The 7 habits of highly effective pick-upers

I have come across a few guys who lament that their friends have amazing girl friends. One particular guy told me that his friend had 12 of them at once. His face cringed like he was undergoing the first exertion of pressure to overcome severe constipation. "Stomach burn" he moaned. " He has 12 I have 0". I told him I know that feeling. It indeed is an omnipresent problem. Among every 10 boys, 3 are just poor pieces of work by god when it comes to the ability to present themselves as likeable to females and the qualification to bag one of them as a regular 'girlfriend'. Alot has been said about how to approach girls and further, perhaps, win a date. But most of them give impractical, unworkable methods. Here, I give a few easy ways to practice what has been preached by those pioneers:

1. Project confidence: Books and online pages ask you to be showcase self-confidence when walking up to talk to a girl. But, d'uh, where do you get that confidence from when you suck? And if you don't suck, you wont be reading that book. Since there's no way to be confident about yourself, you can start by projecting confidence on something else. For e.g "Hello, you know, today's the last day for filing tax returns". 

"What? Really?". 

"Yeah, I'm quite confident about it."

"Shit.....!!"

(Then hopefully this happens two days later, on the street )

"Hey aren't you the guy who reminded me about filing tax returns?"

"Yup"

"Thank you, you saved me from a lot of trouble. You busy tonight?"

2. Be yourself: Dumb suggestion again. Unless you have a divided personality disorder, this is an automatic check for everyone. In fact ask your money back if you bought a book on personality development that suggests this.

3. Use proper body language: This can be interpreted in two ways. One is using your limbs and moving it about while talking. Practice by waving off flies from dried spilt milk. This also includes adjusting your tie, running hands through your hair and other actions which are liable to make your hands unclean. The second interpretation, I feel, is a better bet. This means less talk and more action. Walk upto the target girl and wave your hands signalling a 'hi'. She asks who you are you show her your ID (yes, being a cop helps). She asks you what you do and so you point at her signalling 'you'. She will then call for help. And again, being a cop helps.

4. Be a good listener: This is the toughest thing to follow for many. This also answers why the top scoring guy in class sometimes has a girlfriend. He is a good listener. Naturally, you can develop this trait by  listening to drivel that is available everyday in your classroom. For those who are working, practice listening to Arnab Goswami and Ravi Shastri. For those who simply cannot listen, not all is lost. Simply nodding is effective most of the time, more so if it is over the phone. But be careful of many key words like 'Birthday', 'Saint Valentine', 'Bieber', 'Twilight' etc. You may be asked a follow up question based on one of these. Though it should be said that it might be wiser to fake a cut connection when questioned on the latter two words, by pulling out your own telephone's cord or flushing your mobile phone down the toilet.

5. Put her first: The pioneers mean this as putting the interests of your date above yours. Most assume that this means, when you visit the mall you enter  (set up camp, rather) perfume shops and shoe outlets rather than electronic shops and XBox outlets. Many guys find this a bit agonizing. Once again, interpretation is wrong. Think simple. Put her first. Allot #1 on your speed dial to her number. Getting robbed at an ATM? Make her stand first and hide behind her. On a demining mission? Ask her to walk first with the mine detector with you following a good distance behind. You see? It's not agonizing to put her first anymore.

6. Practice pick-up lines: Usually this means practicing lines which would flatter and 'turn on' your target girl. Most pioneers prescribe something catchy like – ' I smell a lily flower around here. Oh! My, you're the lily flower.' This usually fails for amateurs pick-upers because they lack the charm when they deliver it. That is because it is difficult to lie effectively while displaying charm i.e the principle on which lie detectors work. It is not easy to call you're target a lily when she is a human being.  A good way to practice it is by reciting the same line to your local fish vendor. Another common pick up line is, well, an actual pick up line like – 'need a ride, pretty?' though this, in most cases, is not used on targets you wish to have a longer relationship than a one-night stand.

