The Art of Talking to Women

While I typically like to spend New Year's Eve at home on the couch, I broke out of the mold in 2010 and went to a New Year's Eve party. The guy hosting the party works with my friend Bill at Costco.

Once I arrived, a quick sweep of the room confirmed that there were no potential future husbands in this bunch, so I struck up a conversation with the first person I came accross. I can't tell you the name of the fellow I was talking to (that's just how memorable he was), but I can tell you he was completely clueless about how to talk to pretty women. Our conversation went as follows:

Clueless Dude: So, yeah. Have you seen this show on HBO called "Spartacus"?

Me: I don't have cable. Just Netflix.

Clueless Dude: Oh. Have you ever seen the movies "Troy" or "300"?

Me: Yeah, dude movies. Lots of blood, guts, and fighting.

Clueless Dude: Yeah! Well, "Spartacus" is a lot like those movies! It's really great. You'd like it.

Me: I doubt it. It's not really my favorite genre.

Clueless Dude: Oh, well it's got a healthy amount of porno in it too!

Me: Um, yeah. Still not my thing.

Clueless Dude: What? You don't like porn?

Me: Um, I guess I like the occasional steamy scene, but no, I don't typically sit down and watch porn.

Clueless Dude: Oh. Well . . . that's weird. *Clueless Dude stands there awkwardly for five seconds and then heads over to the margarita machine.*

This guy clearly had no idea what women are into. A safer question for him to ask would have been, "What's your favorite TV show?" Then, depending on my response, he could have proceded accordingly. My response would have been, "It's hard to pick. I watch a lot of BBC shows. But I also really like 'The Office', 'Lost', and 'Gilmore Girls'." Even if he had no idea what the BBC was, chances are he's seen one of the other shows I named off. This gives him a decent range of what I'm interested in, at least TV wise, and he can procede by talking about any common TV ground we may share. But no. None of what I just wrote would make any sense to Clueless Dude because he doesn't think. He just says whatever pops into his head. He probably doesn't get why he hasn't had a date in five years, except with that chick from Lawn and Garden who loves Rusell Crowe movies and has a second job at Cirillas.

That wasn't even the last of my conversations with Clueless guy. He later bragged about how he was the valedictorian of his high school graduating class of four people. He then confessed he was actually pretty stupid and had to go to an alternative school just to get his diploma. I'm not sure why he thought bragging about his lack of intelligence would be appealing to me. I just shook my head and spaced out for the remainder of the conversation. When I was leaving the party and saying goodbye to everyone, I extended my hand to Clueless Guy for a handshake. "Nice to meet you," I said, hoping he would get my obvious attempt to avoid a hug. Nope. He shook my hand and then went for the hug anyway. What an idiot.

And this was no isolated incident. I met an equally as Clueless Guy just two days before at Old Chicago. I'd gotten off work at 11:30 at night, and was headed home after a long shift. I stopped at the bar to say hi to my friend Kate, who was having a brewsky. Kate used to work at Old Chicago, so we chatted for a while. I told her it was my birthday the next day, and she and two of her friends demanded that I stay and have a drink in honor of my birthday. And so I agreed.

I sat down at the bar next to her friend, Kelly. Kelly was a nice enough guy. He was also fairly intelligent. We chatted about his job in Colorado and how he was a philosophy major. We discussed foreign films and foreign language. He even spoke to me in fairly decent Italian when he found out I took four semesters of Italian at KU. He told me about his plans to go to grad school in Boston. It was suprisingly decent conversation.

However, things quickly took a turn for the clueless. Kelly kept trying to persuade me to take shots with them and to stay out all night and party! It was, after all, my birthday the next day.

"Oh, just call in sick tomorrow! No big deal!"

Kelly did not have an off button. No matter how much I protested, and no matter how many legitimate reasons I gave him for only having one beer and going home to bed, he kept at it. Halfway though our conversation, Kelly put his arm around the back of my chair. Great. He was already closing off my exit. When I'd finally had enough of Kelly and had finished my beer, I paid my tab and got up from my stool to leave.

"Don't leave!" Kelly said, grabbing my wrist, "You have to stay and party with us!" I tried to be polite.

"Look, dude. What's your name again? Anyway, I'm leaving now."

"No! You have to stay and be irresponsible with me!"

"No, really, I'm going home and going to bed. I have to be at work at 7:00 am."

It was at this point that Kelly grabbed both of my wrists and tried to pull me towards him. It was also at this point that I had to summon all that was within me to not punch old Kelly boy in the face. I wrenched my hands from Clueless Kelly's grip and backed away about three feet.

"It was nice to meet you. I'm leaving now."

"Well obviously it wasn't that nice since you're leaving," he quipped.

"Yeah, bye."

I was so irritated. Can guys really be this clueless? If you get to the point where you have to physically restrain a girl from leaving your presence, she probably ain't interested. If Clueless Kelly hadn't been a friend of my friend, he probably would have gotten punched, and he would have heard a stream of very colorful words. I've always wondered how much damage a swift elbow to the jaw could do.

I related these very amusing stories to two of my co-workers at Old Chicago, one of whom is a married man in his forties.

"Guys just don't understand the art of talking to women," my married, guy friend John remarked. "Some of these pick up lines guys use these days: 'Nice shoes. Wanna have sex?' When has that line ever worked?" he asked. I mused to myself that it would probably work on the chick from Lawn and Garden. Guys like John have women figured out. They respect and appreciate women.

I guess I just feel like I'm drowning in a sea of clueless lately. Someone throw me a life preserver of common sense. I just want to know that there is at least one, non-clueless guy left out there.

I just don't get it.

Mars. Venus. John Gray had it right.