<p>also i've probably spent more/invested more effort & energy than my boyfriend for every holiday we've spent together.</p>
<p>for valentine's day i walked 3 miles to the nearest grocery store and back to buy all the ingredients to make festive cookies for him (i had a test the next day, too) & bought a blank card to write a cute message.
he went to the school bookstore and bought me an unwrapped copy of the audacity of hope (how do i italicize?) and made a card at a stand in the quad and proceeded to tell me how he didn't have time to let the glue dry so he was sorry it was all smeared..we went to the dining hall for dinner.</p>
<p>soo don't complain about your monetary and time investments, because it absolutely goes both ways.</p>
<p>also, guys, one day a year, even politically-minded girls want flowers :)</p>
<p>All that this cyclical debating proves is that we'd never date each other. The fact is that every girl is different, every guy is different. It's impossible to generalize and claim that girls or guys spend more than the opposite sex for dates.</p>
<p>My boyfriend usually pays for our dates---I try/offer to pay but he likes paying, mainly because he knows I don't have much anyway. He has a full grad school scholarship that pays for his room, books, tuition/fees, etc., and makes a little over $8000/semester at his job. Not much, but enough. When we take our cans/bottles back to the store for recycling, if there's another college kid there (and there usually is), he gives that kid our stuff and tells them "use the $5 to buy some beer tonight" and they always look like someone just gave them a new car. </p>
<p>Every once in a while he lets me pay. </p>
<p>But I rock when it comes to holidays and special occasions. I like splurging for the special dinner or whatnot, and sometimes I cook up something. He 50x better at cooking than me though. He surprised me on New Years (it still makes me smile thinking about what he did!) and paid for everything that night and the subsequent days that I was at his family's place, but other than that I'd say I spend more on special events, he spends more on regular dates/dinners.</p>
<p>Guys and gals, I'm a gentleman so I like to do everything, i.e. hold the door, pull out the chair, pay for dates. If individuals pay then it is not a date. Its just 2 people buying food and hanging out.
I dont care about power. Relationship works two ways so it will never work out unless you are both unequivocally equal. </p>
<p>And leah, she was just a friend and I was under the influence. But she said that she thought it was a date so I used that line and laughed and called me cheesy but sometimes humour works best, right?</p>
<p>Oh and I always stick to the gentlemen's code.</p>
<p>Who is more likely to cook for the other in college? I pretty much see girls benefiting a lot more from relationships. Just ask Easy. Its usually not the other way around.</p>
<p>I'm just saying its usually the guy doing more of the nice gestures in a relationship and spending more. Every relationship on this thread had proved that (well besides Easy's relationship but that's a whole new can of worms).</p>
<p>Salmon en Papillotes if you like salmon or if you life chicken Supreme de poulet and Coq au vin. But if you like some steak you can have a pan seared ribeye steak with entrecote bearnaise. choose</p>
<p>I don't get why this is such a big debate over who pays. </p>
<p>I think that if a guy asks a girl on a first date, he should be the one to pay. If I go on a date with a guy and I realize I'm not interested, then I offer to pay kinda as one of those "hey this isn't a date" or "I don't like you and I'd feel guilty if you paid for me since we won't be going on another date" gestures. After that, I always offer to pay for mine, but he usually won't accept. I usually try to beat him to paying about half of the time. It's not fair to make one person pay for everything.</p>
<p>I asked a guy on a date and I payed. It's only fair to do that. You can't say "hey let's go to this place for a date" and then expect the other person to pay.</p>
<p>lethargytm sounds like a really good guy that most girls would love to go on a date with. It's so fun to be around a guy who actually opens doors for you (but it annoys the crap out of me when he insists that I wait in the car while he comes around and opens it!) and isn't just doing it so he can get in your pants.</p>
<p>I mostly agree with Russell, except that I don't think I do a favor by asking them out. Also, if I pay the first time and she agrees to go on a second date, I would expect her to share the cost.</p>