"Are you married?" people ask me ...as if they're trying to trick me. If I say "yes - I'm married,"  they're ready to put me under house arrest, telling me I have no business writing a book on dating.

So, I tell the truth. "No, I'm not married, but I have a girlfriend." That seems to satisfy them. I was single for a long time until I met my girlfriend, whom I've been with for almost four years now. I'm not sure if it adds or detracts from my credibility as an author of a dating book to say that I enjoy NOT dating now.

I guess I overdosed for a while there - like over a decade or two. Toward the end of that period I really made a concerted effort to connect with someone because 1) I got truly sick of the dating scene, 2) I knew I wasn't THAT much of a loser, and 3) I wanted to win a bet my poker buddy made that I'd never settle down with just one girl for more than a year. Game on!

I met her on the street. I was walking myself. She was walking her dog. As we passed, for some unknown reason that cute little thing started barking violently at me... and didn't stop. Bingo! Instant connection! My opening line - "Was it something I said?" became the first of many banal and predictable comments that I made throughout the ensuing weeks of courtship. More on that later. She was gorgeous. I didn't want to screw it up. So, over the course of the next few months, I made a list of things that worked - and didn't work - with her. The list grew, and as I began to see the screwy similarities between that, and my book of poker strategies, I started to write the first draft of "The Winner's Guide to Dating (What I Learned About Love and Sex from Playing Texas Hold 'em.)"

She later told me that her dog never barks, so according to her (and her dog) there was something "special" about me. On our first date I apparently had many key attributes she liked in a man: sense of humor, athletic, artistic, and over 5'10". Let's see...4 years later... I still play soccer and tennis, I try to maintain a sense of humor about things, I continue to write music, and I haven't shrunk. And...she's still with me. Life is good.