Ask hailebop!

It's an akward situation. On the one hand, you don't want her to think she has a chance with you when she doesn't, as that doesn't do her any good, but on the other hand, you don't want to embarass her by saying that you suspect she has feelings for you but you don't reciprocate them or make her feel bad by being cold towards her.

You haven't said why you think this girl likes you, but as long as her behaviour isn't really overt flirting then I think it's best that you just ignore it as best you can and let her crush run its course. The chances are it's just a crush and not something she intends to act on, which would mean any action on your part would just embarass her. If however it seems that she's going to act on her feelings, then it would be kinder to make it clear you aren't interested before she does anything. I agree with you, this is difficult to do without being unpleasant. Nobody wants to hear that their feelings aren't reciprocated, so it's never going to be a pleasant experience. You could try and do it subtly, such as by talking about a girl you like or are seeing (this is a white lie, in this circumstances) when you think she can hear you, but there is the risk that she'll realise what you are doing and be even more hurt.

I think you have to play it as it comes. I wouldn't do anything unless she starts to become more obvious about her feelings, in which case I'd try to find a quiet moment alone with her and very gently say that you might be wrong, but you suspected she has some feelings for you (this gives her the oppertunity to just deny it if she would find that less embarassing) and that you're sorry but you just don't feel that way about her. All you can do is keep it short, be as gentle as you can and avoid suggesting that she's been in any way obvious. All the best.

You are attempting to loose 25% of your body weight in two weeks. That is completely unrealistic and if you attempt it by going on a ridiculous crash diet you will only make yourself feel physically ill as your body struggles to cope with the sudden deprivation and mentally negative as you do not achieve anywhere near your goal.

I know this isn't what you want to hear, but healthy weight loss is slow and steady weight loss. That's not to say that you can't start before Christmas, just that you can't expect to be a completely different person in only two weeks. Even fad diets like South Beach and Atkins won't promise you this, and they aren't good for you at all, especially if you are still going through puperty, as you need a balanced diet including all the food groups to ensure healthy development.

Instead reduce your food intake by having smaller portions, eat healthier foods and snacks, cut out junk food and soda drinks and exercise. Don't cut out everything you enjoy or you won't stick to it, but have things in moderation. This type of plan won't get you results as quickly as some other diets, but it is considerably better for your health and long term wellbeing. If you loose the weight sensibly by moderating your general behaviour and eating patterns rather then sticking to something very strict for a short period of time and then giving up you are also much more likely to keep the weight off. All the best.

If you are having chest pains you should go and see a Doctor. I do not have any medical qualifications and so cannot offer advice as to what it might be, but with anything of that nature you shouldn't take chances by not visiting a doctor. It could well be related to your sinus infection and something that can be sorted out very easily without medication, but you don't know that without seeing a Doctor, and it's important to be sure by seeking appropriate medical attention.

All the best. I hope you feel better soon.

This is obviously something that has really annoyed you, and as such you should talk to your friend about the various things that bothered you about her behaviour.

She has asked a lot of you and doesn't appear to have thought about exactly how much she's putting upon you as a friend, but perhaps she was really stressed out about having to give away her pets. If this behaviour isn't typical of her and she's usually more considerate you should still raise the issue with her, but raise it gently and sensitively, saying that you understand it might have been a stressful or upsetting experience for her but you felt she wasn't really reasonable in the way she behaved.

If her taking advantage like this is a more regular occurence you need to be a bit firmer. Don't just hurl accusations, but be clear and assertive that you don't think she treats you with enough consideration or respect, with a couple (but not an excessive amount) of examples. She might find it hard to listen to - nobody likes to hear criticisms, but if you are assertive about what she does that upsets you without getting angry she'll at least begin to see how her behaviour is actually percieved, and she'll try to change.

The money thing is probably best left as a seperate issue. Perhaps next time you meet up suggests that she foots the bill - again, in an assertive but not confrontational way by saying that since you got everything last time, perhaps she'd like to sort things out this time. Many people find it embarassing bringing financial transactions into friendships, but if you just get it out of the way at the start by agreeing who'll pay or how you'll share the cost before moving onto other topics you'll probably both feel more at ease.

