Superficial

As I'm gathering up my courage to enter the dating world again, an old saying comes to mind: "Don't judge a book by its cover."

As far as first impressions go, we're generally attracted to someone by their appearance.  Sometimes it's their smile.  Other times it's their eyes.  For guys, it's also a woman's boobs, legs and/or buttocks.  To be honest, I don't know what else women look at.  A guy's teeth?  I think a lot of them look at his shoes.  Perhaps how he's dressed.  I'm curious what you ladies out there check out, so feel free to post and share the wisdom. ;)

I think the main reason why we judge by appearance is that we feel that there needs to be a physical attraction for a relationship to work.  This is very true.  That attraction can be developed over time though.  Say you have a great friend, one that you just kinda liked when you or they were dating someone else.  Now that you're single, you reflect on that person.  With how well you've gotten to know them and the amount of time you spend with them, they may be more attractive than you would have originally thought possible.

But what things are unattractive?  I know obesity is, as I've not had women flocking to me over the past few years.  I also know that bad teeth put you at the bottom of the list, as do a lot of other superficial qualities.  For non-smokers, smoking is a huge turn off.  Being a non-smoker I can honestly say that an incredibly attractive woman loses my interest when she puts a cigarette between her lips.  Just as she might be turned off by my size, I'm am turned off by her stink.

But is smoking that bad of a thing?  Is weight that bad?  After all, isn't it the person inside we're wanted to get to know and date, not the package it comes in?  It's hard to turn off the visual sensor, as we're all attracted to what is pleasing to the eye.  The sense of smell, even harder.  While I might be overweight, I bathe regularly and don't smell or taste like an ash tray.  Doesn't that count for something?  If I'm supposed to overlook someone's smoking habit, perhaps they should look past my most obvious fault as well.

Please notice that I used the word "boobs" above to just state an obvious fact: most men are attracted to boobs.  My repetition of the word boobs here in this last paragraph is simply a ploy to try to get more traffic on my blog.  Boobs.