Romance for Real Women

If you’re a man, getting a date can be hard. If you read some of the relationship gurus who are popping up by the dozens on the web, getting a date can be harder than say, storming the beaches at Normandy or getting the kids to sleep at bedtime. But, if it wasn’t hard, then relationship gurus would have nothing to sell.

Real women know men need to be careful what they buy. A case in point is a fellow who runs a website called “Alpha Unleashed, the official new alpha resource for success in life and in love.”
Michael “Bishop” Emery, who owns the blog, recently posted an entry asserting that women “test” men before giving out a phone number or accepting a date.

This is true. Real women certainly don’t give their telephone numbers to anyone who asks. We look a guy over. There are obvious factual issues to consider. Is he married? We look for the “tell,” say, the tan line on his ring finger. Divorced? How many times? Does he seem to care about his children? (This would be indicated by knowing their gender, their ages, even where they go to school.) Does he support himself? What kind of work does he do?

Then there is instinct. Can he put together a simple sentence? Can he look you in the eye? If you’re in a public place, is he caging money from his buddies? Does he need a bath? Do they all? Women note these things instinctively and insofar as you might want to suggest these are “tests,” you’d be right.

But women don’t run the kind of tests Emery suggests. He’d want his followers to believe that women formulate specific questions for men and then want men to ignore them. By ignoring them, Emery says, men assert their power, power women find irresistible. This is the insight he’s selling.

Here is a direct excerpt from his Thursday, May 29 blog entitled “How Women Test Men – How to Pass”

So, the next time you’re standing in front of a beautiful women who you’ve just asked for her number and she says, “why don’t you just give me your number and I’ll call YOU…” try CHUCKLING out loud and saying:

Then hand her a pen, point to the paper, and look her in the eye expectantly.

Once I got over the bends, I doubled checked the column to be sure he is completely serious. I then had an insight of my own. I realized that this isn’t just half-way funny bad advice. It is, in fact, dangerously aggressive stuff.

I wonder what he’d suggest if the woman in question persisted in declining to give out her number. I hesitate to think.

If you’re confronted with the kind of situation Emery proposes, don’t stop to ask if the guy is a fan or has bought “Fire of Seduction,” the book he’s is peddling. This is not the time to chat. Run away. Quickly. Quickly.

Real women, like some politicians, don’t wear their patriotism on their lapels and I don’t. Nevertheless, I am invariably irritated when I read condescending and spiteful remarks, however elegantly phrased, about our country.

Such was the case yesterday when I picked up a copy of The Financial Times, a British publication our office subscribes to and read Nigel Andrews’ review of Sex in the City.

The writer first confesses that he’s never seen an episode of the popular television show. He goes on to say “I offer no excuse, beyond my instinctive aversion to shows in which Americans pretend they are or can be sexually liberated. They are always hopeless at it – the Puritan ancestry tells – and so the results are always screamy, garish and winsome.”

Yeah. That got my attention, too.

After offering that insight, he goes on to say of the movie. “They walk, talk, giggle, gesticulate and sometimes fling themselves across a room, leaving their owners suddenly pink, startled and exposed. This is in preparation for what passes in America for a sex scene.”

One can only imagine Mr. Andrews’ delight in himself in penning such a riposte.

But by then I knew, I just knew, where this was headed. Can you guess?

“Here is my theory: the French alone understand eroticism, so they alone should be allowed to depict sex on screen.”

Yep. We got there. The French.

Many real women will remember back in 2000 when the national discussion centered on President Clinton’s affair with Monica Lewinski. Anyone who offered the slightest hint of criticism or showed any distaste for Clinton’s performance, was told “the French think we’re prudes.” Commentators pointed with pride to French Prime Minister Mitterand’s funeral to which both his wife and mistress attended. That cinched the argument, all right. If you didn’t consider that the height of sophistication you were obviously a prude, bore and barbarian. (At the time I couldn’t understand why anyone cared what the French thought. I still don’t.)

OK, I’m not going list some of the sexiest movies scenes in history played by American actors, written by American scriptwriters and produced by American studios. I don’t have time, although perhaps I will in another post.

I’m not even going to defend Sex in the City because I haven’t seen it yet.

But I’m going to. This weekend. First thing tomorrow. Nigel Andrews has made me realize it’s my patriotic duty.

