safety strategies

And back to border crossings that take forever and give of time to write...
I'm on my way from Skopje (again) to Nis, and in a truck which is what is causing the delay. I could get out and try for a car, which would in faster, but might not take me the whole way, and i would lose the time advantage waiting for another ride. This guy seems nice enough, and speaks enough german that we communicate quite well, and is going all the way to Nis and beyond. I just have to wait for this incredibly long line of trucks to move. Which they haven't since we stopped here 10mins ago...
So it turns out there is some post of problem with the serbian computer system, and all the trucks are stopped. Some have been waiting 3 hours already. So i said goodbye to my driver and walked through the border to try my luck on the other side. And find a bathroom. I found both quite easily, and got another ride in another truck that had got through the border, but this time with a young guy i seen to have no languages in common with.
Just about every driver, in any kind of vehicle, in any language, seems to have the same list of questions and conversation topics to cover. First comes the 'where are you from' part, and then the 'where are you going to / coming from' and questions about my whole trip. Then there's the surprise that i'm doing it all by hitchhiking, and alone, what's more. Which almost inevitably leads to the 'are you married / do you have a boyfriend' question, at which point the conversation either moves on to other topics (languages spoken, countries visited, how far away and beautiful australia is, and whether i think they could get a visa...) or becomes more uncomfortable as they suggest i marry a [insert country here] man. And aren't [insert country here] men handsome, and don't i like them? Occasionally this leads on to where i am staying that night, and why don't i stay with them.
I have a few strategies that deflect some of these questions. In turkey when i was travelling with Xav and Marcin, i was doing all the communicating, and the questions took pretty much the same line (but more frequently got more uncomfortable, as turkish men are just generally irritating like that), with, of course, the added question about which of the two guys was 'mine'. After the first couple of drivers, i picked Xav to be my husband. ("xav, i know we only net two days ago, but i just told our driver that we are married...), and when asked where my ring was, said he had on money to buy one.
On my own i have a different strategy. I invent a friend in the town i am going to, and usually let it be assumed that it is a male friend. If i have a couchsurfer to meet, then i use what i know about them, and embellish as i like (or as i can in whatever language we're using), but i've also just invented completely fictitious people. The other day i made up an entire family. Sort of accidentally, as he was asking me (in a combination of albanian and macedonian and german and slightly lewd hand gestures) if it was a man or woman friend i was meeting. I got confused, somehow, and ended up saying both- a couple, in fact. Americans. And then if asked if they had children, and i thought i said no, but then if asked how many children, and i thought 'oh well' and invented a 6 year old daughter.
Whoever i choose to invent, i let the driver know there is someone waiting for me, even sometimes writing or receiving a fictitious sms from them. I figure it'r all just slightly safer that way!