Surviving The Enemy
Hearken, Oh Noble Gentlemen, to our collective tale of woe and imminent disaster. We are under attack and our position is hopeless. Doom looms for all of us. Our unstoppable and infinitely inscrutable adversary surrounds us, laying siege to our remaining strongholds with lightning eviscerating attacks. Winning is impossible – our only hope is total and absolute capitulation – lower the drawbridge, raise the portcullis and sue for peace while begging for mercy and leniency.
The History Of The Battle Of The Sexes
Our enemy is neither new or unknown, but has been with us for a long, long time. In my case, I have endured the assaults for over 72 years. Hmmm – brief interlude while I fire up Excel. At the exact moment I write this, I have survived the enemy’s trials and tribulations for 26,406 days – or 633,790 hours – or 38,027,499 minutes – or an astronomically excruciating 2,281,649,971 seconds! Yeah – over 2 billion miserable seconds! (Excel is pretty cool – and not to brag, but I had a hand in developing it.)
Hmmm – now that I think about it, I should probably add 9 months to that total as our enemy had me surrounded even before birth.
Battle Of The Sexes
It should now be obvious to one and all that I am speaking of the most dreaded male terror – the human female! Let’s just face facts, guys – in the battle of the sexes we males were annihilated eons ago.
We have suffered the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune as dished out in wholesale fashion by:
Great grandmothers, grandmothers, mothers, great great aunts, great aunts, aunts, female friends, female family friends, girlfriends, significant others, wives, sisters, seconds cousins, cousins, sister-in-laws, daughters, daughter-in-laws, granddaughters, female teachers, female students, female bosses, female co-workers, female employees, female customers, female store associates, and other random females, including random stranger females met on the street. Oh – and female doctors. One of which asked me during a physical, “Sir, were you in a bad wreck?” To which I replied, “These are just the wounds inflicted upon me by you and your numerous diabolical sisters.” (OK, I admit there were a few from other belligerents.)
The Three Laws Of Thermodynamics
These are the ultimate ruling principle of the entire universe.
1. You can’t get something for nothing.
2. You can’t even break even.
3. You can’t get out of the game.
You can’t avoid them, you can’t cheat, you can’t weasel your way around them – you are stuck.
The Similar Laws Of Male/Female Dynamics
These laws are just as unforgiving – and just as unavoidable.
1. You can’t win.
2. You can’t even break even.
3. You can’t get out of the game.
This obviously leads us to the only possible course of male survival – – –
Yes Dear.
Read it! Know it! Live it!
But understand for the sake of our continued survival that “Yes Dear” is a deadly two edged sword. You must assiduously practice it to perfection. Rehearse before the mirror to achieve the necessary excellence of delivery as any hint of sarcasm, snarkiness, or insincerity will likely lead you to becoming a first name customer of an orthopedic surgeon. It must always exhibit the pinnacle of honesty, subservience, and humility.
But “Yes Dear” only provides limited protection as our treacherous adversary lays male traps at every dainty step. For instance:
She casually asks, “Do you think I’ve lost weight?”
Any unwary male is doomed. If you say, “Yes,” her nuclear blast response is, “So you think I was fat before?” Translation, you are dead meat. If you say, “No,” then she will annihilate you with, “So you think I’m fat?” Dead meat again. Either way you are about to meet her Best Friends Forever, “Smith & Wesson.”
Similarly, “Do these jeans make my butt look fat?”
Any answer “yes/no” answer will again guarantee your doom and a visit from Smith & Wesson. And heaven forbid you say, “Yep. They should paint Goodyear across your butt and float you over the Super Bowl,” you are on your way to a fate that would make a Spanish Inquisitor faint from stomach revolting shock.
Your only hope of survival is “The Save.” In other words, weasel your way out of her trap with distraction and verbal sleight of hand flim-flammery.
“I’m too blinded by your magnificence to answer. Allow me to slip this little trinket from Tiffany’s about your gloriously gorgeous neck and bask in the brilliance of your beauty.”
Hint: Keep a healthy well stocked supply of “trinkets” close at hand to insure you live to see the next sunrise.
Here’s another example:
She asks, “Do you remember where we went on our first date?”
This is patently a typical unfair feminine trap question. Just because you know the starting line up of both teams for the second game of the 1935 World Series doesn’t mean that you remember trivial nonsense like first dates.
Your only hope: “All I remember was that I was so hopelessly in love that I didn’t know where I was.”
(Admission time: I stole this line from an old “Dustin” comic strip. But then, I’ve acquired a lot of my near infinite male knowledge from comic strips.)
Grin And Bear It
Let’s face it guys, there are some situations in which our only hope of survival is to graciously “grin and bear it.” She’s going shopping – and insists that you go with her. Why? Does she value your fashion judgement? Does she seek your companionship?
Of course not. She needs a pack mule. She starts by selecting from her collection of 437 purses the one with the lead bricks, (for building an emergency fallout shelter in the event of nuclear war.) Ten seconds after hitting the first store, you are the one carrying the 73 metric ton handbag.
This is soon joined by a seemingly unending barrage of bags and boxes resulting from her buying frenzy. Most of the time she leaves you to stare at air while she disappears into endless changing rooms. If you exhibit the slightest discomfort at your unfortunate situation, you are guaranteed many, many nights in purgatory – or worse.
You catch her staring in the mirror and wait for the inevitable, “I hate my hair.” Anything you say or don’t say will likely get you eviscerated. You can only imagine what she and her criminally insane hairdresser are going to do to her hair – (her current hair which looks just fine to you.) Your only hope is, “I’ve always admired your judgement and good taste, so here, take my credit card and get a new hairdo.” The idea being that since you are the one financing the hair changeover then maybe, just maybe, she’ll at least give a little consideration to selecting something that is not too offensive to you. Maybe.
Brownie Points Are Key In The Battle Of The Sexes
Here’s another problem and a reasonable solution. She’s going out of town for a week – business conference, second cousin’s daughter’s wedding, or some other nonsense. Call her hotel and arrange for flowers and an “I miss you” card to be waiting for her at the check-in desk. This is good for brownie points and you can NEVER have enough brownie points.
The most important consideration is that she expects the house to be a total wreck after leaving you alone for a week – empty pizza boxes, pyramids of beer cans, etc. – i.e., normal solitary male environment. To avoid the treacherous homecoming inspection, as soon as she’s tucked away on the airplane, check into a local hotel for the week – complete with room service, laundry service, and maid service.
Then, the day before she’s due back, (in case she returns early,) call up “Rent-A-Maid” and have then “detail” your house top to bottom until it is absolutely spotless. Sure, it cost you some bucks, but a non-peaceful female arriving home to a mess will cost you more.
Let’s say the Super Bowl is coming up. Or the seventh game of the World Series, NBA Finals, etc. and you’d like to invite all your guy friends over to watch it. If by some supernatural miracle your female likes sports, then cherish her forever and give her nightly foot massages. Assuming she’s of the non-miracle variety, then you are in for an extended period of living hell unless you take analgesic action to avoid the inevitable pain and trauma.
“Honey, why don’t you call up [insert her best girl friend’s name] and the two of you go shopping and then have dinner together. Take my credit card, it’s all my treat.” OK, you’re buying her off – paying tribute to the barbarians for peaceful existence – but trust me, the expense is worth it.
Just remember guys that you can NEVER let your guard down with ANY female. When you get a call like this from your eight year old granddaughter, “Grandpa, Mommy won’t buy me a car so you have to buy it,” you will know that you are well and truly screwed – and that they start training them early!!!
