure on women to be less selective). In secular America with declining births and smaller age gaps, men face more competition and... well, look at the dating advice industrial complex. Look at which gender is told to “level up” and “increase their value.”

This is the part I find genuinely illuminating: we tend to moralize about patterns that are actually just incentive responses.

Think about how American attitudes toward Irish and Italian immigrants changed over the 20th century. In 1900, “Irish Need Not Apply” signs were common. By 1960, JFK was president. Did Americans become more virtuous? Did Irish-Americans become more likeable? No - demographic integration happened. Irish and Italian families moved into the same neighborhoods, worked in the same factories, sent kids to the same schools. Proximity changed incentives. Outgroup became ingroup. The behavioral shift wasn’t about character improvement. It was about conditions changing.

I think a lot of dating behavior works the same way. Women who take a more receptive approach to courtship aren’t being cowardly - they’re responding rationally to a market where they have options. Men who grind on self-improvement and approach anxiety aren’t being desperate or even agenticly virtuous - they’re responding rationally to a market where they face competition. The behaviors make sense given the conditions.

The people telling me I was a coward for not asking men out? They were treating a demographic phenomenon as a character test. They assumed women’s tendency toward yin was a moral failure rather than a rational adaptation. But you can’t shame people into behaving as if they face different conditions than they actually face.

What to do about it

This is a descriptive post, not a prescriptive one. But if you’re a man who feels like you’re on the losing end of this math, there’s an obvious lever: date closer to your own age, or older.

The male surplus is created by the combination of declining population and men dating younger. If you personally reduce your age gap, you’re competing in a less crowded pool. A 30-year-old man interested in women 30-35 faces dramatically less competition than one focused on women 25-28.

This isn’t a character prescription. I’m not saying you should want to date older women, or that there’s something wrong with age-gap relationships. I’m saying: if the math is working against you and you want to change your odds, this is the variable you actually control.

(Interestingly, if we had the same magnitude age-gap on average, but in the opposite direction, with older women, the cohort size would be almost exactly equal, with less than 1% of the population unmatched. Take from that what you will)

What this explains (and what it doesn’t)

The dating market asymmetry I’ve observed isn’t evidence that men and women are fundamentally different creatures with different levels of worth or desirability. It’s not about who’s “trying harder” or who “has it worse” It’s not about who’s brave and who’s cowardly. It might just be a supply and demand artifact created by three boring demographic facts.

Small demographic differences can cause big cultural effects. A 10% oversupply of men doesn’t mean every woman has ten suitors and every man is desperate. But at the margins, it changes the vibe. It explains why my female friends can be choosy while my male friends feel competitive pressure. It explains different dynamics on dating apps. It explains why the dating advice aimed at men emphasizes self-improvement and competition while advice aimed at women emphasizes selectivity and standards.

This doesn’t tell any individual person why they’re single. Macro patterns don’t predict individual outcomes. And it certainly doesn’t justify treating anyone badly.

But it does make me feel less crazy for noticing the asymmetry. And it makes me more sympathetic to both sides - women aren’t delusional for having options, and men aren’t failing for feeling like they have to compete harder. Everyone’s just responding rationally to the actual conditions they face.

The next time someone wants to explain dating dynamics through gender essentialism or moral character, I’m going to point them at three numbers: 105, -2%, and 2.2 years.

No evo-psych required.

As a mathy, feminist teenager, I was exposed to the secretary problem and the Gale-Shapley stable matching algorithm, and my little brain was SO EXCITED. I was a romantic, deeply hoping for my ideal mate, but I also wanted to reject gender norms and live authentically in a world of true sexual equality. My eyes bugged out of my head when I saw the implications: if I ask men out more, I can get the best man! My girl friends who wait around to be asked will end up with a female-pessimal outcome!

What I didn’t anticipate: I ended up with a string of “eh, I don’t REALLY like her, but she’s OK, and I’d rather have Any Woman than be alone” men. Men too passive to break up with me, leaving ME to end things despite being the one who asked them out in the first place.

It’s uncomfortable to break up with people you asked out. You have to wrestle with the fact that you made a Bad Decision - sometimes several in a row. Worse, the method itself selected for exactly what I didn’t want. By doing all the initiating, I was screening for men who would let me do all the initiating. The dynamic of male-passivity got set at the start and never really changed. I didn’t like feeling replaceable.

Let me explain why the math doesn’t transfer to real dating the way Ajeya and Wesley think it does.

The Secretary Problem

The secretary problem assumes you’re the only decision-maker, evaluating a parade of candidates who have no preferences about you. You observe, you judge, you accept or reject.

Dating has a second agent with preferences. The “secretaries” can reject you. And here’s the kicker: their interest in you is partly a function of how you approach them. The algorithm breaks the moment you introduce someone who can say no - and whose enthusiasm might depend on whether they had to work for your attention.

(There are other issues too - we don’t know the pool size, we can revisit past options, preferences change - but the fundamental break is that dating has two decision-makers, not one.)

The secretary problem might apply to auction theory, where you’re evaluating bids on a single legible dimension (price). It applies very poorly to romance.

The Stable Matching Problem

Gale-Shapley can give us some insight, but both Ajeya and Wes draw too much from it by assuming it matches reality more closely than it does.

I agree the algorithm incentivizes agency. I disagree that agency must mean “asking people out, directly, visibly, legibly.”

The main place Gale-Shapley diverges from real life: in the algorithm, Alice ranks Bob a 7 and that never changes. In real life, Alice might rank Bob a 5 initially, but if Bob shows genuine enthusiasm and effort, he becomes a 7. If Alice has to do all the pursuing and Bob just passively accepts, he stays a 5 or drops to a 3.

Human romantic preferences aren’t static rankings. They’re more like differential equations - functions that include a term for how much the other person likes us. Real attraction can spiral upward into joy and love, or spiral downward into resentment and feeling taken for granted. The math assumes static preferences; real attraction is dynamic.

Jacob Falkovich’s essay “Navigation by Moonlight” is one of the best explanations I’ve seen of how women can exhibit agency in a way that, to the more mathy and rational among us, seems invisible and passive.

He distinguishes between “yang” agency (direct pursuit, explicit asks) and “yin” agency (receptivity, creating contexts, subtle signaling). What looks passive is often highly strategic - setting the table for the outcome you want while letting the other person take the visible final step.

During college, in my “just ask men out! It’s the feminist thing to do! I’ll get better partners!” phase, I asked out a decent number of smart, high-status, seemingly interesting and kind men. But I couldn’t know before dating them how they would interact with a partner. Were they doting, thoughtful, generous? I didn’t need a LOT, but the dynamics we established at the start set the stage for relationships that didn’t feel sustainable.

So I shifted. Rather than overtly asking out men I liked, I started sending classic signals that were well-understood as flirts and expressions of interest, putting the ball in their court. Asking to dance together at a party. Choosing to sit next to them. Laughing at their jokes. Finding excuses to physically touch. Comparing hand sizes. You know the drill.

This fans the flame of desire while making it clear that, for the invitation to be accepted, they have to conquer a bit of fear. Be a little public. Be Agentic - which is a trait I (and I expect many straight-leaning women) find desirable in a partner.

This isn’t passivity. It’s a form of agency that also gathers information. If he can’t or won’t take the final step after I’ve made it abundantly clear I’m interested, that tells me something important about what a relationship with him would look like.

A note on women dating women

Everything I’ve said so far assumes a man-woman dynamic with its culturally baked-in scripts. Women dating women face a different problem: there IS no default script. When both people are used to signaling and waiting for the other to make the visible move, you get the “useless lesbian” meme - two women who like each other, both waiting, neither escalating.

In wlw contexts, I think more direct asking actually IS necessary, because subtle signals are much more likely to be misread or missed entirely. When there’s no shared expectation of who moves first, someone has to break the stalemate. The yin approach works when you’re playing off a yang counterpart; it works less well when you’re both defaulting to yin.

So if you’re a woman dating women: the math might actually apply better to you. Sorry.

”Asking out” is too simple a frame anyway

The more I think about this, the more I realize that “A asks out B” is a weirdly reductive way to describe how relationships actually start. Most of my relationships haven’t had a clear “ask out” moment at all.

My current relationship started like this: we were introduced at a party. We talked. I asked if he wanted to find a quieter room upstairs to keep talking. We did. He initiated a kiss. After that there wasn’t really an official “ask out” - we just texted, we knew we liked each other, and things progressed from there.

So who was the “asker”? I created the context (suggesting we go somewhere private). He took the visible romantic risk (the kiss). From there it was mutual. This is how most relationships actually unfold - a series of small escalations where both people take turns being brave. Not one person boldly asking and another passively accepting.

