I like the hard, crackling buzz of number crunching. Dealing with words is so icky, sticky, messy, and imprecise. Maybe it’s the Taurus in me that likes strong, finite measurements that I can apply to the ludicrous events of my life. Maybe I’m a closet math geek pretending to be a laid back creative writer.

For example, I once estimated that in my lifetime I’d smoked 284,700 cigarettes and spent $50,000-$60,000 to buy them over the course of 26 years. I quit smoking 10 years ago and I’m still here to talk about it. Had I not quit, that would have been another 100,000 cigarettes (approximately 10,000 a year at 2 packs a day) and now, with the higher price of butts , those 100,000 would have cost at least another $60,000.

Instead of spending $60,000 on cigarettes in the last decade, guess what I’ve spent it on? Wait for it…WOMEN!!!!!! Yes, wining them, dining them, coaxing them, traveling to them, funding the poor ones, and keeping up with the rich ones. Women, women, women: a thousand dinners, bobbles, gifts, airplane tickets, hotel rooms, motel cheapies, care packages, outright cash for rent, food, and god knows what. Women have cost me a few bucks. But what is money, really, when you are in a quest for love? LOVE. SEX. Both.
In the ridiculous existence I call my life, it occurred to me recently that I’d had sex with more than one person on my Facebook friends’ list, and this made me want to crunch more numbers. Let me check out my friends list and get back to you with an accurate count. BRB.
Okay, out of 252 Facebook friends, I’ve had sex with 4 of them, which, as a percentage, is 1.6%. Think about that — until I get more Facebook friends, I currently have bedded 1.6% of those on my list. I was hoping the percentage would be miniscule, like .0000000001%, but here I am nudging 2% of my FB friends. Nudging? Oh, I know, you want names, you want names. I won’t give out names. They know who they are. Well, I hope they remember they did it with me.
Four is an interesting number as it pops up in my life every so often. I was born in April, the 4th month, for example. In 2004 (4 is in the name of the year!) I had 4 lovers. Four lovers in 2004. I almost had a bumper sticker made: 4 in 2004! That’s too many lovers for one year, and I have never matched the number since or before. The woman I slept with at the tail end of 2004, I wanted to save for 2005. I said to her, “Can’t we just date for two months? Do you want to be number 4 in 2004 or number 1 in 2005?” Oh yes, I said that. Oh yes, I was that obnoxious and full of myself. When I think about it, I, too, want to gag. And of course Woman Number 4 said, “Oh, number 1 in 2005, number 1 in 2005!” but proceeded to give me a hard time, and by the end of November chided repeatedly, “What are we, children? Come, just come over here…” So, what was I to do? Four in 2004 it was. I think that’s one more woman than the New England Patriots have Superbowl wins.
I had 2 in 2005. One of the women from 2005 is on my Facebook. The other one I don’t speak with; that one broke my heart, used me, so I don’t FRIEND her on FB. FB is a great place to get romantic retribution, even if the object of your retribution does not know you are taking such actions. I wish FB had been invented earlier in my love life career.
I had 0 lovers in 2006 (off year) and then 2 again in 2007, one of whom is on my FB. I loved her, and still do, and that’s why she’s has a place in my FB friends list.
I had 0 again in 2008 (I’m slowing down) and then 1 in 2010 and 1 in 2011 and yes, they are both FB friends.

