Roughly half of my closest friends use some sort of Messenger software, mostly MSN. The guys are more often online, but the girls talk more.

A common theme with the guys, who I often talk with late in the evening, is that they will disappear offline as soon as their significant others say the word, throwing a "bye" and not even giving me a chance to reciprocate before the log off. In other words, my guys treat their girls well.

Come to think of it, that is no coincidence. I have always abhorred men who do not treat their women decently. Only one of my friends used to do that. So one day I knocked him cold. Suffice to say, we wouldn't be considered friends today. I just snap when women get mistreated. That's terribly old-fashioned, I know, but I can't help it. I cut women much more of a slack. I think I can somehow feel what a challenge it can be for women to put up with us guys. "After all, he's just a man", and all that jazz.

Despite all my rhetoric, I guess I'm just an old-fashioned fart after all.