Chapter 1: Everyone else's dish always looks better than yours...

The bar is almost empty, it is mid afternoon on a weekday and the only reason I am here is because I have ages to kill before meeting a friend.
I order a drink and sit at the bar, pull out a magazine I bought especially so that I had somewhere to point my eyes and turn on my Ipod.
This way I don’t look like a loner…

I still look like a Loner.

A woman walks up to the bar, tall , slim, attractive. Lazily drawing circles on the bar, glancing over in my direction from the corner of her eye.
I look up, she is saying something to me.
“Sorry?” I say pulling out my headphones.
“I asked what you were drinking?” she repeated.
I look down at my drink as if to remind myself what I am drinking.
“Southern Comfort and dry”
She smiles at me for a short while before turning to the bartender.
“I’ll have one of those” she says with a hint of a double meaning.
I take another sip.

Silence, the bartender walks away to make the drink as she leans on the bar tilted towards me staring at me, eyes in contact.
I glance back down at my magazine, then up again. Her drink has arrived, she pays.
“Cheers” she says lifting the glass to me. I smile. More silence. Awkward Silence. Staring.

I put my headphones back on and look back at my magazine. She walks away…

I never even noticed that she was interested in me.

Ok… this didn’t happen, but the message of the story is true…

I suck at picking up signals.

Many a time I have been out to town with the goal that I will find someone, I sit at a table with friends pretending to be interested, but really I am scouting… looking for any sign of interest at all. I find nothing.
It’s not until i leave the bar that a friend will turn to me and say. “ That chick was checking you out!”
I put it down to them lying… I didn’t see anything.

At one point my gross ignorance to any sign of interest apparently came across as rudeness as a retail clerk flirted with me, waves of interest washing over me, and all I could do was nod and pay. I had no idea.

The way I see it, I could have one of two issues:

Self defense: Rejection is scary, it is always present and usually easy to get over, but that’s not how the mind plays it out.

“Hi” you say to the hot young thing at the table across the room.
They reply in turn… good start.
“Do you wanna go out sometime?” You ask… the BIG question.
“No”… a pause. “Get away from me you Scumbag!” She throws her glass in your face. Laughter erupts around the pub, pointing and yelling as blood runs down your face. Three cops enter.
“Arrest that douchebag! He thinks he can go out with me!” The girl laughs. You are tackled to the ground as the laughter erupts even louder… Jail and a Death Sentence.

This of course is a worst case scenario.

Self Esteem: The Depressing one, the question you ask as you look around.
“Who’d wanna go out with me?” This is a question you soon answer yourself…
No-one.
This is the more common one, it gives you an excuse to not try, it makes you play out the rest of the night and go home, alone, depressed and ready to fail again.

Excuses are a big thing, your mind tries to assure you that you don’t need to find someone. It’s safer that way, besides its all the girls fault, they are just being to subtle… its not you it’s them. Just wait and someone will come to you.
This never happens.


The mother of all kicks to the face is the falling for a Friend scenario. This is where Self Defense really shines…

“What would happen if you failed asking out a friend?” It asks…
“Surely the friendship would be awkward… over even.

To get up enough courage to ask out a friend takes a lot more obvious signal. In my case a swift kick to the face and a detailed note.

So you hold back, and as you see them every single day you look for signals, any signals… you try to give some back, you act like a gentleman, help them out, do them favors. You try to get the message to them, tell their friends so that info will get back to them second hand without you having to take a risk… you can always deny if it goes bad….

Unfortunately by that time you are already in the friend zone. I am president of the Friend zone.


*please note… I don’t want advice. I know some of you are dying to place a comment telling me that “what you need to do is" i don't wanna hear it. I know my issues and i don't want to make this an advice from the better people than Will society.
This is just a blog, a way to vent. If I want your advice I’ll ask for it. Thanks.


“She is a cannibal and she likes me, Kind of Ironic Since I don’t eat meat” – Children Collide