College visits: A mini vacation.

  Here I sit, a 26 year old man with a rather enjoyable life.  I'm mostly glad to be a grown up, really.  Sure I complain about shit, but really the idea that I can do whatever the hell I want sure beats being 15 and at the mercy of someone with a drivers license.  However, there is one thing I really miss from the ages of 18 to 23;  visiting people at college.  It was like a mini vacation, a break in the monotony of my job and life at home.  A chance to go somewhere 3 hrs away and act like a total asshole for two nights, without having to worry about running into people that know my parents.

  The first time I went and visited someone at another college, I was actually away at school myself.  Millikin University was a short trip down ILL 72 to Champaign/Urbana, and I hopped on board with some other guys that were headed there. A lot of people I knew were at U of I and I figured it was a good chance to see some people I hadn't in a few months.  Millikin is a small school, so the first time I went to Champaign was a bit overwhelming.  Just the amount of people, how much nicer my friends dorms were, and, the fact we could actually go to bars was shocking.  I was blown away that all we had to do was pass back the same ID of person that looked nothing like us, and boom, we were in.  Drinking Red Bull and vodka, shots with stupid names, and whatever other garbage 19 year old's drink.  It was great. 

  The next place I really remember visiting was Bradley University.  This was a bit of a different experience because my good friends that went there were in a fraternity.  It's a bit of a different way to party, when you're loosely attached to people in a fraternity.  Generally their brothers treat you really well and you reap a lot of the benefits (chicks, booze, drugs etc) they do.  Bradley was more of a house party scene when we were younger, and it was still great. 

  By the time I was visiting Bradley, my brief but glorious college career had ended.  I continued going to school, but I was at home and going to community college.  With my good friend Will at my side, we started to go on as many college weekend visits as we could.  It was an escape from our totally boring lives.  Seriously, being 19 and 20 while attending school at home is fucking brutal. I can only speak for myself, but I know without Will to go to concerts, drive around and smoke cigarettes with, and tip back brews when we could get 'em, between school visits, I don't know what the fuck I would have done.  

  Things went on like this for our under age years, and they were great.  But I think once we all turned 21, college visits became even better.  You could do all the same stupid stuff, but there was no chance of getting a drinking ticket.  It was like a double bonus.  Plus, by this time everyone lived in an apartment or house, so there was even more freedom to a guy that lives with his parents.  With people in their own places, I was able to wake up earlier than all of them (I worked full time at this point, so I was used to getting up before noon) and smoke weed in the family room.  Something I certainly was not able to do at home.  

  That may have been my favorite part of college visits.  The Saturday after a night of drinking.  Everyone in their pajamas, casually drinking beers all day, sharing stories from the night before, all in preparation to do it again that night.  I remember one time a guy that lived with my friends had brought his sister, who was still in high school to visit for a Friday.  My friends and I were all partaking in the aforementioned Saturday behavior, while she was terrified in her brothers room.  She would only come out to go to the bathroom or get something to drink.  After she closed the door to her brothers room, one of my friends says; "The Asian kids from the brochure are nowhere to be found, this is real college."  This resulted in uproarious laughter and a memory I will have til I'm dead.  

  By the time my friends and I were all 22 or 23, college visits were at their peak.  Between visiting my friend Sean and all the guys he lived with at Bradley, and my 6 buddies that lived together at U of I, it was a guaranteed awesome time.  This isn't even including the schools I visited on a much less frequent basis (Iowa, Illinois State and Western Illinois).  But the Bradley and U of I visits for whatever reason, hold the most memories for me.  But that's not to say I didn't have amazing times at other schools.  

  One particular U of I party comes to mind whenever I think of the glory days of college.  A ton of people showed up.  And things were going great.  But like great college parties do, things got out of hand.  A friend who shall remain nameless decided to throw a Lay-Z-Boy into the front yard, while other friends proceeded to beat the shit out of the innocent chair.  In celebration, the guy who threw the chair, straight up Chuck Norris roundhouse kicked the front window to their own apartment.  The cops happened to driving by at that exact moment.  This lead to scattering, interrogation, but surprisingly, no tickets.  However, it wasn't all seashells and balloons.  Someone stole my favorite Bears sweatshirt and I haven't seen it since.  

