Five Tips for Approaching Men in Real Life -- My Version

So, I'm sitting here minding my own business on Facebook a few minutes ago...when this story popped up on my Facefeed...so, naturally, I decided to make fun of it.  I don't know how things like this get published and I certainly hope they got paid what I thought it was worth to write it. Seriously...people get actual real money for this drivel?  I also hope you enjoy it somewhat...and, yes, feel free to share it.  Share it on Reddit and Twitter and hashtag sites and MomMe and every other damn website that could possibly start paying me to write content for them.  Whatever that Grumpy Cat person did?  Do that.  Do that a lot for me.  Yes, I'm dead serious. 

I think you have to read their article first and then mine for it to make any real sense...so...just skip down first and then scroll back up when you've read it and then read mine.  This was written by Lisa Copeland...who, I'm thinking, is a self-professed "Dating Coach for Women Over 50".  Yes, it actually says that in the blog...so I'm giving her full credit for it.

Okay, let me get this straight here...but...let me straighten you out here...these are my five "new and improved" tips for approaching men in real life...

Make eye contact with him for a full five seconds. Hold his face steady for all five of the seconds...and employ one or both hands to do so.

I have to ask him a question...such as..."Hey, there are 17 other empty chairs in this Starbucks - at six other tables...but, I like this one the best because the sun is in my vernal biological equinox...do you mind if I sit here and stare at you a while?" Or, perhaps..."I'm thinking of getting a blue Mercedes likes yours parked outside...would you recommend it? Oh, you're not the guy with the blue Mercedes? Okay...um...well...um...the Earth's orbital rotation just shifted a bit...I'm going to have to ask if that other guy over there's chair is taken...sorry."

Let him answer a question you have for him...such as, "Um...is that your blue Mercedes in the parking lot with the out of state plates? Are you interested in picking up someone from their house for dinner with you in your blue Mercedes with the out of state plates?"

Take a cue from an old "I Love Lucy" show - and shove as many chocolate bon-bons into your mouth as you can at one time...sorta like Lucy and Ethel did in the "Candy Making" episode. Trust me...I'm sure you'll get his attention with this one a LOT better than dropping some cheap cell phone you just picked up at the Dollar Store for the sole purpose of dropping and shattering in front of him.

Lastly...and I quote from her article and not mine: "His job is to ask you out if he's interested in you. If he's not, it doesn't mean he's personally rejecting you. He might be married, have a girlfriend or you might not be his type." Hmmmm...I'm thinking "...might not be his type" is possibly "dating tips for women over 50" code for "he's gay"...but, apparently they couldn't come right out and say that because...apparently we are still dropping handkerchiefs as fast as instilling old Victorian sexual mores on clichéd dating tips websites.


This was fun...maybe we can do it again some day.

5 Tips for Approaching Men in Real Life


Mariann Simms aka Mariann Eperjesi is a freelance writer who is currently writing whatever she can to get noticed by anyone who will employ her for doing so.  She can be found most nights totally perplexed by what she reads online...and can be found at her blog, "Blogged Down at the Moment".  She is the founder of the interactive comedy website, "HumorMeOnline.com" although it is currently off-line at the moment, but can be found if you use a search engine.  She is also the 2003 Grand Prize winner of the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest.



I also apologize for nicking a photo off the Internet. As soon as I get my stuff back in the house (a tree fell on my house the end of June and we aren't back in there yet)...I will start taking my own photos again.  If you are the owner of this photo and I have infringed on any copyright you may have on it and have an issue, please just inform me and I will remove it promptly.  Thank you.

Halloween is Different This Year for Me

Excuse me if I get a bit testy on your Facebook posts today...or anything in general, really. You see...it's Halloween.

And it's hard to put a mask on and dance about like a drunken druid on some sunny Solstice day and everything around me...reminds me of frivolity.  But, I'm sad.

First off...I didn't get any pumpkins.  Didn't gut them...no seeds in the oven to burn to a pulp (oh, look...an inadvertent "pun-kin" there) because apparently I'm the only one in human history who can't toast a seed worth a damn.  So...no pumpkins, no pathetic attempt of carving with those crappy plastic knives they sell you with the artsy templates that would have had Michelangelo gouging his own eyes out with them...you know, if he would have had to use them back then.

Secondly, I have no candy.  I live where no one's going to come anyway.  If they do...I guess I'll just pretend I'm not here...or I'll give them some AAA batteries or a nicely wrapped can of dented soup...or something  So that means no 10 p.m. binging on mini-nuggets of Kit-Kats, Whoppers, and Dove's...oh my.  No waking up to wrapper shrapnel littering my sofa and floor.  Nothing.  I don't even have a cookie here to get my choco-fix.  I didn't venture out because I know it will all be marked down 50% the day after Halloween and I guess I can just take an extra Ambien or something.

  

Thirdly (is "thirdly" even a word), my daughter's at college.  I have no reason to dress up - my cats won't care one way or the other.  There's nothing more sad (well, yes there is) than to realize I can't slap a costume on my youngest kid just to justify donning one myself.  If I had a dog...I could probably dress them up...but cats don't appreciate the sentimentality plus they are way too sensible to let humans pop a cape or hat on them to satisfy some whimsical deviant dress-up fascination.  I also have no latent desire to priss up my pussy...for Halloween nor any other holiday.

Lastly, I guess I'm alone with my thoughts...for the first time.  Before, I had to put on a happy face...donning a mask of sorts because it was a happy day, a celebratory day, a day of rejoicing...of candy and costumes...of children and their squeals of "Trick or Treat" and of running up and down lawns, leaving little footsteps in the glistening grass, and scurrying to get under a streetlight to see what you just got.

And what I just got was a flood of memories.  You see, my "Mumzie", my "Mummo", my mother...died on Halloween in 1999.  And...I'm alone - for the first time really...with my adult son...and my cats...and my thoughts.  I always was too busy...with other happy things...to go off and cry; I had to put a mask on and hide it.  It might be Halloween to nearly everyone else on the planet...but to me it's also such a sad day.  I always wondered how people dealt with the death of a loved one...on a "special" day...when all around you is celebration...but deep in your heart, it's nothing but.  It's hard to do...and I guess, from now on, I'll just have to put a brave face on and come to terms with it.

But...it's so hard.  Wow...it's really, really hard.  :(

(And, yes, you can dress your cat up...but, why would you?  Okay, I admit, it's my cat, Simon...with a tiara on his head...on New Year's Eve.  I'm not proud of myself...and yes, that's what cat embarrassment looks like.)