It's unlikely that you cut yourself masturbating unless you were particularly rough or have sharp nails (the vagina is pretty resilient - think of what it goes through in childbirth), and if you had you wouldn't bleed for two days, so it's safe to assume you have indeed started your periods. Congratulations! Now, don't worry about your period being late. Your periods will not immediatley settle into a regular cycle - it takes a while for your hormones to settle down. It can anything up to two years for your cycle to regulate itself fully, so there's absolutely no need to worry that it's been a while since your first period - just give it time and it will come.

To keep your side of the promise, you need to talk to your friend about how you feel. Be honest with her and say that you know that you both promised that you wouldn't let this guy come between you, but that you can't help but feel jealous of their relationship. Not speaking out about it will only make you feel more jealous and resentful of them, so speak up honestly early on about how the both of you can stop this happening. Perhaps she could include you more in conversations with him? It's naturally akward when two people in a trio know each other already and have their own raport, but with effort from both you and Kate you can both grow closer to this guy without feeling like you are competing with each other.

It does take effort, but it's worth the akwardness of talking about this with your friend to keep your friendship healthy. All the best.

It would be unreasonable of your boss to expect you not to talk to you colleagues at all, so the most likely explanation is that your boss was enquiring about what you were talking about because she was curious rather than wanted to discipline you. After all, if she'd told your colleague that you weren't supposed to be chatting your colleague wouldn't have then come over to you and relayed the coversation.

You shouldn't stop talking to your colleagues. Good communication between people is essental for a pleasant and effective working environment. Keep it professional at all times though - it's easy to get drawn into office gossip and this is probably what your boss is concerned about. It does sound like your boss is a bit over-zealous with making sure nobody is wasting time by gossiping, but the way to convince her that you don't is just by consistently not doing it rather than any showy acts of not talking to people at all. All the best.

When faced with a complicated problem, it sometimes helps to simplify things a bit. On the one side are arguments for taking things further with this guy, and on that side there's basically the point that you like him and he likes you. On the other side of the equation, reasons to be cautious and perhaps not take things fruther, is the thing with your friend complicating matters, that you don't want to mess up a friendship you obviously value and that you yourself are unsure and stalling over what to do.

My gut instinct here is that if you don't like him enough to make the leap and start a relationship with this guy then vaguely falling into a relationship of sorts with him won't work out well. Either you like each other enough to be in a relationship, in which case you should be prepared to work past the hurdles of your friendship and the behaviour of your roommate, or you don't - in which case you should accept that and realise that you're better apart despite the attraction that both of you feel.

Can 'friends with benefits' relationships work? That depends what you count as 'working'. They can be fulfilling for short periods, but the setup inevitably end with somebody saying that they're ending the arrangement because they're interested in somebody else who they want to commit to more fully. Can your friendship survive that? However much you try, it's impossible to detach yourself fully from your emotions - it hurts to be broken up with, whatever the setup of the relationship, and it takes a while to get over feelings of hurt and rejection, and your friendship might not survive the damage. It seems if you are really worried about your long term friendship withstanding a relationship it would be better to avoid a sexual relationship of any nature. If however you think you would work on your friendship after the ending of your friends-with-benefits relationship then why don't you have faith in yourself that you could do the same if you ended a full blown relationship? Of course it would be hard, but it is possible, and if you like a friend perhaps you need to make that commitment to yourself that you would work on things after the end.

It seems to me from the language of your question that you do really quite like this guy, but are afraid of making a commitment for fear of getting hurt yourself and ruining a friendship. It is frigtening to let yourself go and risk messing things up with a person, but sometimes it's worth it, and if you like him, perhaps you should take that leap.

All the best.

You almost caused me to have an existentional crisis as I realised I only have two months left of being a teenager.

To actually make a point: no, you aren't the only one who has successfully navigated high school already. And yes, lots of us do occassionaly get irritated or cringe at the "theres this boy from maths I think he likes me what shold I do?" questions we get a plethora of, but it usually passes. Yes, younger users sometimes ask bad questions, but so do older users - I'm pretty sure we get awful questions from accross the spectrum of question-askers. The best thing to do is be tolerant of it and just skim until you find something engaging that you'd like to answer.

I don't know of any similar site, but if this bugs you a lot there's a useful feature on the search questions page (http://www.advicenators.com/qsearch.php) which allows you to see questions from users from only a certain age group, which should get rid of a good proportion of the questions you dislike.

