Saturday, 8 November 2003 - 4:05 PM GMT

I found the way you wrote about it amusing, but also slightly depressing in equal measure, that the simple act of going out for a drink becomes such an elaborate game of fencing off advances and having to stress the coolness because you can't predict the consequences of being more natural. Going down the pub is a lot easier for blokes, which is a bit unfair. There's a local girlie student I sometimes see sitting by herself watching the footie when Newcastle are playing. Good on her!

Saturday, 8 November 2003 - 4:27 PM GMT

Not really a problem - pubs are easier for blokes because pubs are utterly male environments. If I wanted a quiet chat, or not to be interrupted, usually you have to do a restaurant, ime. Going into any pub is generally somewhat of a tedious ordeal for women, much less alone, so I guess it's not that surprising when the obvious ordeal occurs.
I feel some sympathy with blokes for having to endure snotty women in order to pull - most women really don't make it easy to make friends, but without chancing it, you don't meet people. I know from chatting up strange dykes how nerve-wracking going up to a complete stranger and trying to bore them into submission can be. So, all in all, I think the arse grabbers are the most annoying.

Saturday, 8 November 2003 - 5:00 PM GMT

Hey. I'm still here and reading. Just not much to say about the latest entries. They don't seem to have much commonality with my own life.

At a younger age... say last week... I'd have been offended at negative generalizations about my entire gender (or yours, for that matter) but, what the hell. I'M not like the men you describe. Many men, on the other hand, are. Many women are pains in the arse, too. I've never enjoyed myself in a bar much unless it was a very cool one, and I've only ever found one of those, and it's far away from me now. So, you know. Lay into the entire masculine gender for the horrible crime of, you know, FINDING YOU ATTRACTIVE. ::grin:: I won't mind. When I find women attractive I sit like a paralytic in a corner behind my Heinlein paperback and avoid eye contact at all costs. Apparently, you and your friends would like me.

Saturday, 8 November 2003 - 5:14 PM GMT

I wasn't aware I'd generalised about the male gender anywhere in that post. Are you sure you aren't reading things that weren't there into it?
Anyway, the entire English nation is composed of* blokes who read Heinlein in pubs and are a little recalcitrant, you'd not stand out as unusual over here.
[*now that's what I call a generalisation]

Glad you're still reading. I'm going to catch up on some blog reading this weekend - gotten behind.

Saturday, 8 November 2003 - 5:42 PM GMT

I hate bar women. They're like another species. They're easily impressed by flash and glitz, two things I have in short supply. Brains and balls, apparently, aren't good enough for bar women. So I don't try to pick up women in bars. Striking up a conversation is difficult for most people, I find it very easy. Keeping it going, however, is always a disappointment because like you mentioned, Vanessa, my sense of humor is like the edge of a cliff. Eventually, someone's going to fall over and usually it's me. I think I'm a riot. But sometimes it's a one-man riot.

Saturday, 8 November 2003 - 7:09 PM GMT

You'll have to organise a gigantic bar-meet for all the readers of your blog, then, Paul, so we can reassure you of the value of your humour.

Are bars and pubs different? I didn't think you had anything like pubs in the states. Over here, a bar is definitely for pulling, and a pub is for drinking and farting (verbal or @#%$!).

Saturday, 8 November 2003 - 7:46 PM GMT

Hmmm. Well, no. It's just that every reference to every male (and the post seems to mostly be about males) is negative. And my primary thing there was basically my sideways 'look, dear, all the poor beggars are doing is HITTING on you, that means THEY FIND YOU ATTRACTIVE, stop making FUN of them for it'.

So, no, no generalizations, I suppose, except that you kept referring to 'blokes' and only really had one reference to one individual male, whom you mostly found annoying because, admittedly, he was a boor on a subject you're not interested in. (I try to be tolerant of folks like that and at least not ridicule them on my blog; I'm a boor on many subjects other people aren't interested in. Granted, I don't follow folks around in public houses nattering on about Silver Age superheroes and what's wrong with Warren Ellis fans.)

But, again, as I said, I don't behave anything like any of the men in your entry, so this week, at least, I wasn't offended. I was merely commenting on how it struck me.

Saturday, 8 November 2003 - 7:59 PM GMT

I referred to fifteen specific males in that post, although you'd have to have lived my life to know that. Several of them are referred to positively, although the same caveat applies.
And he wasn't a boor at all. In fact, he wasn't a he, he was a they, so a little less of the crudely satirised victim you're implying. They were twenty something, good-looking, with expensive central London apartments, and ridiculously highly paid jobs.
And I wasn't making fun of them, either, I was making fun of the three women (me, Melons and Lettuce) and our instinctive reactions.

I think it's a matter of perspective. You're determined to see sexism there, surely? Why assume I'm some bar-room bitch who knocks innocent men back heartlessly? I said I'd not been in that situation before.

Oh dear, just re-read that, and it sounds way more peremptory than I intended it to sound - sorry Darren. No offence intended!
I'm just interested that you see an attitude in my post that I don't think I put there. Of course, I could well be and often am wrong, and it's useful to have another perspective to compare such things.

Saturday, 8 November 2003 - 8:46 PM GMT

LOL. Don't worry. I won't throw a snit and ban you from my blog like the great big baby I am until you start insulting Steve Englehart's writing and referring to my feelings for the Silver Age as 'extremely dangerous'.

I didn't, by any means, in any way try to imply I thought you a bar room bitch. (Perhaps your friends.) I was simply pointing out, it seemed a sort of misogynistic post. I suspect if a male posted something similar, discussing all the women in some bar in similar terms, he'd be thought misogynistic. I kept saying you hadn't offended me. I was simply making the point... and it's a point I make a lot... that it's not insulting or offensive when someone finds you attractive.

I'm not necessarily saying you think it is, but so many times I run into this... people taking offense, and then ridiculing someone, simply because that person (read 'that person' as me if you like, because, well, that would be entirely correct in this case) finds them attractive and, well, indicates it. Not in an offensive way (you didn't indicate anyone in this pub had been offensive) but simply in a 'hey, you're cute, how about it' sort of manner.

And when I seem to be running into that, well, I knee jerk out of a response, that's all. But, really, it's just you talking about a night drinking with your friends, and what the hell do you care what I think? Go on with your bad self. ;)

Saturday, 8 November 2003 - 10:12 PM GMT

Okay, now I'm satisfied you don't think I'm a using ballbreaker, I can actually see your point (the one about why is it offensive to consider someone attractive). In my experience, it takes a certain psychological maturity to accept a compliment, whereas it takes barely any maturity at all to want not to be thought reliant upon compliments. Certainly here in London (I have no idea if it's a thing specific to the UK, but it seems widespread here to me), people will go to inordinate lengths to prove they can't be accused of egotism.
Yet another reason why blogging will never be cool here. heh.

Sunday, 9 November 2003 - 12:53 PM GMT

never really been a problem for me in the pub scene. No one ever bothers with me. Its the advantage of looking like I do :)

Its you fault for being attractive, tall and slim.

Sunday, 9 November 2003 - 1:11 PM GMT

Yes, I'd have to agree with Briar. You've only yourself to blame Vanessa.

Sunday, 9 November 2003 - 2:29 PM GMT

Don't be so self-deprecating, Briar. I went out clubbing in Leeds with you, and you pulled several people whereas I got sick of the bad music, stopped drinking and went home to bed early.
But thanks for the compliment, I shall keep that one. :D

Sunday, 9 November 2003 - 2:30 PM GMT

I'm going to call you a sarcastic buggah, now. ;D