The Gale-Shapley framing of “proposer” vs “receiver” flattens all this into a single binary moment. Real courtship is more like a dance - back and forth, each person testing whether the other will match their energy.

I want to address two audiences directly.

**To women feeling pressure to ask men out to be “agentic”:**You can be agentic without doing the stereotypical “Do you want to go out with me?” Flirting IS doing something. Creating opportunities IS doing something. If asking men out directly has worked for you, great. But if it hasn’t, or if you’ve felt weird pressure to do something that doesn’t feel right, trust that instinct. There’s more than one way to go after what you want.

**To people like Wes who see women’s reluctance to ask out men as a moral or strategic failing:** As long as women are yinning and not truly being passive, they’re being smart, not self-sabotaging. The math doesn’t prove what you think it proves. Before judging women who don’t ask men out, consider that they might be running a different algorithm - one that’s testing for exactly the traits they want in a partner.

I want to be clear: I haven’t embraced traditional femininity wholesale. I still cold-email about opportunities, I still advocate for myself at work, I still initiate in plenty of contexts. But I’ve learned that different strategies work in different environments. The “optimal” strategy in a hypothetical sex-blind, perfectly egalitarian world may not be optimal for the world we actually live in.

I’m also not saying “never ask men out.” Some men are too in their heads to recognize yin signaling as a bid for their attention. Some contexts make direct asking the obviously correct move. But I do want to offer women permission to try a different path - one that’s not about passivity, but about testing for reciprocal effort from the start.

In the end, it all adds up to normalcy.

Living Alone

I moved into my own place this year. First time ever. I was nervous about it, if I’m being honest. I thought the silence would get to me, that I’d spend a lot of nights feeling isolated and becoming weird(er).

It didn’t work out that way. Living alone has been genuinely good for me, but not for the reasons I expected.

When I lived with people I liked, any invitation to do something outside the house had a natural competitor: staying in and hanging out with whoever was home. That option was always appealing, and I picked it over and over. It was easier. Why go out when comfortable company was right there?

Living alone created this social hunger. The periods of loneliness, when stretched into multiple days, are just unpleasant enough to make me crave hanging out with even medium-close friends. Leaving the house becomes the more enticing option. I started saying yes more, going to things more, and then something clicked - the time at home became actually recharging because I was getting genuine solitude. I get to do literally whatever whim may blow across the forefront of my mind. Whatever music, media, scents, colors, meals, etc. I want, I get to have, without checking in using English with another human mind.

The difference is stark now. I need both the going out and the being home. Before I was kind of existing in a fuzzy middle ground, not getting enough of either.

Becoming a Social Butterfly

I have a remote job, so I could move to any city I wanted, but I picked Philadelphia for a specific reason: even though I only had a handful of preexisting friends in the city, it was a central location to a solid five or six previous connections. I knew that these people already had lives and I wouldn’t be able to just show up and become their new best friend, but after being away from my community so long, it was really heartwarming to see how these friends re-embraced me and were happy I’d returned.

My community in my previous city was close to nonexistent - maybe two friends, and most days staying home. In the new city, I decided I couldn’t let that happen, and made community-building my primary priority for 2025. I implemented a policy of saying yes to every invitation, even the mega inconvenient ones. I was willing to go to events where I only knew one person, or sometimes nobody at all, a despite a pounding heart I trusted that I’d have fun and manage to charm someone.

This way, I built up chains - friend A would introduce me to their friend B, who would become my friend and then introduce me to C. These separate chains would cross and became webs and I can honestly say that now, at the end of 2025, my community and network of friendship is the strongest it’s ever been.

I didn’t just expand out from existing friendships - right after I moved, I signed up for ACX meetups and recurring board game events, despite knowing no one else there. One of those was a hit and one a miss - I befriended the other ACX meetup attendees and that became a stable core group that opened doors to other people.

I also started hosting parties at my place. Nothing fancy, just getting people together. It was unexpectedly fun playing the socialite, introducing people from different circles to each other that had something in common, or making a lonely +1 feel welcomed. I think I did that about four times this year.

Lessons from the Social Year

Starting from close to zero in a new city is genuinely hard. Don’t do it unless you have a very good reason. And if you’re trying to build community, embrace hosting, embrace going to events where you don’t know people, embrace cutting your losses and moving on if you’re not vibing with a group. Forcing it wastes everyone’s time.

I think in 2026 I’m going to pull back from the “say yes to everything” policy to something more curated and intentional, but it absolutely got the ball rolling. Sometimes you need the indiscriminate yes before you can start being selective.

One Year at a Job

I know 28 is when a lot of people have been at the same job for three, four, five years without thinking about it. I’m not one of those people. Between my masters and a job market that wasn’t great, I’ve bounced around. Nothing stuck, or maybe I didn’t let anything stick.

This job has stuck.

A year ago I was still in that anxious early-employee phase, trying to figure out the unwritten rules, second-guessing my contributions, wondering if I’d made a mistake. Now I’m someone people come to with questions. I’ve shipped work I’m proud of. I’ve learned how to advocate for myself in meetings.

I also was assigned as a mentor figure to one of our new hires, and she’s supposed to go to me with questions, and although I doubted I would be able to help, turns out that I overestimated the newbie and underestimated myself, and it’s quite easy to answer her questions and help her improve.

I also have to say, coding assistants completely changed my ability to be useful to my team. Shout out to Opus 4.5!

The natural question is how long I’ll stay here. Will I continue to bounce? Despite starting to put out feelers and revamp my resume for more impactful work, I’m in no hurry. I’d be happy to stay here another year or two.

The Hobby Landscape

I got way more into baking this year. Homemade baked goods are great when you want to not show up empty-handed, and they’re hard to mess up if you can read a recipe.

Continued to get very into cooking - possibly obviously, as I went from the secondary to primary chef in my house. I still mostly work from recipes rather than winging it, but will make adjustments here and there about spices or vegetable quantity. I’ve been working through a few specific cookbooks (SUPER recommend Isa Does It)

Reading became a consistent thing again. I read 16 books this year, which I’m super proud of. I credit my kindle. The e-ink has been great for different lighting environments and doesn’t mess up my sleep. 5 of those 16 were He Who Fights With Monsters, a LitRPG series which was so engaging I found it nearly impossible to put down.

This year I got into strength training and weightlifting! It’s been absolutely fantastic to have a form of exercise that doesn’t feel linked to the whole feminine skinniness beauty complex. I see my capabilities grow week after week, and feel totally unstoppable - if I can do this hard thing, I can do ANY HARD THING.

I’ve played a lot fewer video games. The single-player thing hasn’t grabbed me the same way. A few games that did grab me, though - Outer Wilds (again), Balatro, Blue Prince, The Case of the Golden Idol. I barely touched Magic. Board games are still exactly as appealing as they always were, maybe more.

And I got super into journaling this year. There’s something about writing things down that clarifies what’s actually going on in my head versus what I think is going on. It’s become a space where I can be messy and honest and figure things out. I use Day One.

And finally, a hobby I went from 0 to 60 on this year - interior design. With a big place all my own to decorate, I tried dozens of configurations of the same pieces of furniture, stalked facebook marketplace and the thrift shops for underpriced beauties, I made a god damn pinterest account and dozens of mood boards. If you want me to do free interior design for your place I’d be very excited to do so just shoot me some pictures of the room and some inspo images lol.

The Relationship Year

This one’s complicated in the way real life is complicated.

I had a long-term relationship that ended last fall / winter but in that half-and-half way where you don’t entirely separate for a while. It was messy and confusing and probably not great for either of us, but it’s also the truth of how I processed it. I should have been firmer, and I’m sorry.

Then came my hot girl summer (which extended into fall). More sex, more casual dating, more people, more exploration. First time in my life I’d played that part, instead of jumping from committed partnership to committed partnership.

I found it extremely valuable. I learned a lot about what I wanted and didn’t want. Yeah, sometimes I got my feelings hurt, and sometimes my partners’ feelings got hurt, but we’re all adults and knew the risks and made it through the other side knowing more about ourselves with no regrets.

I had a short relationship that didn’t last long but transformed into a real friendship. That feels like a win.

And now, in the last stretch of the year, I’m in something that’s still early but is far from casual. We’re both extremely optimistic about where things might lead.

I’m very glad I did this arc. I feel more fully myself

What’s Left

This year, I experienced a lot of growth. I’m proud of what I accomplished, and would do (almost) all of it again, given the opportunity. But I made different choices about what I wanted and went after it. I chose Solitude and learned I need it. I chose community-building and it worked. I chose to stay in a job long enough to actually get good at it. I chose to try hobbies and explore and figure out what actually engages me. I chose to explore intimacy without forcing it into a box.