In the dog days of this never ending campaign season, real women will be delighted with this little snippet of campaign candy.

Yesterday, The New York Times ran a long profile on the aptly named Reggie Love, Barack Obama’s personal assistant.

Reggie is Barack’s shadow, anticipating his every need which apparently includes ball point pins, Sharpies, stationery, protein bars, throat lozenges, water, tea Advil, Tylenol, Purell and emergency Nicorette. (Yes, ladies, it turns out, Barrack is a smoker. However, we have to assume that Reggie spoke to the Times with his boss’s approval, unlike another recent staffer on the other side of the aisle.)

He’s tall. At 6’5”, he’s three inches taller than Barack. He’s fit. He benchpresses 350 pounds. And, according to the Times, he’s cool, although the newspaper didn’t provide any examples.
He’s also cute. The Times didn’t point this out either although the reporter is clearly in a swoon. Check it out at in the New York Times.

Real women might want to sit up and take notice of a just released University of Texas study on the different “mate values” harbored by men and women. According to the study, it’s a “serious effort to delve into an area that has been largely ignored by scientists.”

“Mate Values.”

That’s a new one.

Boiled down, the study found that beautiful people are attracted to beautiful people; it found that beautiful women want more from a man than a hot bod; and, it found that powerful men tend to have multiple wives and play around.

All kind of jaw dropping, huh?

According to news reports, the authors sent teams of interviewers to rate the attractiveness of women interviewed. Once they were rated, and I for one would love to know what they made of tattoos, like are shoulder tattoos more beautiful than butt tattoos? Did the respondents show them? What about various body piercings? Were they counted?

At any rate, respondents, rated beautiful or ugly, were given a list of “mate value” attributes, sex appeal, good earning capacity, good parenting indicators, education, etc., and asked to prioritize them.

Intelligence was at the bottom of the list.

No kidding. For both “beauties” and “plain Janes.” The researchers described the finding as a “puzzle.”

Who the hell did they ask? UT co-eds?

“Honey, you’re dumb as a post, but you’ve got ‘good partner indicator.’”

Think about it.

All those smart guys out there with poor mate value.

So saddle up, ladies. I, for one, like a guy who’s smart enough to check the mail, empty the dishwater and find a fuse box.

I think the playing field just got leveled.

As you may have gathered by now, I’m a fan of sexy lingerie. I’m a fan of many other things including books, jewelry, food, wine, and, of course, men. But my love of sexy lingerie is no doubt a reaction to my mother’s insistence on white cotton panties while I was growing up and her (continued) befuddlement on why anyone would want to wear a bra.

Mom came of age during the sixties and enthusiastically embraced all the mores of the time including free love, music, especially Bob Dylan before he went electronic, the pill, alternative lifestyles and social justice. She got rid of her own bra circa 1967 and hasn’t seen the need for one since. (Fortunately, she’s also a vegetarian and very small, so any image you might have of an aged crone with boobs flapping down to her waist is false. You can let go of that right now.)

However, her own outlook meant she never saw a need for bras for her daughters.

This was never a problem for Anne who was and is flat as a board, but Mary, who back then we called “Blessing,” and I needed bras since about the time we were eleven. And, among the many things I’m grateful to my grandmother for is her determined insistence she would provide us with suitable undergarments.

To her credit, Mom didn’t fight her. She merely asked whether we actually desired said undergarments. When we enthusiastically concurred with Granny, she looked a little wistful at what she saw as a betrayal of her own principles. Nevertheless, she bowed to our wishes.

So, off we went to the local department store and into the lingerie department where Granny announced to the sales lady that we were there to get our “first little bras.”

To her credit, the sales lady didn’t burst out laughing since Mary at aged thirteen and I at age twelve were already in B cups.

After being fitted and equipped with four white Playtex bras, Granny told us we could pick one apiece as a special treat.

I looked around the department starry eyed. I’d never seen such stuff, slinky nightgowns in gorgeous colors. Underwear that wasn’t white. And, bras on hangers in red, black, white and camel color with lacy trims. (This was years ago and the department store was conservative, even by the standards of that bygone era.)

Mary and I arrived at the bra display at approximately the same moment. Fortunately, we were different sizes and to our great relief found a siren red bra for each of us. And, Granny, that dear heart, despite her reservations about what Mom would say, made good on her word and bought them for us.

