Q: I hope you don't think this is silly, but does the three-date rule before you have sex apply to a soldier shipping off to Iraq? Is it my patriotic duty to bend the rules?

Steve: It's been a few years, but my experience is that the three-date rule is not widely enforced. Or perhaps the rules varied, from the one-date rule to the "only in your dreams, buster," a rule that women applied only when going out with me.

Whatever your rules, I would not make an exception for a man or woman in uniform. There are plenty of better ways to honor their service. Otherwise, you could end up in bed with a marching band.

Mia: I always tell folks to get to know someone before getting intimate. You say three dates, I say you should wait at least three months. So pass on doing the horizontal boogie with soldier boy until you know him better.

Q: Thanksgiving was just yesterday, the Christmas holidays are weeks away, and I'm already dreading New Year's Eve. It's my least favorite holiday - next to Valentine's Day. Why? Because if you're dating a woman even casually, they expect you to be with them that night. But if you go out with one, the other ones get mad at you. I want to go somewhere and hide. Any suggestions? Me and my friends go through this every year. We hate being the bad guys.

Mia: Well, playa, why don't you resort to Chapter 2 in the Casanova handbook and just get out of town? Go visit your folks - I hope they live in another state! - and then reappear once the holidays have passed.

Stay in hiding long enough and the women you've been dating may even forget why they blocked your e-mails. Just remember that you can run, but you can't hide forever. Valentine's Day will be here before you know it.

Steve: The downside of dating more than one woman at a time is that the emotional stress rises geometrically. Thus, dating three women at the same time produces nine times the stress of dating just one woman. The phone calls when you're with another woman, the clumsy explanations, the questions, the holidays. Stress, stress, stress!

I suggest you try that trusty old standby: serial monogamy. Date them one at a time. Then you're a bad guy only when you break up.

Steve is a 50-something married man who's been around the block. Mia is a younger, recently married woman with an altogether different attitude. They may not agree, but they have answers. For answers e-mail S&M@phillynews.com or write: S&M c/o Daily News, 400 N. Broad St., Philadelphia, PA 19130.