  This was par for the course on a good college visit.  Something wild happening with no real consequences, thus resulting in a great story.  Once at Bradley, my friend and I and all his roommates came home after the bar, and just started hitting each other with steel chairs and and empty water cooler bottles.  We woke up the next day unscathed and full of laughs from our stupidity.  I would have to write a novel to describe the all the great times I've had at various schools, but this is just to maybe help some other later 20's people remember a time that they enjoyed.  

  Visiting people at college is something that is gone forever for me.  At least in the way that I'm describing it. But I will always remember how exciting the drives down were, and how awful (especially in the winter) the rides home could be.  The idea that you will be able to walk just about anywhere you needed to go on a party weekend has been replaced by cab rides and L stops, but dammit if I won't always remember it.



Note:  I spent many a great night at North Central College, but I don't lump that under the "college visit" category.  It was 30 minutes away and we were there so often, it was more of just an awesome thing to do on the weekends.

  

House hunting: Touching a bunch of strangers stuff.

  For the last few months, I've really been trying to find a house.  I won't bore you with the details of how completely aggravating the entire process is, and how it seems it will never end.  But, there is an aspect of it that I never really thought about until today: You more or less have a total window into how a complete stranger lives, and access to their things.

  I have looked at a lot of houses, and I can't tell you how many have been vacant, left to rot foreclosures.  It is a window into the last months of what I can only assume is a desperate home owner scrambling to get by, then just saying "FUCK IT", and start ripping out all of the cabinets.  There's generally holes in the walls, missing plumbing fixtures, animal fur all over the place, etc.  Now, there are homes taken care of by the bank and/or Realtor that are quite presentable.  But for everyone of those there are six total shit holes.  It's sad really.  At one point a family lived there, just like mine or yours.  At some point something went terribly wrong.  Maybe they were given a loan they shouldn't have been.  Maybe the breadwinner lost their job.  Whatever the case, they lost their house.  That has to be crushing.  But whatever, fuck 'em.  I'm getting a cheap house out of the deal so hooray for me.  

  What is even more strange, is looking at a house that is currently occupied.  A lot of the time they people clear out so you don't have to see them.  But even so, you're just traipsing around a total strangers house, with access to just about every aspect of their private lives.  If one was so inclined, you could basically have a dick party in a total strangers sock drawer.  If that's the sort of thing you're into.  There has to be people out there that get off on that sort of thing.  Their realtor is downstairs filling out paperwork.  Meanwhile, this guy is balls deep is some poor strangers loofah because he; "had to go check out the upstairs one last time".    Sort of a gross, but plausible thing to consider.

  One thing I did not consider, however, was how big of slobs some people selling their house would be.  I kind of assumed they wanted their houses to be as presentable as possible.  But there are some people that clearly do not give a shit.  Dirty dishes in the sink, laundry on the floor, general kitchen grossness.  You're trying to move a product you lazy asshole, make it look pretty for me.  It's just sort of shocking to me that people have that level of not giving a fuck in them.  

  A lot of the time the messiest houses have the owner on site while you look.  So you have to see the slob that is trying to make you buy their crumby house.  When the people are home, dirty house or not, looking at a house sucks.  You can't make remarks about how awful they have decorated, or really get into being a critical jagoff you need to be to look at a house.  It's really awkward.  

  Looking for a house stops being fun after about a week.  But, if you're bored and want to see how a bunch of strangers live, pretend you're in the market, and go hunting.  It's really the only legal way to dive into the deep end of a multitude of people's personal belongings.  Who knows, you might meet a cool person along the way (I haven't yet).  Or a person that you are totally convinced is a serial killer (I have).

  

  

  

Things I see on the internet that make my brain hurt.

  For every thing I find on the internet that brings me enjoyment, there are a plethora of things that make my blood boil with misplaced rage.  Anyone who has read any of my previous blogs can probably see that a lot of things in the world at large bother me more than they should.  But with that said, here are a few things I have seen on the internet machine that make my brain explode.

