Me, Myself and my Blog.

Survival of mankind rides on the successful pickup line

BY DAVE BARRY


This classic Dave Barry column was originally published on Sept. 26, 1999.

So I was at this party, and I wound up at a table where three attractive
single women were complaining about - Surprise! - men. Specifically, they
were complaining about the pickup lines that had been used on them in a bar
a few nights earlier.

One woman said: ''This guy comes up to me and says, 'Are you a teacher?' I
mean, is that supposed to be romantic?''

All three women rolled all six of their eyes.

Another one of them said: ''This guy says to me, 'I've been looking at you
all night!' So I go, 'Hel-LO, we just GOT here.'''

At this point all three women - and I want to stress that these are
intelligent, nice women - were laughing. Not me. I was feeling bad for the
guys.

I realize that there are certain hardships that only females must endure,
such as childbirth, waiting in lines for public-restroom stalls, and a
crippling, psychotic obsession with shoe color. Also, females tend to reach
emotional maturity very quickly, so that by age 7 they are no longer capable
of seeing the humor in loud inadvertent public blasts of flatulence, whereas
males can continue to derive vast enjoyment from this well into their 80s.

So I grant that it is not easy being a female. But I contend that nature has
given males the heaviest burden of all: the burden of always having to Make
the First Move, and thereby risk getting Shot Down. I don't know WHY males
get stuck with this burden, but it's true throughout the animal kingdom.

If you watch the nature shows on the Discovery Channel, you'll note that
whatever species they are talking about - birds, crabs, spiders, clams
it is ALWAYS the male who has to take the initiative. It's always the male bird
who does the courting dance, making a total moron of himself, while the
female bird just stands there, looking aloof, thinking about what she's
going to tell her girlfriends. (''And then he hopped around on one foot!
Like I'm supposed to be impressed by THAT!'').

Male insects have it the worst. The Discovery Channel announcer is always
saying things like: ''After the mating, the female mantis bites off the male
mantis' head, and then she and her girlfriend mantises use it to play a game
that looks a lot like Skee Ball.''

Because I live in Florida, my patio is basically a giant singles bar for
lizards. On any given day during mating season, I'll see dozens of male
lizards out there making their most suave lizard move, which consists of
inflating and deflating a red pouch under their chins. They seem to think
that female lizards really go for a guy with a big chin pouch, but I have
never once, in 14 years of close observation, seen a female respond.
They just squat there looking bored, while all around them males are blinking on
and off like defective warning lights.

Every now and then you'll see an offbeat TV news story about some animal,
usually a moose, that has for some reason fallen in love with, and decided
to relentlessly court, something totally inappropriate, such as a lawn
tractor. This animal is ALWAYS a male. On the TV, they show it hanging
around the lawn tractor with a big, sad, moony look, totally smitten, while
the lawn tractor cruelly ignores it.

My point here is that, in matters of the heart, males have the brains of a
walnut. No, wait! That is not my point. My point is that perhaps you women
could cut us males a little bit of slack in the move-making process, because
we are under a lot of stress. I vividly remember when I was in 10th grade,
and I wanted to call a girl named Patty and ask her to a dance, and before I
picked up the phone, I spent maybe 28 hours rehearsing exactly what I was
going to say. So when I actually made the call, I was pretty smooth.

''Hello, Dance?'' I said. ''This is Patty. Do you want to go to the Dave
with me?''

Fortunately Patty grasped the basic thrust of my gist and agreed to go to
the dance. This was a good thing, because if she had shot me down, I would
have been so humiliated that I would have never have been able to go back to
school. I would have dropped out of 10th grade and lied about my age and
joined the U.S. armed forces, and as a direct result the Russians would have
won the Cold War.

That is the awesome power that you women have over us men. I hope you
understand this, and the next time a guy walks up and uses some incredibly
lame, boneheaded line on you, I hope that, instead of laughing at him, you
will remember that he is under the intense pressure of wanting to impress
you enough so that you might want to get to know him better and maybe
eventually, perhaps within the next 15 minutes, mate with him, thereby
enabling the survival of the human race, which believe me is the only thing
that we males are truly concerned about.

In conclusion, let me just say to all females everywhere, on behalf of all
males everywhere, that you are very beautiful and your eyes are like two
shining stars, unless you're a female fly, in which case your eyes are more
like 2,038 shining stars. So please give us a chance. And if you're not
interested, could you introduce us to your lawn tractor?

It was not "someone" who called me a bachelor the first time. It was "something". The white official-looking envelope I received by registered post that day had my degree certificate in it. 'Bachelor of...', it announced in somewhat gaudy letters as I stood smiling. Bachelor!

Till then I was a boy, a brother, a student and whatnot -- but not a bachelor. All of a sudden, that important piece of paper had given me a new identity. I know you are dying to tell me things like 'this bachelor is not that bachelor', but believe me, the very next day my phone rang. It was my real-estate agent, an uneasy reminder to the approaching expiration of the initial company accommodation. "Sir, you are a bachelor, are you not?"

"Sure, I am," I said, almost adding, "and now I have proof of that, if you need."

"Sorry sir. The owner is not willing to give the house to bachelors. But don't worry, sir, I have many other houses. You see..."

So that's how it is. No country for the people of Palestine. No food for starving Somalis.No trees for migrating birds. And yes, no houses for poor bachelors. They are not welcome in residential areas. Bachelors party and make noise round the clock. They go after the neighborhood girls. They don't respect the norms of the colony. They come in groups...

Anyway, I learnt my lesson: Bachelors don't have all the civil rights that 'normal' citizens enjoy. But then, what do we have that makes many a married guy cherish the memories of his long-lost bachelorhood? Palestinians have to cling to their land. Migrating birds are bound by directions. But a bachelor has few restrictions. Except for renting an apartment and walking into one those stupid 'couples only' clubs, he can have everything else.

He gets up at any time and sneaks into the office unnoticed when others get ready for lunch. He sits to almost any time in front of the computer without worrying about anxious where-are-you calls. He stays away from the house for days and no questions are asked. He does whatever he wants on the weekend, in the company of his friends...

Yes. Friends are the most important aspect of any bachelor's life. Without them he practically has no existence, especially if he's staying away from home.

But then one day, over the thundering music and the first round of cold beer in a dimly lit pub, he announces his plans to get married to this cute girl that someone else had found for him. Over the double cheers, the naughty comments and laughter, I become aware of something that hurts me somewhere.
My friend's getting married. Of course it's something to celebrate. But then, that also means he's leaving the gang!

We attend his wedding, the most colorful function of his life, in full spirits. All of us. We give him gifts, wish him good luck and retreat to our good old world, one member less. It does not take much time before we find him reduced to much-delayed replies to our bunch of mails -- and as for phone calls, that comes only once in a blue moon.

For my part, I watch the pile of wedding invitations in the corner of my desk grow at an amazing, alarming pace. Before I know it, most of my cool buddies are gone. And the rest of us soon realize that we are not always welcome to the new circle the married men have formed. So we seek solace behind those office doors where the sun never sets.

I do meet my married friends occasionally. In the office, on a casual walk, or in a busy restaurant. They are my friends still. And they are still friendly as much as their new lifestyle and added responsibilities permit.

But...

Oh heck, there's my telephone. I think it is my real-estate agent again.