Thus began a lifelong devotion to sexy lingerie. And, although Mary is a very different person than I, she also is a devoted buyer of sexy lingerie and some of the best times we’ve ever shared have been over hangers in the lingerie department.

There it is. My lingerie back story.

Depending on who you listen to, divorce rates in the U.S. are between forty and fifty percent. And relationship breakdowns appear to be just as dismal in Europe. Recently, The Institute for Family Planning, a European family policy think tank released a report asserting there is a divorce in Europe every thirty seconds. (Its solution, by the way, is for European couples to have more children, a discussion we can get into another time.)

But, there is no doubt that these are disheartening statistics, especially if you believe in happy endings. I’ve gone through a divorce. My sister, Mary, whom I’ve mentioned has gone through several. They’re not pretty.

Nevertheless, the solution I stumbled early this week, suggested by columnist Lucy Kellaway seems preposterous. In fact, when I first read it, I thought it was farce, lame, but still farce.

Her brainchild is to establish an online date rating agency to collect information from former lovers about former lovers. She suggests “Date Rate” would be a cross between Ebay and Wikipedia. Information would include “fidelity, sexual appetite, generosity, dedication to watching football on television, tendency to leave dirty sock strewn around and so on.” Biographical information would be included.

Can you blame me for thinking this was supposed to be funny?

I naturally don’t expect anyone to take her proposal seriously. But I wouldn’t have anticipated anyone seriously asserting that having more children is an appropriate prescription for divorce so no doubt Lucy has potential bankers lining up to invest, assuming there are any bankers anywhere with any capital.

We are so out in left field here.

Marriage, partnership, dating, friends, children, family. All significant relationships involve some degree of risk.

When evaluating a potential partner, insist on meeting his family. That’ll tell you a lot. Meet his friends. That’ll tell you more. Watch how he reacts to small and large things. That’ll tell you something.

If you’re still not certain about your own judgment, run a D&B on him. Hire a detective. There are plenty of services out there that are more than happy to invade his privacy. Better yet, if you’re unsure about him, just run and save your money.

The last person you want to talk to is a former lover, especially a disgruntled former lover. Yeah, that’s information you can trust.

Dating, marriage, committed relationships…rough stuff and hard work. But no database of biased information from aggrieved ex’s is going to make it any easier or less risky.

In the absence of a worldwide database providing information on your quirks as well as quirks of former lovers to anyone who logs in, I’d suggest using a little commonsense when deciding whether to date someone. Better yet, listen to your heart.

You can view the article at www.ft.com

PBS aired the final episode of Canford last night to the applause of real women everywhere.

The Masterpiece series is based on the novels of Elizabeth Gaskell, a Victorian novelist who also wrote gothic horror stories. (In fact, if you’re reading an historical romance and the hero makes a snarky remark about the heroine’s preference in novels, he is probably referring to the work of Mrs. Gaskell.)

Cranford, however, is based her 1851 novel of the same name about life in rural Cheshire.

Mrs. Gaskell is what we used to call in college when I thought I had some understanding of these matters a “minor Victorian novelist.” There was, however, nothing minor about this production.

Headed by a fabulous cast including Judi Dench and Eileen Atkins, the series focuses on the relations between the men and women in a rural English village and how those relations were impacted by the Industrial Revolution which brought such sweeping change to England in all matters, large and small.

These things interest me.

As an example, the Judi Dench character, Miss Mattie Jenkins, has been in love for decades with the yeoman farmer, Mr. Holbrook, played by Michael Gambon. However, as the rector’s daughter, it was thought that an alliance with a yeoman was beneath her station. Some of the most touching scenes in Cranford include their reunion and its outcome.

A variety of relationship issues beset other couples. A young doctor with radically new medical theories such as how to set a broken arm is undone by a hormonally driven patient. Duty to family and father drives another couple apart. And, through it all, we are reminded of how terribly fragile life was in England even in the middle of the vast and ultimately beneficial changes leading to the modern era.

Oh, my. I love this stuff.

Unfortunately for me and I suspect many of you, the recent attention by Hollywood to Jane Austin’s work including Pride and Prejudice and Bridget Jones Diary has snapped my partner’s willingness to sit through what he derided as “another chick film” on his way out last night.

Pay him no mind. Go to www.pbs.org and check it out. Then get the DVD. Curl up and watch it by yourself or with friends.

