I'm Having More Fun Than You (4 page)

HCIs

For years, I’ve wondered how it’s possible that annoying people who don’t shut the fuck up don’t realize how annoying they are. We’ve all been there—trapped in a conversation with someone who isn’t able to pick up on the most obvious hints that you’re not interested whatsoever in what they have to say and are desperate to leave. I call these people HCIs—“head cock inducers”—because while you’re standing there listening to them blab on and on, you subconsciously cock your head to the side and think to yourself, “Is this person fucking serious right now?”

An HCI can be a guy or a girl. Either way, they’re always blissfully unaware. It seems like whenever I’m talking to a bunch of women, the least attractive and most annoying one latches on to me. It’s kind of like when you go to Hooters and get the one ugly waitress. You sit down, all excited—“Hooters, yeah!”—and then you see the waitress start to walk in your direction and you’re like, “Oh no, not her. No [look around], oh no, we wanted Brandi…ohhhhh…I guess I’ll have the buffalo wings.”

As much energy as I expend chasing appealing women, I spend an equal amount of time avoiding HCIs. Most guys are quite adept at evading girls—which is not surprising given how so many of us seem naturally selected for the very purpose of repelling them. When a girl whom I’ve been trying to avoid calls me and I accidentally pick up, you would not believe the shit I come up with: “Oh, uh, hey Jill. Where am I? You know what’s funny? No one here knows the name of this bar. And there’s no sign. And none of the adjacent streets have signs either. But you should—” and then I hang up mid-sentence (which gives it a feel of authenticity), shut off my phone, and pretend the battery died.

Women, of course, have a much more elegant method of avoiding male HCIs—they don’t bother talking to them in the first place, a devious tactic I call “preemptive avoidance.” When accosted, though, girls are skilled at shutting down unwanted advances. I’ve found that the less a girl wants to hook up with a guy she meets at a bar, the more outlandish an excuse she’ll give, and it will often be accompanied by blatant giggling and eye rolling from her nearby friends. And nothing inspires confidence in a guy like a giggling, eye-rolling girl telling you she has to leave because she’s got a placekicking tryout with the Giants in the morning.

THE MINDSET

The truest and most frustrating observation ever made about kicking game is that it’s all about confidence. Every guy has contemplated how much damage he could do if he could just go back ten years knowing what he knows now. But we’re stuck with what we’ve got. Luckily, the desire to hook up outweighs every other one of our primal instincts.

My favorite television show is
Lost.
I’m obsessed with it. There’s just something about these flawed characters trapped on a mystical island that totally fascinates me. But there is one important, real-world lesson that I’ve learned from
Lost.
After all the survivors have been through—the crash, the smoke monster, the Others—they’ve never, ever given up hope on pulling ass. It’s like the first week they were concerned with getting rescued. The second week they were concerned with getting water. And by the third week they were concerned with getting head. Somehow, it always comes back to that.

These pressures aren’t unique to us humans. I was recently reading about these insects called cicadas that lie dormant underground for seventeen years. After seventeen years, they come out, they mate, and then they die the next day. And I couldn’t help but wonder, how much would it suck to be the guy who doesn’t hook up that night?

Perhaps the most trying situation I’ve encountered is going out on the prowl with friends who are in relationships. I think that the longer you’re in a relationship, the more you begin to forget what it was like to have ever been single, and how the game actually works. Whenever I’m in a bar with a couple who I’m friends with, they’ll inevitably say, “Hey Karo, check out that girl over there. She’s totally cute—you should just go talk to her.” Oh, is that all I have to do? Just go
talk
to her? Well, thanks for clearing that up, because I was just gonna whip my dick out and hope she came over and touched it. But just go talk to her? That’s a foolproof plan! Is that how you two met? Who knew it was that easy? Thank God I have you and your girlfriend here to show me how the world works. Now stop holding hands and drinking chardonnay, and get the fuck out of my face so I can continue stalking this chick from a distance!

THE COMPETITION

A cute girl once asked me what I thought about a guy across the bar. I told her I thought he was a douchebag. She asked why. I said because any guy besides me whom a girl is interested in is a douchebag. You see, guys generally don’t like other guys who are not our friends. But we definitely don’t like other single guys who are our competition. It is a well-known fact that women dress to the nines often just to look good in front of other women. Guys compare themselves to other guys as well. Except Brad Pitt could walk in the door and we’d still mutter under our breath, “Douche.”

There are many varieties of douchebag, none of whom recognize their fatal flaws. Listen, guys, wearing only a V-neck undershirt to a bar is just not acceptable. Neither is sporting a blazer over said undershirt, unless you’re going for the “just went to the dry cleaners but only half my order was ready” look. Also, if you’re about to go out but can’t remember if you put cologne on, don’t give yourself a precautionary spritz. Too much is worse than none. Your cologne should not linger in the elevator any longer than you do. Oh, and if you’re actually using water from the sink in the bar bathroom to restyle your hair, you should have never even bothered going out in the first place.

