Hey, make sure you check out Part 1 here before going on. OK? And make sure to tuck in your shirt and wipe that dirt off yer face before entering.
***
Three Pros About Being Single
You can get some from theoretically anyone.
You become oddly optimistic when you’re single. The feeling never really lasts permanently…well, unless you’re on meds, but let’s assume that’s not the case here. This euphoria may last a few hours, days, maybe even weeks. And it generally takes the form of: “You know, there’s a fantastically hot person out there that I’s like to shag, and who I have a sneaking suspicion will want to shag yours truly as well.” And you walk to work, or into a store, or jury duty, and you’re scoping for that lucky someone who gets to nail you senseless.
The possibilities are endless, and as such, your imagination runs wild, usually promoted by images in beer commercials. Lithe, tan bodies await you. You just need to find them, pin them against the wall, and take what’s yours. And here’s the best part: you can decide who this lucky person is. Like the band Snap, you’ve got the power.
You aren’t expected to actually do anything nice, and thus anything you do seems special and leads to at least heavy petting.
This point works whether the person you do something nice for is single or already taken. If they are single, and you do something nice for them, they just might follow you home. To quote Staind, “it’s been awhile”. Girls will dig it so long as they don’t think you’ve got the above beer commercial fantasy running through your head. In fact, if you do something nice for them and clearly show (not say!) you don’t wanna shag them, they will wanna know why the hell not and find every way possible to shag you as soon as possible. (If you say you don’t wanna shag them, the game is up. Either way, the girl will know what you’re up to, but for some reason, she’ll try to prove herself shaggable anyway if you take the former tact. Hey, I’m just the messenger here, people. Don’t shoot.)
Guys will dig it in that we’re always looking for girls to give us a hint that they are interested, since we’re clearly too dumb to know ourselves. And you could argue that people don’t just do nice things to get some, and that’s really cute and all, but let’s be real. I’ve made a few dozen compilations in my life, and as Travolta says in “Pulp Fiction”, “…they ALL meant something.”
If you do something nice for someone who’s taken, they just might be in a position where they say, “Hey, what a sec…why is this person treating me nicer than the person I’m actually dating?” And depending on your own morals, you can either be the “side project” or rebound person in no time flat. I’m not advocating the sabotage of relationships here. I am, however, saying that if a simple nice gesture breaks up a relationship between two people, then it wasn’t much of a relationship to begin with.
You’ve got a blank slate with which to forge new relationships.
You don’t know them, they don’t know you. You can have a lot of fun with this.
For starters, they don’t know your funny stories. Usually people have at least four or five funny stories, at least. So you can drop a few almost instantly to get them hooked. It’s a bit how a band drops a few major hits early in the set of a live show before settling into the deeper album cuts for a while. It’s why you start a compilation mix off with a bang before cooling it off. It’s all related. Trust me.
So, you’ve got your “funny” part down, and people always say they value sense of humor, so this will work in your favor. Now, most people could be lying, but I don’t think so. They want looks as well, but if you’re chatting them up, they don’t think you are ugly, so you’re in. Humor can only help. Make sure you know your five best stories. Practice them in the mirror. It’ll pay off, trust me. These newbies haven’t heard your stories, unlike your ex, who didn’t laugh after the third time you told it, yawned the 6th time you told it, and threw a shoe the 10th time you repeated it.
In addition, almost anything about you will be interesting. The boredom comes much later. Like, at least a month from now. Furthermore, you’re extremely attuned to what they have to say, mostly because you’re probably interested in snogging at some point with this person. A person who hangs on your every word is sexy. A person who hangs out on your lawn? Not as sexy. But for now, in this blank slate state, it’s just two people finding out about each other, and it can be great.
***
We’re in the home stretch, folks. Last iteration coming up:
Three Cons About Being Single
Face it: generally, you’re generally not going to get any, you ugly loser person.
You know, those beer commercials exist in the same way that most pieces of art exist: as a work of fiction. And unlike good fiction, beer commercials don’t shed light on the commonality of human existence. They simply serve to show you all the people you’ll never see naked in real life.
Guys who go out simply to get some never do, unless their name happens to be “Orlando Bloom”, in which case they see more ass than a rental car. Girls can smell it a mile away, and since we’re letting our pants do the thinking, we’re as a rule not smart enough to hide our intent. Girls, wisely, shun us like the plague.
