When I was a little kid, my parents pushed me out the front door every day.

“Come back when the streetlights come on,” they said.

Oftentimes, my 3 year old brother was sent out with me to tagalong. Of course, I considered this a great imposition. After all, at 5 I was way too old to hang out with babies. Still, I had to take care of him because that’s what older sisters are supposed to do.

Back then, we never dialed phones and set up 2 hour play dates. Instead, we’d simply knock on our friend’s doors and say, “Is so&so allowed to come out and play?”

Of course they were.

When we got a good group together, we’d play baseball or kickball in the street.

Yes, in the street.

When the cars rounded the corner, we’d scurry away as fast as we could. We’d use a whiffle ball instead of a real ball in order to prevent hurting anyone’s car. After that, we’d have a squirt gun war. No one checked the temperature on the Internet to make sure it was warm enough to get wet.

Fortunately, no one got sick or died.

Some days, we’d go exploring in the woods. Our minds full of fantastical stories of bad guys chasing us, we decided we must build a tree house. So we gathered up scrap pieces of old wood, rusty nails pulled out of rotting pieces of equipment, and a hammer someone nicked from their Father’s toolbox. Then we’d nail this crap to a tree. Once the rickety house was complete, we’d climb up in it, careful to hold on to the branches in case the floor gave out beneath us. Then, we’d muse to ourselves that we had not built it high enough.

We built ramps in parking lots and jumped them with every toy we had that sported wheels. Skateboards, bikes, roller skates. We didn’t have helmets or kneepads or elbow pads. It didn’t matter. Sometimes we’d fall and rub the skin completely off of our bodies. Nobody cared.

We’d eat berries and apples from strange trees. We’d ride our bikes 6 miles to the park, alone. And not just any park, either. We went to parks with monkey bars higher than our Dad’s heads and dangled our legs over cement. We sat in puddles full of oil and water and swam in water so dirty it might as well be called sewage. In the summertime, we’d go 6, 7, 8 hours at a time without laying eyes on our parents.

And we survived.

Hell, we didn’t just survive. We flourished.

Not a single one of us was overweight; we all had little muscles popping out here and there. We were brave, too. Little badasses. There was no way a perv was going to kidnap us. In fact, we kept little sticks we had sharpened on the sidewalk in our pockets, just in case. Homemade shanks. Sometimes we got lost or hurt, sure. But we knew the difference between a creepy adult you should steer clear of and a responsible adult you could ask for help.

And not one of us died. Not one.

Unfortunately, things have changed and I’m inclined to believe it’s not for the better. I cannot stand how cowardly, weak, and coddled children have become. Children twice the age I was back when I was running the streets with a 3 year old brother in tow have 1/8th the confidence and capability.

Last week, I went to target with a 10 year old and an 8 year old. We stopped in the toy section for a moment because I remember what it was like to walk the isles and dream. (As opposed to today where children walk the isles and demand shit until they get their every heart’s desire)

I said to the children, “I’m going to go look the bath towels. If you want to stay here and look at the toys, I’ll be back to get you in 10 minutes.”

As a child, I wouldn’t have even acknowledged this was a big deal. It was commonplace for me to split from my parents in department stores. They always looked at boring shit and I had a Christmas list to write.

“No, we’ll just stay with you,” the children nervously tittered.

“You want to look at bath towels?” I asked, “Are you sure? Are you sure you wouldn’t rather stay and look at the toys…or maybe cross the isles and look at the electronics?”

“No, we’ll just stay with you.”

I can’t stand it anymore. Kids aren’t normal! They have no childhood anymore. They just have one never ending, confidence crushing, adventure less, schedule. They have self esteem, (whatever that means) but no actual accomplishments.

So I came up with a plan.

I gave the children $20. “This is for cleaning up the yard,” I said.

Then, we went to the mall. As we stood by the pizza place in the food court, I approached them with a little proposition.

