The Dating Triangle

A friend of mine recently announced that there were no decent women in Sydney.

"What are you talking about?" I scoffed. "There's a Man Drought."

"It's not a shortage of women," he clarified, "it's a shortage of decent women."

And what is a decent woman I hear you ask? Turns out there's an equilateral triangle for that.

I've written before about the Fatal Flaw--that thing the perfect guy has or does that's a deal-breaker-- but this puts it into pictorial perspective.

"I've come to the realisation that you can't have it all in a relationship," she a girlfriend who recently started dating her swimming instructor. "Why do we expect one person to give us everything? My guy might not be the sharpest tool in the shed, but he's nice and he's really hot." I guess that's why we call him Hot Pool Guy.

She might be on to something.

Matt over at The Modern Savage actually ran a survey to see what people thought, and the findings are possibly unsurprising:

Men would overwhelmingly sacrifice intelligence in a woman, while women are happy to settle for intelligence and emotional stability, and give up the good looks.

So ugly guys and dumb girls are in with a chance, but if you're batshit crazy, then you're going to die alone.

Having thought about this from every conceivable 45 degree angle, it's hard for me to choose which quality I'd give up. But I think, if I absolutely had to, I would sacrifice the intelligence. It's no good if he can read me Dostoyevsky if I never, ever want to him naked.  If it's an intellectual challenge or witty repartee I'm in need of, I have work and friends. No, when it comes to stimulation in relationships, it's not the mental kind I'm looking for first.

How about you? What would you give up?