I only studied Popper and falsification very briefly (and unfortunately not in the context of Philosophy of Science), and I'm also not sure what level you are at, so I'm not sure if any of this is relevant to your level of study, but here's some material.

Popper argues that a sentence is not scientific (and possibly actually meaningless - literally without any meaning at all) if it does not admit the possibility of being false. This might seem a strange idea, but examples illustrate it. This wikipedia entry (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falsifiability) gives a good example of a pyschoanalyst who believes that his patient is a homosexual in denial. The patient denies this, but the psychoanalyst says this is evidence of his denial. Further protestations and evidence that he has had relationships with women are also taken to be evidence of his "denial". The point is that to the pyschoanalyst, nothing that the patient does can make false the proposition that the patient is a homosexual. To Popper and other falsificationists, this means that the psychoanalyst is practising bad science (or not practising science at all) because there isn't any evidence that could be presented (even theoretical evidence) that would convince him otherwise.

Anthony Flew explains this point via his "parable of the gardener":

"Once upon a time two explorers came upon a clearing in the jungle. In the clearing were growing many flowers and many weeds. One explorer says, "Some gardener must tend this plot." The other disagrees, "There is no gardener." So they pitch their tents and set a watch. No gardener is ever seen. "But perhaps he is an invisible gardener." So they set up a barbed-wire fence. They electrify it. They patrol with bloodhounds. (For they remember how H. G. Well's The Invisible Man could be both smelt and touched though he could not be seen.) But no shrieks ever suggest that some intruder has received a shock. No movements of the wire ever betray an invisible climber. The bloodhounds never give cry. Yet still the Believer is not convinced. "But there is a gardener, invisible, intangible, insensible, to electric shocks, a gardener who has no scent and makes no sound, a gardener who comes secretly to look after the garden which he loves." At last the Sceptic despairs, "But what remains of your original assertion? Just how does what you call an invisible, intangible, eternally elusive gardener differ from an imaginary gardener or even from no gardener at all?" "
(From Anthony Flew's "Reason and Responsibility", http://www.stephenjaygould.org/ctrl/flew_falsification.html)

The idea being basically that if there's no possible evidence that could prove a hypothesis wrong, then that hypothesis is not a scientific one.

Science relies on extending hypothesis from some evidence to make general claims. For example, a chemist might tests air around them and find that the air they've investigated always contains oxygen. After a sufficient number of investigations, they might say that all air on earth has oxygen on it. This methodology is valid because there is theoretical evidence that would prove the general claim to be false - in this example, finding a sample of air on earth which didn't contain any oxygen would prove the original hypothesis false and mean that the hypothesis would need to be abandoned or reworked.

Popper's idea has basis in logic, which I can explain in more depth if you want me to, but as I'm unsure of your level I don't want to scare you with symbols. But basically, in logic, any proposition can be shown to be false if you can deduce a contradiction from it.

Some other possibly useful links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falsifiability
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophy_of_science
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_Popper
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/popper/ (this one is more advanced)

All the best. If you think I can be of more help, feel free to send a question to my inbox.

A lot of people will tell you that age doesn't matter. There have been far crazier matches then teenagers dating somebody a few years older or younger than them.

Age gaps become less and less of an issue with age. 4 years is nothing when you are 40, but when you are twenty it might feel like a lot and it's and even bigger gulf when you are fourteen or fifeen.

I feel like a massive hypocrite when I answer questions like this because my answer is always caution caution caution, but I myself am happy in a relationship with a man 6 years my senior. Age gaps are not the barrier to happiness I once thought they were, but age certainly is a factor and something you should think about before diving into a relationship with somebody who is significantly older or younger than you.

People who are significantly older or younger than you are likely to be of a different maturity level than you, and you might find that difficult. They may well be in a different position financially, emotionally, or just want different things in their life at that moment, such as family, career, or just hving fun.

One of the biggest problems that can face age-gap relationships is that the two people are in different places in their lives. If you are a university student dating somebody who works full time, they are at a different stage in their life with a completely different set of responsibilities and, possibly, interests. If your partner is in a different life stage, whether it be it school to university, university to working, casual work to serious career work or enjoying your youth to parenthood... these things will become tension points at some point. Not tension points that you can't get over, but things that will come up. If you really like somebody and are prepared to work on the relationship then go for it, but I wouldn't advise getting into a relationship where one party is significantly older unless both parties have thought it through beforehand.