“You guys are free to go spend your money, but I’m not coming with you.”

They blinked their eyes, confused. “Where will you be?”

“I’ll be in the boring stores and I don’t plan to step foot in a single toy store. So if you want to spend that $20, you’re going to have to go it alone.”

The children were torn between the desire to spend the money that was burning a hole in their pocket and their preference to remain in the company of adults at all times. Finally, they hesitated and I knew I had them.

“We got to lay down some ground rules, though, before we split up. The first one is that you stay together no matter what. The second one is you do not leave this mall under any circumstance without me…not even with another adult. The last one is we meet back here at this pizza shop at exactly 3:30pm.”

I paused briefly when I realized that neither one of them was wearing a watch. Then I thought to myself, fuck it.

“If you need to know what time it is, you can ask any clerk working behind the counter of any one of these stores. If you need directions back to this pizza place or to a restroom, you can ask them that, too. I want you to mind your manners, don’t break or steal anything, no fighting, no screaming, no running, and no idiocy. You got that?”

They nodded their heads carefully.

“Alright then, go. Have fun.”

I watched them walk away until they got lost in the crowd. For a moment, I felt completely satisfied. They’re finally learning independence, I told myself.

But that lasted only a moment. Not more than 5 minutes after they walked out of my sight, I found myself choking on my fear.

What if they get lost? Fall down? Get into trouble at one of the stores? What if someone sees them walking alone and calls the police? Ten and seven is plenty old enough to walk around a mall, but people are nuts now. Nuts. And what if they’re right? This is a safe neighborhood. Not a single child has been kidnapped here in my lifetime. Crime is low. No gang violence. This is a safe neighborhood! But still…but still…but still.

I resisted the urge to track them down and tell them I changed my mind. If I had I would have invalidated every bit of courage they had displayed in walking away. So, I let them be.

And at exactly 3:15, I was at the pizza shop waiting for them. If they are even 5 minutes late, I will go looking for them. Get on the intercom or something, I nervously told myself.”

But they weren’t late. At 3:30 on the nose, they showed up, cheeks red with excitement, with a bag of spoils wrapped around their arms. They had an adventure. They had a great time. They walked with a bit of a swagger now. Children of the world; little bad asses.

I knew the answer the second I saw them strutting, but I asked anyway, “Did you have a good time?”

Their answer was enthusiastic.

Of course they had.

Of course they had.

No one died. Instead, they experienced a bit of pure, undiluted, childhood.

One of my guiltiest pleasures is watching men scramble to figure women out. The practice of convincing women to sleep with them seems particularly challenging and they rack their brains trying to figure out the best way to score.

Cocky men will often claim that all it takes is a bit of ‘game’ and they will smugly impart their infinite wisdom on their gawky peers. A guy that lacks experience in the sex department will sometimes latch on to any tip or trick thrust down his throat without ever considering the lasting effect his behavior has on society as a whole.

There is a difference between ‘bad game’ and ‘good game.’ Because I’m in the mood, I’m going describe a few popular forms of game to all of my young, single, male readers from a woman’s perspective. After that, it’s up to you what you do with this oh so valuable information.

The “Accidental” Insult

This is when a man purposely tries to manipulate a woman’s insecurities in such a way as to make her feel like she has to prove her womanhood by sleeping with him. To really make this work, a man has to portray his comments and gestures as completely accidental or risk starting a fight. The key here is subtly. He doesn’t want to insult her too much or she’ll get angry. But he does want to insult her just enough to make her feel that there is something wrong with her. The idea behind this is that women with insecurities are easy to get in bed.

Examples

Common examples of this include: Playfully pinching her back fat or arm fat, casually pointing out wrinkles or dark circles under her eyes, or buying her clothing that is obviously too small for her.

Sometimes a man can simply ask with mock concern, “Are you tired? You look tired today. Is everything ok?” This works particularly well if the woman is feeling alert and cheerful. The man ends up looking thoughtful and sensitive, while the woman is left with a nagging feeling that there is something wrong with her face or demeanor.