-In my journey through the world of internet based pornography, there's a trend I noticed that kind of blows my mind.  The women who star in these films (maybe the men too, but I doubt it) make Amazon.com wish lists of random items they would like for their fans to buy them.  AND PEOPLE FUCKING DO IT!  It's not enough that if you're at a point where you have seen their wish list, you have most likely paid money to watch them blow six dudes, but they want you to buy them a fucking sweatshirt too.  Now, I don't at all blame the women for taking advantage of getting free stuff.  Fuck, if someone wanted to buy me a bunch of new fishing rods and pairs of sneakers because they enjoyed my work, I'd take the fuck outta that.
  My main problem is trying to wrap my head around what the logic of the dudes that buy this stuff for porn stars.  They aren't going to fly to Ft. Wayne IN and fuck you, you stupid gomer.  You're being played for a sucker.  Knock it off!  You're making other dudes who watch porn look bad.  Save your money and get a classy escort.

-How have people not picked up on Facebook "like" viruses yet?  There's never anything good on the other end of a video that says; "You're never going to believe what she does next!  Click to find out!"  Also, do you really want to see a spider lay eggs in someones face?  If it looks sketchy, it probably is.

-Thirsty ass dudes on Facebook.  If you're going to take the time to come up with some thinly veiled sexual advance as a response to a girls dumb status about how she hates her job (EVERYBODY HATES THEIR FUCKING JOB), you're a mark.  Don't reward stupidity because you want to get your dick wet.  It makes the world a worse place to live.  I guess girls probably do this too, but I think they are smart enough to know how little effort they have to put in to enticing a guy to sleep with them.

-Pinterest.  I have never been on it, and I will probably never go on it, but I think it's dumb.  I find things I like the old fashioned way, BY LOOKING FOR THEM.

Things that I would like to see happen to people in commercials.

Often times while I'm watching TV I have a lot of thoughts running through my head.  Generally the thought is; "OH MY GOD I FUCKING HATE COMMERCIALS."  So, here are a few things I would like to see happen to people in commercials I don't like.

1)  There's a Jimmy Johns commercial where a guy is in an air plane that is delayed for some reason or another.  Unfortunately for him, his seat is sandwiched in between two large men, making for an uncomfortable wait.  That is the first thing wrong with this commercial, the two guys.  Who the fuck are these guys supposed to be?  They have on these ridiculous "gangster" outfits that consist of graphic hoodies and sideways hats.  What?  Why?  Why can't they just be two big dudes?  Fuck whoever wrote this commercial.  Finally, the man in the uncomfortable situation decides the best remedy for this problem is ordering a sandwich from JJ's.  So, suddenly, there is a knock at the air plane door, and lo and behold a Jimmy Johns delivery girl with the guys Beach Club.  What I would like to see happen next, is the delivery girl get tackled by a TSA agent and tazed.  Then thrown in the can because she probably broke a fuck ton of laws getting on that tarmac and opening and air plane door after it was closed or whatever. 

2)  Taco Bell has an advertisement for their new Dorito tacos, in which a young man, probably close to my age drives over 900 miles in order to try said tacos.  Fuck that guy.  He is an embarrassment to my generation of human beings.  I eat fast food as much as anyone, but I would NEVER drive more than 5 minutes to get a taco from Taco Bell.  What I would like to see happen in this commercial, is the car filled with this asshole and his friends drive off a goddamn cliff.

3)  Anyone in the AT&T commercials that says something like; "That was so 10 seconds ago..." should get hit in the head with a hammer.  Don't fucking talk to me like that.  I asked you a question.  I'm a grown ass man and I expect you to answer me like one.

4)  I hope something generally bad happens to the T Mobile girl.  I don't like her, and I don't really have a good reason.

5)  Match.com can go eat a dick too.  The people in those commercials are not using online dating.  They look far too attractive and successful.  People that use dating sites are, well, people like me.  I hope each and everyone of those beautiful people end up married and in horrible relationships, but won't get divorced because they are Catholic. 

There's so much more television vitriol running through my veins, but I'll save it for another time. This all makes me seem like an angry hateful person.  I'm mostly not that.  TV just makes me angry.  I should probably watch less.

A letter to day drinking.

