[VOA]

When I mentioned that I wouldn't trust the women I meet with money for the next pitcher,
I heard "well, it must be your fault for attracting the wrong type of woman".

Let that stuff just slide off your back.

I have a cousin in Dallas who's an electrical engineer and owner of a small, lucrative
Internet/database connectivity shop.
He's been a church-going fellow all his life, but been repelled by the way in which
women he's dated seem to always (and quickly) put a dollar-valuation on him.

He's into his mid-thirties, says he's not going to marry until he's got
a substantial fortune stacked away...given that what you earn/own before marriage
has some protection in Texas, a community property state.

I understand folks that give the "all about trust" speeches on marriage...
I would not want to live in a world where people didn't generally have that sentiment.
But the view must be tempered with the realization that the divorce and child-custody laws
have been rigged to extract the maximal (in some cases >100%) of the worth of the
male in the relationship.

[FITZ]

He's into his mid-thirties, says he's not going to marry until he's got

Waiting too long to marry can be a lot of the problem. The happiest marriages I know of are with couples who married between 19 to 23 years of age, waiting until you're set in your ways doesn't help and in his mid-thirties he can expect to meet women carrying a lot more baggage which makes things harder, plus by then he's likely to have more himself.