Okay, here's the story... ever since nine9 noded me as Cute Guy, I've been none too happy about it, but I could deal with it (relatively speaking, anyway). Then a writeup from rgladwell implies that because I'm (apparently) cute, I must be a mean bastard.

Not so. At least, I don't think so. And when I took rgladwell to task about this, he explained with "experience has made me bitter"... and it occurs that that's true about a lot of things.

I spent a long while being engaged to this girl. Two and a quarter years, to be precise. When that broke up - for those of you intrigued by the gory details, suffice to say she ran off with my best friend and a sizable proportion of my money - I was left as the bitter, tattered wreckage of a human being.

Following the breakup, I had a lot of casual sex - which is fine - and swore to myself I'd never, ever have a relationship again - which is Bad. It took me almost as long again as the initial relationship to realise that this was ridiculous.

The world is a horrible place, and bad stuff happens. But bitterness isn't the way to go. As well as being horrible, the world is a complicated place, and just because a set of events causes Bad Stuff once, it doesn't automatically follow that it will happen again.

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Update: two years later. Huh. It happened again.