Dear Day Drinking,

You're just the tops.  This past Saturday I was able to become reacquainted with you, after some time apart.  It's getting closer to the time of year where we spend most of our time together.  So I look forward to sun drenched days of shot-gunning beers with no shirt on.  I know that's when you think I'm at my best.  Remember when I turned 20, and me and my friends taught you to swim?  We had just met and you were afraid at first, but you got the hang of it in no time.  As that summer went on, we hung out more and more.  My parents accepted our friendship, as well as your bond with my other friends.  I can't wait to continue our great relationship, and listen to Cubs games, eat a ridiculous amount of meat, probably end up sending some texts/making some phone calls we regret.  But hey, what's a good friend if you can't cause a little trouble with them?  I'll have my own house this spring or summer, and I can't wait for us to hang out there.  There will be a whole new world for us to explore.  Well, I have to get going.  Can't wait to see you again.

With love,

  Derek E Self

Pumping iron, bro.

  The last month I have been much more determined to get my health in order.  Not that I have something wrong with me, like a diagnosed disorder or something, I'm just tired of being fat.  So that being said, I have upped my normal once or twice a week trip to the gym to four or five.  Spending more time there, my disdain for other people has grown more and more each time.  Here are a few things that I think would make the gym less irritating:

1)  When you're in the locker room, don't take for-fucking-ever to do stuff.  Get changed and get the fuck out.  There's other people waiting to shower and get changed, and I don't really feel like standing there naked while you read your text messages from your shitty girlfriend who's probably cheating on you.

2) While most things in the locker room should be done quickly, with Navy Seal like precision, there is one thing you certainly shouldn't do fast: turn a corner.  There's fuckin' naked dudes in here man.  Bumping dicks with some guy is not on my list of things to do today.  So always make wide, deliberate turns when approaching corners. 

3) Don't worry about what the fuck anyone else is doing.  Don't look at my treadmill to see how fast I'm going, or what incline I'm at.  Mind your own fucking business.  Don't fucking eyeball me while I lift weights with a look on your face like; "That guy is big, but I can shoulder press more..."  I'm not there to impress you asshole.

4) While minding your own business, keep in mind the majority other people there are doing just that.  Don't do anything to draw attention to yourself, like scream really loud or something else fucking retarded.  If you do that, you're an asshole and I hope you get a knife in the dick.  Now, everyone, including myself, understands that if you're really exerting yourself, you might inadvertently let out some noise.  Fine.  But we all know that I'm talking about those jagoff's who bench 275 for three reps and scream like the just caught a golf shoe to the balls.

5) Respect other peoples space.  This is on the gym floor, and in the locker room.  Wait a goddamn second to move so you don't bump into me while I'm in the middle of a fucking exercise.  If there is room for you to leave an elliptical machine between us, don't go on the one right next to me.  Say excuse me when you need to get by (this goes for anywhere, including bars). 
  In the locker room, I think this is pretty self explanatory.  We're naked dudes, standing in close proximity to one another, give me a little breathing room.  If it's crowded, wait a minute for it to clear out, so we can have ample space to do what we need to do (people following #1 would help this greatly).

6) There's no reason for you to walk around with a duffel bag with all of your supplements, chalk, various straps and wristgaurds.  Get a goddamn locker.  Nobody thinks you're cooler because you went to GNC and bought NO Explode.  All your bag is going to do is make me trip and look like an asshole.

7) Finally, one for the laaaaaaaaaaaaadieeeeeeees:  Don't be attractive with a great butt and go on the treadmill directly in front of me.  Please.  It's distracting and I feel like a creep, because I have no choice but to look at it.

That's all I have for now.  As much as this makes me sound like I hate the gym, I'm really glad I'm back at it.  I feel physically and mentally better than I've felt in a while.  Hopefully people at the gym I go to stumble on to this and I won't have as many people to be irritated by.

Having a mustache.

