You must have been living under a rock if you haven’t heard the latest from my girl Britney Spears. Her new single, simply called “3,” is a hot and steamy track with particularly racy content – even for the sex-sells-bare-all Princess of Pop.

I’ll make it easy on you and cut to the chase: The song is about a threesome. You know, getting down and dirty with more than one other person.

Despite my love for the single and Britney herself, I couldn’t help but realize how opposed I was to the idea of a threesome. I’m sorry for being traditional and monogamous for an edgy and chic homosexual (oh, shut up – you know I am), but the idea of sharing my sexual partner with some other beez just doesn’t fly with me.

I’m my boyfriend’s only sex star. The only ass he should be pounding is mine. You think I’m letting someone steal my hot and sweaty thunder? Not gonna happen.

So when I started talking to some friends about their opinions of ménage à trois, I was surprised to find many of them would be open to the idea. After I picked my jaw off the floor, I shook my head in disgust: “Eww, I’d never be in a threesome.”

Then they pounced on me. It was a frenzied whirlwind of angry backlashes, but I did manage to catch, “What’s wrong with threesomes?” “Why are you such a prude?” and “How can you go wrong with an extra dick in the mix?”

My apologies but “the more the merrier” doesn’t bode too well with my sex life. There are plenty of reasons for my hesitation to get freaky in the sheets with two others instead of one. Yet, my friends’ comments made me mull over their eagerness and my reluctance for group sex.

Why are my friends so pro-trio? Am I just too old-fashioned? Am I really a prude? I couldn’t help but wonder: Why are threesomes so alluring?

Of course, this is a question I can’t answer myself. So I went to my trusty (and “sexually experienced,” apparently) friends to see what they had to say.

“Threesomes are fun!” a few exclaimed. I must admit, I have some pretty courageous friends – mind you, I won’t reveal any names. I can tell you, however, that I could discern a sense of satisfaction as they thought back on their triads.

They all enjoyed being a part of a threesome because the experience was an excitingly new one. It was like unfurling the sails for a voyage on an uncharted sea – or in this case, two uncharted seas. It was thrilling, intoxicatingly delicious. Being in a threesome was an even greater adrenaline rush, and in the end, my friends say the orgasm was euphoric.

“We’re all curious and want to explore – threesomes are the perfect way to do it!” When it comes to sex, curiosity doesn’t kill the cat; it brings out the sexual adventurer in you, apparently. To my friends, sex is simple. It’s just sex – and a threesome is merely another medium, if you will, to practice the art form.

“Hey, we’re in college. We’re supposed to be reckless and naughty,” said one particularly risqué acquaintance. “A threesome is just another angle, another way to practice the craft of intercourse.”

“In a serious relationship, adding a third could liven up a very stagnant sex life.” If you and your partner are experiencing a few shortcomings in the sex department (mind the pun), you can spice things up by inviting someone extra to your tango.

I’m told a threesome could re-spark the sex fuse between the two of you. It could even be fun, I hear – the scoping out of a potential lover, the selection process, the new person in your bed, etc. As long as rules and boundaries are firmly set (yeah, I don’t know what that means, either), nothing can go wrong when you splash a third ingredient into your sex stew.

After hearing what all my friends had to say, I must admit I get it. I get their reasoning and understand their fetishes. To each his own, I suppose.

So, I’ve made a vow: I, Mario Lugo, will not judge you if you decide to have some fun, explore your sexual desires and invite a third person to join in for sex. Hell, invite as many as you want.

As for me, I’ll think about it.

MARIO LUGO thought about it and no, he still wants to be the only ass his boyfriend pounds. E-mail him at mlugo@ucdavis.edu to either congratulate him for sticking to his guns or send him hate mail for being so prudish.

It’s Halloween, and since our pre-game has lasted until 1:30 a.m. after all the parties have been broken up, this would technically qualify as show time: Vanna and I drinking leftover beers on her dining room table talking about 500 Days of Summer.

“I don’t think she was happy in the end,” Vanna says.

Yes, believe it. We are spending our Halloween night debating the meaning of some low-budget indie flick. In the movie, this fictional character, whom we refer to casually as Zooey, carries the whole 90 minutes by teasing this guy into a relationship with her even though she doesn’t believe in love, and then breaking up with him and getting married to another guy at the end.

Vanna doesn’t buy that Zooey finally met the prince on a white horse that will take her away. I say she did finally believe in love; Tom just wasn’t the one to prove it to her.

“You can tell by the way she was smiling,” Vanna says.

Yes, believe it. We are debating about what the angle of a fictional character’s smile says about her personal life. Because tonight, she is more than fiction. We are setting out to answer some of life’s greatest unanswered questions. Who is she? Why is she so depressed? And why does this make her so hot?

She represents the abstract force we can only attempt to understand by attributing human characteristics to it. This force, the Zooey, has manifested itself in various incarnations throughout history, from Mary Magdalene to Cat Power. Not unlike the Dalai Lama, the spirit of the Zooey is one that continually perpetuates itself, always on the lookout for unsuspecting young girls with daddy problems.

This is what the Zooey has become in the 21st century: the pill-popping, self-proclaimed bisexual who takes pictures of people’s feet with her Lomo, and tells all her potential boyfriends she has a habit of destroying things because it makes her feel alive. This would make her a complete social pariah forced into a life of anime if she weren’t hot. But she always is, and guys go crazy over this.

