How To Bag The Best Babes

Attention geeks, nerds and social misfits! Tired of not having a date on Saturday night? Tired of being completely ignored by the opposite sex, or worse, being laughed at by them? Now you too can bag the best babes! Yes, even you! By following the following tips, you too can become a total chick magnet (or at least manage to get a girl to talk to you like you’re a human being)! Just think, no more expensive bills from eHarmony or Adult Friend Finder! These secrets have been passed down through the ages, and are now available to you free of charge (and worth every penny).

1. Shower Regularly. I know this is a difficult concept to get your highly refined mind around, but personal hygiene is important to women. I know, I know, I don’t get it either. But the sooner you figure this out, the better. In addition to showering regularly, consider using an effective underarm deodorant. Believe it or not, this can be purchased at your local grocery store for a mere pittance! You may even consider using an aftershave or cologne, but go easy on the stuff. Too much and you could melt people’s eyes out when you enter a room.
2. Drop the Geeky Persona. This might be asking a lot, but it’s not as hard as it sounds. If you’re like 90% of the nerds out there, you already do this when you play your favorite RPG. Before speaking or doing anything, ask yourself, “What would Jethro the 14th level Barbarian-Magic User do in this situation?” An easy way to remember this is by using the acronym WWJFLBMUD. You might even consider making a bracelet with these letters on it as a reminder. Other ways to drop your geeky persona include:
   1. Dropping that nasally voice you normally speak with. Most nerds are quite capable of doing this already. Think about the number of voices you use when quoting Monty Python, or Star Wars. Pick an actor that you think represents pure masculinity and do your best to mimic his voice. Please Note: Any attempts to imitate Chuck Norris will fail miserably. There is only one Chuck Norris. You are not, nor will you ever be, him.
      
   2. One word: Lasik.
   3. Another word: Dermatologist.
3. Put Away Geekish Things. This is quite possibly the hardest thing you will have to do, but it is a necessary step. Do not, under any circumstances mention any of the following: role-playing games, comic books or anime. Hide your collections of such things as if they were pornography and your mother is threatening to search your room.Computers and the internet are okay to talk about, as long as you restrict your conversation to such things as mySpace or YouTube. If you must talk about what kind of system you own, tell everyone that you own a Mac. Don’t even think about using the word “Linux” in casual conversation.Unfortunately, you will also have to ditch your regular friends for a while. You don’t have to do this rudely. When they call you up and ask if you’re going to Donald’s all night AD&D game, politely tell them that you’re busy that evening.
4. Don’t Treat Women Like Objects. I realize that popular culture and internet pornography are teaching you otherwise but, believe it or not, women are people. No! Really! I didn’t believe it at first either, but it’s absolutely true! They’re made up of more than just breasts and vaginas. Some of them even have brains! Really! I’m not making this up! Try talking to one sometime, you’ll be as surprised as I was.

If you follow these four tips diligently, you will soon be well on your way to having your very own girlfriend. I realize that it is a large sacrifice, and you may want to protest that you will have to give up being who you are in order to accomplish your goal. This isn’t quite true, because the goal here is not to be a total sell-out. The goal is to get a woman to acknowledge your humanity so that you can ask her out, without her having to get out the pepper spray (this can be tricky – if she reaches into her purse, assume she is going for a pen to jot down her phone number for you, but be prepared to duck… just in case). Once you have been in a relationship for a while, begin introducing elements of your geekdom back into your life. For instance, invite her to meet one of your friends (and only one, it’s important to take these things slowly). Gauge her reaction, and if it’s favorable (or at least not utter revulsion), introduce something else (save the anime for last, trust me). Over time, your geekdom will become very apparent, but by then she’ll be so involved in the relationship that it will be too late to go back. It worked for me. I was married for almost three years before my wife realized what a nerd I was.

