Gave a Boy My Number

Accomplished the week of Jan. 3

While this might seem like a very small feat to you, to me it was incredibly nerve-wracking. "Painfully shy" doesn't really capture the way I am around men—excruciatingly, agonizingly shy is more like it. The source of my timidity is the complete lack of luck I've had with the opposite sex. It's almost as if I'm invisible to them. Like, the entire male gender had a meeting and declared, "So, Lauren, we avoid her, right?"

But, much to my surprise, shortly after midnight on New Year's Eve, a cute guy approached me and started talking to me. When my friends that I came to the party with indicated to me from across the room that they were ready to go, I asked the guy to Facebook me. (What I actually said was slicker than "Facebook me," but it would require too much explanation.) He friended me the very next day. I commented on his wall. He commented on mine. And then I realized I had made a big mistake. All of our communication was now limited to silly (and very public) FB comments. "OMG, nice pic. I'm totes LOL." Cyrano's letters they ain't.

And so, with a bit of prodding from Lisa, I sent the guy a message with my phone number. Now at least I'll know sooner rather than later if there's any kind of attraction here.

Lisa has approved this as my first Red act, but she says she thinks I need to do a second one this week because it's the first week of the new year. I'm not sure I totally follow her logic, but she's the judge, not me.