That sentence contains at least five follow-up questions she WANTS you to ask. Where in Florida? What brought you here? How long have you been in the area? What do you miss? How does it compare to here?
She handed them to you on a silver platter. And you said, "Oh cool. I come here every week. I love this band. Ummm... pretty crowded tonight."
She smiled politely. Nodded. And never texted you back.
I was that guy for years. Talking too much. Listening too little. Panicking about my next sentence while she was literally feeding me the answers.
Then I found 22 rules that fixed the whole thing. Rule number one: shut up and listen. She'll tell you exactly what to say.
You've replayed it a hundred times. She stood three feet away, scrolling her phone. You had an opening. You composed the perfect line — after she was gone.
For all you know, she's married now. To some guy who said something. Anything.
Openers are cheap. Almost any sentence works when it's delivered within three seconds. The expensive part is the standing there, drafting and deleting, while the window quietly closes.
The "22 Rules" stripped out my hesitation. What to open with, how to keep it alive, and the one habit that costs guys more women than anything else: waiting for perfect.
It's funny you say that about choosing your own government. If I decided to start an uprising they would call me a terrorists and nutjob. I was never lulled into a false sense of security. I always said we need to invest in foreign oil :woo: Big moneycomic_relief said:a lot of the price of oil has to do with supply disruptions in the oil producing countries.
Right now, the Middle East is breaking out with a revolutionary furor not seen in over thirty years. Libya, Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, Bahrain, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, just to name a few Middle Eastern countries that are having problems. Saudi Arabia is attempting to stop any revolutionary furor with its Shiah Minority in the southeast.
I'm not sorry that you when I see young men and women fighting to throw off the yolk of oppression and authoritarian leaders. I stand firmly on the side of democracy and freedom to choose your own government. Once these countries stabilize in a few years, than the price will go down again.
I just wish that the price of oil never went down in 2008 because it lulled Americans into a false sense of security over low gas prices. The price drop was just because of the recession. Be prepared for oil to go up even further.
- comic_relief
She calls you when her car breaks down. When she needs help moving. When some guy she's actually dating treats her badly.
You're the listener. The reliable one. The guy who would treat her so much better, if she'd just open her eyes.
She won't. You trained her to see you as the low-effort option — the friend who requires zero risk and zero investment. Every favor dug the hole deeper.
The "22 Rules" break the pattern. You'll stop auditioning for a role she already cast and become the man she chases instead. It starts with Rule 1.