Overheard in my Living Room

JR: Dude! You have five women living in your house.
Me: Yeah. You noticed that, did you? You’re very sharp today.
JR: I hope you give them a lot of support.
Me: I give them space.
JR: What?
Me: I give them space. Lots and lots of space. It’s almost the same thing as support, and it keeps me sane.

I, Dirt

I live in dirt. I know that sounds odd, but it’s true. If you’ve ever been to the Mojave Desert, you’ll know what I’m talking about. Most of the Mojave is made up of dirt. And it’s not fun dirt, either. It’s dry and hard and nothing grows in it except for weeds and Joshua trees. I wash my car, and two days later it looks like it’s never been cleaned. I had to dump a ton of soil in our yard just to grow some grass. You get the picture.

I also live in wind. The winds in the High Desert of California are legendary. You’d think that having a nice breeze blowing through would be a good thing, cool things down and such, but it’s not. The wind is hard and unsteady, stopping intermittently only to start again and blow all that much harder. You can almost hear the wind god turn his head, inhale and then turn back to exhale with a loud “SSshhhhhhshhhhhheeeeeeeeeewwwwww.” Then he turns his head and starts the whole process all over again. I tried flying a kite in this wind once. The kite sailed up into the air. Then the wind died and it started to plummet. Then the wind started up again, and instead of sending the kite back up into the air, it grabbed it and threw it to the ground. I could almost see the face of the wind god laughing maniacally. I know I heard him as I picked up the broken pieces of $3.99 Kmart Special. The gods only think they have a sense of humor.

When wind and dirt get together, it’s not pretty. I was sitting in my living room one Saturday afternoon and heard a loud BOOM and sort of a whooshing noise. I looked out the front window to see that a dust devil the size of the Chrysler Building had just attacked our house and was moving onto my neighbor’s. I went outside and found that the swing set had been upended and my entire house was covered in a thick layer of dirt, along with miscellaneous bits of trash. That was fun to clean up.

I mention all of this simply because I wanted to give some context for this story. This week my wife landed a job teaching kindergarten at a local elementary school. She’s very excited, but also a bit stressed because the school year starts on Monday and she needs to get her classroom ready quickly. Yesterday she brought two metal bookshelves home from her classroom that she intended to spray paint in bright red and blue colors. Because her time is limited, she wanted to get it done right away. However, it was very windy outside, and I told her that it probably wasn’t a good idea to spray paint outside. I was worried that the paint would blow all over her, all over the yard, all over the house, etc. I was also worried that dirt might get blown all over the wet paint. I suggested that she put down some newspaper and paint them in the garage. She didn’t think it was such a great idea, but was willing to defer to my obviously expert opinion on the matter.

Half an hour later I was in the bedroom reading when I felt that strange burning sensation I get when I’m being glared at angrily. I looked up from my book to find my wife boring a hole in my forehead using nothing but her eyes.

“What’s wrong, Snookums?” I don’t know why I resort to pet names when I know I’m in trouble. It’s never had the intended effect.

“You… told… me… to… paint… in… the… garage…” Her voice was cold, but obviously restrained. I could tell I was on shaky ground.

“Um. What happened?” I asked with as much innocence in my voice as I could possibly muster.

“Follow me!”

Obediently I got up and followed her into the garage. A red haze hung in the air. Not only that, but everything in the garage now had a red tint to it – the areas of floor not covered by newspaper, the kids’ bikes, some laundry piled up by the washing machine, a few boxes, everything.

“Um. Sorry?” I ventured.

I won’t elaborate on what followed, I’m trying to put it behind me. Suffice to say that I now not only live in dirt, I also feel like dirt… At least I’m in my native element.

Lack of Slumber Party

“Slumber Party” – I want to meet the person that came up with that term, because it’s a completely inadequate – if not downright deceitful – way to describe it, and I’d like to slap them around a bit. Slumber is something that never happens at these things.

