Manslations (3 page)

I'm not a psychologist, though I have to admit that it does seem mildly attractive to charge somebody 150 bucks an hour to sit there and let
them
talk to
you.
I'm not trying to give you “ammunition” that you can use against men—we're already obscenely outmatched by women as it is. I'm just a nice, normal man you might meet on, you know, the Earth. And I wanted to offer women something a little different from all of that.

Since it's so simple for men to read and understand the behavior of other men, I wanted to share with women my experience in how to do it. It's not just about how to get a date or how to get a husband.
It's about how to understand men—any man—and understand who it is you're dealing with, even when he won't (or can't) tell you himself.

Plus, as if that isn't enough reason to sell you on
Manslations,
check
this
out—you're already
reading
it. Purely from the standpoint of convenience, I'd say that's tough to beat.

I've seen this sort of section listed in the introductions of other books. Honestly, I'm not sure how many ways there
are
to use a book. Well, other than to say that you should probably read the words. I think you'll find it makes a very real difference in your appreciation of the book.

If you can think of any other ways to use the book, though, feel free to write them in the margins here. (Please make sure you've paid for it first. Bookstores tend to frown on that sort of thing if you don't already, you know, “own” the book. Boy, did I find
that
out the hard way.)

__________________

*You might have seen me on Comedy Central's show
Live at Gotham
. This is especially likely if you were looking at your TV during my set.

* I have been blessed/cursed in that people I meet need to tell me about their deepest, most embarrassing problems. I'm not sure if I give off a smell or what. I think it's probably just that they sense that I'm a good listener. And luckily, they don't know that the reason I'm such a great listener is only that I'm trying to get all the details down so I can get their story right later on when I'm telling the first person I think will laugh the loudest.

CHAPTER 1

basic manslations theory,

or the stuff you don't know

O
kay, in the interest of full disclosure, this is kind of a trick title. All manslations theory is basic. I know that some women love to believe that there are complex and fantastical explanations and excuses for various male behavior patterns. (And if you want to hear a few, just ask any woman who is having an affair with a married man. She's got
piles
of that stuff.) But in most cases, men are very, very easy to read if you know how to do it.

Lucky for you, it won't take long to learn absolutely everything you need to know to understand all the men in your life. (And the ones in other people's lives, if you've got some spare time on your hands or if you're waiting at the airport or something.)

Behold: The Five Supreme Laws of Manslation
^*

I know it seems like an oversimplification to say that all male behavior can be explained with only five things—but in truth, even five is probably giving us too much credit. Most stuff can be explained using just one or two of these at a time. But you get all five, so now you'll be prepared for everything and anything.

Well, except for the thing where some guys like to fart on each other. You're on your own there.

Where does male thinking come from? (And can we send it back?)

Ha ha ha ha. Oh ho ho ho! Oh! Oh, you!

No, but seriously. Where does male thinking come from?

To explain, we have to go back to caveman times.
^*

When there were problems in the caveman world, they were mostly physical problems. Things like, “Mother
eff,
is it ever cold in this cave!” or, “Holy cow, would you just look at the size of that bear that's coming into our cave. What are we going to do about this huge ani—?”

So the biggest, strongest cave folks (i.e., the men) would have to run out there with clubs or sticks and do something about it. And if they couldn't, people would die, and nobody would snuggle up next to them during the long caveman nights.

Or when someone said something like, “Hey, I think I'm getting hungry for dinner,” there would be grumblings about how delicious that elk had looked yesterday, all antlery and jumpy aroundy, and so unlike that bowl of twigs we had for breakfast.

Once again, who had the honor of chasing down that elk and stabbing it with a pointy stick? You guessed it. The bigger, more muscled folks—the men. As a result of all of this running around, hitting, poking, hunting, etc., the male mind evolved into a problem solver. His value was based around whether or not he could
do
stuff
about
stuff
with
stuff.

Now, fast-forward to today. Men are still trying to solve problems. But the problems are different. We almost never battle with wild animals anymore. (Probably for the best, if you think about it. I've seen TV shows where some creature gets loose at a zoo or something and battles with a human. It almost always goes badly for whichever one happens to be wearing the polo shirt.)

So with no giant beasts to fight, when a woman says something like, “I feel fat,” the man will snap into action and attempt to poke the problem to death with the pointy stick of his little mind, telling her how she is
not
fat—what is she,
crazy
?—she's perfect just the way she is—what is she talking about “fat”? Even when, wow, she sure is.

In the cave-ish portion of his brain, the man has defined a problem (“Something's wrong—we aren't watching football”), and he's working feverishly on a solution (“Please, what can I say so we can stop talking about this in time for the fourth quarter”).

This ancient style of problem solving doesn't always help a man become very
good
at thinking of a solution today, especially since your garden-variety modern problem isn't going to require a spear. (Though God knows I've had moments on the subway when I'm positive that a spear would help.) Sometimes his “problem-solver side” goes after the wrong thing entirely and needs some help.

You might see this when you're discussing a problem with your man. You're talking about work; you're frustrated; you're feeling underappreciated; you're upset with your boss; and you're not sure if you even want this job anyway. What's your man doing? Listing off eleven different ways you could make this situation better. And you want to kill him because HE'S NOT LISTENING…

Well, he
is
listening. Just not in the way you need. He has identified what he feels is the appropriate elk (your job problems) ripe for the stick-poking (getting you a different job, telling your boss you want a transfer, whatever).

Solution? Give him a different elk. Tell him, “I have a problem, and I need your help. What I need most is for you to just listen to me, let me vent, and don't try to solve the problem yet. That will really help me.” He'll poke and club that problem to death like you won't believe.

So, men have left behind the caves, the pointy sticks, the fur bathing suits of their ancestors in the days of yore (most men, anyway). But in addition to the mad pointy-stick-problem-solving skills, men can trace another trait back to the cave, and it is this: Men still have some kind of a weird biological memory of being badasses. Think about it. One of our ancestors must have been a badass, or else everybody in that cave would have bit the dust. (Yes, I realize that everybody in that cave
did
bite the dust, but you can't blame men for that. Simple biology, people.)

So what does the fact that our progenitors were ancient badasses have to do with, say, a modern accountant? Or a computer programmer? Much like the spearing of your odd elk, there's not much call for badass-ery in most of modern life. Your ability to fight a woolly mammoth with your bare hands is less in demand than, say, knowing how to order properly at Starbucks.

According to the most brilliant minds in this field,
^*
the badass tendency didn't go anywhere. It's still there, lying dormant in most men. Thus…

Every man secretly believes that he's just a few sit-ups away from being
24
's Jack Bauer.

We're all pretty sure that one day the Navy SEALs are going to call up and say, “We're under attack—we just lost half our squad! We need
you!
” And by God, we'll be ready.
^**

Now… consciously, intellectually, we know that not only are the Navy SEALs never going to call, but we would
not
be ready if they did. However, we still wish we were badasses.

It's very, very important for women to understand this about men. If you follow this, then you know why he doesn't want to, say, go clothes shopping with you.

Imagine your Jack Bauers of the world (or your average Navy SEAL, Green Beret, ninja, or Jedi) picking out blouses with his girlfriend. You can't, can you? That's just not much of a “mission.” These men have no time for blouses—they're all rappelling down the side of a building or kicking in a door or punching an evil person in the stomach or something.

I'm not saying that your man actually wishes he was
doing
these things, but he likes the idea that he might be considered capable of them. He doesn't want anything to interfere with that fantasy. Like shopping with you, for example.

Let's take that a little further.