  I have the ability, like most men of my age, to grow facial hair.  Facial hair is great.  You can grow beards, mustaches, sideburns, mustaches connected to sideburns.  The list goes on.  I think though, for reasons I don't understand, my favorite facial hair I have had to date, is my current mustache.
  Now, the mustache that currently adorns the space between my nose and my mouth was grown as a motivator to lose weight.  I figured that since the mustache isn't the generally the most socially accepted form of facial hair for a 25 year old lad such as myself, I would punish myself by having one until my fat ass dropped 25 pounds.  And while I'm doing OK on my drive to make myself healthier (for now), I started to think that mustache as a motivator was kind of fucked up. 
  What the fuck is wrong with a mustache?  Great men throughout history have had mustaches (See:  Mike Ditka, Joel Quennville, Tom Selleck, Lemmy Kilmeister, Billy D Williams), but at some point the mustache became a symbol of depravity.  I attempted doing some google research on this, but was just linked to blogs about creepy mustaches and why women hate mustaches on young men.  WELL FUCK YOU WOMEN.  I am keeping this fucker until I see fit.
  There's an entirely different aspect to mustaches stereotyping;  the gay part.  Apparently at some point in history a ton of gay dudes thought it was a great idea to grow mustaches.  Maybe it was a thing to help them identify one another, I don't know.  All I know is that there's nothing gay about my mustache.  It's not a bigot or anything, it's probably friends with gay mustaches, it is just not gay itself.  I don't know, maybe it is gay.  Maybe after I go to bed it leaves my upper lip and goes clubbing on Halsted. 
  All I do know for sure is that I like my mustache.  I have had them in the past as jokes, or for "irony", but I've grown to think that I look OK with it.  As recently as yesterday I was referring to it as "my gross mustache", but I've had a change of heart.  It probably has something to do with my dad having a mustache my entire life.  My dad rules (that's another blog in and of itself), and if also having a mustache makes me more like him, great.  But I don't really give a fuck if people think I look creepy or weird, I like it.  I'm not trying to "bring the mustache back" or anything like that, but I'm not 86ing the thing because people don't like it. 

  So in summation, grow whatever facial hair your little heart desires.  I know I will.

Thoughts on "Kidnergarten Cop" 22 years later

  "Kindergarten Cop" is a great movie.  I really enjoy it even to this day.  But as I watch this movie as an adult, there are several things that seem really strange.  First off, Det. John Kimball disintegrates a couch with a shot gun, but that's really just the tip of the iceberg.
  What the shit is the deal with this town?  Astoria, Oregon is full of divorced women that are all apparently in heat.  First, all the moms assume that Kimball is gay, because he is a kindergarten teacher (because no self respecting hetero would want to try and get kids on the right track from a young age).  But as soon as John comes strolling in with his rippling biceps all the single moms are drenched and want nothing more than to get pounded out by this massive Austrian.  I suppose that divorce is very prevalent all across the United States, but at one point the town is referred to as the "single parent capital".  I'm supposed to believe that this sleepy little town in Oregon is the ravaged by divorce more so than let's say, LA or Chicago?  I call bullshit.  Not only that, but that all the divorced women want nothing more than to get down with a guy they just met 20 minutes ago.  What terrifically responsible mothers.  This dude's buddy is probably going to ransack your house while you're getting slayed, steal your valuables, and sell your kid on the black market.
  Then there's the kids.  At least 80% of the kindergarten aged kids are fucking weirdos.  The one kid has a father who is a gyno, that tells him the ins and outs of the human anatomy on a daily basis.  Which he feels the need to share with each new person that he meets.  The creepy twins (who are the real life version of Cheri and Teri from The Simpsons) are informed by their mother that their father is "a real sex machine"  Gross.  I guess that's proof that not just the divorced women in Astoria thoroughly enjoy getting pounded out.  There's the fat kid who thinks its OK to just get down on every other kids lunch (I've been a fat kid my whole life, and this have never seemed OK to me).  One of the kids has bags under his eyes.  What fucking 6 year old has enough stress in their life to cause them to not get enough sleep?  This same kid is also obsessed with death and assumes Kimball's headache is caused by a brain tumor.  Weirdo.  How about the kid with the slutty mom who uses dolls to look up girls skirts?  He's going to be a real winner!  The rest of the kids just seem pretty creepy and gross.  Except for the girl that was in "Beethoven", she's alright.
  Finally, there's Crisp.  He might be the worst bad guy ever.  No one with that stupid of a pony tail has ever been a bad ass.  Also, he's totally bangin' his mom (who is just the real life version of Cruella Deville).  The guy just sucks in general.  If I was going to use Richard Tyson (the actor who plays Crisp), it wouldn't be as a bad ass tough guy, he would play a child molester or rapist.  He is probably both of those things now, because I haven't seen him in any move since.
  The only thing I have no beef with at all in this movie, is Det. Pheobe O'Hara.  She's a good egg.