Girls who go out to get simply usually don’t because they have one thing guys generally don’t, and that is “standards”. I can’t tell you how many good-looking girls I know aren’t getting any, because even if they have the attitude of “OK, fine, tonite I’m gonna get me some,” once at the bar/club they generally act as if they’ve swallowed something particularly nasty. Guys will have standards that decrease by the hour: there are girls you talk to at 10, then girls you hold off until 11, then 12, etc. It’s a bit like Dante’s Circles of Hell, mostly because that’s where a lot of us are ending up anyway.
And even if, after all of this, you do succeed, you’ve generally got to start the whole thing over again from scratch, and really, after a while, who’s got the time and money for all of that? Just remember: porn is the gift that keeps on giving. Return on investment? High. A tip from me to you.
Action? Act of kindness. Reaction? Can of mace deposited into your eyes.
Maybe it’s a Boston thing. Or a Northeast thing. Not quite sure. But the easiest way to make someone thing you’re absolutely out of your mind nuts is to perform a random act of kindness towards them. Easiest way by far. People simply don’t know how to react. In good incidences, people go from “flabbergasted” to “graciously appreciative”. However, as is often the case, they can also go from “flabbergasted” to “fleeing in abject terror”. Somewhere in the middle lies the general reaction, though.
Both sides get shafted when the issue revolves around a nice gesture towards a maybe-eventual object of affection. In the girl’s case, she’ll do something nice for a guy, and be upset when he doesn’t notice. Here’s a PSA for all you ladies: men don’t get hints. And the only signs we get are the ones you make out of crayons and construction paper. Plain, direct, and simple. That we get. Anything short of, “Wanna come hang out and drink tequila from my navel?” will be lost on us. Not saying it’s right, just sayin’ that them’s the facts.
As for men, well, those of my generation have been trained to be romantic. We don’t always know why we’re supposed to give flowers, but we know you like them, and that’s OK for us. (I once saw a girl in a play of mine receive pre-dried flowers, and had no idea for two weeks why she was so happy to get flowers that were already dead. Yea, welcome to my world.) But every guy, at least once, has seen that unmistakeable look of panic in the eyes of the girl for whom we’ve done an unsolicited nice deed. Because unlike men, women can read signs, and like Ace of Base, it’s opened up their eyes, and they do NOT like what they see whatsoever. And we guys can see that look, and it makes us want to be as dead as those pre-dried flowers.
As the other person fills in their slate, you remember reading about that escaped mental patient in the paper that morning.
It’s always great getting to know someone, until that very clear, distinct point that you want to possess the power of teleportation and pull a Nightcrawler out of the bar and back home.
After all, it’s always a crap-shoot, meeting new people. One man’s meat is another man’s social poison. I generally don’t like…well, humanity, really. Takes a lot for me to like someone. I have a lower threshold for simply tolerating someone else’s right to co-existence in my general space, but all in all, I’ll admit of somewhat of a snob. It’s not that I’m better than everyone else…oh wait, that’s exactly it.
It’s a common fallacy, perpetrated throughout the years, that we all have to get along. We don’t.. Plain and simple. I’m not advocating violence against my common man, far from it. I’m just saying there’s plenty of space to go around, and really, you do your thing, I’ll do mine. I don’t care about your job, you shouldn’t care about mine. I like my music just fine, don’t need your opinion on Coldplay either way. Great if ya like 'em, it's all fine if ya don't.
And really, so much of meeting people is pretending to like stupid crap you really, really don’t. Either I find you interesting or I don’t. I expect no more, no less from you towards me. Neither of us are under any obligation to like each other. I find that kinda cool. Makes finding the interesting people that much more special, in my books. I don’t think it’s wrong to have high expectations. But nooooo…we’re supposed to all sing kumbaya together, regardless of quality. Me? I’m not buying it.
Point is, I have a good amount of people I like. And while I’m not inherently against meeting new people, I’m not hunkering for the opportunity, either. Friendships develop over time. More time than a few beers could ever allow. I’ll shake your hand, I’ll try to learn your name, I won’t interrupt your tales of backpacking in Bavaria, but honestly, it takes more than that. As Shania would say, that don’t impress me much.
***
Well, that was an interesting exercise, methinks. Hopefully struck a few familiar chords. Maybe raised a few eyebrows. Either way, you’ve made it this far, so bravo, I say. Thoughts, reactions, comments, haiku…hit me baby, one more time. My loneliness is killing me.
Posted by Ryan McGee at March 17, 2004 12:05 AM