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Sex, love, and other mysteries in the city your mother warned you about.

Peter Pan was the original fuccboi. That dude would NOT grow up, you know? So perhaps it should come as little surprise that a city with a long history of comparisons to Neverland has a shit-ton of fuccboi Peter Pan syndrome sufferers who are effing up your lovelife.

If that's the case, then this blog post is for you, and it's inspired by a rant that might stand for many others. A 35-year-old San Francisco woman, one who identifies as queer but is clearly dating all the wrong dudes, tells Elle magazine today that she is utterly exasperated with her romantic prospects here.

"Dating in the Bay Area is hard," she observes, "The tech guys are the worst; I've pretty much stopped dating them." Yes, a lot of tech guys are young, and therefore dumb, but she adds that "it's not just tech guys." In the end, it's a general immaturity — the kind that stands in the way of a person's ability to really appreciate and account for another person in their life. As she puts it, these guys "don't want you to have needs and wants of your own." Some she's dated have even adopted expedient political opinions just to get laid. "It kind of sucks when you thinks someone is super cool and really down with social justice and it turns out they're just into fucking girls who are into social justice," she says.

Now, this particular Wendy doesn't speak for everyone — there are plenty of people out there who are looking for a bit of boyish charm. Boys do make such excellent playthings. But when you've personally decided that you're through with the Peter Pan types you keep dating, look out for these five signs he isn't ready to grow the eff up.

1. He wears a little green hat

Peter Pan guys are easy to spot because they wear those fucking little green hats. You know the ones: With those little red feathers in them? Who do these guys think they are, some kind of puckish wood nymph? By extension, this rule can be applied to any dude that wears hats, especially uncool ones, especially inside. If he wears a hat at a restaurant, go to the bathroom and do not return.

2. He flies in through your window at night

Umm can we talk about how this is definitely NOT okay? This is some heavy breaking and entering shit, plus it's rude as fuck and a clear invasion of your space. This Peter Pan asshole needs to learn some serious boundaries. Even if he isn't literally sneaking in to your apartment, this type of person will always put his needs ahead of yours — at all hours. Yes, this includes unwanted texts for late night booty calls.

3. Super vague at making plans

"Second star to the left and straight on 'til morning" does not constitute a date night plan. Where are you going? Where is this headed? In the end, you need a dude who you can scheme things out with. And, if he's trying to take you somewhere and wont' tell you where that is, start preemptively typing 911 into your phone.

4. He has hella other chicks and they're tryna kill you!

Look, it's 2016: This thing doesn't have to be totally exclusive right away. Monogamy is so retro! But if your dude has all kindsa chicks and mermaids and such who are actually attempting to murder you, that's a red flag right there. Please be careful! Possessive behavior on the part of his friends, especially those with whom he might be romantically involved, is definitely a bad sign. While, yes sure, they could just be jealous — it's clearly a deal-breaker if he has other known partners who are out to get you. You just don't need that drama in your life anymore.

5. He fetishizes youth

Neverland doesn't last forever. Face it: We're all getting older. If he wants to ride a skateboard or a motorcycle or some shit to feel young, that's up to him. But if he's obsessed with youthfulness in others and is somehow trying to enforce it on you, it's time to make romantic investments elsewhere. You know where this is going: In the end, this dude is just gonna leave you for some young thing who doesn't have half of what you've got. I mean, what, is this dude gonna try to date your daughter or something? That's disgusting.

All previous volumes of Eff-ing in SF
Related: Neverland Forever: SF's History Of Lost Boys And Girls

"Second star to the right, and straight on till morning." That's the way to Neverland, the magical island dreamt up by Scottish writer J.M. Barrie in his 1904 play Peter Pan; or, the Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up and his 1911 novel Peter and Wendy. But those directions might double as the route to San Francisco in the popular conception of our city, one that's been frequently invoked of late. It's not just San Francisco's relative youth compared to its aging surrounding areas, and our increasing childlessness: it's a unique countercultural heritage that makes the comparison so popular. But how, exactly, does the analogy work?

Here on our peninsular, near-island home, we speak in sometimes chiding but mostly proud tones of boys and girls who refuse to grow up, often pathologizing the tendency with reference to Peter Pan syndrome. Though that term wasn't invoked until 1983 in Dan Kiley's hit pop psychology text, similar diagnoses predate it. As former SFist editor Brock Keeling writes for 7x7, the figure of the puer aeternus (Latin for "eternal boy") might be traced through the generations, from '60s hippiedom to '70s gaydom to today's techdom.

The historical analogs are many, so here are just a few. Consider Huckleberry House, a shelter for stray children — literal lost boys and girls seeking the promised land of Haight-Ashbury. This refuge from the violent strictures of exurban American family life was a beacon for runaways, and it was the symbol of its era in late '60s San Francisco, one usually criticized by conservative politicians.