Once a man has knocked the woman down a couple of pegs, it is much easier for him to close the deal. She will feel vulnerable and apprehensive and will likely over inflate the importance of even the most meager of validations tossed her way. She might even put a little extra effort into her lovemaking subconsciously trying to prove to him that she’s still worthwhile…even if she has gained a couple of pounds.

My Thoughts

This method most assuredly works. It is an especially effective tool to use against young women who are naturally critical of themselves.

With that said, I don’t like it.

For one thing, every single criticism that can be said of the female population is a direct result of deep seated insecurities, too much pride, and a shockingly large and easily bruised ego. The women that constantly feel bad about themselves are also the women that file false domestic abuse charges and seek large quantities of alimony after a divorce. Women plagued by worries that they’re no longer desirable have a harder time remaining loyal in their relationships, are generally more mean spirited, and have a larger tendency to engage in malicious gossip. A woman that completely lacks confidence in herself can be emotionally destroyed by too many ‘Accidental’ insults and a woman destroyed is a woman that has nothing to lose by destroying you.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that if you use this technique, yeah, you might get laid for the night. But you’ll also be doing your part to help create a monster. When you divorce a woman who is zealously consumed by thoughts of ruining your life, you have to ask yourself what is missing in her life that drove her to this point. What happened to her inner sense of self? What happened to her pride that caused her to stoop to such levels?

Men, if you desire women who are confident, even tempered and fair, then it makes sense to build them up rather than constantly knocking them down. Sometimes, this might mean jerking off for the night.

Also, I’d just like to note that I have slept with men that have utilized this technique. Every single memory is etched into my mind negatively. A lot of men don’t mind being remembered as a lousy fuck. But if you are the type of guy that wants a woman to fondly remember your penis, avoid this technique.

The Balancing Act

This is when a man attempts to insult and compliment a woman at the same time. This works for all the same reasons that the ‘Accidental compliment’ works in that it preys on a woman’s insecurities. However, it is much more successfully used on young girls than it is on grown women. Grown women are liable to get pissed the fuck off.

Examples

“You know, even though you’ve got a big ass, I think it’s really hot.”

“Your nose is a little crooked, but your eyes are so beautiful that you barely notice.”

“Kirsten Dunst is a lot thinner than you, but I bet you have the better personality.”

My Thoughts

Like I said above, I generally do not approve of any method of operation that ultimately makes a woman feel bad about herself. Also, this method often backfires resulting in some pretty intense domestic fights.

The Reverse Compliment

Out of the three, this method takes the most skill and a fair bit of perception to pull off successfully. Because of this, I do not see it as often used or explained as the other two. However, with the right amount of practice, it can score you large quantities of ass.

To do this correctly, a man has to first identify an insecurity that the woman already possesses. Then, he has to casually refrain from validating her until an intimate moment arises.

Example

This is a tough one to explain, so I’m going to give you a personal example and hope it clarifies things a bit.

Way back when I was a single girl, I decided to get my hair cut before a date. I told my hairdresser that I wanted something dramatically different from my old hairstyle and she obliged. However, when I looked in the mirror afterwards, I couldn’t decide if I hated it or loved it.

I went on my date feeling very insecure about the cut. My date made note of it by simply saying, “Ah, you got your hair cut.”

I patted my hair nervously and said, “Yeah, I’m not really sure how I feel about it. It’s really different.”

Instead of instantly complimenting me, my date said, “You know, I read somewhere that women who change their hair want to make big changes in their lives.”

The next thing I knew, we were talking about my goals and it occurred to me that he hadn’t said whether or not he liked my hair. I secretly stressed out about this during the rest of the date.

Much later that evening, during an intimate moment (We were kissing), my date paused and whispered in my ear, “You know, I really like your hair like that.”