Attainable baller goals for 2012

If you know me, you know that I really like rap music.  Being a white dork from the suburbs doesn't really allow me to act like a baller all that much (the fact that I don't make millions of dollars probably doesn't help either).  But after having a discussion with my mans Dan Kricke, I decided to make a list of things that are moderately baller that I can achieve this year.  These aren't really in any particular order, and I'll probably add to it as I go along.

1)  Pop a bottle of champagne in a bar that's going nuts while "Ima Boss" plays loud as fuck.

2)  Be fat and have mad bitches be all over me.  This will involve going somewhere stupid and taking as much cash out of my bank account with out bankrupting myself.

3)  Wear a dress shirt, open, with no undershirt and a giant chain.  I'm assuming I can buy a chain and return it the next day, as long as I don't ruin it.

4)  Beat someone up while a Dipset song plays in the background.

5)  Smoke weed in a luxury automobile.

6)  Go to an expensive restaurant, totally not in dress code and not get let in.  Only to make the Matre D look like an asshole after flashing a shit load of thuggin' money (building engineers are total thugs, trust me). 

7)  Have a party in a penthouse suite of a fancy hotel.

8)  Have sex in a limo.

9)  Eat lobster for breakfast.

10)  Get a candid photo taken with someone who is actually a baller.

Hot babes, man.

  Woooooooooomeeeeeeeennnnnn be shooooooooooppin'!  That's not really what the tone of this blog is going to be, I just like quoting Dave Chappelle as "Reggie".  My dear friend Mr. A Elbows wrote a blog the other day concerning how much he enjoyed being male (this can be read here).  And boy howdy is he right, but there are different aspects of women that I started to thing about.  Mainly, how strange the existence of a hot lady must be, and how different it is than my own.
  For starters, being like a fat dude or whatever is probably the opposite of being a hot lady, so I have no idea what that must be like.  I can't even imagine what it's like to be leered at by dudes, because I know what goes on in their heads.  It's been said a million times, by a million different people, but it's all terrible (the thoughts in a mans head, that is).  But every gross dude on the bus, that hasn't showered in four days, is thinking about getting you in the sack.  How awkward.  I don't think I would like that.       
  Another negative, is you're a prime candidate to end up in some creeps basement chained to a radiator.  That will never fucking happen to me.  Ever.  Now that I'm a grown man, I'll never be kidnapped.  But as a lady, you never know.  That guy that's really nice to you at the pharmacy sure has easy access to sleeping pills, and your medical records.  Maybe he mixes up your Allegra with a couple of 'ludes.  Maybe he follows you home.  Maybe you wake up in a warehouse in Stickney tied to a desk chair.  This is not a likely scenario, but you never know.  All I'm trying to get at is that I won't ever have to worry about this.  I'm a large man that is moderately attractive at best, no one has any use for me in that capacity.  Also, I don't plan on going to Central/South America or eastern Europe so I can probably rule out getting kidnapped for my organs (joke would be on them though, no one would want my shitty organs). 
  There's the whole clothing/makeup ordeal as well.  This was all stated perfectly by Mr. Elbows in the link I provided above, so I won't really go into much detail.  However, I will say that the sheer amount of clothing a hot fashionable babe must have boggles the mind of a guy who wears plain t shirts to every occasion.  I once asked a female friend of mine if she and her friends bought new dresses for each night they went out to do something in Vegas.  Her answer was yes.  I was blown away.  I probably shouldn't be putting myself on blast, but I have like 4 shirts.  If one were to look at photos of me taken at parties or other occasions where one would dress up, some minor detective work would reveal to you that I wear the same 4 shirts whenever I want to look "nice".  That shit won't fly in the female community.  All the catty broads in the neighborhood would be shit talking you so hard your ears would explode. 
  Among the negative things that I have mentioned, there are indeed positives.  Mostly, you can generally do whatever the fuck you want, people are nice to you for no reason, and people will listen to what you have to say, no matter how fucking retarded it is.  Now, not every attractive woman is a dumb idiot that takes advantage of people, I'm just saying you can. 
  I've seen pretty ladies get away with shit at bars that I would get tossed out on my head for.  Cutting in line, going in the opposite sexes bathroom, yelling at staff members, and all manner of other impolite behaviors.  But, because the ownership wants the illusion of attractive people attending their establishment, they are allowed to behave in such a way.  If more attractive people are in a place of business, the unwashed masses such as myself are more inclined to give said business their patronage. 
  There's really not much to the fact that people are nice to attractive individuals, particularly ladies, they just are.  Not always, I guess (if you're an ugly jerk you might be mean to someone that's pretty),  but most of the time.  I guess people (men mostly) think that if they are nice, this attractive lady will let them in their circle and that will lead to untold pleasures.  I think sometimes even another women will have this illusion in their head.  The pleasures aren't the same as they would be for a man, but maybe this lady will invite you to go clubbing with her gaggle of other hot babes.  I don't know, I can only speculate. 
  As far as people listening to hot ladies, it really all just relates to the other two reasons I just mentioned.  For example, the other night at a bar I listened to a girl talk about her job, and dog for like 20 minutes, because she was cute.  I'm thinking; "Hey, I'm being attentive, showing interest.  This is going somewhere."  Well, we finished our conversation and walked inside, where she proceeded to kiss her boyfriend on the mouth.  Whatever, he's probably an asshole.  Point being, if some random dude started talking to me about the very same subjects, I would have smiled and nodded for as long as it took me to finish my cigarette and walked inside. 
  I don't know what any of this is supposed to mean.  I was just thinking about it.  Shut up.