This upcoming year, I hope is quite similar, but the key difference will be intentionality - rather than saying yes to every invitation, worrying about opportunities slipping through my fingers, I hope to focus on the subset that brings me the most joy. Schedule time for myself to work on solo projects or hobbies. Lowering the amount of time I spend scrolling. A planned trip or two. Making time for love.

Thank you for listening to my reflections, and I hope that you found something you can take with you into 2026.

Since then, a few times now, I’ve been overcome with love in my heart for specific friends and family, and rather than my previous strategy of sending them a ‘thinking of you’ text or journaling about them, I pour out the feeling into a letter. So far the letters have been no more than one double sided page, and have taken no more than 15 minutes to write.

I conceal them in the envelope, stick on a forever stamp (78¢), feel a bit of pyromania as I alight the candle and drip hot wax onto the envelope, and emboss it with one of my favorite shapes. I get to feel like a game of thrones character - they'll know who sent this by the emblem, know if the messengerboy (USPS?) tampered with it, feel a sense of prestige from the royal purple color.

So far, every time one of these letters has been received, the recipient has texted me with nothing short of elation. They’re touched! The thank you messages contain an outpouring of teary-eyed and heart-filled emojis! Maybe your friends don’t get quite so misty-eyed as mine, but I’m willing to bet that with not very much effort or financial investment on your part, you could seriously make the day of several people you hold dear. Medieval signet optional, but encouraged.

How I Got Here

I first learned about kidney donation from Scott Alexander’s writeup, and I’ve since read retrospectives from others who’ve done it: Molly Hickman, Elizabeth Kugh (directed donation), and Dylan Matthews. Their experiences have been genuinely inspiring, which is probably why I keep revisiting this decision. Another few key components in my consideration have been Quinn (@qd_forall), a friend who did undirected donation and was happy to share his thoughts about the process with me directly, and new-ish boyfriend Josh Morrison (@joshcmorrison) founder of Waitlist Zero, who has also been an open book about his donation and gently encouraging.

Where I’ve Landed (For Now)

After a lot of consideration: this is currently too high a personal cost for me to do right now. However, if The End Kidney Death Act (EKDA) passes—which would provide a $10,000 annual refundable tax credit for five years (50k!) I am committing to donating if I pass screening and the hospital approves me.

My Motivation

I consider myself an effective altruist motivated by reducing suffering. While I don’t currently work in any field of EA, I try to help through donations and persuasion. Donating one’s time and organs is sometimes discussed as a natural next step, though there’s genuine debate about how effective it is compared to other options. The standard wisdom is that a donation directly buys 5-7 quality adjusted life years, which may be slightly outdated and up to 7-10 these days. Scott Alexander’s analysis that includes unlocking chains of previously unusable kidneys suggests that a kidney donation produces roughly 10–20 QALY. These are not small numbers - and it’s not like that extra kidney was doing anything anyway! Creating that much value for a fellow human seemingly out of thin air is somewhat miraculous.

The Cons

Medical risks: (small) Increased chance of kidney failure later in life, (small) risk of death during surgery, and a (small) increased risk of death from cancer due to screening (Scott addressed this—requesting an MRI instead of a CAT scan can mitigate it). There’s also the significantly increased risk of preeclampsia and gestational diabetes if I become pregnant. Minor complications like UTIs or similar would also be annoying

Practical concerns: No more ibuprofen for pain management. My vanity dictates I don’t want a scar on my abdomen. I also need to pass the screening process, which involves a lot of blood draws, tests and appointments - something that feels harder to coordinate and recover from without logistical support.

The math problem: At the current most effective “going rate” for saving lives via EA charities [https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/kJEBgnFKnQd8Y5inb/does-givewell-list-cost-per-qaly-for-their-recommended] of $50-100 (with a BIG asterisk), 5–7 QALYs is worth roughly $750. Even using Scott’s numbers of 20 QALY and the upper ($100) end of the cost estimate, we still get an equivelent price of $2000. Which is, let’s be honest, that much money in the grand scheme of things. I’m much more comfortable working an extra year at The End of my career (generating significantly more than $2k) or skipping a vacation and donating that money than undergoing major surgery for the equivalent impact. This feels like a lot of personal risk for a relatively modest donation.

For more detailed QALY tradeoffs, see this analysis.

Relationship and personal stress: There seems to be a bit of a curse relationship-wise for many of the people who’ve written about kidney donation. (Curses are fake, but correlations are real.) I’m genuinely worried about stress this could bring to my relationships. Given my connections to people close to this issue, there’s a chance that this brings me closer to my future-partner, but even if they’re someone who’s been through it too, the realities of helping to take care of a recovering person are likely to be tough. Also, personally, the idea of emailing, calling, scheduling and then attending multiple appointments fills me with more stress than the surgery itself. I’ve put off appointments before and am likely to miss one thing here and be disqualified / have to start over. I would not want to deal with coordinating the screening process and recovering from surgery unless my current situation - living alone, self motivating, difficult access to transportation - were changed.

Vouchers: To encourage donation, the kidney registry lets those who donate assign 5 vouchers to their loved ones at time of donation so that if one of them needs a kidney later in life, they get to ‘skip the line’ and get priority donation. On learning this, I was concerned about people close to me who may need a kidney someday, who either don’t exist yet (future children, nibling) or my relationship to them doesn’t exist yet (future spouse). I emailed the national kidney registry and they confirmed my concern. It feels crazy to me that I may not be able to help save people who will be the closest to me if the worst were to happen, merely because we’re not close right now.

The Pros

The obvious: Saving a life is unambiguously the morally right thing to do. The medical care is theoretically free, though travel and time off work are not.

The multiplier: I could potentially advocate for kidney donation and convince others to do it, multiplying my impact.

The game-changer: Waitlist Zero is pushing the End Kidney Death Act, among other things, which would provide a refundable tax credit of $10,000 each year for five years ($50,000 total). While I’m aware this makes me less altruistically pure than the people listed above, I believe this would make a big enough difference to push me Over the Edge. Both for personal compensation reasons, but also just for effective altruism reasons - even if i keep only half, $25k to charities represents an extra 5 ish lives saved.

My Commitment

If the EKDA passes and I’m healthy enough, I’m committing to donating1. The tax credit would cover all lost wages, travel, and personal hardship from donation—with plenty left over to donate to highly effective charities like GiveWell for bednets and vitamin A supplements.

I’m curious what others think about the math here, and whether there are considerations I’m missing.

For those who don’t know, there’s a wonderful rule of thumb called the Pareto Principle, also known as the 80/20 principle, that says that 80% of the outcome can be obtained from the first 20% of the effort. This is related to Zipfian Distributions and has applications in far more fields than I could reasonably name. I’ve used it as an organizing principle for lots of areas of my life - health, beauty, fashion, finance, home decor, travel, even love and relationships. I think it would be fun to do a series of posts exploring this! The first one in the series will be about beauty, because I’ve already written this post on a previous blog and it only requires minor amendments. The previous version of this post included a first section on beauty (copied below with edits) and a second on how to dress, which I’ve decided to split up into a second post on fashion to be released later.

Why Should I Care?

There are two major reasons you should put any effort into your attractiveness

1. It’ll help you feel more ‘yourself’, defined, confident, capable, etc. (‘for yourself’)

2. It’ll bring joy to others, make other people like you more, and cause you to get better treatment in a whole host of areas (‘for others’)

Note that this is true for all genders. I’ll cite a few key findings about point 2 - the better treatment thing is not fair, but super real. It’s generally called The Halo Effect1

Money

• Earnings Premium: A study of MBA graduates found that attractive individuals experience approximately a 2.4% beauty premium in earnings, translating to an annual salary increase of $2,508. For the top 10% most attractive individuals, the premium rises to over $5,528 annually compared to less-attractive peers.

• Wage Disparity: When workers were classified into above-average and below-average attractiveness groups, those in the above-average group earned 12% more than those in the below-average group—a wage disparity comparable to those associated with race and gender.

• Job Applications: Attractive applicants receive higher competence ratings and are more likely to be invited for future rounds of job interviews

People Just Like You More

• Jury Bias & Legal System: In court cases, unattractive defendants tend to receive significantly harsher treatment, receiving sentences averaging 22 months longer in prison than more attractive defendants.

• Behavioral Economics & Cooperation: In a high-stakes Prisoner’s Dilemma game played on a television game show, attractive contestants generated more cooperative behavior from their counterparts, though this effect was only significant in mixed-gender interactions.