The best way to cook omelette's is with butter rather than oil (although the following istructions will also work if you are using oil). Butter is rich and yes, not so good for you, but it tastes fantastic as an occasional treat.

You need a small to medium sized frying pan, for an indvidual omelette (2 to 3 eggs for 1 person) or a larger one for a bigger omelette for multiple people. Avoid using a frying pan that's too big, or your omelette will be prone to burning.

Thoroughly whisk the eggs with a fork.

Melt a knob of butter in the pan. The mistake people always make with omelettes is to add the eggs before the butter is hot enough, so wait until the butter is bubbling and just beginning to turn brown (although you definitely do not want to burn the butter). Then add the eggs. Unlike with scambled eggs, you shouldn't add anything to the eggs with omelettes - it's just egg, no milk / water, although you can add salt, pepper and possibly a few herbs to taste.

If you've got the butter hot enough, the egg should almost instantly start to cook (turn white) around the edges. Using a wooden spatula, push these edges into the centre of the pan, then tip the pan, allowing the uncooked egg to get to the edges. Repeat until all the eggs are cooked. This shouldn't really take long at all. If you're adding extra ingredients to the omelette, such as chese or bacon, add these at the final stages of cooking just before you serve. To serve, just slide on to a plate from the pan, and possibly fold the omelette over itself.

All the best.

Your vagina has a natural scent which you shouldn't be ashamed or embarassed about. If you are washing and changing your underwear daily, it shouldn't be a problem. If you do these and it still has a really strong and unpleasant smell, it may be a sign of infection which you should get checked out by a doctor, but if it's not overpowering then it's just the way your vagina is supposed to be.

You may be tempted to use "feminine wash" products to cleanse the area and get rid of the scent, but this is a bad idea. These products are very chemically and can upset the natural acidic balance of your vagina, leading to infections, irritation, discharge and extra smell as your vagina has to work extra hard to cleanse itself. Similarly, avoid anything scented near your vagina. Use gentle, unscented soap on the area - anything perfumed is bound to irritate.

Some women prefer shaving, and hair does trap scent so yes, removing some or all of the hair may help you feel less self concious about how you smell. But there is absolutely no requirement to shave or remove hair - it really is a matter of personal preference. All the best.

Now there's a question.

How do they get pregnant? Through having sexual intercourse. By being sexually active, but not taking any or adequate cotraceptive measures to protect themselves.

If people engage in penetrative sex, then pregnancy is a real possibility. It is possible to get pregnant through what is loosely termed "fooling around": sexual activity without penetration, but this is a minute proportion of cases - by and large, teenagers get pregnant because they have penetrative sex and either do not use contraception or do not use the contraception they have properly or effectively.

Why do they get pregnant? That's a deep social question. Teenagers get pregnant for a wealth of reasons - because they want to; because they have not recieved adequate sex education; because they do not understand the risks; because they are pressured not to have abortions; because they are ashamed of what happened; because they were raped; because they do not know their choices; because they were pressured into having sex and/or not using contraception - there are huge numbers of reasons.

Teenagers get pregnant because teenagers have sex. Teenagers have been having sex for thousands of years, and will likely continue to do so. To lessen the number of teen pregnancies, education - about the risks involved in sex, the reliability of contraception, how to say no, how to decide - needs to be much, much improved.

I am extremely sorry for your loss.

It is pretty dispicable that your partner is not supporting you at this very difficult time in your life, but I think GDROB2 raised some good points. If your partner is trying to be supportive but genuinely feels that he is compelled to keep a promise to his daughter then you have an issue with his spoiling his daughter, but his intentions are still good. If, on the other hand, he just doesn't want to stand up to his daughter then he has really let you down. How old is the daughter? It's much harder to explain to a 4 or 5 year old exactly what's happened and why it means they can't have their party because, as GDROB2, they can't really understand what the loss of parent means to an adult, but if the child is much older, particularly over 8 or 9, then they do have the capacity to understand and he should have put you first.

Normally I advise people to talk things out, but you are undoubtedly in an very bad place emotionally and it will be difficult to discuss this rationally with your patner. Perhaps it would be best for now not to have a full blown discussion about it, as it seems there are many underlying issues with how he treats you and his daughter, but save that until after the funeral and for now just repeat to him that you need him and his support at this time. He could just be in denial: for many people the death of a partner's parent is a wake-up call about their own (and their parents) mortality, and he may be throwing himself into this party for his daughter as a way of avoiding his fears. Keep telling him that you need his support and hopefully he will soon come round and begin to treat you much better. You do still need to talk this out, but I think it should wait until after the funeral when you can give it your full energies. All the best, and again, sorry for your loss.

