10 THINGS GUYS NEVER WANT TO HEAR

-- the following are things make guys cringe.-- (Decide for yourselves whether that matters to you or whether you'd rather not censor your thoughts, thank you very much!)

1. "I'm friends with all of my ex-boyfriends." That's great. Maybe we can invite one of them out with us on Friday. Yeah, right. On one hand, guys want to be happy with this statement. After all, it's comforting to know that when you decide you're done with us, we can still have cappuccinos together occasionally. On the other hand, unless we are 100 percent sure of ourselves, most guys perceive another male as a threat, especially if at one time he was good enough to win you over. And what is with the "all of my ex-boyfriends"? Like, are we just going to be another in a long chain of leave-behinds?

2. "You never bring me flowers/call me anymore/[fill in the blank]." That's because we don't have to anymore! Don't you get it? We use up about every ounce of creativity and romance we have during those first few weeks to win you over. Call it courtship, call it scamming, call it whatever; just be sure to call it temporary because there's no way we can keep it going for the life of our relationship. We have to act like Romeo to win your heart, but once we start feeling a little more secure that you'll like us for who we are (and not for what we bring you), we let our guard down. That's why when we hear you say, "You never buy me chocolates anymore," or whatever, we worry that what you're really saying is you liked the courtship (and the chocolates) more than you like us.

3. "Can we talk?" This means we're toast. What did we do? Get caught looking at another girl? Forget an important day? (Quick: When is her birthday? When is our anniversary?) "Can we talk?" is about as scary to us as seeing the words "See me" on top of an English paper you plagiarized. It means trouble to us. It puts us in defense mode. We might even try to avoid you for a while until we feel that whatever it is we have done wrong is long forgotten. Even if we rack our brains and decide we didn't do anything wrong (at least that you could have found out about), the words "Can we talk?" imply a conversation that we will probably want no part of.

4. "I beat you again! Want to play another game?" Yeah, sure; let's play "rip the ego off your male friend." And it's not losing to a girl that most guys have a problem with. It's losing in general. Most guys take losing very hard. Guys are big into competition. Just look at the more common male interests like sports and video games. Competing and winning has been drilled into our brains since birth, so you can understand the obsession, right? If you do kick our butts in a game, don't be surprised if we don't share in your joy.

5. "I tell my best friend everything." And she tells her second-best friend, and she tells her lab partner, who tells her brother, and next thing we know we're being harassed in the locker room for getting teary-eyed while watching Jerry Maguire. Look, most girls are about as good at keeping secrets as guys are. And that's not a good thing. Trust us. There has to be some sacred ground on which we can tread in this relationship, meaning we can feel safe knowing that how we act around you won't be analyzed play-by-play at the next galfest. Especially our arguments. Like, when has a girl's best friend ever sided with the boyfriend? One guy I know was dating a girl and every time she stopped speaking to him, so did her best friend. Think their coupledom lasted past the two-month mark? Not a chance. So, please: Tell your best friend everything but what's going on in our relationship.

6. "I really think your little tummy bulge is cute." Just because there aren't a zillion magazines out there telling guys how to get great bods doesn't mean that we don't care about our physical appearance. You didn't hear this here, but we're probably just as concerned about being at our physical peak as you are. If you simply must say something, break it to us gently.

7. "What do you think our future is?" Well, tomorrow I thought we'd go watch the Cowboys game somewhere, and Saturday we're going to that party, and then on Sunday--not what you mean, huh? Why is it that guys freak out when asked to think about relationships in the future tense? I dunno. Why do girls swarm to the bathroom in groups? Seriously, though, even if the thought of no longer dating his girlfriend rips a guy's heart apart, when the conversation heads down the "Where are we going?" highway, most guys want to get off at the first exit. Could be the fear of revealing our feelings and becoming vulnerable. Or maybe we were just programmed that way.

8. "Hayden Christensen is such a babe." While most guys like a little competition every now and then, competing with a guy who actually got to play Romeo on the big screen is a losing proposition. And even though we think saying "Britney Spears is hot" is a pretty harmless statement on our part, when we hear that your heart does not just belong to us, our ego takes a nosedive.

9. "Do you think she's pretty?" Guys have learned that there is no correct response to questions regarding other girls. I mean, you lose no matter how you reply. Case in point: We say: "Yeah, she's a babe." You say: "I hate you." If we say, "She's OK, but you're much prettier," you say, "You're lying." Get my point? Not even taking the Fifth will help on this one. If the world were a perfect place, you could say "Leonardo diCaprio is a babe" all you wanted to, and we could say "Alicia Silverstone is hot" all we wanted to. But our world is far from perfect.

10. "Maybe we should date other people." Really, does anyone ever want to hear this? Didn't think so. As gently as you may be trying to put it, what we hear is, "There are probably better fish in the sea and, well, I'm ready to go fishing." Not easy on the male ego. And let's face it: When you get to the point where you want to date other people, the relationship is pretty much history. Over and done with. Instead of using a line to try to make it easy, just tell it like it is and honestly let us know that you want to end things. But, hey, don't worry--we'll be fine. After all, we'll still be friends, right? Maybe we can even go out for cappuccinos some time.