• Dating Pool & Partner Quality: In online dating, physical attractiveness predicted romantic outcomes more strongly than indicators of intellectual abilities or personality traits, and people are significantly more receptive to contact attempts from attractive individuals

  There is substantial evidence that more attractive romantic partners—regardless of one's own attractiveness—are associated with higher relationship satisfaction.

Upon hearing this, there are a few possible reactions - I know the first time I learned about this my reaction was to lament in its unfairness, pout that I would never get these unearned benefits, and declare myself to be smarter than my peers. But there is another way! Attractiveness is a skill, like any other, and it can be exercised and strengthened. It’s also possible to pour unending energy and money and thought into it for diminishing returns - I’m here to help direct you to a happy medium

Part 1: the Universal Foundation

These basics transcend all beauty standards - whether you’re punk, preppy, or somewhere in between, these fundamentals matter.

Your Health is Your Glow

The big three: Sleep, water, movement. That’s it.

• Sleep: 7-8 hours consistently beats any concealer for tired-looking skin

• Water: Make it your default drink - not only will this help with weight-control, it causes your skin to be brighter, and your organ systems to work better.

• Exercise: Just 2x per week makes a dramatic difference. Find something you actually enjoy, even if it takes time to discover what that is. Some people prefer the ease of an at home-workout, some prefer the mental separation of a designated location. It’s ok if it takes you SEVERAL attempts at finding what exercise works for you, don’t feel like you have to stick with a particular regimen that’s making you miserable like weightlifting, running, some expensive sport, whatever just because you started it.

Weight note: You probably don’t need to be as skinny as you think you do for appearance-reasons. There’s a significant gap - up to 20 lbs! - between what’s actually considered maximally attractive and what people think they need to achieve. Losing 5-10 pounds won’t make you happy or change your life.

That said, if you’re substantially overweight, losing weight is likely one of the highest-return things you can do for your appearance. I know this is way over 20% effort - it’s difficult and can take a long time. I just would be remiss to not mention it. GLP-1s are kindof a miracle drug and are worth at least looking into.

Healthcare: Stay current with checkups (1/year physical, 2/year dental). Treating underlying health issues improves how you look and feel more than any beauty product ever could. For example, one of my yearly physicals caught my hashimoto’s, treatment of which has given me more energy and brightness, and reduced a goiter from a self-conscious tennis ball to an undiscernible size.

Hygiene That Actually Matters

Showering

Showering when your BO is noticeable, your skin has accumulated oil or gotten dirty, or when you’ve exerted yourself enough to sweat has a huge impact. For most people, every other day is sufficient, but some people with different flora can get away with even more seldom, and some really need the daily shower.

Product tip: Avoid 3-in-1 shampoo/conditioner/body wash products or even 2-in-1 products - they don’t do any of their jobs well. Get separate products. Use a loofah or washcloth rather than putting liquid soap directly on your hand. This has the benefit of your liquid soap not immediately being all washed away, and a bit of exfoliation (removal of dead skin).

Hair Washing

Most people over-wash their hair. I shampoo every other shower when my hair starts looking stringy (around day 4). Condition every time you shampoo, and maybe also on non-shampoo days. Experiment here - your mileage may vary. Use sulfate-free shampoo for your hair type. Bonus points if it smells delicious.

If you really want your hair to look extra luscious, you can add in a product called ‘deep conditioner’ aka leave-in conditioner, approximately every month.

Shaving & Grooming

Women: shave legs/underarms: Shaving every shower is propaganda. If you regularly wear sleeveless tops, shaving your armpits matters to most people. If you wear shorts/skirts regularly, leg shaving is similarly important. So in summer, maybe every week (3ish showers) is plenty. Consider the season - who really sees your legs in winter? Also consider using a hair removal cream instead - I think it’s about as much effort as the razor but some of my friends feel it’s significantly simpler (either way, when removing hair you’re reducing friction! ha)

Men: trim facial hair: If you’re keeping a beard, use an electric beard trimmer to maintain a uniform length. Frequency depends on how long you’re keeping it - shorter beards may have to trim once or twice a week, longer beards can be left alone for longer. It’s pretty important to clean up your neck line and cheek edges (again, with frustratingly large frequency windows. My friend says he does his about every 3 days); it’s the difference between “intentional beard” and “haven’t showered in days.” For a clean-shaven look, invest in a decent electric shaver ($30-80) or safety razor ($20-50) and replace blades when they stop cutting cleanly. Every other day shaving usually takes 3-5 minutes. The whole routine is genuinely low-effort if you commit to the weekly edge cleanup and avoid the trap of thinking beard maintenance is complicated. (Bonus: beard oil or balm optional but nice if you want to feel a bit fancier. I’ve heard good things about this one, but this is not my area of expertise)

Everyone: Keep nose and ear hair trimmed so as not to be visible. It’s a small detail that makes a big difference.

Skincare

Ignore the 10-step routines. I saw understanding and getting into skincare as SUPER intimidating - there’s so many products with confusing names! Do I need to splash the water on my face like the commercials? Masks? Serums? I’ll cut through it for you. And no I’m not sponsored.

You can go super easy mode and do just one product. That might be like 10% of the effort for 50% of the rewards. That product would be high-spf sunscreen. Sunscreen seriously saves your skin so much damage and makes it look so much younger and healthier over the long term - and it’s not like the lower chance of skin cancer is something we can round off to inconsequential!

Or you can go easy mode - classic 80/20 - and do a 3 step routine.

• Cleanser to remove dirt / oil. One with Salicylic Acid if you’re acne prone.

• Moisturizer with SPF to protect and hydrate

• any product with retinol, like a lotion or serum, at night. This the the only “active ingredient” that has a ton of science behind it - longevity scientists and beauty gurus stand united!

CeraVe has plenty of articles for science-backed, non-intimidating, non-feminine skincare guides, though they might encourage more products and effort than I do.

Spot Treatments: salicylic acid cleaners should prevent blemishes, but if you do find yourself still dealing with them, a bit of benzoyl peroxide should clear it up. If you want to reduce puffiness (for example from allergies or crying), apply an ice pack.

Other Underrated Essentials

Teeth

People don’t think about teeth as an important part of beauty, but it totally is! Brush morning and night, floss regularly, brush /scrape your tongue for good-smelling breath, see your dentist regularly. This has a significant effect on your attractiveness. Consider getting an electric toothbrush and/or a water pick.

Smelling Good

EVERYONE gets a boost from smelling good. Keep your teeth brushed (maybe an extra brushing or stick of gum before a date!), wear deodorant every day, and find a signature scent that you spritz on daily. Once you’ve found your scent, this is basically no additional daily work with crazy strong returns.

I recommend going to a perfumery or department store where an expert can help you pick something that matches your tastes. What scents you pick will be personal preference - some are more masc, femme, or neutral. I like to have different scents for summer and winter, but that’s just me. Most expensive perfumes have cheaper dupes you can find on www.fragrantica.com and are significantly cheaper to obtain on ebay.

Nails

Don’t let them look chewed or ragged. If your nails are weak or brittle, consider using A nail strengthener. File regularly so they’re smooth and rounded. Personally I keep a nail file in most rooms of my house so I pick it up and use it absent-mindedly when I’m tempted to bite. If you polish them, remove it when it chips. Probably getting fancy dip or gel manicures is not worth it. They should not hurt when scratching sensitive spots (like the inside of your cheek) - if they do then cut and file. Men - this may sound silly and frivolous and like too much work, but it’s super common for women to be somewhat obsessed with men’s hands, and we notice these things!

Hair

Find a cut that flatters your face shape and isn’t high-maintenance. Talk to a stylist about what works for your face-shape. Avoid super trendy cuts or anything requiring constant upkeep (like bangs or shaved sections) unless you’re quite committed to it for for-yourself-beauty reasons. Also don’t be scared to do that upkeep yourself - trimming bangs or split ends or reshaving parts of your head is not that hard, and can keep you looking fresh between trips to the salon. Personally, I get my hair cut about 2 times a year and pick a style that grows out smoothly.

Specific longer cut recommendations: French bob (chin length or a bit longer, with a slight inward curl) for square faces, long layers ending in a “V” for feminine women with any face shape, a bixie (between a pixie and a bob) is flattering on a wide range of hair types and textures and can easily be customized for your face shape, a sleek bob kept just below the collarbones but above the chest for oval faces, etc.

For women - A note about length and beauty:

I’ve heard some of my female friends say that they think they have to maintain long hair in order to be attractive to men. I acknowledge there is substance to this concern, but like most beauty things, it’s overblown. Studies have shown that lengthy and good quality hair in women is positively evaluated by men, and men rate female faces with long hair as more youthful, healthy, sexy and feminine. In a study of 204 heterosexual marital dyads, women with long and high-quality hair experienced more frequent sexual intercourse with their spouse, as it heightened their husband’s perception of their attractiveness.