He won’t know what he’s missed.

Real women who love romance also love vampires. Edgy, angst ridden and oh, so sexy, our favorite vampires have issues, usually self-hate, unrequited love and strong and frustrated sex drives. Today’s vampires battle the forces of evil, both human and undead, all the while meditating on the cursed twist of fate that made them what they are.
What’s not to love?
So we were delighted when CBS began airing Moonlight last fall starring gorgeous young actor Alex O’Loughlin as angst ridden vampire and detective Mick St. John. Not only did the writers get it right with the character, the show was a happy break from reality programming and Dick Wolfe.
By vampire standards, Mick is young, only ninety odd years. Turned by his wife on their wedding night, he hates being a member of the undead. But no moping around for Mick. He keeps busy solving grisly murders, often perpetrated by his own kind, that is to say, rogue vampires. (There are other twists, but you’ll have to watch yourself.)
Moonlight developed a following. But, I suppose because the show is literate and plot and character driven, CBS hasn’t decided to renew it. (NBC, after all, canceled Studio 60, a fabulous show, for similar reasons.)
Now, Moonlight fans are…well, out for blood.
Literally.
Websites www.moonlightfans.com, www.youuchoose.net and www.moonlightfan.blogspot.com are asking Moonlight fans to donate a pint of blood to the Red Cross in support of the program and Internet news reports claim some 4,000 fans have already pledged. Alex O’Loughlin is apparently “so moved” by the effort that he will become a spokesman for the Red Cross.
This is a crusade I can get behind. Two worthy causes.
Word is that the drive is making a difference. Four new episodes have appeared since late April. And www.HollywoodReporter.com and www.eonline.com claim the network will renew the show.
There are some snarky news accounts which allege the network had already decided to renew the program before the drive got underway.
Who cares?
Why, dare I say, puncture their balloon?

            In most markets, the quality of local media range from mediocre to poor. Real women know there are some exceptions, but not many.

            This is not such an exception.

            Yesterday I posted a report from University of California at Davis about men confusing a comment such as “it’s getting late” with “let’s skip the preliminaries and get it on.”

            This is egregious stuff. After finally dragging rape out of the shadows; after all the serious work that’s been done in the area of spousal and child abuse; after all the sensitivity courses in the workplace and in school, it appears that a large number of men still confuse what they want to hear with what’s actually said.

            This isn’t funny.

            But it apparently did tickle the funny bone of a Davis CBS13 reporter Mike Dello Stritto who went to the Davis campus and chatted up some of the students about the report.

            Led by an infallible news sense, Stritto asked the kids some of the same questions the professor posed on his study.

Yuk. Yuk. Giggle. Giggle. 

How did he think those kids would react when asked about their sex lives with a camera pointed in their noses?

Lost was any sense of the serious implications of the study.  Although as noted the professor did not study rape, this is moving very close to the line.  And it ain’t funny.

Check out this meathead and his compadres on the news desk.  And it may interest you to know that later in his video blog Stritto opined “this was kind of funny and a fun story to do.”

What a jerk.

The video is at http://cbs13.com/local/men.hear.yes.2.706568.html

A new study out of University of California at Davis ought to have real women calling their collage age daughters right this minute.

Scratch that.

Call your daughters however old they are. Call them at work. Get them in the kitchen after school for a chat. Do it now. And, while you’re at it, call your friends, too.

The study, by communication professor Michael Motley, found that men frequently, no, make that nearly always, misinterpret “indirect” messages from women resisting the “escalation of sexual intimacy.”

According to Motley, when a woman says, “It’s getting late,” the male hears, “Let’s get it on more quickly.” When she says, “Let’s be friends,” the male hears, “I’m not committed, but let’s get it on.”

UC Davis reports that fully eighty five percent of college women have had at least one “unpleasant” experience where physical intimacy escalated without her consent.

The study did not look at rape. But if you ask me, this kind of stuff is getting pretty close to it.

It’s hair raising.

When you’re talking with your daughters, tell them to forget being “nice.” Tell them to forget worrying about his feelings.

If the guy is pawing them beyond what they like, they have to be unambiguous.

“Knock it off.”

“Quit that.”

“Get your hands off me.”

“I’m going home.”

You undoubtedly can think of other, similar unambiguous messages.

Make your daughter repeat them after you.

I’m going to.

Right now.