“I'm sarcastic and facetious. It's hard to find those people on the first encounter. I can be nice, but I don't want nice friends. I want funny, gregarious, sarcastic, and smart friends. It's so nice to hear you're not alone.”

“Popular culture has made it okay to yell "I want a man!" from the rooftops, so why are we still embarrassed to say, "I want a best friend"?”

“I think the waiters and hostess are beginning to recognize me. They must either think I'm the most popular girl in Chicago or a lesbian seriously looking for The One. Either option is far less embarrassing than the truth: 'I'm here auditioning best friends forever!”

“But on a Sunday morning when I want to grab an omelet over girl talk, I’m at a loss. My Chicago friends are the let’s-get-dinner-on-the-books-a-month-in-advance type. We email, trading dates until we find an open calendar slot amidst our tight schedules of workout classes, volunteer obligations (no false pretenses here, the volunteers are my friends, not me, sadly), work events, concert tickets and other dinners scheduled with other girls. I’m looking for someone to invite to watch The Biggest Loser with me at the last minute or to text “pedicure in half an hour?” on a Saturday morning. To me, that’s what BFFs are.”

“Sometimes when I see people from high school I feel trapped in a persona I maintained then,' she says. 'Ten years have gone by, a dive changed a tremendous amount - both emotionally and in circumstance. So while my oldest relationships are incredibly dear, and it's true that they know me intimately, it can be freeing to have relationships built on exactly who you are at this moment.”

“It's always nice when two people who don't got no one else find each other as friends.”

“Shel: "I'm finding it really hard to fight wanting you, Josh."Josh: "Well, that's nice to hear, because I stopped fighting a while ago.”