9/22 (Tue) Boy Meets Girl or Whatever (Host: Carmen)

[CarmenTao]

Boy Meets Girl (or Whatever) (excerpt from The Book of Joan: Tales of Mirth, Mischief, and Manipulation)

When it came to my mother teaching/advising/cautioning/warning me about dating and romance, listening to her was like playing Truth or Dare with a pre-op transsexual: I never knew what I was going to get. On the one hand, my mother talked about love in an old-fashioned manner; on the other hand, she spoke like the whore of Babylon.

My mother felt that “courting” was a game I needed to know and know how to play. She fancied herself a modern-day courtesan in how she behaved and treated her men. To be fair, she did have two legitimate long-term relationships after my father’s passing. I actually got to see her in her “courtesaning” mode, flirting with men she was interested in. The only thing I can say about that is it’s one of those things that, once you see, you can’t unsee, and it will haunt you for the rest of your life.

She always told me, “Dating is a game. When you’re dating, trust me, they don’t really love how you look when you don’t have your makeup on, even though they say they do. They don’t want to hear about your ailments and your worries. Men are basic: they want you to look pretty and be good in bed. Oh, and if you’re smart and funny, that’s nice—let your friends enjoy that side of your personality. No man ever wants to be reminded that women are truly superior. Yes, the truth makes them that insecure. You can be smarter than them or funnier than them, but not both.”

One mantra she lived by was to “make sure the man always thinks he’s the best and the smartest, and that every time you look at him, he thinks you’re thinking, ‘Honey, I need you.’ ” The fact that men are inherently stupid makes this not such a hard task to accomplish.

One of my mother’s good friends was the wife of a famous billionaire financier—you can guess which one; I’m not telling. When my mother would have them over for dinner, her friend would sit at the table with her hand in her chin, hanging on her rich husband’s every word. “Oh, sweetheart, that is so wise. You are such a sage.” My mother said the only way she managed not to laugh or vomit was to look at the ring on her friend’s finger and think, “Check out the ring on her finger; who’s sage-ing whom?”

My mother treated her men the same way. She tried making them feel like they were the best things God had ever put on the planet, even better than Bergdorf or Saks.

She was coy, and was always about “making life better for her man.” She instinctively knew what buttons to push to make a man feel good about himself, and would push them as needed. (Conversely, she knew which buttons to push to make me feel bad; of course she knew those buttons; she’d installed them.) She’d say things like “Oh, Lenny, I love the way your love handles drag on the floor; I don’t have to vacuum,” or “Milton, it really turns me on the way your hair plugs tickle my thighs.” She may not have been honest in the boudoir, but she was smart. “Melissa, making a man’s life better may take a little work and a little craftiness, but it will earn you large, shiny necklaces afterward.” When I replied, “I can buy my own shiny necklaces,” she said, “Of course you can; but why should you?”

My mother often gave me tips on dating. Some were actually good, and some were ridiculous. For example, she told me always to wear heels. They make your legs look better. (She even suggested to me that I play tennis in them.) “Even if he’s just coming over to relax, answer the door in heels. You can always kick them off and curl your feet under you on the couch like Marilyn Monroe.” Not a bad suggestion.

On the flip side, she also suggested that before a man came to the house to pick me up for a date, I should send flowers to myself so that when he walked in he’d be jealous and say, “Who sent you those beautiful flowers?” I don’t know about anybody else, but not one man I dated ever noticed the flowers in my house. Not even the mortician I went out with once. (Don’t ask. In bed he wanted to put pennies on my eyes and have me lie perfectly still.)

My mother was from an era when men asked out women, and wined them and dined them in the hope of getting (a) a relationship, (b) a wife, or (c) a good roll in the hay. She used to tell me that when she was young, there were always one or two girls in her high school who were “fast” and who “put out,” but most of them stayed virgins until they got married. “Things have changed, Missy. Now they only stay virgins until homeroom.”

She believed that today’s women have “fucked it up for themselves” because they give it up so quickly. On Fashion Police she hated seeing the young stars dressed like sluts because it sent a message that girls were available for the taking.

Her concern about teen sluttiness was genuine. My mom worried that a lot of today’s youth would miss out on the wonderful rites of passage that she, and to some extent I, had. She used to talk about the innocent experiences of flirting, and passing notes in class, and holding hands. As forward-thinking and trend-conscious as she was, she was still old-fashioned in certain ways. She didn’t like everything about modern technology. “Melissa, in my day a boy asked you out, bought you flowers, and had you home at a reasonable hour. In high school we had boyfriends and girlfriends, not baby daddies and baby mamas. I hear about all these college kids sexting pictures of their junk. It’s not right. If I want to see a young penis, I’ll take a shower with Chaz Bono.”

