The Battle Plan: Part 1 - Mustering, Training and Equipping Your Army

Be prepared. The Boy Scout motto. I was never a Boy Scout, literally or figuratively, but it is sound advice. Robert Evans says the same, only more eloquently: Luck is when opportunity meets preparation. So this section is about the things I do to make sure I am ready mind, body and soul to meet a girl.

Live your life. Don't worry about being single, don't worry about finding someone, just live your life. Do the things you love to do. Do them often and with great gusto. If you don't like to do anything more than watch movies and TV at home...then find a couple things outside your home that you like to do. You can't meet a girl if you stare at your TV or computer every night.

Shower, clean clothes, maintained hair, brush them teeth, clean appartment, clean car (note to self...CLEAN YOUR FUCKING CAR IT IS A MESS). Simple upkeep every day...because if you don't you'll meet the girl of your dreams while wearing a shirt stained with mustard and relish, reeking of weed and feet. (true story)

Exercise. I hate the gym and don't have room for a home gym. So my hobbies are all athletic stuff. Riding my bike, surfing, hockey and training at home for these activities (pushups, situps, practicing poping up) have me in real good shape.

Get clothes that fit. Find a look that works for you and rock it. You'll probably need an iron. I still need an ironing board. We're all in progress till we're dead. Look good. People will notice. Recently after getting some new shirts one of my coworkers asked me if I had been taking my handsome pills.

Know yourself. Know what you are looking for in another human being. Know that most male female interaction doesn't include I do, kids, house, two cars, three cats, a dog, two turtles, a school of goldfish, and a stuffed parakeet named Bernie who was killed by one of the cats and left on the kid's doorstep...luckily you found him before your child did and were able to spare them the horror of its evicerated corpse. Most women are gonna shoot you down, or not call you back, or break it off after a couple lousy dates. That is life and I have more of those stories than I have actual love stories. So what's another rejection.

If you are doing all these things for yourself, then the right girl tends to come along. At least that is the way it has worked for me in the past.

Update

Friday I came down with a cold. The Rhinovirus. No it has nothing to do with a Rhinoceros, it has to do with your nose. So I laid low this weekend. Rode my bike a little on Saturday. Bought some new clothes and some Legos. Watched the first half of the second season of Grey's Anatomy.

I know guys, I need to return my testicles. But as someone who's desired career path is creating and running TV shows, I justify it as research into what makes a sucessful TV show. Honestly, I am finding it to be a great show. Not just a great "chick" show. All the characters are well written and well performed. It is very much from a woman's point of view. I think if guys watched it they wouldn't be such douchebags towards girls.

I've already picked up a few things myself. For example: If a woman shaves her legs before you go out, you better kiss her or she will be pissed because she wants to hook up with you. This is actually strange to me because most of the women I have hooked up with say the same thing, "I wasn't expecting this to happen, so I didn't shave my legs. Please don't think I am gross." Which looking back I realize I should have extrapolated the shaving legs = interested in you long before. But that is what I am saying, I am seeing things that I have done in the past in all the guy characters on the show.

So the point of this update is that I didn't go out with or ask out any girls this weekend because I was sick, but I think I will now be better prepared for interacting with the female of the species in the future.

Also, Legos are awesome and I will write a whole post about their awesomeness soon. Probably when I am taking a break from building a battle cruiser of some sort this weekend.

General Washington's Battle Plan - Overview

The following is a collection of my experiences, knowledge and theories on dating, love, etc. These posts will evolve as I myself evolve. I will be constantly updating The Battle Plan. Every good General knows that plans change as the current situation requires. As new knowledge is collected, it will be added to the corresponding parts. Each part will be created as a separate post. They are as follows:

Part 1 - Mustering, Training and Equipping Your Army
This part details the things I do to make sure I am ready, Physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually.

Part 2 - Deploying Your Army
This part details how to go about meeting women. Things I do to find the type of woman I am looking for.

Part 3 - Strategy and Tactics for Skirmishes
This part details the first meeting of a woman I find attractive and how to peak her interest. Ways to ask her out or get her number.

Part 4 - Strategy and Tactics for Battles
This part details early dating up till having sex for the first time.

Part 5 - Strategy and Tactics for Sieges
This part details the early exclusive relationship up to moving in together.

