My sister Joan says she has a “stalker”. A guy from her student ward who’d given her rides to activities a few times has now started emailing and instant-messaging her all the time. She has turned down repeated date invitations, but he keeps asking. He’s not lurking outside her window or anything, but she’s still a little creeped out.

It brings up the question of where the line between persistence and stalking is. They’d been cordial to each other in the past when she was still accepting rides from him, so how long is it okay for him to persist in case she’s just playing hard to get now that he’s showing interest in more of a relationship? I’ve heard of girls who do that to see whether a guy is willing to keep trying (annoying!), and I’ve heard of people who ended up at least being friends after a first date that required a little extra persistence from a guy.

You can’t fault a guy for being interested, and I don’t think there’s anything wrong with asking a few times before giving up. But it sounds like this guy has been clinging on a little too long.