That said, the research shows notable nuance: some research indicates that a woman’s hair length doesn’t significantly affect her attractiveness, and other research shows that short-haired women are perceived as more honest, caring, and emotional, while long-haired women were seen as more dominant and intelligent. There’s enough variation in what people prefer that we can’t pull out a clear signal. Pick a length that you love and that you can take care of.

For men - Keep it groomed and intentional:

Shorter, well-maintained hair is generally the safer bet for appealing-to-others. The key is that it looks deliberately styled rather than neglected—similar to the beard principle. A clean, shaped cut (whether that’s a crew cut, textured crop, or longer styles on top) that you get trimmed or trim yourself every 4-6 weeks reads as intentional and put-together.

Makeup: Find Your Power Products

The 80/20 approach: Instead of buying a full makeup collection, discover which 1-2 products make the biggest difference for YOUR face. (or zero! You don’t need to wear makeup at all.)

The testing method: Try products one at a time (borrow from friends, test at makeup stores, or buy drugstore versions to experiment). Put on just that one product and see if it makes a noticeable difference. If it doesn’t wow you, skip it. Your goal is a 2-5 minute routine that makes you do a Double Take in the mirror.

Common high-impact products:

• Eyeliner: Often the single biggest eye-opener (literally)

• Lip color: Lipstick, gloss, or even tinted chapstick can brighten your whole face

• Mascara: If your lashes are light or short, this might be your game-changer

• Concealer: Great for covering blemishes or under-eye circles if they bother you

Lower-impact for most people: Foundation, eyeshadow, blush, contouring. These can be nice-to-haves but rarely provide the dramatic improvement that justifies daily application.

Your mileage will vary: My daily routine is eyeliner + lip color, sometimes a clear gel on my eyebrows for special occasions. Yours might be completely different - maybe just mascara makes you feel put-together, or maybe lip color alone does the trick.

The key: Find your 1-2 products and master applying them quickly. A 2-minute routine you’ll actually do beats a 20-minute routine you’ll skip.

Conclusion

The beautiful thing about the pareto principle approach is that it gives you permission to stop overthinking. You’re not aiming for perfection. You’re just hitting the fundamentals that matter, then deciding what upgrades (if anything) brings you joy. You’re saving your energy and your money for other parts of your life. Go forth, smile genuinely, and see how the people adore you!

Keep posted for the follow-up post about finding your fashion sense

I MEAN LOOK AT THEM!
I give them temporary names- Alan Purring (right), Mewclid (middle), Terence Meow (left) and René Descats (below). Partner Ari, previously “not a cat person”, becomes enamored with René.

Basically immediately there was more love and happiness in my life. The context of the picture below - I am attempting to have a sad flop, the kind where you dramatically collapse and stare the ceiling and listen to music other people can’t stand and feel your feelings. But there are four kittens scaling my body like a mountain. They get tangled in my hair. One is purring directly into my ear at illegal volumes. They all have intuited their solemn duty as weighted-blanket. It is impossible to stay sad when you have four kittens on you. It is impossible to stay sad when you have one kitten on you. Four is just overkill.

The Practical Details:

• Isn’t 4 cats, like, a LOT?

  • Yes and no! Multiple cats, especially bonded siblings, means that they entertain each other, socialize each other, and regulate each other, which actually means less attention I need to spend on the cats compared to if I had only one

• How long did you have these cats for?

  • Each of my litters was in my home for 2-3 months

• How difficult was it to start fostering?

  • For the shelter in CDMX, I literally sent one email / DM and that was enough for them to drop off a litter within the week. For the shelter in the US, it was longer - there was an application form, it involved calling my references including a previous vet and current landlord, but we still handed off the kittens the first time we saw each other face to face and that was less than a month after applying.

• How big of a burden is it?

  • Both of the shelters I’ve worked with so far have handled 100% of the medical care. They’ve also both handled a ton of outreach, looking for and screening new adopters, though of course they wouldn’t be upset if I also searched. Both shelters helped out with some starting supplies, but ultimately the ongoing cost of food and litter (maybe $50 a month including special kitten wet food?) was on me. I felt like this was a reasonable cost for how much benefit I was getting.

  • The other big burden was no longer being able to pack up and jet away for trips. If the trip was relatively short and planned in advance, I could ask the shelter to take the kittens back under their care for a few days, which was nice. I also got the help of my generous, kitten-loving neighbor to pop in and feed + play with them a few times, if I was going to be gone more than 24 hours.

The first litter started to trickle out - first Terence Meow (to be renamed Oreo, and brought into a house with other cats but none of his siblings), then Mewclid and Alan Purring together. We have reached the hard part of the story - saying goodbye.

I felt strongly connected to these kittens. But, I’ve always felt strongly that loving something or someone means wanting the best for them, even if the best isn’t me. Just because I love something doesn’t mean it belongs to me - whether that be a cat, a boyfriend, a memory or sentimental object.

Litter #2

The second litter happened to arrive on the same day that 2 members of the previous litter left. Leaving me with 4 baby cats, one annoyed adolescent, and very mixed feelings.

Here, have some pictures of them being adorable and swarming each other and also me before I move on to philosophy. Their names were Rogue, Wizard, Cleric, and Warrior.

Parallels to Polyamory

• Having multiple kittens means that I am not their only source of love, attention and play, meaning I am less likely to be burnt out which makes me better able to give what they need.

• The various kitten interactions are analogous to metamours - Some pairs (say, Mewclid and René) often offer each other one type of interaction (high energy play fights), where another pair (René and Warrior) may have more of a protective / mentor style relationship, and a third (René and Rogue) may be full of sleepy contended cuddles.

• Abundance of love means that any act of love, in my opinion, becomes more meaningful. Ability to get your needs met by yourself or by your other connections means that any particular request for connection is done out of care for the individual, a want rather than a need. This is also tied in to why I prefer cats over dogs generally - the ability to say ‘no thank you, I’d rather do my own thing now’ makes the connections feel more special.

• There’s been a bit of a rhythm - alternating months of deep connection, then of freedom and spontaneity. This rhythm has worked excellently for me - I have some periods of deep responsibility, roots, routine and nurturing, and some of traveling, freedom, seeing friends across the world without worrying about those I’ve left behind. Neither is better, both are valuable. This maps to relationship rhythms too - sometimes deeply enmeshed, sometimes more independent.

• Seeking adopters for my kittens feels like wingwoman-ing My Boys

Litter #3

This third litter was not orphaned - I brought in 4 kittens and their nursing mother in June 2025. These were my first pets after moving out of Mexico, breaking up (…deescalating?) with Ari, finding my own place and spending effort on making it Mine. To me, it was a signal that I was ready to re-open my heart to connection after an important time caring for myself.

Internalizing the impermanence of all things, these kittens did not get names - merely unique identifiers based on their coloring or face-shapes.

Tensions

• The Grief has been real. Some kittens were harder to say goodbye to than others. There was a point in Mexico City where René jumped out a window I thought was too high for him to reach, and wandered across the roof to the next building. I spent hours panicking, suppressing sobs, heartbroken, thinking he was lost or dead or both. I feel deeply in my bones that the Grief of love is worth the pleasure of it, but I know that the calculus is different for everyone

• I had the space, time, and resources to be able to bring litters into my home. I also have the space, freedom, and emotional regulation capability to choose my relationship structure. Not everyone has such a luxury.

• The cats (and short-term relationships) can start to blur together. There starts to be a certain fungibility to the individuals that may be difficult to invite into your life, if you want to preserve specialness. Once I started to notice this, I did make efforts to maintain their separation - writing stories, collecting pictures, of each of the cats to remember them as individuals once they left as best I could. Even so, I still feel as though my affection here is for ‘cats’ as a class and the ones in my life are semi-fungible instantiations of that love, and my love for my partners is semi-fungible instantiations of my love for all humanity or all my friends. Specialness is interesting - it tries to increase value through rarity rather than through qualities of the object/ritual/cat/boy. Use the good vanilla

Closing Thoughts

• If you would like to see more pictures of these cats, you can here, here, or here

• If you already have some experience with overcoming jealousy or naturally have low jealousy / possessiveness, I strongly recommend fostering cats or your preferred animal yourself! You can take in just one if a litter is too much, and it really does mean a world of difference to that one. It’s easier and lower commitment than adoption and can teach you a lot about yourself.

• Both for fostering and polyamory - I think the transition from the more standard lifestyle (adoption or monogamy) is easier than people expect. Just because you have big feelings, even big negative feelings, doesn’t mean you have to let them control you.