Oh yeah. He closed the deal that night.

My Thoughts

While this is technically just another form of manipulating a woman’s insecurities, I like it because the end result is positive for everyone. The man gets laid and the woman walks away from the experience feeling a bit more confident and sexy.

Nowhere does the man attempt to create negativity. Instead, he primes the woman in such a way as to make his compliment seem more sincere. For example, had my date just complimented my hair right off the bat, I might have suspected that he was just trying to be nice and continued to stress out about it. However, the way he did it made his opinion seem more genuine and I ended up loving my fucking haircut after our date.

Furthermore, a man that utilizes this technique will likely be remembered positively by the woman he fucks. While her other sexual experiences may have been shrouded in feelings of shame or anxiety, this one will probably make her smile when she looks back on it. Also, a woman that has had many positive experiences with men will likely not end up a ball busting, bull dyke feminist.

How is that not a win-win for the whole wide world?

The summer I turned 6 years old, some of the neighborhood boys started bullying me. Back then, I owned a pair of cabbage patch kid roller-skates and my favorite activity was skating around the block singing nursery rhymes at the top of my lungs. One day, a few boys in the 8-10 range thought it would be pretty humorous to push me around and watchme flail. I tried to run from them, but I couldn’t skate faster than they could run. They taunted me for a while and then knocked me down. Angry, humiliated, and with two freshly skinned knees, I did what any 6 year old girl would do in my position.

I went home and told my Dad.

My Father was an ex marine and always preached the benefits of learning self defense. Unlike most parents, he had no interest in calling the parents of my bullies to ‘open up a dialogue’ or some other such tripe. Instead, he planned to teach me to kick a little ass.

My Mother balked at this idea. She didn’t think little girls should be fighting. Little girls were supposed to have tea parties and then play dress up. Fighting was for little boys.

“What if someday a vicious serial killer kidnaps her?” my Father asked, “Do you want her to die weeping and begging for her life? Or would you rather she have the courage to wrench the knife from the killer’s hand and stab him in the throat?”

He paused, mid tirade, and said to me, “If that ever happens, V, stab and twist. Stab and twist.”

With my Mother temporarily mollified, My Father took me into the back yard to teach me how to fight.

Nervously, I explained to my Father that not only was I outnumbered by the boys, but they were bigger and stronger than I was. There was no way that I could beat them. My Father merely brushed my fears aside. He said that while they had the advantage of size and strength on their side, I could develop my own advantages. Here are some tips that he gave me:

1. Always Respond to Threats with Complete Confidence
Sometimes all it takes to make a bully re-think pounding you into a pulp is to make it very clear to him exactly how unafraid you are of a physical confrontation. When a bully threatens you, he is trying to invoke in you some fear in which he can feed off of. If you respond to his threats with confidence, even eagerness, it will give him a pause. If he doesn’t chicken out right then and there, he will enter the fight with a slight feeling of unease. His apprehension is your advantage.

2. Fighting Dirty is Fighting Smart
A fist fight isn’t the same as a karate tournament with judges and points. Your opponent is trying to hurt you, so don’t let some silly moral argument prevent you from kicking the little bastard in the nuts. Throw sand in his eyes, kick him in the back of the knees, bite him, or punch him in the stomach hard enough to knock the wind out of him. If he’s got you pinned down and you happen to see a rock out of the corner of your eye? Don’t be afraid to grab that rock and smash his face with it. There is no shiny trophy waiting for you at the end of this fight, so everything goes.

3. Talk Some Shit
Nothing will rattle your opponent faster than you screaming a steady stream of shit at him while you’re engaged in combat. The crazier you sound the better. If you can’t think of anything tough to yell, yell nonsense like, “I’m going to eat your eyes!” If you can’t think of any nonsense to yell, just plain scream. The second your opponent suspects that you’re a freaking lunatic he’s going to get scared. Fear causes people to make mistakes.

