Rick Nelson and Claude Peck dispense unasked-for advice about clothing, relationships, grooming and more in a weekly dialogue.

CP: How are you set for straight male friends, Rick?

RN: I don't quite understand the question.

CP: I have 133 entries in my cell phone. Among that number I see just four straight men who are good friends and not related to me. Should I be concerned, or is this OK? There are 58 gay men listed, all close personal pals, including all three surviving exes.

RN: Close personal pals? You sound as if you're borrowing a page from the Sid Hartman playbook.

CP: Is that some kind of sports reference?

RN: I've always thought of Sid as a role model for us all -- he's in his 80s and the man has more energy than the both of us, combined -- so no worries there. But as far as the friend thing goes, I'm no better. Of course I know and adore a number of straight men -- and these are guys with whom I do not share a familial or workplace bond -- but when it comes right down to it, do I have any that I would consider to be friends the way that you and are I friends? No. Does that put us in some emotional gay ghetto?

CP: Yes, it does. Early this year I ran into an old friend at a yoga class. He's straight, recently divorced, a dad. I always liked him and thought it might be fun to reconnect with him as a friend. You know, kick back, have a beer, watch a game, golf, bowl, boat, hunt -- that kind of thing. I got his e-mail address and sent him a request for the e-mail of his brother, another good old friend. Nothing came of it, friendship-wise, and he stopped coming to yoga, so it faded from my mind. Perhaps it was a missed opportunity.

RN: His loss, as far as I'm concerned.

CP: I'm just back from vacation, which I spend with a gay male friend and a boy-girl married couple. I count the hubby as a good friend, and I trust the feeling's mutual. One thing that makes that bond easy is that Andrew has other good gay friends. He seems to "like the gays." Sometimes we may (mistakenly?) sense that straight guys have a problem with gay guys, or think there'll be tension there, sexual or otherwise.

RN: Andrew is a doll; it's easy to see why Melissa is ga-ga over him. Perhaps the secret is befriending, as my cousin Elise used to call them, SNAGs, as in Sensitive New Age Guys. They know who they are, we know who we are, and we appreciate one another's differences and similarities.

CP: You sound very Free to Be You and Me, mon cher. We're supposed to be post-gay now, so I fret that my relative lack of straight buds is dating me.

RN: That, and those shoes.

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