So howdy guys, boy I miss having time to blog.  Obviously I hardly get around to doing it anymore so if you're reading this pat yourself on the back and give you a prize, you deserve it, especially since as usual, this is probably going to be just a bit long winded.

I'm drawn to the writing table today to speak a bit to some of the ladies out there.  I normally try to stay out of the realm of dispensing too much relationship advice for a few reasons: 

For one, nobody really wants to hear what you think even when they ask you- they want to hear what they think come out of your mouth, so even when you're honest they generally tend to do what they were already going to do in the first place, and resent you a little for not having read their mind and agreed with them.  The thing is, I think MOST people don't really want to change themselves, they want to change other people's perception of themselves, which nobody seems to realize is about as possible as getting a bowling ball through a keyhole. 

Two, I have only been in two relationships, so what works for me is probably not going to work across the board, it just so happens that they were both long term relationships so I haven't had the so-called "experience" of serial dating to speak from.  Nope, just two long term relationships.

Three, it is more difficult than you think to be honest to a fault with a friend or acquaintance, because well, you want to maintain a friendship or at the very least civility so its very hard sometimes to personalize advice that it would behoove someone to hear from a psychologist, per se, rather than a friend, and again it goes back to point one which is they don't intend on listening to you anyway. 

So then many of you are probably wondering why bother, and what qualifies me to say anything in the first place.  Well, I haven't gotten any schooling when it comes to relationships, I'm not a counselor or psychologist, lets just put the cards on the table, I don't have any kind of special qualification.  I enjoy human observation- people watching- as it were and am sort of perceptive, and I have three brothers and have therefore been around a lot of dudes in my lifetime, and have picked up on some things.  I didn't interview any of them to write this, there's no research involved, this is just me, giving my unsolicited two cents.  Take it how you will.  In fact, if any dudes read this, feel free to chime in at the end with your own thoughts, I could be wrong about some things, you might have some insight, do share, I'm sure some of the girls would be happy to have some dude knowledge dropped on them.  So, onto my spiel.

Ladies, if nothing else there is a quote you need to learn from Super Troopers that is funny, yet strangely poignant, "Desperation is a stinky cologne".  It sooooooo is and men can smell it a mile away.  You can be attractive and a great catch on paper but the minute he smells your desperation you have been instantly booted out of potential relationship material to maybe I'll call her when there's nobody else better around.  He doesn't always tell you but there are signs, if you only get calls after 7pm to do something and it's rarely ever out in public and you haven't met any of his friends or family after a couple of months... if he doesn't refer to you as his girlfriend even though you tell your friends he's your boyfriend and he always has something else to do when you want him to meet up with you... you're being used, cut and run- staying longer will only get your feelings hurt and no, you're not going to change his mind.  Why?  Because he smells desperate on you.  And desperation has some family members he doesn't around, two sisters, Needy and Clingy, a couple of cousin Psychopath and Stalker, and Desperation's mother, Biological Clock.  He doesn't want to meet them at all, and when you keep company with Desperation, there is a good chance the family will want to have a reunion that he wants no parts of.

Well, you might be asking yourself, what does desperation have to do with your title, what does desperation have to do with being the "cool chick"?  Plenty, says I.  The cool chick is, I would venture to say, 95% of the time formed out of desperation.  Yup, I sure did go there.  Sorry.  Now, the thing about "cool chicks" is that like a malignant narcissist, many of them are unable to come to terms with the fact that they are in the majority, and would like to classify themselves as in the 5%.  Let me help clear that up though, I would have to say 50% of the 5% of "cool chicks" that are not desperate... are lesbians. so that leaves 50 percent of five percent, so lets do my unscientific math here, for every ten thousand "cool chicks" out there, that means 9500 are desperate 250 are lesbians and 250 are straight non desperate chicks.  The other 250 of those are girls who spent more time with their Dad's and brothers growing up and never outgrew being tomboyish.  If you still think you are one of those 250 out of the ten thousand lets delve a little further into this because probably there is a lot of confusion into what a "cool chick" is.

The "cool chick" also goes under the name, "one of the guys".  She "LOVES" all the stuff her guys love, she doesn't keep many girlfriends because she "hates girls", she belches or occasionally farts around her guys and laughs a anything they do, the more juvenile the better.  "Most of her friends are dudes"- she guzzles beer, plays pool if the guys like pool, plays poker if the guys like poker, watches football if they watch football, watches baseball if they watch baseball, she even goes as far as to memorize teams and the names of guys on their guys' favorite teams, she will sometimes start wearing the jerseys of her guys' favorite teams, she will talk about hot chicks and action movies and invite herself to as many guy functions as she possibly can to the point that she starts holding the events at her house when it becomes necessary.  She thinks of herself as one of the guys, and she thinks that they do too.  But here's the secret she doesn't know and won't admit to herself no matter how many times she hears it...

THEY DON'T.  (We're going to switch tenses here, if this is not you then I'm not talking to you but its going to seem like it for a minute).  They might tell you they do.  They might act like you are one of the guys and they probably do enjoy your company MOST of the time.  BUT!!!  BeCAUSE you are a girl, they can't tell you the real truth of the matter because your feelings will inevitably get hurt and they don't really want to do that, or deal with that, especially because you're the one who picks up the tab when they're short, but there are times when they just want to hang with the boys.  The REAL boys. 

