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"Two and a half years ago, a heartbroken young gent started an anonymous blog to chronicle his dating ups and downs. He abruptly stopped blogging a few months ago when he met a special someone. Today, he&amp;amp;#8217;s agreed to reveal his true identity. Our mystery man. Los Angeles blogger Brandon Hoang (better known as So@24) created the wildly popular Starting Over at 24 when his first and only girlfriend broke up with him. He&amp;#x27;s currently working on a book, so he&amp;#x27;s decided it&amp;#x27;s finally time to unveil himself. He was sweet enough to chat about his blogging adventures and share some relationship lessons he&amp;amp;#8217;s learned along the way. Much better without the bluebar, am I right? Smitten: Why did you start the blog? And what&amp;amp;#8217;s up with that title? Brandon: After being dumped by my girlfriend of 6 years, I was bewildered and extremely confused. Friends of the dumpee can attest to the fact that it gets old listening to the same emo, sob story and theories over and over again. I knew that I couldn&amp;#x27;t keep bothering my friends, but I still had thoughts I wanted to get out. A &amp;quot;diary&amp;quot; that existed online seemed easy enough. I didn&amp;#x27;t want to write about how sad I was about being dumped. I wanted to focus on the humorous part of learning to date. At the time, I really felt as though I was starting to date for the first time...at 24 years old. For the most part, people learn how to date or have sex though awkward experiences, multiple hook ups, dating many people in high school and especially college. I had the same girlfriend all throughout high school and college. It wasn&amp;#x27;t until I moved to a new city and was on my own that I had to relearn how to date. Smitten: Why did you decide to be anonymous? Brandon: First and foremost, I didn&amp;#x27;t want to put my ex girlfriend in an awkward situation by airing out our dirty laundry. I wanted to respect her and any other girls I would encounter in the dating world. And, I knew I would tackle issues that might be controversial and I didn&amp;#x27;t want to have to second guess myself while I was writing. Smitten: How did your ex feel about the blog? Brandon: My ex girlfriend had no idea I was writing a blog until after it had picked up momentum. But when she discovered it, she soon became an avid reader! She always liked my writing and encouraged me to always write more. I even let readers post questions to her and allowed her to write her own post from her point of view. It was a huge hit! Smitten: We love stories of awkward or wild sexual experiences around here. Are there any you blogged about? Brandon: My wildest and most awkward sexual experience are actually one in the same. It was with a girl who I had only met a few times through friends. I couldn&amp;#x27;t even tell you her last name and I don&amp;#x27;t think she could tell you mine. But I knew there was mutual attraction between us. After a few dates that consisted mostly of heavy drinking (after discovering that whiskey is the only thing we could have a conversation about), we had a handful of heavy make out sessions, but nothing more. I was absolutely baffled! It wasn&amp;#x27;t until the next morning of the last night, when she told me why things never went further. Smitten: The bar across the eyes can only cover so much, did anyone ever recognize you? Brandon: Axe hosted an event, specifically targeting bloggers. As I thanked the host and headed toward the door, two female bloggers came up and wanted to shake my hand. I guess they had been watching me and thought I might be &amp;quot;So@24&amp;quot;, but were too embarrassed to confirm it. We had a laugh about it when I fessed up. Smitten: What prompted the decision to stop blogging? Brandon: I started to date Beth, another blogger. [ed note: not to be confused with our own Beth from The Girls in The Beauty Department.] Obviously, I knew she was reading so that compromised my &amp;quot;100% uncensored&amp;quot; content that I really strive for. Things are going really well: we talk daily and have discussed plans on having her move from New York to Los Angeles. If someone would have told me &amp;quot;You&amp;#x27;re going to meet your next girlfriend via the Internet off a blog you created&amp;quot; I would have slapped my knee while holding my splitting sides. I&amp;#x27;m very lucky to have found her, all thanks to my humble little blog. Smitten: What advice can you share with people dealing with a big break up? Brandon: Surround yourself with friends and force yourself to be social even though it&amp;#x27;s the very last thing you want to do. Find the outlet that works best for you; mine happened to be spilling my guts on the Internet and making light of the situation by poking fun at myself. And, while a majority of people won&amp;#x27;t agree with me on this, depending on the circumstances, there&amp;#x27;s no reason to not be friends with your ex. It helped me out tremendously. It sucks to have the cliche spouted at you a million times, but it&amp;#x27;s true: &amp;quot;It gets better&amp;quot;. You just have to wait it out until scientists invent the fast forward button. Thanks Brandon! Have you ever stumbled across an ex&amp;amp;#8217;s blog? Do you peek at your ex&amp;amp;#8217;s Facebook page? Are you friends with any of your exes? How do you deal with break ups? Blogroll, please! * A fashionable blogger with a serious love for H&amp;amp;M * This blogging mom wants to help you start a college fund for your kiddos! * A fitness blogger who believes one size does not fit all. More Ways to Get Glamour You could win $50,000 just for registering or logging in to Glamour.com! Sign up for Glamour.com&amp;#x27;s Style Tips of the Week and Beauty Tip of the Day newsletters! Add Glamour to your iGoogle homepage. Follow Glamour on Twitter. Photos: Starting Over at 24"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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