Ok, this is going in the daylogs because I don't know where else to put it at the moment. Maybe it will end up constituting
practical advice. At least, that's my sincere hope. If not, well, it's a daylog, so who gives a damn?
For most of my college career, I've been too chickenshit to ask the girls who caught my fancy for dates. I'm not sure why, exactly, this should be; certainly the idea that people don't date at dartmouth factored into it, as did my sincere belief that, in each case, the girl who had caught my fancy was way out of my league. I managed to ask for dates a few times, and generally got them, but nothing lasted longer than a few weeks, a month at the outside. The end result of all this was that I went from party to party on the weekends, getting my share of meaningless play, and feeling incredibly unhappy.
Fast forward to a couple of weeks ago, on a Friday night. I was at a party with several friends, and I was quite drunk. For reasons that remain unknown to me, I mentioned that I was fond of a certain girl, and that I intended to ask her out the following evening. The following morning, I woke up, went over my recollections of the previous night to make sure I hadn't done anything too stupid, and immediately started kicking myself for having a big mouth. A few minutes later, I stopped kicking myself, on the theory that most everyone else had had as much to drink as I, and that nobody was likely to recall my rash declaration.
Of course, had that been the case, I would not be writing this. Several of my friends remembered, and, having seen me pull the standard fraidy-cat move before, they decided to hold me to my word this time. So, they walked with me over to her dorm , told me to "Go get'er, tiger," and assured me that they'd be waiting outside, and that they'd take me out to get loaded and commiserate if she said no.
Here comes the practical advice part, boys (and girls; I hear girls bitching all the time about not getting dates): knock on her/his door and, after the normal salutations, repeat after me: "Would you like to go to dinner sometime? Maybe a movie?"
Works like a charm.
A couple dates later, and things are going very nicely; I've even shown her (briefly) around e2. Of course, I'm probably jinxing myself by writing this...
Here's the practical advice, part deux: I was talking with her a few days ago about what a hell of a time I had getting up the nerve to ask for that date, and she said, "Didn't you know that most of the time, a girl is going to be caught entirely by surprise, and just say yes?" This was a revelation. Ask for dates, and you'll usually get them out of shock, if nothing else.
Anyway, this was never coherent enough to be a node, so although it doesn't exactly describe events which took place today, it's just as well.
Happy Turkey Day, and don't eat any Turkey Napoleon.
(That's the bony part)