Part 6 - Strategy and Tactics for Naval Battles
This part details...I’m not quite sure yet. If you have any ideas what a Naval Battle could equate to in the dating world please leave them in the comments.

Part 7 - Strategy and Tactics for Campaigns
This part details living together to getting married.

Part 8 - Dealing With the Civilian Population Once Victory is Achieved
This part details being married and having kids. (These won’t be personal stories for a while, but instead will be collections of observations of my friends and their children.)

In Summation
A summary of the battle plan, what I feel are the most universal points that other people might be able to use to help out their own battle plans.

Appendix A - Instant Action
This appendix details how to just get laid...none of that sappy, introspective bull-honkey that the rest of this Battle Plan is comprised of.

I haven't been slacking...really.

So I have been meaning to write entries on a more regular basis...but alas there are many obligations for a General such as myself. I know the couple entries I have posted seem mundane and nobody is following this blog anyway, so it isn't like my fans are disappointed and waiting by their computers hoping I will post something new. Maybe I should tell more than just one or two people to read it. We'll get to that. Need some more content before I tell people to read this.

So lets write a real post...

The dating game...that is what started this blog, specifically my friend Charlie Brown (not his real name) deciding to get back out there after getting divorced at 28and starting a blog himself. Charlie Brown, I am sorry that I totally ripped off your idea. But hopefully the other cast of characters will start their own blogs too and we can really get something happening here. A discorse, a collection of different people's experiences, a document of our times and struggles, a community even. These are my goals with this endeavor.

I have decided to really give it my all in "getting back out there." I got divorced when I was 29...a week before my 30th birthday. I have casually dated in the three and a half years since, but haven't taken that next step into pursuing an actual relationship. Had my share of naked fun, sometimes only for a night, sometimes a weekend, one almost a whole week. But all of these were safe lays. Women who I wouldn't have to see again. In some cases, women I knew there wasn't chance for anything beyound that moment. It was fun, I really needed that after the divorce and move cross country. A reassertion of my prowes as a viril male mamal.

Now I am ready for something more. I know it, I feel it in my heart, mind and soul. I need to find a companion. My other half. I am ready to fall in love again. Honestly, I have probably been ready for a while and just haven't been able to overcome inertia. I have gotten pretty good at hookups, but can't seem to translate that to hooking up with a girl I would actually like to date. I think the difference is that with a random hookup, there is nothing at stake for me if I get rejected. In the last couple years, whenever there was the possibility of long term, I found a way to sabatoge it. Either by not taking my shot early enough, not taking my shot at all, or by overdoing it and scaring the potential girlfriend away.

So here are some things I am going to do to fix this problem.

1 - I am going to ask out every single girl I already know and have always wanted to ask out. These are women who I already know as friends and I think that the comfortability factor would make it easy to relax and in the very least give me some good practice for real get to know you first dates with women I don't know.

2 - When I meet a woman with potential, I will ask them out at the first available opportunity after realizing I want to ask them out. I think one of my problems is that I wait too long, so I allow myself to indulge the idea of what could be rather than living in what is. If I just ask the girl out when I first want to, then there won't be a lot of hopes riding on her answer and I won't be nervous when asking her out.

3 - I will remind myself that I have been rejected literally hundreds of times in my life. Some of those women who have rejected me are now my dear friends. Rejection is still a partial victory because I asked. Every battle I win with myself, brings me closer to winning the campaign.

I have already started implimenting these tactics. I've asked out two girls in the last couple weeks and had coffee with one. I am not sure that the second was an outright rejection. While I got her digits, we have yet to hang out. Hopefully that will change this weekend.

I will update this more regularly and keep you posted on all the battles, troop movements and news from the front.

Sunburn

So, I made a little mistake the other day. When I went out for the afore mentioned ride where I found the golf course...I was wearing a tank top. This was really the first major sun exposure for the year and the result...not so good. A little sunburn on the shoulders...and tan lines from the tank top. So I spent Monday and Tuesday trying to even things out. Put sunscreen on the burned areas only and then rode my bike around the beach with no shirt on. If you can't walk around half naked at the beach, where can you? Out of towners looked at me funny. Really? I am the least freaky person in my town. What about the guy on the rollerskates with the guitar who never seems to age. Or the guy out front of the freakshow telling everyone about their turtle with two heads. No I'm the wierdo. Me with my tanktop tan.