Part 5: Couples+ What man doesn't want to jump into a menage-a-trois? Me, apparently. When I had my big chance in the late eighties, I blew it because I had a steady girlfriend, and didn't want to be unfaithful! I actually thought it best to stay out of the way of temptation! So just at that airless moment when even a three-year-old knows sex is coming right up, I got up and took the most awkward leave in the history of bad exits.

Since that night, it's become ever more apparent to me that there is no point doing the right thing. Years later, I can barely remember what my then-girlfriend looked like, but the two women I avoided having sex with are forever carved into my brain. At the time, when it fully dawned on me what an occasion I'd wasted, I consoled myself with the hope that it might happen again. But it never did, because opportunity only knocks once.

Do I regret it? And then some! If you don't make love with a woman when you have the chance, you'll never get her out of your mind. With two women, it's twice as bad. Life sucks.

Got any romantic regrets of your own? BACK to the Beginning Previously in simpleton: Friday: simpleton unplugged: The ugliest page on the web Thursday: T&A Jokes explained: More Taylorism for quipsters Wednesday: Reader Mail: Volume 2 Tuesday: Internal bleeding: The IRS scandal reconsidered Monday: Light Rain in India: 3,000 Dead Friday: Farts & Mumbles: simpleton gets a seat at the Algonquin. A century of simpletons in the simpleton archive. Tomorrow: Shuck and jive