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We’d talked on the phone a few times but hadn’t met. It was early evening when we talked again and he said he’d love to take me to dinner that night. But he had a favor to ask: his Jag was in the shop so would I drive to his area for dinner?

He lived 45 minutes away in a newly gentrified part of a not-so-great area. It was already dark. I didn’t relish driving to his area after sunset.

A midlife friend recently broke up with his girlfriend of 10 years. The reason he broke up with her is after a lot of soul searching and couples counseling, it became clear they wanted different things.

When I asked how he was doing regarding this, he said he was using this as an impetus to reassess many things in his life.

When you’ve decided you don’t want further contact with someone, it’s easy to ignore their phone calls, IMs, texts or emails.

Perhaps you rise a level to at least send a “we’re not a match” email.

It’s hardest to actually tell the person face-to-face. However, if you’ve only had one encounter, it seems counter-productive to arrange a meeting just to tell the person you won’t be seeing them again.

So a phone call is in order. But what do you say? How do you phrase it to not focus on the other’s deal breakers? You don’t want to stoop to a level of name calling or pointing out the other’s bad breath, disheveled appearance, incessant cursing, bad manners or lusting after you. You want to do this task with class and leave the other’s dignity intact.

You procrastinate making the call because you don’t want an altercation and since you barely know the person, you have no idea how he’ll respond.

But you decide you must act consistent with how you’d like to be treated — respectfully — so you make the call.

A new man started pursuing me and after a few calls shared how much he liked me. I had made no sexual innuendos nor teasing, so was taken aback when he said, “I want to make love to you.” I’ve heard this from a number of men and generally shake it off as they are lonely and horny and socially awkward reentering the dating world so don’t realize how off-putting that can be.

I’ve had others tell me before, during or immediately after a first date what they fantasize our doing together — and I don’t mean going to the movies! They have concocted their own movie of us in their head, one that would receive an x rating!

When someone likes another, the “liker” wants a lot of contact with the “likee.” However, if the ardor isn’t equal, the likee can feel smothered.

No one likes it when someone they are dating “plays games,” which is a nebulous description of someone trying to manipulate the other. (We’re not talking Monopoly, Bridge, or tennis here!) But very few people can articulate what constitutes a game. (However, it is commonly agreed that if an “attached,” [e.g., non-single] person acts as if they are unattached, s/he is “playing games.” Or if when asked “are you seeing someone else?” they respond, “no,” meaning “not at this very exact moment as I’m with you and she’s at home.”)

Some people consider arbitrary rules to be game playing. For example, women who won’t call men under any circumstance, or pay for a meal, or have an x-dates-before-sex criteria.

Good-looking men are nearly always alluring. Some ruin it, however, when you spend time with them. Their good looks have made them arrogant, vain, insensitive and/or jerks. They are used to women treating them well even if they behave badly.

In an episode of “30 Rock” Jon Hamm played a handsome doctor who Tina Fey’s character described as living in a bubble. People bent over backwards for him, but he thought that was how all people were treated. He had no idea that the generosity he experienced wasn’t commonplace.

Other men use their good looks to manipulate others. Some are con artists, exemplified memorably by Brad Pitt’s character in “Thelma and Louise.” Not only did he seduce Geena Davis’ character, but he took all her money afterward.

I would have never predicted that this would be a problem in dating. But it was — for a friend of mine.

Sometimes we find ourselves thinking about someone we would have liked to date, but it never came to be. You wonder how it might have turned out. If he’s still single, you wonder if you should reconnect. Or if he’s now a pal, if we should telegraph our romantic interest.

A colleague and I found ourselves single during the same time frame. We enjoyed each other’s conversations, but there was never any move to go out. We shared dating stories and cheered each other on. He was always attentive and complimentary, but he never intimated that he felt other than pals.

Since humankind began, people have been trying to improve their allure. Yet it seems elusive for many, even though some elements seem obvious:

I’d deleted his contact info everywhere I could find it after he broke up with me via text 2 years ago. I was surprised to receive that text, as our 5-month relationship had been tumultuous, but I (wrongly) thought we were committed to working out our hiccups. Our last conversation two weeks later — via text because he refused to talk on the phone — didn’t go well. So I worked to heal the hurt and move on. We hadn’t had any contact since.