Why?  Well for starters because no matter how crass they can be in front of you there are still some things they can't say when a girl is present, even if you have tried your very best to prove you can "handle it".  Another things is this, most guys don't need a girl friend that is not a girlfriend, and once you decide to be one of the guys, they will likely perceive you as affirming yourself one of two ways, either having put them into the "don't date/friendship" box, or asserting that you will from here on out expect to be included with him and his friends at every function you have desperately convinced yourself that you like... because he likes it, or because guys like it.

He likes playing pool?  Sweet, you're now going to learn the ins and outs of pool, you might even take a lesson or two so you can show him how sweet your pool game is.  That'll be a cool way to spend time with him right?  He likes pool, now you have made yourself become (or at least made yourself appear to be) crazy about pool, you buy a cue stick with a monogrammed case- doesn't hurt to look like you've been into pool for a while before you met him, you might even join a team, all in the hopes that he (or maybe even another guy at the pool hall) will see just how enthusiastic you are about pool and see you as the type of girl that will be so cool and "gets" him and does the things he likes.  Heck, you may have even picked the sport before you picked a guy just because you knew you like the types of guys that play it in hopes that they would notice the cool chick who's into what they're into... right, but instead he sees that if he dates you, he'll never get to enjoy his time playing pool with his friends again without you wanting to be invited along and invading his guy time, or worse, pouting because you weren't asked to come along. 

Don't forget the staple likes too, though, you can't just like the sports or games they play... you have to like their beer too.  (How many girls do you know that drink Fat Tire or Guiness that used to drink girly drinks?  It's cause of a dude... bet.)  You have adopted a sudden love of cars and watching Pinks doesn't bother you... things you would have not previously done now you will do.  Not because you actually really enjoy them, though try as you might to convince yourself and you might actually find yourself willing yourself to like them and get some enjoyment out of this stuff. 

I need to ask you something here.  Who do you think you're fooling?  Have you actually convinced yourself that you're enjoying yourself?  Yes, there are girls who genuinely like things that dude like, but even they sometimes fail to realize that this doesn't make them one of the guys.  Usually dudes know the genuine ones when they see it, but you?  You who just "adopted" the likes of this stuff midway into your twenties when your normal stuff wasn't working with the guys... (psst, it was because you had desperate on you then too, but that's a different blog)... they sense the desperate in that. 

They know because you "loathe" the "girly girls" and they wonder why you can't get along with your own kind.  Only desperate girls "hate" all other women... men will inevitably feel its because you feel threatened by them and its true, many times you are.  When you say, "girls are sneaky and will steal your boyfriend", they hear, "I'm afraid you will think my friends are hotter than me and so if I don't have friends you can't leave me for them", which also means, "I will expect for you to hang out with me all the time while I pretend to love what you like so you will love me". 

When you say, "girls are catty", he hears, "I am insecure and afraid other girls will see through my shortcomings".  When you say, "girls are backstabbers", they hear, "I have a lot of skeletons in my closet and I am afraid if I tell another girl they will let those little details slip".  When you say, "I totally think chicks are hot", they hear, "I am so desperate that I will make out with another girl I am in no way attracted to in a desperate attempt to get your attention". 

Now at this point you have to ask yourself, is this the type of person I really want to be?  With no real interests of my own because I want to make myself seem like the coolest chick ever.  The type of chick that sits at her guy function, hating it when their girlfriends get invited, secretly jealous because you're not dating any of them and wondering what it is they see in her because she's not even half as cool as YOU are.  The thing is, dudes don't want to date other dudes.  As crazy as we drive them as females, they are attracted to.... FEMALES.  Not saying you have to be high maintenence, just don't try to wrap your world up in what they do, like I said they don't want to date another dude.  And they need time away from you, they don't want to spend every waking minute with you because you "enjoy" the same stuff.  Men NEED to be around other men just as women NEED to be around other women... like it or not.  Its what keeps us normal and sane, its where we can really vent and find out what types of things are normal with us and what kinds of things we need to work on. 

The fact of the matter is we all go through phases of thinking we're doing the right thing... heck I went through it, it's hard being a tomboy and learning to transition into being a girl, but I had to do it and I did come to realize that I didn't love some of the stuff I thought I did when I was trying to fit in with even my brothers.  I don't like watching sports on t.v., I don't like stuff about cars, (ooh, though I would like to learn to fix them so I could stop paying people for that sometimes).  Its hard, I'm sure to try and figure out just how we're going to meets someone and how to maintain ourselves whilst doing so, but I'll tell you if you do for some reason hook a man by pretending to like what he likes, you're going to end up miserable.  If its not genuine you will bore of it and he will start to see through your ploy.  Then you start to resent each other and it all falls apart anyway, so why not try having your own like.

And you know what?  It's okay to actually genuinely like those things, I super love boxing because I got hooked when Mike Tyson was the reigning heavy weight champion and my dad used to let me watch the matches... I have a girlfriend that loves restoring old cars and a friend who drives hydroplanes out of sheer love for those things.  And there are girls who are girls' girls who have a lot of guy friends but have found the balance between liking what they like and having fun with the guys but know when to give them space, so all you girls, I'm not talking to you.  As a matter of fact you are probably the types of girls that get attitude from the "cool chicks" because they don't see why its so effortless for you. 

So, that entire rant and diatribe has an end coming up here.  Learn who you really are.  "Cool chicks" that are "one of the guys"...stop trying to be what you think HE wants and be who you want to be, he will like you better!  No, really!  Anyway, now that you see why I am not paid to dispense relationship advice, please add your own two cents.  Do you agree with me?  Do you think I'm full of crap?  Do you think I'm not giving some girls enough credit?  Tell me whatcha tinkin...