7. Show that you care: This is probably the most important aspect because this shows to her that you are excited about having her as your girlfriend and gives her the confidence that she can trust you to start going out with her on regular dates and later maybe proceed to higher levels. This usually involves morose rituals like how you will always be there for her and that she can always count on you for anything. A voluntary bonded labour agreement in short. This usually leads to an exponential reduction in time spent with your beloved Xbox and an exponential rise in the time you do the duty of a chaffeur and shopping bag carrier. Once again a case of misinterpreting what the pioneers meant to convey. Who has thought of it this way? – That you care about her and are worried that she has fallen prey to the tricks of global brand retailers and are concerned that she is indirectly contributing to the killing of innocent crocodiles and monitor lizards in remote parts of the globe in addition to the poisoning of a few fresh water fishes and that you will not allow her to give God a reason to pull the lever that opens a trap door from the gates of heaven that takes her all the way down to the devil's kitchen in hell. That you are care about her health and will not allow her to be disfigured by witchdoctors who sell potions of milk, eggs, cocoa, vanilla,almonds etc in various combinations that will shock not only her bathroom scales a few days later but also your cash bill a few minutes (hours?) later, in addition to the mental trauma that she will later go through after either browsing magazines or spotting an ancient egyptian hourglass in an antique store. After all this, when you tell her that the Xbox is healthy and blissful, she will just believe you.

If all these tips don't work, launch a nationwide protest against the hoax of proclaimed pioneers who profess dating tips. As it is a nation wide protest involving TV and chances of getting your photo on the newspapers exist, expect to meet a few girls there. And try your luck.

The Cartoonstution

“Social studies is my favorite subject…!” beamed Dinesh, a class IX student of Holy Cow Senior Secondary School. His friends secretly set up an appointment for him at the State Rehabilitation Center for Juvenile Maladies. Say his friends, “ I mean seriously, who’s ever liked Social? He isn’t normal”. But little did they know that Dinesh’s school was prescribing to the new NCERT textbooks. Dinesh was released from rehabilitation after the mental health officer learnt the fact that his school followed the new NCERT books.

Dinesh isn’t alone. Many of his classmates are now hooked to social studies. They say they’ve never seen anything so entertaining before. “My marks have improved. I read social every day. And without my mother having to plead with or threaten me with flushing my Playstation memory card down the toilet.”

So what’s with the new NCERT books? “CARTOONS…!” yells Dinesh. “There are so many of them. Like over here, this Children’s day dude is whipping the guy with glasses for not doing his homework while people around are watching that. It conforms to the tales my grandpa used to tell me about his days at school. That’s exactly how punishments were in those days. That’s history right there for you – punishment in the 40s. The best way to learn is indeed through cartoons.”

Well, perhaps Dinesh hasn’t exactly grasped the crux of the cartoon. But his classmate, class topper Aarthi, shows her substance. “I now spend much lesser time to learn social. There’s much lesser to mug up because the book is like 10% cartoons. And they usually give us ruled sheets in our exams. So I know they can’t ask us to draw those. So instead of 30 hours a week I spend just 27 hours to read social. I use the 3 hours I gained to solve RD Sharma’s math problems for the 5^th time. My score in math jumped from 97 to 99. I wish they put cartoons in Science too. I can gain a few more hours and get a 100 in math too” she exasperates.

She was nudged as to what she understood by the Nehru-Ambedkar cartoon which Dinesh so uniquely misinterpreted. “Didn’t I just tell you I skip the cartoons? Those are introduced just to motivate and scare poor students who don’t study well or do homework. I haven’t thought about the cartoon much but since you ask, it looks to me as if Nehru is whipping Ambedkar for writing a constitution which even brilliant, talented, high-IQ students like me have to mug up 8 times. You know, because Nehru loved children he would have never wanted them to read such difficult documents and score such low marks. You know, I forgot the Preamble and Fundamental Rights and got only 95 last year in Social” she weeps inconsolably.

Differing outlooks from different students. But it didn’t seem like any student interpreted it the way certain pro-Ambedkar groups claim they will i.e it will poison their minds and create an aversion towards politicians. One certain pro-Ambedkar activist, Chiruthai, had this to say. “This cartoon defames our icon, Babasaheb Ambedkar. It projects Babasaheb as a wimp. He was a very brave man. We demand that another cartoon be printed in which Babasaheb fights Nehru back. And it also projects Babasaheb as a mean person. He would never harm even a fly, let alone try to squash a snail.” So how will it affect what the students infer from it? - “Can’t you see that for yourself? Babasaheb is riding a snail. The younger generation wants 220cc racer bikes. The students will think life involving the constitution is not lucrative. Atleast someone should tell them that not all of us politicians adhere to the constitution” decries Chiruthai.  A better understanding of the cartoon than Dinesh and Aarthi, it appears.