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I spent the morning doing check-in shifts FAR too early after the late night and little sleep of Saturday, interrupted by a talk on alternative family structures. I’d expected it to focus on non-monogamous family configurations, but it was mostly about family court—still interesting, and it got me thinking about what my ideal family structure might look like someday. Something with a lot of community, co-living, friends and family and love all mixed together.

After lunch, I caught CJ the X’s talk “The Philosophy of Fucking” (I should watch their YouTube videos—they’re very funny). I briefly popped into “How to Be Attractive to Autistic Women” presented by Paola and another speaker, then settled into the “Men’s Living Environments Optimization” panel, where I wasn’t just attending—I was on the panel, giving feedback. It was very fun. Interior decorating / functionality has been a deep interest of mine since moving into my own place, my friends have all heard my shpiels by now, so I felt proud to share my knowledge of rugs and plants and using vertical space.

Then came a workshop on hair braiding. I was paired with a very chill man who didn’t want much from me, and I was grateful for that. I just sat there and let someone touch my hair, braid it slowly, carefully. After all the emotional intensity of the weekend, it felt like exactly what I needed. Just being touched, gently, with no stakes. He asked me questions about what it was like to be a flirt girl, my tattoos, my hobbies and upbringings.

Later, I led some reflection groups—small circles where attendees could process their experiences from the weekend.

What struck me most was how the safety benefited everyone, not just the women. The promise of “no one will be mad at you if you hit on them and they’re not interested” gave men permission to be brave. And the promise of “the men won’t be mad at you for rejecting them” gave women permission to be honest. That mutual safety led to so much genuine bonding and open expression.

But there were also some harder observations. A few men mentioned feeling like there was a “rich get richer” or “winner take all” dynamic—that the men who were already confident and attractive seemed to get most of the attention, while those who struggled didn’t know how to break in.

I had sympathy for that feeling, but I also didn’t know what to do about it beyond what we were already doing: making it okay to take up space and talk to women. We can’t make women interested in you. We can’t make you take up space. Maybe an icebreaker early in the conference would help with that very first step, but ultimately, you have to help yourself.

I also noticed that men still flirted with me when I was tired and didn’t have my wristband on—when I was clearly off-duty. Maybe a reverse bracelet system would help signal that more clearly.

I hope I helped people. I think I did.

Sunday evening was when things got quietly intense again.

Around the fire, I hung out with various connections from the weekend. That’s when I learned even more about L—the security volunteer who’d been part of K’s posse Saturday night. He played guitar. He played guitar well. And sang. Also well. Then he mentioned he was into [niche mathematical topic I also love that might be too identifying?]. Then that he’d written a textbook about it.

My crush, already substantial, intensified to an almost ridiculous degree.

I made a very direct pass at him. Scary and brave and clear: “Do you want to get out of here?”. He kindof laughed it off and did not respond directly, continuing to chat around the fire. I felt embarrassed. Then, maybe 20 minutes later, emboldened, I decided to try one more time “hey. This con is not just for helping men be more direct so… I like you. I’d like to go somewhere with you and do whatever you’re comfortable with. Are you in?”

His response was so casual, unbothered, it surprised me: “Yeah, sure, I’d have sex with you.”

Just like that. Easy. I keep replaying that moment—how scary it was to ask, how proud I am of myself for asking anyway.

We ended up not having sex due to logistical difficulties (he was on security duty and had to leave to catch a flight immediately after), but the asking itself felt like a victory.

Filled with horny, unresolved energy from the whole weekend, I went on the prowl. Perhaps this was not the smartest thing I’ve ever done, and perhaps it let to a bit more heartbreak than I could handle on Monday and beyond, but I ended up with A instead. I asked a group of new friends, hey, has anyone seen A? They said “oh, we haven’t seen him in a while, and his room is empty. We think he checked out and left. Sorry.”. I responded “Darn. Oh well, I was looking to have sex with him before he left”. Then, 5-10 minutes later, HE SHOWS UP and the friends who heard my request excitedly pointed him out to me. I was embarrassed, if I had known he hadn’t left I probably wouldn’t have shared with them that that was what I was looking for. Oh well! He picked me up in a princess carry, carried me to a secluded spot, and we had a lovely time together. Ultimately, it was good, not great, not regrettable but we don’t line up in certain ways.

Another thing that happened later sunday evening- I joined a cuddle puddle with a few other people, including Ari. Lots of touch, but I got out when I felt I’d hit my limit. I was getting better at knowing where my boundaries were and actually enforcing them.

In the days after, people reached out. Text messages from the woman in the cuddle puddle, from L, from Quinn, from M, from K and her fiancé, from A, from other volunteer women I’d hung out with. Offering emotional support, checking in, saying thank you, making plans to see each other again.

It felt like proof that these connections—however brief, however bounded by the context of the weekend—were real. People cared. I cared. We’d touched each other’s lives, even if just for a moment.

Final thoughts:

I laughed. I helped men who didn’t know how to talk to women. I saw substantial improvements. I flirted. I was touched and stroked and picked up and danced with. I had micro-loves and micro-heartbreaks. I kissed ten people. I learned that I could hold space for intense feelings without losing myself. I learned what I actually want.

I’ll come back next year for sure. It was meaningful but not life-altering

There’s a bit of an open question here about if this “easy mode” environment is ultimately helping people. I think it is, for most, but i’ve seen some reasonable arguments against. At least the talks and demos are obviously useful. There’s a large amount of a post-con drop now (kinda feels like i depleted all my serotonin, like the days after a molly trip) but i know how to take care of myself. I wish everyone a very happy slutmas :)

I changed into my most scandalous outfit that I bought specifically for this party a blue lingerie bodysuit where my nipples were basically falling out, paired with fishnet tights. The compliments came immediately and generously. “DAMN, LOOK AT YOU!” Over and over. I loved it. I loved all the flattery and attention. A thought that has occurred to me several times over the weekend was that, given how big the ego boost was, I need to purposefully find ways to deflate my ego like asking people to say mean things about me.

Quinn showed up for the party - my current flirty friend with whom I have history [ Note: he has requested being referred to as my “every probability is 50/50”.] who I’d been with for about a month and a half before we transitioned to friendship. He’d shaved his beard and looked completely different, almost unrecognizable. He also gave me the “damn, look at you” reaction, which felt good in its predictability. We caught up, and I talked him up to one of the other volunteer women. I’m proud of how we’ve handled our transition—staying close, staying flirty, but genuinely rooting for each other’s romantic adventures elsewhere.

The atmosphere was electric. There was dancing (I saw Aella dancing with her boyfriend—she was naked, and I couldn’t help but think it was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen), a performance art piece where a naked woman had desserts arranged on her body, various kink demonstrations, a hosted bar, and an overall sense of permission to be exactly as shameless as you wanted to be.

I spent some time in a soft squish room chatting with the East Coast Guy from Friday, continuing to build that gentle rapport. Then K found me.

K is someone I know from Twitter—cute, red-haired, freckly, nerdy, bisexual. She hadn’t been at the rest of Slutcon, just the After Dark party. And she arrived with a posse: her fiancé(e?) S (who uses he/him pronouns but presents very femininely) and L (hot, square-jawed, blond, had been doing security and volunteering all weekend but I hadn’t really talked to him yet). They were positioned behind her on either side like cartoon villains. It was hilarious and somehow worked perfectly.

“HELLO, I KNOW YOU FROM THE INTERNET,” she announced.

After maybe two sentences of conversation, she asked if I wanted to make out. I said yes—why not? That’s fun.

What followed was about an hour or so of increasingly intense group interaction. At first it was me and K, then gradually her posse joined in—kissing, touching, making her moan, then the dynamic shifted and I ended up in the middle. The East Coast Guy was still there too, finally breaking the touch barrier we’d been dancing around all weekend. Everyone was so sweet and complimentary: smooth, soft, good kisser, enthusiastic, “a million kisses to give.”

Being in a group of five people all getting hot and heavy was amazing. And it was so public—we had voyeurs gathering throughout. At some point I thought, “I know who would want to watch this,” and sent someone to fetch Ari, that close friend I keep mentioning. But he was nowhere to be found. (I later learned he was having his own sexual exploits elsewhere. Good for him!!! It perhaps would not have been great for the two of us if he had seen, after all, but it felt reasonable at the time)

I fell a little bit in love with K and S and L. Perhaps other people can handle sexual interaction without falling a little bit in love, but I cannot. As Vonnegut would say, so it goes. Some may argue that I’m not using the word correctly if I feel it this soon - sure, English should probably have another word for this vs the life-ruining head-over-heels version of things. But I think THAT should get a STRONGER word rather than the more common connection getting a weaker word.