One arena where I’m admittedly deficient when compared to other guys is performing in “nontraditional” situations. Friday and Saturday night is business time, and I dress the part. But even though I’m aware that there are plenty of opportunities to meet women during the week, like on the subway or in the grocery store, my civilian attire is totally lacking. I hate guys who wear nice clothes on Sunday afternoon even if they’re not going anywhere. When I look around, dudes are wearing dress shoes, khakis, and polo shirts. Why? It’s Sunday. Afternoon. I’m not even wearing socks, let alone something with a collar. But the fact is, they are prepared for chance encounters. Generally speaking, I know I’m not suited to kick game to a beautiful woman when I walk into my apartment building and the doorman mistakes me for a deliveryman.

Shortly after I moved to LA, I had a meeting at MTV’s offices in Santa Monica. In the lobby with me were thirty of the hottest fucking chicks I’ve ever seen, all waiting for an audition. Tens as far as the eye could see—and no male competition in sight. After I stopped my hands from shaking, I called my buddies in New York to apprise them of the situation. They urged me to hit on everything that moved, but before I could gather up the nerve, I got called into my meeting. By the time I got out, the girls were gone. In a way, I’m glad—it would’ve been a Duck Hunt anyway.

GAME ON

When we’re taking the elevator down to the lobby after getting ready to go out for the night, I’m always amazed at how chivalrous my friends and I are. We’re holding the door for girls, we’re making sure they all get out first, we’re generally being polite and friendly. Then we get to the bar and immediately lose all sense of tact and discretion as we vainly make passes at any chick above a six. I really believe that guys would be much better off if we never left the elevator. That option notwithstanding, after I’ve assessed my options, scouted the competition, and made my approach, the game is officially on.

First things first: there is no such thing as a pick-up line. The kind of guys who use pick-up lines that actually work are the kind of guys who don’t need them in the first place (i.e., they’ve won an Oscar or are Derek Jeter). I’ve only used two successful lines in my entire life: “I’m in this fraternity; wanna go upstairs?” and “I’m the guy you just saw onstage; wanna go upstairs?” I mean, let’s face it, if I ever move to a first-floor apartment, I’m fucked.

Guys should, however, be encouraged to leverage (and embellish) their particular situation for the purposes of game. The most effective scenario is if you’ve just moved to a new city. “I just moved here” is a trusty icebreaker and conversation-prolonger. It also invites an element of pity that cannot be underestimated. If the new-in-town theme seems to be working, guys will often try the “Let’s go back to my place—you can be the first person to see my apartment!” tack. Women should be wary, though, that there is no set statute of limitations. You are most likely
not
the first girl to have seen this dude’s apartment. Hell, I moved to Los Angeles years ago and I still break that puppy out every once in a while.

One thing that most guys have been blessed with is the ability to sound interested. No matter how dull her job, inane her jokes, or boring her banter, if I’m attempting to get into a girl’s pants, I can feign curiosity about whatever the fuck she’s talking about. Guys do this because we’ve found that walking away glassy-eyed in mid-conversation ensures we won’t get laid. If you’re a girl who majored in communications or likes to show off her iPhone, please be aware that every male you’ve ever spoken to in your entire life was faking it. Just a heads up.

There is a stark difference, however, between embellishing how long ago you moved or faking like you’re paying attention to a girl, and flat-out lying to her. This is an issue that bachelors are evenly divided on. Some get off on it. The bolder the lie, the greater the challenge. Some guys lie because their real life sucks. Others, like me, reject lying as uncool, unfair, and unnecessary. Also, I’m not a very good liar. Besides, it’s too easy to go too far. I’ll never forget when my buddy Shermdog excitedly told me he’d just met two hot European blondes at the bar and told them we were from Quebec. I said, “Good work, Sherm. But next time you lie and say we’re Canadian, I’d avoid the one French-speaking province.”

PLAN OF ATTACK

Once a guy has acquired a target and sees potential, he is then faced with maintaining a difficult balance: trying not to smother the girl or appear too interested, while at the same time not losing her either. One of the worst feelings is turning around and realizing the amazing girl I’ve just met, whose name I can actually remember, is now missing in action. Because drunk chicks are like pinballs: they’ll bounce around the bar like ding!—ding!—ding ding!—ding!—ding! and then just go home with the last guy they bump into. So I always try to keep a safe distance while never letting the girl out of my sight. If I lose her, I’m then forced to do a full sweep of the bar because the time and energy consumed establishing rapport with a new girl will be far greater than that required to locate my original mark. Guys must also always be vigilant of “kissing whores”—women who will make out with you on the dance floor and then run over to their friends, giggle, order lemon drops, and hide. You will never see her again, unless you resort to just waiting outside the women’s bathroom all night on the off chance that she comes out of hiding or drunkenly knocks into you.