But why have the cartoons made the NCERT books so popular? Dinesh explains, “Before we used to get some very good cartoons on Cartoon Network. Nowadays it’s total crap. I can’t stand the sight of Ben10 and Billy Mandy aur life mein haddi. The cartoons on Disney are no respite either with Doraemon being shown 17 out of 24 hours. These new social studies cartoons have injected new life and enthusiasm into us. We open those pages and laugh our heart out in the same way we laughed when we see how the mayor of Townsville (Powerpuff Girls) is only as tall as Miss Bellum’s heels. And the way we focused our eyes on Mayor Tilton’s (The Mask) corrupt deeds. We enjoyed those cartoons. The only way we can relive it is through these NCERT cartoons. If not mayors, atleast regular politicians recreate the memories of those cartoons to some extent.”

As expected topper Aarthi loved the cartoons for a different reason, altogether. “Are you retarded? How many times do I need to tell you? I love the cartoons because I have lesser pages to mug up and more time to concentrate on RD Sharma problems. With every second I’m wasting answering your pointless queries I am losing 0.025 mark. Which works out to how many marks till now? Wait, let me get my log book. We’re not allowed calculators” she quips.

The final view to make the verdict on these cartoons was the view of teachers. Principal of Holy Cow Senior Secondary School, Interest, was ready to state his views. “I think it’s made our job a lot easier. Even weak student now has learnt that Babasaheb ‘rode’ the constitution. We just have to tell them it’s ‘wrote’ and not ‘rode’. It’s the teachers who have created some problems infact. Some of them thought it was a novel punishment to make erring students sit on a snail. I had a lot of answering to do to the ‘People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) ‘”. So did Interest think students will get wrong notions from the cartoons as expressed by Chiruthai? – “No I don’t think so. These students have learnt from the cartoon that you will be whipped if you try to write a constitution. Hence no one in future will try to rewrite the constitution or become an extra-constitutional authority. Thus there is no fear of our nation losing its sovereign-secular-democratic-socialist-republican identity. It is quite clear that this cartoon has the put the future in safe hands” claims Interest. A far-fetched logic in it, but it seems to work.

Both students and teachers alike have thus favored these cartoons. It is better for the children of our country that these cartoons are not removed from the NCERT text books. Chacha Nehru loved children, and Aarthi’s argument showed that. Let the children be provided with a life-saving alternative to CN…

Powerpuff, Power rangers, Powerstar- They're nothing in Tamil Nadu

It was an anxious moment. A moment of truth. A life changing moment. The cool breeze blew across his cheek and made her hair dangle in air like musical notes. The amber light from the lamp-post next to the park-bench on which she sat, created the ambiance seen so far only in movie dream-sequences. He was on his knees.

"Divi, I have something. Please close your eyes."

"Why Niku? Whats this about? Got a surprise for me??"

" I guess... I hope you like it."

Divi would have had to be a pea-brain to not have realised what this was all about. She did, and she was all for it, and felt her heart warm so much that had she suffered an artery rupture, she would not have known. She was all ecstatic and decided to close her eyes, and perhaps imagine the two of them together sipping the finest wine in Switzerland months later.

"Ok.... surprise me... " *giggles giggles*

Divi heard a click, a click that was a melody at this time. Closed eyes were not a handicap, she could see with ears the ring-box open. Now only to experience her retina focus the light from the lamp-post refracted off the diamond.

"Surprise...!!"

Divi opened her eyes, and what she said killed Niku more surely than a bullet.

" Where is it?? I don't see anything. Don't tell me you didn't buy me a diamond ring."

" I did! You can't see it cos the damn power is gone. Good thing I have my Nokia 1616."

" 1616? What happened to your Samsung Galaxy?"

" Sold it.."

"What? Why?"

"What do you mean why? I'm not able to have charge in it for more than half a day. It's difficult to charge my Galaxy fully when there's power for only 6 hrs of my awake hours, most of which is spent at work."

" But my iPhone is always charged."

" That's cos I spend two hours in running trains everyday with your iPhone charging it near the door. I could've bought you a more splendid ring if I hadn't had to spend 5000 rupees a month paying fines for ticketless travel. "

" You mean you got me a cheap ring?"

"No..."

" Let me see it...."

Niku's 1616 flashes light on the diamond ring, and Divi melts...

"Oh, Niku....its... its..... BEAUTIFUL....." *sob!sob!*

"It is...?" *wipes a sweat"

" It's dreamy...!! How could you afford this?"

" I couldn't"

"Then?"

"Oh I stole it! There was no power, no light, in the shop. I just...stole it. Decamped. It's nothing really."

"Oh you stole from a jewellery shop just for me?"

"Um..hmmm..."

"Oh Niku, you're the best! And my answer is yes..."

*kiss, kiss, smooch* and they lived happily ever after...

