What is most interesting to see that we all seem to attracted to beautiful women/good looking men. It is an inbuilt human perception.
Human seems to attracted to object of beauty and desire to have it. This is quite true among male, however, from my observation, generally, female are less shallow than male.
Beautiful or good looking he/she is externally, rarely we come to discover the beauty inside us. Because it cannot be hold and it cannot be seen easily. It can be demostrated.
Some (i can't remember who) have said that they don't want to be brought down, or made stupider, by their partner
No one can made stupider or brought down except yourself. Imagine, you meet a very beautiful woman ,physically, she is what you want. She is funny, interesting and feminine. Your desire to want her overwhelm you. You try to seek an acceptance from her. You try to do things that she think you are interesting and funny to be with.
I know a female who used to drink excessive alcohol in order to gain approval and acceptance from the good looking male so that the male could perceive her as interesting, funny, and not 'out of box'. If one's boyfriend starts smoking drugs, his partner will soon start smoking drug too just to gain acceptance. In extreme, it leads to self-destruction. Look around and you will see. Investigate your past behaviour and you will understand.
We ,human, desire to seek acceptance but we need to understand the limit. In the journey of seeking accepetance and love, we should avoid path that lead to self-destruction. Those who know how to care themselves will know how to care his/her partner properly. In the area of where I live, it is obvious. My heart ached but I couldn't do anything that can change it.
It's just something i've been thinking about recently... whether or not to have sex before marriage, and what type of girl to go for.
I think it depends on our choices of life. The most important thing is what is marriage? I cannot keep wondering whether the idea of marriage ever occur in Thiaoouba. What are the factors that determine whether or not to have sex before marriage? Is it that you something within you that find it hard to control or because if you have sex before marriage you will let your ego/demon to run amonk in your mind or risking becoming *** becuase sex is so easily obtained? I think the answer entirely determine by one own understanding of oneself and your understanding of what is marriage.
What I find the most important is the desire to understand me. The more you understand yourself the more 'complicated' your mind become and the easier you understand others. A sense of intelligence and a sence of open-minded and capable of self-reflective is condition for a good company whether it is your life company or your friends.
For example, my friend could give me a bag of potatoe crisps to me to eat, but it is one of the worst food on earth. It made me having sore-throat the next morning, probably because of excessive salts or strange additive inside. They get annoyed when I refused to have some. The only way is to tell them why I dislike it. I am sure that they feel strange of my answers. When you have taken care of your body, your body becomes efficienct on detoxicification . Your body is sensitive enough of food which is bad for you. Your body quickly tell you that this food is bad by showing its effect the next day. Most people have dulled their senses by excessive consumption of alcohols, junk foods and smoke. Their toxics are stored somewhere waiting to develop into 'horrible' illness. Hence, it is not a good idea to dull our senses.
Your senses are a great tool of learning of yourself and about life!! Take care of it and it will teach you tremendous things of life without going through so much suffering in life. Learning of yourself and about life should be fun!!Opppss..too long and sound like a bit off of topic.
It's just something i've been thinking about recently... whether or not to have sex before marriage, and what type of girl to go for.
Be with whom you feel is best for you. We are here to learn love are we not ? I think that you will find in every person something primitive, something rather dissapointing. However, there are still those individuals whom you can love for their intellect. 
Thanks for the great responses bomo and GI. I agree 100% with everything you say. I liked that last part in bold, too, bomohawkl. something that i need to be reminded of every so often that i overdose on junk food cause i'm feeling down