DATING TIPS MY MOTHER GAVE ME
•Take breath mints with you. No man, not even one with BO and a sinus condition, wants to kiss a girl who has the breath of death.
•Always have lipstick, powder, and a mirror in your purse. It takes five minutes to freshen up and look good, but it only takes five seconds with lipstick on your teeth to ruin a relationship.
•Never pick up the check. “You have the vagina, he has the wallet. He pays.”
•Let him open the door for you. If he doesn’t, and leaves you standing in the street, turn around, get in a cab, and go home. If he leaves you in the street, he’ll leave you for another woman.
•Never give it up on the first date, because once you do, you give away your power. And once you give it up, you’d better make sure you’re so good at it that it’s like an addiction. (She would actually send me articles on how to be good in bed and how to give good blow jobs. I’m surprised she didn’t try to hire me a tutor.)
•Never carry condoms. Those are his responsibility. “Women who carry condoms don’t look like Girl Scouts who are always prepared; they look like prostitutes who are always at the free clinic.”
•Make sure he’s straight. Gay men make great BFFs but lousy boyfriends. Any man who mentions Bette Midler more than once a year, or who gets giddy when he realizes that you two look good in the same colors, is probably not a good dating choice. (“Hey, honey, check this out: we’re both autumns!”)
•Google him before you do him. No sane woman wants to have toe-curling, I’ve-already-fallen-in-love-with-you sex with a man only to find out later that he’s got wives and families in nine different states or is wanted by the FBI, CIA, Interpol, and ISIS.


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Discussion questions:
This is just an article about the author’s late mother – Joan Rivers. Please do not take it personally or too seriously. Let’s just have fun discussing these issues.

Session I

1. Do you agree that in a relationship, most men want to appear to be the best and the smartest? Whether you agree or not, tell us about your observation or how you tackle this issue when your partner wants to appear to be the best/smartest/prettiest.

2. What’s your opinion about “sending flowers to” or “receiving flowers from” your partner? Tell us your thoughts from financial or romantic perspective and the probable consequences.

3. If you have/had a daughter, what tips will/would you give her on dating.

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Session II

1. This question is what Carmen really wants to know…..

Do you consider holding hands with your girlfriend/boyfriend/husband/wife important? Why or why not? If you think the degree of the importance is slightly different between young people and middle-aged people, please tell us the difference, but obviously you have to admit you are middle-aged first to make yourself qualified to answer.

2. In a relationship, who do you think should pay the bill when you go on a date. Please tell us your own principles, philosophy, mechanism or bottom line regarding this issue. Please be HONEST.

3. Have you googled someone who is not a celebrity? What made you do so or what aroused your curiosity?

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Agenda:
6:45 ~ 7:00pm Greetings & Free Talk / Ordering Beverage or Meal / Getting Newcomer’s Information
7:00 ~ 7:10pm Opening Remarks / Newcomer’s Self-introduction / Grouping
(Session I)
7:10 ~ 7:50pm Discussion Session (40 mins)
7:50 ~ 8:10pm Summarization (20 mins)
8:10 ~ 8:25pm Regrouping / Instruction Giving / Taking a 10 Minutes Break (Intermission)
(Session II)
8:25 ~ 9:05pm Discussion Session (40 mins)
9:05 ~ 9:25pm Summarization (20 mins)
9:25 ~ 9:30pm Concluding Remarks / Announcements
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聚會日期：列於該貼文主題內
聚會時間：當天請準時於 6:45 pm 到達 ~ 約 9:30 pm 左右結束
星期三聚會地點：丹堤濟南店
地址、電話：台北市濟南路三段25號 地圖 (02) 2740-2350
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走法：出忠孝新生站 3 號出口後，沿著巷子(忠孝東路三段10巷)走約 2 分鐘，到了濟南路口，左轉走約 2 分鐘即可看到。
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注意事項：
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2. 與會者請先閱讀過文章，並仔細想過所有的問題，謝謝合作！

給新朋友的話：
1. 請事先準備 2~3 分鐘的英語自我介紹；會議結束前可能會請你發表 1~2 分鐘的感想。
2. 請事先閱讀文章以及主持人所提的討論問題，並事先寫下自己所欲發表意見的英文。
3. 全程以英語進行，參加者應具備中等英語會話能力，對任一討論問題，能夠以 5 到 10 句英文表達個人見解。
4. 在正式加入之前，可以先來觀摩三次，觀摩者亦須參與討論。正式加入需繳交終身會費 NT$1,000。

[CarmenTao]

Please feel free to let me know if you have any questions regarding the vocabulary.
www.urbandictionary.com is my favorite online slang dictionary.
FYI.

[toshi]

I prefer to meet εïз εïз

[Rock]

I prefer to meet εïз εïз

Cannot decipher the code.

[Rock]

For the holding hand question, I do have an aged man's answer: Passionate love drives a young man to hold hands with his lover, while compassionate love keeps an old man's hand on his life-long partner's. In the middle, he doesn't usually do it because there is no need.

However, after being sent to an obedient school, I am trained to hold hands at anytime.

[CarmenTao]

Rock, you are always this quick-witted. Your students are lucky.
By the way, I think those symbols you can't decipher are butterflies.

[toshi]

For the holding hand question, I do have an aged man's answer: Passionate love drives a young man to hold hands with his lover, while compassionate love keeps an old man's hand on his life-long partner's. In the middle, he doesn't usually do it because there is no need.

However, after being sent to an obedient school, I am trained to hold hands at anytime.

You Rock!!!

[toshi]

I prefer to meet εïз εïз

Cannot decipher the code.

Greek, Latin & Slavic ^^

[CarmenTao]

Participants: Leo Wendy Michael Jason Kat Shirley Amy Sophie Ryan Steve Sabrina Rock Wen-han Julian Tina

New comer: Vicky

Speakers: Shirley Sophie Ryan Wen-han Jason Sabrina Amy Tina