Another roguish figure of the times was the Diggers, a piratical group of anti-capitalists who came to govern their entire neighborhood. The Diggers ran the Haight, providing meals, parties, and political mantras. A few of their notable "happenings" were the "Death of Money Parade," and the "Invisible Circus."

The Cockettes, a psychadelic drag troupe, emerged at the end of the decade, subverting gender and representing San Francisco on tour. Drag is a big part of Neverland: From the original theatrical production of Peter Pan to the Mary Martin classic to the recent live version starring Allison Williams, Peter is typically portrayed by a woman, implying a connection between youth and gender fluidity. That could be another way the Bay Area maintains its youth: by playing with gender expression.

Still, gender undeniably operates in Neverland as the lost boys crave a mother figure in Wendy Darling, a kind of Mama Smurf. The gender imbalance on the magic isle could be a strong reason for comparison to San Francisco. Here, a male-dominated culture — or at least the stereotype of one — exists from the Castro to Silicon Valley.

That isn't to say the boys' club aspect of Neverland is its strength. In fact, it might be among its weaknesses. It's never been said that Neverland is a perfect sort of heaven. Though mermaids, fairies, and magic flourish there, Captain Hook threatens to kidnap, kill, and ruin. Likewise, troubles were many for the youth of Huckleberry House and for the Diggers — from governmental pushback to destruction wrought by drug use. But we forget that Neverland, too, was inevitably half Lord of The Flies — a place of peace and freedom from authority that inevitably has its own struggles staying civil.

The "anything-goes" San Francisco has come and gone over the years, notably as the free-loving '60s gave way to the nightmarish '70s. Among a cast of horrors from Jim Jones to the Zebra Killings, one oft-cited turning point was Altamont. The music festival featuring Santana and the Rolling Stones quickly became a free-for-all, partly thanks to a decidedly Neverlandian move of designating the Hell's Angels gang as the festival's security. By the time the horrified Stones took the stage, the mood was violent, even lethal. 18-year-old Meredith Hunter was killed in the fracas, and the event is generally considered the final death knell of the Woodstock era.

But, just like it's been obscured by fog and shaken by earthquake, the city remained, and even managed to stay weird, as they say. Today, there's plenty of youthful vibrancy and Peter Pandom here thanks to an influx of young, imaginative techies and a still very sizable gay population. We've got invention, play, and performance. But there are new nightmares, with still plentiful homelessness and a recent wave of evictions. Mere clapping for Tinkerbell isn't going to keep the magic alive: We have to.

Though Wendy chooses to leave Neverland, there's an interesting hint in many versions of the story. It's implied that Mrs. Darling, Wendy's mother, was whisked away by Peter back in her girlhood only to return home, as Wendy does, to lead a normal life. Moreover, the original story contains an addendum in which Peter returns to abscond with Wendy's daughter.

In addition to being more than a little creepy, the detail could be read as comment on how Neverland exists for many of us. It's a place of joy that must be remembered but not eternally inhabited, a realm and a time passed on, in our inescapable old age, to the next generation of would-be "eternal" youths. Though childish memory and behavior may keep us light of heart, we're inevitably mortal. We age, we die, though in its way, Neverland is always ours. Here in SF, most of us are Wendy, not Peter, and that's not a bad thing.

The details were fuzzier before, and it seemed like the place was being prepped for some kind of exposure. Now it is becoming clear that the co-owners of Neverland, a real estate firm called Colony Capital LLC, want to offload the place to some entrepreneur or mega-wealthy fan so that they can turn it into the tourist attraction it seems destined to become. They opened the property to the news media on Thursday, seemingly with the hope of showing it off to potential buyers. And Michael hadn't even been living there for four years -- after his 2005 child molestation trial he felt the spirit of the place had been destroyed, and he moved to another house five miles up the road. In 2008 sold a share of the house to Colony Capital in order to assist with $24 million in mortgage arrears. So the road trip is still on, kids! All you have to do is show a press credential or pretend to be a wealthy buyer to get in!

The NY Times has this nice slide show of Neverland, which smacks a little of a broker's sales portfolio, especially since the place has pretty much been emptied of furniture. That is, except for the ice cream cart which was a gift from Elizabeth Taylor.

Sadly, for all concerned -- including the deceased -- Michael Jackson's public memorial is going to take place at the Staples Center, Tuesday, July 7th at 10 a.m. and tickets will cost $25. We're guessing Diana Ross is going to sing. In any event, we still encourage the die-hard fans and all those who never say no to a road-trip to swing on by Neverland, where plenty of sod-laying and moving van activity seems to indicate that something is going to happen there... and at the very least it will likely open as a tourist attraction that will rival Graceland both in size, and bizarreness.