Platonic Friends of the Opposite Sex

    Can I or any other straight male be platonic friends with a female?

   I had to ponder this as it's something that comes up with some regularity in life. Because most people will look at crazy if you mention that a friend you kick it with is of the opposite sex.

   I have many female acqauintances but I also have ONE clear cut female friend. We work together and wound up hitting it off right away. We had some things in common and it turned out she liked the fact that I was a good listener. We wound up sharing long conversations both serious and fun, so of course we bonded.

   It took me longer to trust her than it took for her to trust me but eventually it did happen. The deal here and one reason it makes it all simple for us is that we both see other people. There really is no sexual tension. THAT is the main thing. I recently watched an episode of the always interesting "Louie" show and in it he was hanging with a female friend that thought of Louie in a platonic way and in his case it was the total opposite. And he almost wound up ruining the friendship because he had underlying feelings for her. And if  my female friend and I had any underlying tensions like that, this friendship wouldn't work.

   What separates us from being acqauintances is that we have both spent time with eac others' families and have done favors for each other in times of need. We both get along very well with the opposite sex too. We have discussed dates with others at times and offered candid opinions to each other and advice and anecdotes.

   We're also fortunate that we work someplace where we're not being judged for talking to each other and joking around. I guess the ones that would have trouble understanding are the people that we date.

   But it's a good feeling to have a meaningful platonic friendship that offers different perspectives on things many times. I think most people could have this but there can be NO SEXUAL ATTRACTION.

   Is that possible?

Gravel Truck, Cover Thyself!

   On the way to work in my short five mile trek I don't have to deal with too many road annoyances. But this time I was ticked off because of something that is against the law AND common sense and still is seen on the freeways.

   No, not the texting driver, the eating on the way driver, the makeup applying driver or even the zig zag crossing the lanes with no blinkers driver.

   This is just a big truck carrying gravel. Without a cover or tarp over it.

   The sound of teeny gravel pebbles falling feet or yards away behind it as it gets on the freeway. The sound of little tippity-taps as the gravel hit your car. And the sound of my mouth as I hold my breath hoping that I don't get a cracked windshield out of this.

   Ohhhhh (imagine sounding like Simmity Sam here) Ohhhhh, that varmint! You see, I don't care about the exterior of my admittedly old jalopy of a car. But what I do care about is not having to fix a cracked windshield because someone decided it was a good idea to get on the freeway at 55+ miles per hour driving a truck that is releasing pebbles at an unacceptable rate. Acceptable rate is zero.

   Well, I made it through okay. Having three lanes and moving two away worked fine. But what about other drivers?

*The ones with brand new cars.
*The ones driving a convertible.
*The ones on motorcycle.
*The ones that have no choice but to get behind this truck and get that cracked windshield or worse.

   Has something like this happened to you? Or really just annoyed you?