My daughters had some friends over Saturday afternoon, and as evening drew near they decided to see if they could have a sleep-over (another horrible way to describe it). They consulted my wife who, for some reason known only to her and God, she said, “Sure. That would be fun!”

Now when I was a boy of about 12, the idea of being in a house with nearly a dozen teen and pre-teen girls all dancing around in their pajamas and giggling might have been appealing. These days, however, the thought isn’t quite so attractive – for reasons that I hope are obvious. But there’s also the less obvious reason – something I really didn’t think too much about when I was 12 – that when girls get together they have a language all their own.

This exclusively female language involves many things, most of which are incomprehensible to men – which is why we find it so annoying. I will try to describe it here as best I can. It seems to be a mishmash of several things. Part of it resembles American Sign Language, with a lot of emphatic hand/arm gesturing. The odd thing is, it’s not always the one speaking that does the gesturing. Second, inserted here and there are comprehensible English words, broken up with snorts of laughter and random giggling. These are never complete sentences, though some may start out like they’re going to be. Here’s an example of what I’m taking about from part of a conversation I overheard on Saturday night:

“And then… and then…” Hands waving up and down as if shooing away a fly.
“She said… y’know. Ohmygosh! Ohmygosh!” This coming from a different girl on the other side of the room. Her cheeks puffed out at this point and she started turning purple.
This was followed by a huge gail of laughter from everyone in the room.
“But… but…” Another person injected after the laughter had subsided somewhat. “How could she… with the… the…”
“Because… you know.” More hand gestures, followed by more giggling.

They all seemed to know what the conversation was about, and that whatever they were going on about was uproariously funny. This lead me to conclude that – like dogs (though I’m not comparing women to dogs) – women can read minds. Maybe that’s why they expect men to be able to do it, and get angry when we say that we can’t.

“Honey, you look upset. What’s wrong?”
“You mean you don’t know?”
“How can I know if you don’t tell me?”
Angry glare.

About the only redeeming thing about the whole slumber party incident is that my wife joined in on the dancing around in pajamas thing. That was kind of fun to watch. Oh, and secretly video. I put it up on YouTube for everyone’s enjoyment.

No, just kidding about the YouTube thing. I enjoy breathing and would like to keep doing it for as long as possible. But you can click on the link anyway.

Go on. I dare you.

Understanding Women Part II

Okay, so I found out what my daughter meant when she said she was “going to do her hair.” She meant she was going to color it. But it wasn’t just her. It was all four of my kids. They all decided to color their hair for Easter… Yeah, I know what the guys are thinking – but only because I thought it too – “You’re supposed to color eggs for easter.” Fortunately I didn’t say that out loud…

Anyway… Where was I? Oh, yeah… Hair color. Do any of you men out there know how noxious the fumes from hair dye is? Good grief! Within 5 minutes of those bottles (or tubes or whatever they were) being opened, the entire house smelled like a toxic waste dump! I used to work for a petroleum distributor a few years back and we handled some pretty nasty chemicals, but there was nothing that compared with this. I swear my eyes actually started bleeding… Okay, that’s an exageration. But they did water quite a bit. I went through every room of the house, opening windows and turning on ceiling fans. I opened the back door and all the animals ran out, squealing in terror! (Okay, I made that last bit up). I couldn’t believe they were putting this stuff in their hair! Hair dye? Try hair die. I’m surprised they didn’t all wake up bald the next day… Of course my wife assures me that it’s supposed to smell like that, and I shouldn’t worry. Okay, but it’s a wonder that the smoke detectors didn’t go off. Really! Those fumes could peel paint!

This morning, one of my daughters showed me her shoulder. Apparently some of the hair dye had dripped onto it, and now she’s got a big stain on her skin. I told her I was surprised it hadn’t eaten away her flesh!

But now all of my girls have new beautiful hair for Easter. So I guess it was worth it. We’re all going to die of brain aneurysms, but that’s okay. We look good, and that’s what’s important.