“No, I think she really was happy in the end,” I say. “No one believes in love until someone proves it to you.”

What I just said is the maxim of the Superhero. I know this because I used to be one. Those with the Superhero complex actively look for train wrecks with the intention of cleaning them up.

We are the ones who go out of our way to fix girls’ computers even though all we intend to do is run System Restore. We are the ones who run across freeways to get to the gas station when girls are stuck on the side of the road without gas, even though they have AAA membership.

Superheroes and Zooeys don’t get along.

Superheroes say, “What happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object?” Zooeys say, “Bitch, why you trynna act like you know me?”

An hour passes. All the parties we planned to hit up but never do are 30 minutes from getting rolled out, and we are still sitting at the dining table.

I ask Vanna how she sees relationships, and she tells me she doesn’t ever want to get married. She doesn’t find it necessary.

“Well, one in two couples cheats right?” she says. “Everyone gets divorced these days. People are selfish, and you can’t blame them.”

This is when she tells me about how in the sixth grade, she won a scholarship for writing an essay on world peace – but when she was interviewed, the interviewer was way more interested in talking to her mother than about what a middle schooler had to say about international relations.

She and her sister then began noticing their mother leaving the house at 11 p.m., and then coming home at one the next morning. To find out where she was going, her sister told her to hide in their mother’s minivan one night. So she did, and she waited in the back trunk as her mother drove to a hotel.

“I don’t hate her for it,” Vanna says. “I never did. We’re all human, what can we do?”

By 1:30 a.m., it clicks to me. In the same way recovering Superheroes never get rid of the urge to fix things, recovering Zooeys never get over their romantic pessimism. And that’s when you find The Joker drinking with Damaged Goods on Halloween night, feeling too old to walk around Davis dressed up as people they no longer identify with.

GEOFF MAK wants to thank his friend Vanna for letting him perform verbal surgery on her in public. E-mail Geoff at gemak@ucdavis.edu if you have an idea of what he should write about next.

All right, I’ll admit it. This past weekend, I not only had “You Belong With Me” by Taylor Swift replaying on my iPod, but I also had it on my laptop while simultaneously replaying the music video on YouTube. (Okay, that might have been TMI, but seriously, it’s a cute video). If I weren’t so lazy about uploading songs to my cell phone, then trust me, it would’ve been replaying on there, too.

I mean, it’s one thing to say I had something “legit and old school” playing on repeat like Tom Petty (well, actually, I don’t know about that), but Taylor Swift? Really?

So halfway through my listening (that would have been approximately the 1,005th time), I paused and thought:

“Uhh, why in the world is this song on repeat?” (And yes, I also Tweeted that question immediately after).

Being the self-proclaimed “deep-thinking philosopher” (white beard and ponderous pose included) that I am, I immediately wondered if it was because there’s something in my mind that I’m trying to ignore.

It was like having two little Tiffs, each sitting on one of my shoulders and going at each other.

“Yeah, Tiff, whatcha have to hide, huh?” the first one says. “Are you trying to block your thoughts out, or is it because you feel the same way as Taylor?”

“Well, hmm … it’s just a catchy song,” the other replies. “It’s easy to bop my head to it while finishing this freakin’ English paper.”

So basically the moment I started imaging myself as two halves, I ripped out my ear buds and pondered about being:

1) Delusional, psychotic and/or schizophrenic, or …

2) In denial of my thoughts of some sort.

After all, without music blasting through my ear buds and hypnotic lyrics repeating through my head, it’s just my thoughts and me. It’s a strip down to everything internal – just you and your thoughts flowing freely with no distracters.

And if you really think about it, don’t we listen to music because in one form or another, we want escape?

It’s easy to say you only pop your ear buds in when you walk by the organizations lined up in front of the MU, or when you’re riding the bus home after a difficult day of midterms.

But ultimately, underneath all these “reasons” is the underlying fact that we blast our music to escape – to escape the pushy club leaders by the MU, to be relieved of the chatter on a Unitrans bus after a long day, and to be freed of the frustrating thoughts we encounter when it’s just us and our thoughts in a silent room. (Can I be any more dramatic? But seriously, silent rooms can be the most uncomfortable things ever).

Of course, it’s so much easier to just block it all out with music – block out annoying roommates, or emo thoughts of how that cute guy is who just doesn’t notice you.

Who really wants to sit silently and recount a day of a failed midterm or relationship? Popping in that ear bud is just so much easier. One click and all thoughts are pushed aside. Press repeat, and the thoughts may subside for hours straight.

But when we choose to refuse our thoughts or avoid actions through the use of an iPod, we aren’t really listening to our problems. That’s because, well, we’re so preoccupied with worries about how “she wears short skirts while I wear t-shirts.” We still aren’t asking that girl or guy out no matter how much we listen to Taylor Swift, or noticing how “enlightening” those club members outside the MU can actually be (not that I would know, since I somehow find myself “listening” to my iPod while I walk by them).

Even though we may hate the thoughts we sometimes have, they are there for a reason. As harsh as it may sound, you’re totally screwing yourself over by keeping those thoughts shoved aside by listening to music.

So let’s keep it real. Real thoughts. Real feelings. Real people. That’s all the music you need.

TIFFANY LEW tends to release any frustrations here, so she’s happy in person. Please don’t fulfill her mother’s premonition and send her to jail for her thoughts. (Love you, Mom!) She can be reached at tjlew@ucdavis.edu.