My best friend is a hopeless romantic.

I don’t mean hopeless in the good 1980s John Cusack way – I mean hopeless in the Peyton Manning visiting Foxboro way.

It’s not that he looks like Paul Giamatti or has the intelligence of Jessica Simpson. He doesn’t. He’s a nice guy with a big heart and goes to a school much better than this one. Heck, I’d marry him if I were desperate.

No, my buddy’s problem is a little deeper. He simply refuses to play the game – not talking “Halo 2,” baseball or “circle of death.” I’m referring to the inane system of checks and balances that makes relationships go and courtship tolerable.

It’s waiting three days to call a girl after you’ve got her number. It’s acting disinterested to gain the upper hand. It’s relentless and thorough Googling to gain the ability to pretend that you like what they like in order to manipulate them into falling in love with you. Not that I do the last one. (I use MSN Search.)

His ignorance and disrespect of the system we have all abided by for hundreds of years recently became crystal clear.

He asked a girl out … via voice mail. Obviously, this was probably a mistake. So he shouldn’t have been surprised when she responded … via instant messenger. Such is the nature of a proportional response after all.

This was her slightly edited message:

JaneDoe: I think the girls and I are going to go get something to eat tomorrow. You can come be one of the girls if you would like … I’m not sure where we’re going. You can call me later to find out, though.

The message wasn’t exactly the Da Vinci Code, but my friend inexplicably couldn’t determine its meaning. Me? I thought, “You can come be one of the girls if you would like” was kind of a dead giveaway.

My friend had committed the cardinal sin of making it too easy for the girl to say no. His chances would have been far increased if he had made his move in the flesh. She might have said yes even if she didn’t really want to.

Now, some would question the point of dating someone who doesn’t even like you. What those people fail to realize is that the old axiom is true: It doesn’t matter if you win or lose, it’s how you play the game.

Views expressed in this humor column every three weeks do not necessarily reflect the Northern Star or its staff. Send questions or comments to [email protected].