Most people your age watch too much television, and it's great that you are aware of that and don't want to fall into that pattern. That said though, you shouldn't be afraid of this "guilty pleasure" of yours. Programmes like the O.C. are designed to draw you in and get you hooked, and it's okay to enjoy them for what they are - mindless, but enjoyable nonetheless. Spending an hour or so a week watching escapist television just gives you a chance to unwind and loose yourself in something for a bit. All the best.

Being older and without children might be a sign that a man doesn't want to have children, but it could also be explained by many other factors, such as him not having met anyone he wanted to settle down with yet, him not feeling ready to be a parent when he was younger or him having a demanding career that didn't leave him much oppertunity for meeting and socialising with women. You can't really tell unless you ask, and to be honest, if you see the relationship with this man progressing to a long term relationship involving children it is better that you are honest so you can guage his opinions on childrearing at an early stage. If having children is very important to you, you don't want to waste two years attempting to suss out his behaviour by watching him with small children only to be later told that he likes kids but feels too old or that he doesn't see himself becoming a father.

You might feel akward asking directly "Do you want children?" or "How would you feel about becoming a father?", but if you are planning on spending your life with a person (or, indeed, just having children with them) then these are the kind of things you've got to be prepared to discuss with them. If you prefer, you could open the conversation with something more neutral about yourself, such as "I've always imagined I'd have children by the time I'm 30" or "I didn't like being an only child, I think children are better raised with siblings", etc. where you can then allow the conversation to develop naturally to whether you and he have the same wants with regard to children, but it's something that I think for your own piece of mind, needs to be discussed. All the best.

I second pinky's advice - you do not have an STD if you haven't had any direct sexual contact. The most likely explanation is that it's an ingrown hair - just a folicle that's got slightly infected. Just keep the area clean and try not to aggravate it. If you are still concerned or it doesn't go away, show a doctor, but really, it doesn't sound like there's any need to worry.

I'd also recommend visiting http://www.livejournal.com/community/vaginapagina - it's an excellent online women's community where you can post this kind of question and get really good advice from other women who've been through similar things, which is really reassuring. All the best, and try not to worry.

It's hard to not get drawn in to other people's arguments when they tell you their sides of it and pressure you to support them, but it really will be better for all three of you if Michelle and Leigh sort this out amongst themselves. If you take sides then the third person feels ganged up on, and even when the argument is resolved betweeen the original two may feel resentful that you got involved against them.

If either girl complains that you aren't supporting them in the argument, stay calm and reassure them that you are still friends with them, you just don't want to add fuel to an argument and think it would be better if they sorted it out between themselves without getting more people involved. It might be a bit tense between the three of you whilst they sort it out, but it will return to normal far more quickly if you don't get involved than if you get involved trying to sort it out. All the best.

It's perfectly reasonable to have high expectations from a relationship, and it's great that you value you yourself enough to realise that you deserve a really good man. However, it is important that you don't think of a potential partner as just a list of characteristics or things that can be checked off on a list. You might find a guy who fulfils everything on your list, who you just don't spark with in person, or worse, who doesn't really respect you. Similarly, you might find somebody who doesn't answer to absolutely everything on your list, but makes up for it in other ways.

I don't think you should throw away your list. I think it's a good thing to have something you can look at and remind yourself that these are qualities you want and deserve from a relationship. It's also a good screening process - if you can rationalise why you should just stay away from bad boys that you might be attracted to, then this will likely prevent you future heartache. I do however think you should avoid seeing the list as the be all and end all. When you meet a guy, don't run through a mental checklist - talk to him and get to know him a bit so that you are judging him not just by your preconcieved notions.

My mother used to tell me that the best way to find out what you didn't want in a relationship was by dating. You already know from experience that you don't want somebody who has all the qualities you listed, but you might find that some of them in isolation bug you less then when they are part of a whole package. If you otherwise like a guy apart from one thing that you don't like, get to know him a bit more to see whether you could really live with that quality. If you can't, you can't, but do be prepared to try. All the best.