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"At dinner with my friends Bea and Edie, Bea was agonizing over how to gently decline a second invitation from an &amp;quot;eh&amp;quot; guy. I felt her pain. But I was glad it wasn&amp;#x27;t me. I am not good at turning down a piece of chocolate, let alone a nice, interested guy. I always feel bad, and so sorry for the guy. I lose sleep over it. But then part of me goes, Erin, get over yourself. It&amp;amp;#8217;s not like he&amp;amp;#8217;s going to die if you say no. Still, I hate doing it. Here are 5 ways to say thanks, but no thanks:1. The Fade Out. The fizzling out is harder than it looks and requires patience. It often feels mean, and it ends up taking more energy because, let&amp;amp;#8217;s face it, you might have every busy excuse in the book&amp;amp;#8212;&amp;amp;#8220;I&amp;amp;#8217;ll be going out of the country, I&amp;amp;#8217;m booked up for the next three weeks,&amp;amp;#8221; and still, if a guy is interested, he will keep after you. At some point, you gotta come clean&amp;amp;#133;I mean, you&amp;amp;#8217;ve gotta stay busy. He&amp;amp;#8217;ll send one last-ditch-effort &amp;amp;#8220;just checking in&amp;amp;#8221; email, and you literally have to be like, &amp;amp;#8220;Thanks! Great! Hope you&amp;amp;#8217;re well!&amp;amp;#8221; It feels horrible. And so transparent. 2. The Rejection Letter. In my older age, I appreciate honesty. I don&amp;amp;#8217;t want to waste anyone&amp;amp;#8217;s time, including mine. Sometimes I send an email like this: &amp;amp;#8220;That&amp;amp;#8217;s very sweet of you to offer to take me out again, but I don&amp;amp;#8217;t feel there&amp;amp;#8217;s a potential match here. I had a great time and think you&amp;amp;#8217;re a cool guy, but I&amp;#x27;m just not feeling a romantic connection.&amp;amp;#8221; It&amp;amp;#8217;s a bit formal. You can&amp;amp;#8217;t send this if you got drunk and made out on Date One. So try not to do that. If you met him or her on a dating web site, it&amp;amp;#8217;s nice to say, &amp;amp;#8220;I know you will find what you&amp;amp;#8217;re looking for.&amp;amp;#8221; Feel free to copy and paste that. 3. The Houdini. Sometimes I screen all calls and delete all texts and emails. When I do this, it&amp;amp;#8217;s because I feel the guy misbehaved or disrespected me and therefore doesn&amp;amp;#8217;t deserve an answer. So I don&amp;amp;#8217;t waste my breath. 4. The Big White Lie. Sometimes I tell a guy that I got back together with an ex. I think that&amp;amp;#8217;s the only believable alibi there is, unless you seem like a person who might go to prison/move to Siberia/join the army on Tuesday. Just make sure your story is plausible, and then try not to run into him at The Gap. 5. The Pass-Along. Beth once went out with a guy who was not her type&amp;amp;#8212;but he was her friend&amp;#x27;s type. So when he asked her out again, she said he was nice but that he&amp;#x27;d be really perfect for her friend. He was thrown off for a second, but ultimately intrigued, and he agreed to the set-up. It didn&amp;#x27;t end up working out, but it sure was generous of Beth! Looking back, these are all pretty wussy (well, except for #5). Even the &amp;amp;#8220;honesty&amp;amp;#8221; option is executed from behind a computer. But you know what? 95 percent of guys say, &amp;amp;#8220;I&amp;amp;#8217;ll call you,&amp;amp;#8221; and then they don&amp;amp;#8217;t. So at least I&amp;amp;#8217;m not doing that. What do you do? Get Glamour Wherever You Go! Follow us on Twitter. Friend us on Facebook. Add us to your Google homepage."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.glamour.com/sex-love-life/blogs/single-ish/2009/06/4-ways-to-turn-down-a-second-d>