I’ll close out the week by commenting on some comments…
On the Fantasy Football front: I’m a little torn on the idea of taking Peyton Manning in the first round. Admittedly the only time I won money in our league was when I broke every rule by picking Peyton and Marvin Harrison in the first two rounds. Of course, I also saved myself with a brilliant Thomas Jones pick up in a later round. I still think you can do it if you admit that you will be chasing for the rest of the draft. We made a decision beforehand that if Peyton was there at 9 take him and I didn’t hesitate. I still have no idea how Westbrook fell so far since I was thinking of taking him at 5 at one point. And Holt in the third round was a steal given that even I passed on him with my real team. I’m still not 100% happy with his team due to the lack of depth at RB and no great #2 receiver but based on tonight’s game I don’t think he’s arguing.
And yes I know that most people get the same expression on their face from listening to a guy talk about fantasy football that I get when they talk about their kids. I promise this won’t turn into a weekly thing.
However, there is a weekly topic that I do need to write about and that is the comment on Mystery and The Pick Up Artist. Basically, the idea is that people with first hand knowledge view Mystery as a freak whose method is essentially having no shame and talking to every girl until one gives you the time of day. I don’t doubt that at all. I am still thinking of picking up his book because a) I have a ton of credits at Amazon and b) I want to see how bad he really is. But the real question is why am I so drawn to this show?
The first reason is that the entire setup of the show is so bizarre that you can’t help but enjoy it. It’s a game show built around the concept of sending a bunch of geeks into a club and seeing if they can score. There is just too much humor there to be believed. The lessons are shown so briefly and in such arcane language that it seems like Mystery is legitimately teaching them magic tricks. It doesn’t help that these guys are taking copious notes. I’ve taken less notes in graduate school than these guys take from a guy named J-Dog. On this level I think everyone can enjoy the show.
The other reason, and definitely the more interesting one, is a lot more personal. My first novel, which I’m going to start writing on October 15 and have the first draft finished by November 30, has a plot that revolves around a guy who has kind of lost the plot of his life and has his buddies perform a complete makeover on him in order to see if he can land the girl of his dreams. Or any girl for that matter. Now there are some people reading this who will view that as sounding rather autobiographical. The fact that many scenes will take place in a bar featuring a wise bartender possibly named Donna will pretty much settle it.
See, that’s the big reason why I have to watch the show. I kind of already lived this. As this blog has made abundantly clear I’m a bit of a nerd and definitely not the most confident person in social situations. But a few years ago I sat with my buddies at the corner of the bar and we came up with a plan to not really reinvent me (I didn’t change anything of my core being) but to show me in the best light. And sure, this is why I invoke the Tao at times and it may have seemed silly but damned if it didn’t work. I wish I could get everyone back together so we could do it again because I could probably use a refresher course.
But what gets me is that what Mystery taught and what my buddies taught varies at one massive point. Mystery is showing how you pick up women. To give his best example, this is how you see someone in the grocery store and twenty minutes later she is naked in your hotel room. While at some base level every guy will go “that is cool” it does raise the question of “should I be sleeping with someone who twenty minutes ago was walking down the cereal aisle minding her own business?” It’s viewing social interaction as conquest and that really isn’t healthy. What I was taught was how to not ruin the opportunity of meeting the girl of your dreams before you even had the chance to start. It was how to hold yourself with confidence, how to change your attitude and most importantly, knowing how to walk away. There’s a reason why my novel is called “Until We Say Goodbye”. That last lesson has been the hardest to learn.
So The Pick Up Artist is a filmed train wreck. It didn’t have to be. Hopefully my novel will show how one can change from a nobody to a somebody in a little better light. At the very least, I’m confident that no one will be called El Matador in it.
Have a great weekend. Go Irish and Illini? Please?
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