You're Not A Proper Bloke.....
Thus were the words of Lady Bracknell's secretary companion during a conversation I had with her on the telephone on Sunday night.
The problem is she's right. I fear I'm not a proper bloke. These immortal words sprung forth from her learned lips during a discussion on how I was doing with Lady B's Guide to Flirting. Now I admit that I am trying to put it to good use and I have spoken to random people, real live random people quite a bit. Only last night I had a brief converstaion with a young women at a booking reading/signing event in Chelmsford. Whether it is officially classed as flirting or not is open to interpretation, but I did speak to her rather than shyly stand there like a twat.
Lady B's Secretary Companion (henceforth known as LBSC for brevity) pointed out that my inability to be a lad and 'chat birds up' (that's not exactly what she said but I read between the lines) was a sign of my non blokeness. I'm sure some of my non bloke attributes has a lot to do with lack of self esteem blah, blah, blah, but it did get me thinking. I decided to look at the evidence of my non-blokeness.
Marmiteboy's Non Blokenes Evidence.
1. I'm totally rubbish at DIY, so rubbish in fact that I have no interest in it whatsoever.
2. I know fuck-all about how cars work. I can fill it up with petrol and that's it. I have never changed a wheel. Ever. What's the AA for anyway?
3. I'd rather have a cup of tea and a ginger nut than ten pints of lager and a kebab.
4. I have never fancied Pamela Anderson, Jordan, Carman Electra or Page Three girls. I'm a committed Girl Next Door (GND) man. Glamour models are NOT sexy!!
5. I have over 20 pairs of footwear. (Surely a clincher).
6. I like, no make that love, shopping. Even at supermarkets.
7. I can colour co-ordinate my clothes without female intervention.
8. I'm afraid of spiders.
9. And creepy crawlies.
10. I have never chatted up a woman in a pub. (or any where else for that matter).
11. I do not understand the male wish to indulge in contact sports. Contact sports hurt. Watching doesn't.
12. I don't know, nor do I care, how things work.
13. I do lunch.
14. I prefer the company of women to men.
15. My favourite tv station is UK TV Food.
16. I cry at happy bits in films. Especially when the boy gets the girl.
17. I have never had a fight, not even at school. I run away from fights.
18. I like going to IKEA. (You get really good cheap candles there for a start).
19 I'm a bugger for "buy two get one free" offers in Sainsbury's.
20. I have never had 'the flu'. I have colds, not that mystery illness that lasts 24-hours that blokes get in the winter.
Well that's the evidence. Full and comprehensive. If I was as clever as The Goldfish I would insert voting buttons at this point and you could vote on if you thought I was a bloke or not. One button would say 'You're a bloke' and one would say 'You're a non-bloke' and I could publish the results. I'm not as clever as Goldfish though. And I haven't the patience to learn how to do it. Maybe I might just be a bloke after all.
posted by marmiteboy at 4:11 pm
6 Comments:
You're a bloke. You sound like most of the blokes I know (give or take one or two perculiarities) but then I'm probably hanging out with a better than average class of bloke. And trouble seducing women is not a common complaint among them.
Many of your points of evidence sited are massive survival advantages. The best way of surviving conflict is to avoid conflict. You are economical, practical and independent. The spiders thing is silly but it is at least born of the survival instinct.
Of course, some women want to be perpetual mothers in the same way that some blokes want to be perpetual children. Loads of couples work within this dynamic; man is generally useless and insensitive, woman looks after him, dresses him etc, and despairs at his weakness. Some women need to feel really very needed. I have heard women compete with stories of how dependent their partners are. But not like, "He says he can't live without me" more "If I wasn't there he'd never change his underpants."
If I needed to interfere in any aspect of my partner's underpants management, I would not be proud of the fact.
In addition, some men are deeply insecure such that they feel the need to subscribe to a very restrictive version of the masculine cultural construct. And they bluff. I have overheard conversations about technology where two men are talking out of their backsides and I know it because I know better than both of them. The interest is not always genuine.
I believe most blokey blokes are just playing at it.
6:31 pm
Mr Dawson,
So good to see your likeness. You area gentleman sir and no mistake.
I'm afraid handfasted sounds a bit rude.
I must be a bloke then.
Cheers.
8:52 pm
Goldfish,
Thanks again for your wisdom and insight. You right of course.I suspect a lot of blokes are just playing at it. I'm just not a very good actor. My heart's not in the part you see. I'd rather be a non-bloke any day of the week.
Maybe I'm the male equivilent of a tom-boy? ;-)
8:57 pm
Lady Bracknell feels constrained to point out that there is no formal understanding between herself and Mr Dawson. She is not handfasted to him. Particularly now that she knows he is on the rebound.
9:55 pm
Oh good lord Marmiteboy... I think I just fell in blog-love! ;-)
6:02 am
No pushing at the back there, form an orderly queue. One at a time...
;-) Cheers xx
11:47 am
Post a Comment
<< Home