If we eliminate sex from the equation (this is getting rather algebraic, don’t you think) and solve for C, meaning how many people on my FB list I’ve had a Crush on, well, the percentage shoots up to 4.8% or 12 people. Think about that. I’ve had the hots for nearly 5% of my FB friends. And who knows how many more, should I ever meet them in person.
What about you, barring spouses and significant others, how many on your FB list have you slept with or at least had a crush on? Come on, I want hard numbers.
i think you spent more money on your pets than on women, just saying. 😀
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In recent years, yes. I can’t argue. 🙂
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I’m a virgin, so my answer is none. 😉
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Well, Natasia, baby, I knew that about you. :-). Hey, thanks for pimping me all over Twitter! xo
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Anytime! xoxo
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To answer your question…Just one and it may surprise you to know that my husband doesn’t do Facebook. This is a very funny and clever post, Cindy. I do remember when you calculated all the money you spent on cigarettes. We were sitting around the table at the now defunct Hearts and Stars bookstore and you read us your story about quitting smoking. I recognized your talent then and I see it flourishing now.
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Okay, Elissa, now I’ll have to go through your friends list and try to figure out who that 1 is/was! Thank you for all of your nice words and encouragement. Glad you enjoyed this post.
🙂
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Two. And I was/am married to them both.
Rob.
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Hi Robert, thank you for following my blog! Are you saying you’re married to two people now? That’s more interesting than anything I wrote. I may have misunderstood. Thanks for reading. 🙂
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Hi Cindy,
My reply was rather ambiguous. One of my ex-wives and my current wife are amongst my friends on Facebook. I’m not a bigamist: I struggle with one at a time! I have not had sex with any of my other Facebook friends.
Rob
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Ha, Rob,
Thanks for the clarification! I can only deal with one at a time myself and barely. It’s nice to have you here as reader. Thank you again. Cindy
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Hmm…I believe it is only 2 and they were from way back in the day.
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Hi there, nice to hear from you. I enjoy your blog! Back in the day, huh? That’s probably better. 🙂 Thank you for reading.
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I loved your spin on this — Great!
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Thank you so much!!! 🙂
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Cindy,
Four lovers out of 252 doesn’t sound so bad… Unless, of course, you have a lot of other lovers not on FB.
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Hi Kathie,
It’s good to see you here.
Unfortunately, I only mentioned the ones on my FB list. Several more over the course of years.
I’ve yet to find “the one.”
Hope you are well. Thanks for reading.
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[…] How many Facebook friends have you done it with? (cindyzelman.wordpress.com) […]
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Cindy,
It’s really nice of you to reply to each and every person here. You seem to be a really kind person with a good sense of humor. I have no doubt you will find someone. You may have even met “the one” already. It happened to me. I thought my “one” was out of my life, but it turned out to be quite the opposite. Hang in there.
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Hi Kathie,
It’s nice to see you here again. You always have such kind things to say. I’m so happy to hear that your “one” has come into your life. That’s wonderful, and I have no doubt you deserve it. I’m still looking but hopeful. I meet a lot of special people along the way to finding my “one,” so I have no regrets.
I respond to everyone who comments because if they’ve taken the time to read AND comment, it’s the least I can do. I appreciate you and the others who read my blog very much.
Take care,
Cindy
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none… I really hate facebook 😛
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Ha. Well, I really like you! 🙂
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One, and we just celebrated 22 years together. I enjoyed your post, you scandalous thing.
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Bridget,
I so admire that you’ve celebrated 22 years with your partner, while, scandalous thing that I am, should probably be celebrating 22 lovers over 22 years. I am truly impressed by your commitment and grateful that you read my blog. xoxo Cindy
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If we reverse the question to, “How many of the people you’ve done it with are you friends with on Facebook?” the answer is, I’m amused to admit, “All of them.”
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Ha, Laura. Now give me hard numbers. I’m looking to make graphs. 🙂 You stay friends with your exes. That’s nice. 🙂
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Hard numbers are so difficult to get… they never let me whip out a ruler! 😉
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Such an incriminating question…and I like it, but I’m NOT a number girl…;)
Once, again, you’ve entertained me, Cindy.
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Any time I can entertain you, Kassie, I feel pleased with my writing. Thank you for reading. Hope your semester is rockin’….
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55 out of 862 friends, so around 6.5 percent. University was a very formative experience 🙂
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I’m very impressed!
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Not really. The impressive bit was that I got a good degree.
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That, too, is impressive. 🙂
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