I did multiple outfit changes throughout the night—an all-black bodysuit with a plunging neckline that went past my belly button, another with visible cutouts and buckles and straps, and eventually a sheer golden dress over a bra that provided support but no coverage. The details blur together. It was that kind of night.

At some point I ended up flirting with A again. Making out. He was being playful and teasing in a way that clearly felt flirtatious to him—”how dare you make me feel this way,” “you know exactly what you’re doing,” “that look KILLS me,” even “you monster.” He definitely didn’t mean to hurt my feelings, but he accidentally hit a sore spot. I tried to communicate: “I’m trying to be as straightforward and honest as possible, what do you want from me?”

These are the risks we take when we’re being vulnerable with people we barely know.

Skipping ahead - the next morning I decided it was my duty as a honest-feedback-giving flirt girl to Track Down A and tell him how deeply these comments had affected me. Ethical behavior is my #1 priority at basically all times, and I’m not confident enough in my ability to not slip up in order to play fast and loose with it like that. He really appreciated that I did this, and the conversation brought us closer - another notch in my belt of ability to be honest even when it’s hard.

Eventually we ended up cuddling around the fire. Another woman, Jo, again who I know from previous events, joined us and sat on my lap. She also was just a party goer, not a standard attendee. We all chatted and caught up on our evening. I kissed Jo a little in the spirit of the event (first time! probably won’t do it again, but it was sweet). I kept making out with A.

And Ari was sitting nearby, watching (A and I had explicitly said this was allowed). He started sharing feelings. I won’t go into a ton of details about exactly what and how we shared, but suffice it to say that the highs and lows of SC, coupled with the figure-it-out-as-we-go nature of our relationship without having a lot of defaults, has been tough. We hugged and even cried it out.

There was also a hot tub. I wore a strange plastic cover on my stomach to protect my new navel piercing, which probably looked ridiculous like a teletubby but was necessary. This detail is not very important. I just wanted to share it.

There was general debauchery throughout—flashing, making out, tits out everywhere—that doesn’t warrant individual sentences. I loved the atmosphere. It fostered so much trust. Security was ON POINT. And horniness. Trust and hornitude, as someone later coined.

By The End of the night, I was exhausted and buzzing and full of feelings.

The insight I keep coming back to: Sex and love, even sex with people you barely know, are inextricably linked. I think a lot of people stop themselves from intense early interactions because they can’t handle these micro-heartbreaks. And I get it—they’re hard. But I’m getting better at being fully present, fully caring and loving with new people, and then returning to myself afterward without falling apart.

You can love someone for just one hour, and that’s still real.

I feel more trusting of myself to handle intense feelings, guard appropriately, speak up for myself, and be authentic, than I ever was before.

A friend asked me later how the weekend affected my feelings about someone I’d started dating back on the East Coast - someone I’d been seeing for only a short time but already felt strongly about. It’s a good question.

Being at Slutcon meant encountering so many different types of people: emo music poem boys, woo outdoorsy types, divorced golf dads, autistic tech nerds, suave salsa dancers. Everyone was so authentically themselves. And I got to ask myself, not “do I binarily like the person in front of me?” but “what’s actually important and attractive to me, independent of what’s just available?”

The answer surprised me. All those micro-connections—as real and lovely as they were—actually clarified rather than confused. The traits I was drawn to kept pointing back to the person I’d left behind on the East Coast. It shifted my feeling from “I’m letting this bloom and see where it goes” to “Wow. I can have so many different things. I actively want THAT one.”

I think that’s what ethical non-monogamy can do at its best: not dilute your feelings, but help you understand them more clearly.

Almost immediately after arriving at the venue, I was pulled into a panel called “RLHF on stage” (Reinforcement Learning from HotGirl Feedback, for those keeping track of the AI metaphors). The concept: women sit on stage and give real-time feedback on men’s appearances and presentation and vibes. What do we like? What would we change? What reads as authentic versus performed?

I thought I’d be nervous - I’ve struggled with stage fright in the past - but I wasn’t. I loved the attention. I felt confident, helpful, in my element. It also felt very exciting and pride-inducing that I shared the stage with some very famous individuals - Aella and Nina Hartley namely. The feedback we gave felt obvious to me but clearly wasn’t to the men receiving it: “Change your shoes.” “Take off the jacket.” “You seem husband-shaped, not slut-shaped.” “Have you considered shaving your head?” “I love your jewelry.” “Shake it out—try a fighting stance—see how you feel after.”

The first guy up was someone who’d given me uncomfortable vibes since before the conference. The same person I’d said no to during Friday’s breast-touching homework. I got to call him sleazy on stage, in front of everyone. I was much tamer than I could have been, but it still felt satisfying.

There was a funny moment when one of the men was encouraged to ask us questions (showing interest in women makes you more attractive, after all). He asked the panel, “What would you be doing if you weren’t in porn?” I was the only one who looked confused. “I’m not in porn?” The other women laughed.

After the main stage portion, we broke into small groups for more detailed feedback. One man in my group stood out—let’s call him M—because he was so unusually relaxed. At the time, I thought he was the only truly comfortable man at the entire event. After spending more time with him over the weekend, I developed a better sense of how real versus performed that ease was, but in the moment, it was magnetic.

I left that session feeling great. Empowered. Useful. Like I was good at this.

Then came the emotional workshops.

The first was just a flirting workshop. Simple - the guests would try to have a flirty conversation with us (me and two others, including J from Friday’s writeup) and the organizer would interrupt and give direction. I was paired with A - the presenter I had started to connect with on Friday. He publicly told the room something like ‘I have already made out with Cinnamon, so I would like to try practicing with someone else please’, which felt pretty embarrassing - both an exposure of a private moment and a rejection. Then, the flirt-shop-presenter decided to change the format from 3 1-on-1s to a single 1-on-1 on stage, picking J to be the flirtee. I expected him to cycle her out after a conversation or two, but he kept her on stage for the whole hour, which maybe compounded some feelings of jealousy of her, specifically and inadequacy generally. I generally do not endorse these emotions, and was good at being forgiving and reassuring to myself in the face of them.

The next was called “Talking Women Wet”—a seminar on using storytelling and hypothetical futures to build attraction. The presenter gave examples that felt over-the-top to me: “What if we were married and had kids!” “What if we flew to Paris this weekend!” But the instruction was clear: paint a vivid, specific picture. Make her feel something.

I was paired with three men who took turns crafting scenarios for me.

The first proposed we go dancing together. It was sweet—he’d figured out we had that in common—but not very detailed. I said I’d probably step on his feet. He said that was fine. There was potential there, but not much flutter.

The second man described a picnic. Not just any picnic—tea sandwiches, my favorite wine, a gorgeous location he’d scouted in advance. Then it started to rain. But he’d brought a tent. We ducked inside, listened to the rain on the roof, cuddled close, and... then the story got more graphic. I could feel my heartbeat quicken. I genuinely wanted to go on this picnic. I don’t think I saw him again for the rest of the conference, but I’m still thinking about that rained-out tent.

The third man was different—balding, big glasses, deeply calm and confident and comfortable. He had been giving advice to the first two men in the group. Spiritual, outdoorsy Colorado vibes, turquoise jewelry. He asked about my music taste, then painted a scene: I’d doodle a design on his arm based on his favorite poem (Khalil Gibran, about not living half a life), and he’d get it tattooed. I proposed a split face—half skull, half life. Then he described taking me to an underground punk show, moshing together. The combination of personalization (he knew his favorite poem), intimacy (a permanent tattoo, my design on his body forever), and actually touching his arm while we talked left me a little breathless.

I was surprised by my own reaction. Usually, when men talk about commitment or long term plans too early, it feels suffocating. But framing it as a hypothetical—”wouldn’t it be cute if we did this?”—made it safe to imagine the best-case scenario. I’d never actually design a tattoo for someone on a first date. But wouldn’t it be sweet if I did?!?

At the end of the exercise, the organizer asked, “Women who are okay with being the subject of a gangbang fantasy with your group, raise your hands.” I did not raise my hand. I was pretty shocked that about half the women did. Those groups went off to discuss that scenario. The rest of us were instructed to imagine any group activity. My group, feeling a bit juvenile and embarrassed, landed on doubles pickleball. We got surprisingly into it—prizes for individual winners, swapping teams between rounds, penalties for losing.

It was a weirdly intimate workshop. And then, before I’d even processed what had happened, the next one started in the same room.

“Physical Escalation: Theory and Practice.”

Men were paired with women and instructed to communicate across a crowded space using only eye contact and gestures. Get her interested. Get her to walk over. Initiate touch.

There were feelings about being picked—or not being picked first—but I pushed them down.