____________

Chennai Times, back page:

"POWERSTAR'S LATIKA HITS ROCK BOTTOM"

Chennai, March 18: The much anticipated release has evoked minimal response from the cinema-loving residents of Chennai and other parts of Tamil Nadu. Latika, a much awaited release for facebook trollers, laugh therapy specialists, and biological researchers working on the evolution of apes into humans, has failed to live upto expectations. Cinema owners and distributors have ruled out legally demanding Dr. Powerstar S Srinivasan for a refund. Says Irulappan, a distributor, " What can Dr Srinivasan do? It's not his fault. The public are not able to relate to Powerstar when they don't understand the catchy-ness behind the name. They recognise 'star' but they're asking what is 'power'."

Dr Srinivasan has decided to take matters into his own hands. " This is a conspiracy. My new enemies are not Facebook trollers. It is the TNEB. They have contrived with Facebook trollers to tarnish my image. This is the reason they are cutting power so much. They know that since power has become a joke in Tamil Nadu, powerstar will also become a joke. I will deal with this. I will become Doctor Lawyer Powerstar S Srinivasan and challenge TNEB and Koodankulam protesters is court."

On the other side, a group of protesters are forcing theatres to stop screening Latika protesting the wastage of power in TN. Says one, " What Dr Srinivasan is doing is atrocious. Already we are suffering. We don't have enough power to even make use of the central operation theatre high power light in our bedrooms that help us put make-up properly. In this situation he is wasting more power by including power in his name. We cannot allow this. We will allow Latika to run only if Dr Srinivasan drops power from his name."

Is this the beginning of Dr 'Powerstar' S Srinivasan's identity crisis??

__________________

*Yawn* Sunday morning! Yaenga (the respectful word that wives use to call their husbands) looked at his digital alarm cum radio. Blank, no power. Sun shining outside. Must be anytime between 7am and 9am, the first of the days powercut slots. Trundles along to the bathroom. Takes a s**t. Opens tap. *bucket filling sound. 3 seconds later, plink, plink, plonk, stop*. Now, Yaenga says s**t and shouts to Yaendi.

" Yaendi, did you not run the motor?"

"Yaenga, this is Sunday. I woke up only now. I didn't put motor. Take tissue paper. It's in the kitchen cupboard."

"Kitchen cupboard?? @#&%$!!"

Noon:

"Yaendi, I'm hungry. Is saapaadu not ready?" asked Yaenga

"Yaenga, now only I am going to pakathu aathu maami's house to get ammi."

"Ammi?? why??"

"Current is not there. We have to use ammi to make sambar podi."

"Why make podi? why dont you just buy Aachi Sambar podi or Rasa podi?"

" Current cut is in whole state. Not just our house. So podi packets out of stock. We have to make our own."

"Aiyo! thayir saadham enough. Tell where is thayir?"

"Yaenga! No current means fridge wont work. Thayir has gone sour. Eat if you want."

" Do you atleast have rat poison?"

Evening:

Yaenga was watching TV when power got cut. So he gets pissed off.

"Yaendi, give me your USB broadband device. I want to see news online."

"Yaenga, I have not paid its bill."

"Yaendi, dont you have any responsibility? Why didn't you pay it?"

"It is unnecessary I thought, since we already have modem for our desktop."

"What is this?? I work so hard 6 days a week to feed you and kutti, and this is the gratitude I get? I should rightfully have asked you to go get water in a bucket from the hand-pump in the next street when I was stuck in the toilet in the morning."

"That is your mistake. You should've checked if water was available."

" You're opposing me and speaking?? GET OUT!!!"

Yaendi cries *sob! sob! boo, hoo!!*

Night:

"Ah c***! Have to go to work tomorrow. Have to get up early, so have to sleep early."

Suddenly fan stops...

"Yaendi, why is the fan stopping? Is inverter not working?"

" Inverter maintenance guy came when you were grinding sambar podi in the ammi. He told me to bring water in bucket for pouring into those holes in the battery. But since power had come only half hour before water had not yet filled the sintex tank. So told him to come later."

"Then?"

"Then I tried calling him, but it kept saying switched off, so I realised his mobile battery might've got drained."

"Loosu! Why didn't you bring water in bucket from hand-pump on the next street?"

"From next street? If you were so worried you could've gone, why didn't you?"

"You're opposing me and speaking? GET OUT!!"

Yaenga pushes Yaendi out of the house and slams the self-locking door. Yaenga doesn't sleep because of no air circulation. Yaendi borrows Odomos from pakathu aathu maami, applies it and sleeps soundly on the terrace with cool breeze.

_____________________

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