Friends

  Today I was looking at a friend from high schools Facebook page.  It's not at all important who, but really what about their page got me to thinking about the idea of making friends.  This person went far away from home for college (a whole other state, time zone etc).  In college, it's easy to make friends.  You're almost forced to.  Whether it's out of mutual hatred for your roommate, or just a shared love of Early Times whiskey, you're going to find someone to hang out with.  But the part that got me thinking, was the fact that after college, this person then moved to an entirely new city, in another state for work. 
  For some people, that might sound like a terrific idea.  A chance to totally reinvent oneself (hell, people do that in college).  If that's what you want to do, more power to you.  But it sounds fucking terrible to me.  There are differences in how I think and act today, but I'm essentially the same dude I was at 14 years old.  I'm OK with it.  Seems like a lot of work to come up with some idea of this "cool" dude you want to be.
  Back to my original point...making friends as an adult, post college.  It's a totally foreign concept to me.  I don't try and make friends with people.  I am friendly, and a generally polite guy so I tend to become friends with people naturally.  But I certainly don't try.  That's the key difference, trying.  If you move to a totally new place, you have to seek out friends, introduce yourself to people, try and find a common ground with your fellow man.  Bleech, sounds awful.  I suppose you can choose to say "fuck it", and just see who happens to like you enough to stick around.  But I don't know anyone who's that anti social.
  There is one key reason I don't try to make new friends:  I don't have to.  I have friends.  Good ones.  I'm not saying this in an "I'm so fucking cool, I got hella friends" type of way.  I'm just saying I'm fortunate enough to have people in my life that have been around for a long time.  Most of the guys I hang around with I've known since grade school.  And I wouldn't have it any other way.  Sure, meeting new people is cool, and some of them become friends along the way, but knowing I can be a total dick and just not talk to anyone at a party or bar is a comforting feeling.
  I don't want to come off sounding like I'm some kind of recluse, and truthfully to anyone that knows me, this probably sounds hypocritical.  I love talking to people.  I will talk to just about anyone, anywhere about anything.  Give me six beers in short order, and I'm like a goddamn tornado of socializing.  But the fact of the matter is I don't HAVE to be.  And that's nice.  If you're my friend, and you read this, thanks.