The Chat-Up

Just over a month ago, I announced that I was going to go out and have the mother of all celebrations for my fortieth birthday.  For a number of reasons, some of which were beyond my control, the shindig didn't eventuate, and my best mate has been at me to reschedule ever since.  Well, thanks to her incessant pleading/nagging/threats of bodily harm, I finally gave in.  Next Saturday, we are hitting the Irish pubs of Melbourne for a night of Bailey's, Boys and Bad Karaoke - but my chronic shyness has had a major resurgence of late, and is threatening to put the kibosh on all but two of these activities.  Fortunately, my best mate is the most stubborn, bull-headed woman in the universe, and will have none of my refusals or excuses this time around.  She told me that my inability to initiate conversation with men, (while sober), could be solved by the implementation of a time-honoured practice that has been used the world over since social interaction began all those years ago - you know, before women waxed their legs.

The icebreaker.

'All you need is a really great line, delivered in just the right way.  Men do it all the time.  It can't be that hard.'

So sayeth the tall, gorgeous, blue-eyed Rachel McAdams lookalike who has never had to approach a man in her life.  Still, a conversation starter might not be a bad idea, and I think I've come up with a good one: I'm going to tell them about the blog!

It might sound crazy to try to capture the attention of potential suitors by telling them that if we do decide to take things further, thousands of other people will be reading all about it.  Well, not ALL of it - I'm not      angling for an HBO series.  I do have to wonder about the types of men this approach would attract.  I mean, do I really want to share physical space with a guy who would read my blog the following week, eagerly searching for a mention of himself like he was trying out for a football team?  (And yes, I do know what that analogy suggests - shut up).  Some guys would understandably be put off by it, particularly if they had never actually read the blog.  For all they know, it could be a performance review, (something I would NEVER partake in, unless I was assessing my own talents, or lack thereof).  Everyone I've told about this, which no doubt now includes you, thinks it's insane and, you know what I say to that?

Thank you.

Why?  Because it's a compliment.  It takes bravery to put ones self out there and do the crazy thing, and if you guys think that much of me, then I must be a lot gutsier than I thought I was.

Or just crazy.

Time will tell.  

*Note:  I just realised that the phrase 'Take things further' may be misconstrued as code for 'Engage in non-committal carnal festivities.'  This was not my intention.  At least at the time of writing.          

Typo.

Despite strenuous arguments, denials, and emphatic statements to the contrary, I have had to admit recently that I do in fact have a type.  Not a physical one exactly, although most of the men I fancy do remind me uncannily of either Jason Bateman or a young Davy Jones, (shut up! it's the dark hair, dark eyes combination, okay?).  I do find a guy with brains, sensitivity, a cracking sense of humour and a healthy dose of arrogant charm more than a little intoxicating, but it isn't exactly about personality traits, either.  What seems to attract me like a death row inmate to a loose-moralled appeals judge is not the handsome guy, the cheeky guy, the smart guy or the funny guy...it is the unattainable guy.

You know the guy I mean; he's the one who, despite your best efforts, seems determined not to test the friendship.  The one who affectionately refers to you as his 'Best Friend,' or 'The sister I never had.'  The one who sends you a smiley face, then liberally hands out wink emoticons to all two hundred and fifty eight of his other female Twitter followers and Facebook friends.  You could carry on an entire Skype conversation with him, wearing nothing but a smile, and he would still regale you with details of his naughty night out with the deceptively sedate looking school teacher he met on E-harmony.  My mother sagely advised me as a teenager that, when it came to women, men loved a challenge.  Not for them, the loyal, dependable, readily available girl who hung on their every word.  The chick who promised them the least would invariably end up being the one they wanted most.  I don't believe this is true of all men, any more than I believe that all men love football and hate quiche.  Furthermore, I don't believe that it is an exclusively male behaviour quirk.  How could I, when it informs my very own choices? 

You could stick identical twins before me, each boasting the same dark eyes, the same cheeky smile, the same irresistible Buddy Love type humour and bravado, the same leg-opening sensitivity, and I would still go for the one cruising Facebook chicks on his Iphone.  And now I know why. 

The challenge of it!  Fabulous as it is to be wanted by anyone, there's still no better ego stroker than snaring the creature who you had to chase through miles of rough terrain to get a clear shot at.  The one who put up the biggest fight is the one whose skin feels the most exquisite wrapped around your own on the living room floor in front of a roaring log fire.  I realise now that I've been choosing men like this my entire life and although I know that it's a pretty self-defeating practice, I can't seem to stop, and I have to wonder; is my need for gratification going to end up costing me long term satisfaction?

Am I the only woman who does this?  Let me know in the comments...I'm begging you.  Lol.      

Polar opposites attract.

My high school teachers, my schoolmates, my best friend, and even my own mother will tell you that I am a confounding mess of contradictions and, interesting though it might make me, this dychotomy can also be extremely frustrating to deal with, particularly when it acts as a roadblock, standing between where I need to go and where I actually want to be.  Correction; roadblock isn't quite right.  A more fitting analogy would be to imagine a giant fork in the middle of a road, with a dirty, sweltering metropolis on one side, and a hippy commune on the other. 

Most liberal-minded single women of my age and disposition would flick the indicator to the left, and cruise down that humble looking little dirt road in search of a fellow free thinking peace monger, only of the male variety, with whom to sing acoustic guitar ballads on the porch and make love in a daisy field.  I more often than not tend make a hard right, with no warning whatsoever, and scream through the city streets with a thousand watt spotlight mounted on the hood of my car, scouring underground taverns for the most arrogant, smart-arsed, right-radical mouthpiece I can find, just because my brain wants me to do the opposite. 

Maybe it's the rebel in me, but despite my left wing, fair's fair leanings, it's the guys who I know I'm going to spend most of my time screaming with righteous indignation at that really push my buttons, (the fun buttons).  If you were to line up my boyfriends thus far and make them sit a personality test, their compatability scores with me would be on par with Sarah Palin's presidential suitability rating.  Now, every time I enter into something with one of these guys, I know it isn't going to end well - the most I can ever usually hope to get out of these trists is mind-blowing post-tyrade sex which, spectacular as it is, doesn't last; so why do I keep making the same mistake? 

Shouldn't I know better at my age? 

The answer is yes, I should, and I will learn my lesson one day. 

But for now I'm cutting class to Skype with a hot guy in his twenties who plays guitar like the devil and thinks socialists are Commies. 

It's fun because I know it's wrong.

Hey, I'm not dead yet.