The Ryan Report – Episode 214 "The Third Man"

Ryan's Bio | Read the episode recap

So, it can be fun being a bachelor. Just ask Castle – the man got voted the Ninth Most Eligible Bachelor in the city. How much easier can it get to meet women than that? It's like getting a publicist for your dating life ...which, come to think of it, Castle probably already has.

When you're single, anywhere you go is chock full of possibility. Maybe you'll meet the love of your life in line at the grocery store or the library. Maybe you'll get into a fender bender and end up falling for the driver of the other car.

Espo and I used to head out on the weekend and see how many different places we could hit up. We may have known where we'd start, but we never knew where we'd end up. Bars in New York close at four AM and you can get into a great deal of mischief before then. We spent a lot of weekends trying to calculate exactly how much mischief was possible.

Now that I'm no longer a single man, Esposito spends a lot of time telling me about all the good times I'm missing out on – the Santa Claus bar crawl, the Thanksgiving Turkey-flavored shot challenge, the Jersey Shore themed party where he spent the whole time "creepin." And I have to admit, they do sound fun... Well, all except for the Jersey Shore one.

Being in a relationship isn't as dramatic as my bachelor days – there aren't any Tequila waterslides or waking up in another state (geographic or otherwise.) But, to be honest, I don't miss those things that much. As fun as the good times were, there were way too many valleys and not enough peaks.

Besides, there's something awesome about just spending a Saturday night eating pizza and watching the movies Jenny and I both loved back when we were kids. Being with your girl helps you get past the fact that Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze is a really, really terrible movie. I mean, Vanilla Ice doing a 'Ninja Rap?' That's hardly in keeping with the TMNT ethos.

And it's not like Jenny and I don't have crazy times. I mean, the other night we did a whole fondue night where we tried to see the craziest things we could dip in cheese. Carrots, cereal, chocolate chip cookies... Let me tell you, strawberry ice-cream does not go so well with melted Gouda.

Okay, so maybe that's not exactly a "crazy time" compared to the time Espo and I drank "around the world" at that Beers of the World bar and woke up to find ourselves in the back of a moving beer truck. But when you're with your loved one, even racing to return a DVD before Blockbuster closes can be an adventure.

The point is, even if I could be one of the Ledger's "Most Eligible Bachelors," I wouldn't give it up for what I have with Jenny. Meeting the right person means not needing that sort of thing anymore (...although it would be nice to bring that article to my high school reunion).

Nowadays, I tell Espo he gets to do all the partying for the both of us – which suits him perfectly fine. And when he needs me to pick him up from a bus stop in Yonkers, zero questions asked, I'm more than happy to. Well, maybe not zero questions asked...