Once paired, the interactions were mostly hug-sway-dances. Hands on shoulders, their hands on my waist, pulling me closer. Hand-holding, scalp scratches, spinning and dipping. One person wasn’t sure what to do for physical touch, so we played a hand-slapping game instead (hands gently on each other, pull away before the other person can slap). It was less romantic but fun, and fun made me like him.

I gave a little feedback—”you’re pulling me too close too soon”—but mostly they were good at it. One person did nice salsa moves.

Here’s the thing about those two workshops, back-to-back: they were very emotional.

I felt real things. Genuine attraction, genuine connection, genuine flutter. And then I’d be reminded it was practice. I was a training dummy. A Pavlovian response generator. The men cycled through, trying techniques, and I cycled through micro-heartbreaks

Multiple micro-heartbreaks add up to a medium-sized one.

I took a break after that. Ari, a close friend who I have a romantic history with, helped me process. We sat together for about an hour, and I started to feel okay again. I’ve been through worse, and I would be again, and I do genuinely believe that the lows are a price worth paying for the highs.

Ari and I attended a talk presented by a polyamorous therapist called “jealousy in non-monogamy” that I found very insightful.

Then dinner. Then I found M from the earlier workshop and asked if he wanted to find a nook. We made out. He wanted to have sex; I said I was good with making out only and he respected that. I was proud of myself for enforcing that boundary—it’s something I got better at this weekend.

We caught the tail end of a talk called “Good at Sex.”

And then, suddenly, it was time for After Dark.

What I’m learning: You can be fully present with someone, fully caring, even feel real love, and then let them go without falling apart. I think a lot of people avoid these intense early connections because they can’t handle the micro-heartbreaks. And I get it—they’re hard. But I’m getting better at it.

Shakespeare was right: ‘tis better to have loved and lost. Even if the love only lasts an hour. Even if it’s practice.

They say no man is an island, but maybe I’m not an island. Maybe I’m a peninsula with occasional flooding.

I arrived at the venue around 9:30am on Friday, even though the training was set for 10:45 and the first scheduled workshops not until 3pm, deliberately giving myself a slow start to the day. There’s something about walking into a sex-positive conference that benefits from not rushing. I wanted time to tour the space, ease into conversations, let my nervous system adjust to what I was about to spend three days doing.

The morning was orientation, bracelet distribution, and t-shirts. I met several of the presenters and volunteers—Chesed, Pandora, and others whose writing I’d been reading for months. I had a brief moment of internal panic when I realized I was meeting Aella, one of the organizers and speakers, someone whose work I’ve followed closely. But I managed not to visibly freak out, which felt like a small personal victory. She even let me borrow a dress for the day, a fitted formal number that went past my knees and somehow read as both hot and sweet. People kept commenting on it, calling me “sweet,” which became my unintentional vibe for the day. I ended up bristling at this a little bit because I usually consider myself more feisty, so subsequent outfit changes leaned hard into the contrast

As a volunteer “flirt girl” (one of the wristband-wearing participants who signed up to receive practice flirting and give honest feedback), I was technically there to work. Ten hours of volunteering over the weekend in exchange for a free ticket. But Friday didn’t feel like work yet—it felt energizing, exciting, like I was getting to be helpful while also having fun.

The opening ceremony included what would become a defining moment of the weekend’s philosophy. The host announced that every ticketed attendee had homework: ask one of the volunteer girls if you could touch her breasts. She might say no, and that’s okay! Girls, make sure you say no if you aren’t feeling it. But she might say yes. Practice being brave.

I THINK four people asked me. I said yes to three of them and no to one—someone I had a preexisting relationship with who’d always given me uncomfortable vibes. What struck me most wasn’t the touching itself, but the asymmetry of the experience. I felt surprisingly calm, matter-of-fact about it. The men, though, were clearly navigating layers of awkwardness and vulnerability I wasn’t experiencing. It was a strange inversion—I had permission to be relaxed while they had to be brave.

The day’s schedule took me through a handful of workshops: intro to men’s fashion, bondage meditation (more meditative than I expected, less bondage-y), navigating STI risk, and a very basic ballroom dance class called “Lead Like a Lover.” I also caught the intro to circling and spent some time in the Kino room, the designated space for practicing physical touch with consenting volunteers. Contrary to what you might expect, nothing too crazy happened in any of these rooms - the most that happened in the Kino room was a shoulder rub.

Throughout the day, people were friendly and complimentary. I was bubbly, accessible, wearing my sweet formal dress and then later changing into a more revealing athletic-style one-piece with cutouts at the waist and sides. The compliments flowed steadily, but direct flirting—the kind with clear intent and follow-through—was surprisingly rare.

The exception was A, a presenter and close friend of Ari [Ari is my current best friend, who I was staying with in Berkeley for this trip. We also were live-in romantic partners for almost 2 years. It is difficult to fully express our relationship here in a footnote, but it’s close and we’re constantly Figuring It Out as we go. He has given permission for me to use his name.]. A was confident, clear about his interest, and we ended up making out later that evening. I also re-connected with someone I’ll call the East Coast Guy—a genuinely sweet person who talked to me like a whole human being even when I was wearing the most objectifying outfit of the night. We’d met a few months ago and hung out as friends a few times. He’s very therapy-speak-fluent, very conscious of treating women well. He also later asked, almost shyly, “By the way, did you think I was flirting with you at [a previous event]?”

“Yes. Were you?”

“Yes!”

That small exchange felt significant—clarity about past interactions, permission for future ones.

One of the day’s scheduled events was “micro-dates” on stage, where attendees could volunteer for brief, public flirting practice. Ari went up and had a micro-date with J, a petite porn actress who’d introduced herself to me earlier in the day and gleefully insisted on our newfound friendship. Watching it unfold, I felt simultaneously thrilled for him, invested in how it would go, and aware of a small pang of jealousy. Mostly from him saying the phrase “J, I think you're the most beautiful person at this convention”. I was under no false pretenses about that being me from the point of view of a stranger, but given our connection and history, this really took me by surprise. When I mentioned the jealousy to him later, he grinned and said, “Good.” Later in the weekend he expressed regret for saying this. We have that kind of dynamic—complicated, affectionate, teasing but still tender.

J then had a second on-stage micro-date with a well-known writer and researcher in the community, who was more forward than my friend had been. The whole thing felt surreal in the best way. At one point I spotted a semi-famous comedian I recognized and managed to say hi without being weird about it. This is not a dream, I kept thinking. This is actually happening.

Late in the evening, around the firepit, I sat with a very sweet ex-Mormon guy who was clearly trying to undo a lifetime of conditioning around sex and attraction being sinful. He was actually quite attractive, but carried himself like he didn’t know it. His whole body was tense, holding years of shame in his shoulders and jaw. I cuddled up next to him, asked him to put his arm around me, and tried to validate that what he was feeling—attraction, desire, curiosity, regret, shame, meta-shame—was normal. I hope it helped, even a little.

By the end of the night, I was tired but energized. Being a flirt girl here wasn’t draining—it was the opposite. I got to be helpful, generous, open, authentic, extraverted. And people were generous and open back.

God, I love being touched. It’s so nice. It’s so nice.

Things I wished I’d attended but missed due to scheduling:

• Confidence Engineering (hosted by A, before I’d really connected with him)

• Applying Design Thinking to Sex

Overall impression of Day 1: Not overwhelming yet. Exciting, validating, surprisingly comfortable. The kind of day where you realize that practicing vulnerability in a structured environment actually works—it doesn’t feel dangerous, it feels like relief.

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Who I Am

I expect most people who subscribe / read this blog will be people I know in real life - Welcome! I’m excited to have one space where I can go into a lot of detail about the things that happen to me and my analyses of them, instead of in approximately 20 DM chats. I expect to talk a lot about relationships and sex, as that’s taking a decent portion of my brainpower these days [parents please do not read my blog!] but also book, movie, and event reviews, career musings, ethics, fashion, explorations into health and body improvement, and more.

POLICIES

1. This is semi-anonymous

I will be using my real first name / nickname, and avoiding my last name. All names of people mentioned here will only be first names, and real only if i explicitly ask. Otherwise expect one-to-one swaps with similar sounds. I’ll be asking permission to share stories about others (but I hope they say yes!)

2. I will probably post in bursts

I’ve gotten pretty good at journaling regularly these days, so this probably won’t ever die off without intentionality, but I have a hard time figuring out what might be interesting to other people. If i try too hard to stick to a schedule, we’ll all be disappointed.

3. Comment, ask me questions, give requests!

I consider myself 95% an open book. I don’t play things very close to the chest except by privacy policy. As i’m new at this, I’d love some direction if you have any thoughts

Thank you <3