4. When You Lose, Claim It Didn’t Hurt
Sometimes you’re just outmatched. But even losing a fight can be used to your advantage. When it’s over, feel free to spit blood in his face and tell him that it ‘didn’t hurt.’ Laugh when he walks away. You might have just gotten your ass kicked six ways from Sunday, but I guarantee you that anyone watching that fight will think twice about ever messing with you in the future. No one wants to fuck with the crazy kid who feels no pain.

Armed with my new tips and tricks, I laced up my skates and headed out to face the jungle that is childhood. When the boys confronted me again, I dared them to mess with me. One ballsy kid lunged towards me with the intent of pushing me down. Quickly, I kicked that kid squarely between the legs with my skate. He crumpled to the ground as I hysterically screamed at his friends, “I’LL EAT YOUR EYES! I’LL EAT ALL OF YOUR EYES!” Terrified, those boys got up and ran like Hell. I’ve never felt so empowered in my entire life.

In retrospect, I think my Father was just trying to teach me a little something about fear and courage. Back then, and even more so today, it became quite popular to advise your children to: Run. Hide. Look away. Go get someone bigger. Be afraid. As a result, modern children and adults alike are easily paralyzed by fear and have no idea how to defend themselves.

After reading certain articles on my website, I’ve even seen people comment, “What is she going to do if she says the wrong thing to the wrong person? She’s going to end up getting hurt or killed.”

I feel sorry for those people. So paralyzed by fear of what might happen, that they lack the courage to stand up for themselves or for someone weaker. I refuse to live my life afraid to say what I feel or do what is right because there might be some mysterious villain lurking in the shadows who is bigger and stronger. Better to be dead, than to live your life afraid.

Besides, I could just as easily spend my life acting meek and compliant only to still end up with a bullet in my head. However, because my Father taught me courage, it’s not likely that I’d go down without a fight. Who knows? I may even end up wrenching a knife from some psycho’s hands and stabbing him in the throat with it.

Of course, I’ll remember to stab and twist.

Ever since I was a little girl, I have periodically played a game I like to call ‘What would happen if…’

The very first time I played this game I was 5 years old and riding in the car with my Mother. She had allowed me to sit in the front seat, but the novelty of that wore off rather quickly and I got bored. Almost immediately after we merged onto the expressway, I spied the car door handle. I thought to myself, I wonder what would happen if I opened the car door right now?

Would the door fly open? Or would it stay closed since the car was in motion? If it flew open, would the wind rip the door completely off of the car? My seatbelt was secure, so I was pretty sure I wouldn’t fly out of the car, but would anything else fly out? What would my Mother do?

I looked over at my Mother who was paying careful attention to the road and vaguely singing along with the radio. Then I looked over at the gleaming car handle. I knew that opening the door while we were driving was a very stupid and potentially dangerous thing to do, but it was almost as if the handle was calling my name. It wanted me to open it. I tried to resist, but my curiosity overwhelmed me. Slowly, I reached over…and opened the door.

Turns out the only thing that happens when you open the car door on the expressway is your Mother screams, “OH MY GOD! HOW DID THAT HAPPEN?” pulls over, closes your door, and then goes homes and bitches to your Father about her vehicle being unsafe and demands he buy her a new one.

It wasn’t the most exciting outcome in the world, but at least I knew.

This past Friday evening, I found myself inadvertently playing another game of ‘What would happen if…’

My husband has been dealing with a particularly nasty summer cold and it’s making it difficult for him to fall asleep. Shortly after midnight one evening, he asked me to run to the store and pick him up some medicine. I agreed because I’m nice like that.

After selecting a bottle of Nyquil and my Husband’s favorite brand of ice cream, it was time to check-out. I elected to go through the self check-out lane because the group of kids who normally jockeyed the registers looked thoroughly engrossed in a conversation about their parents sucking or their jobs sucking or who de-friended them on myspace recently or whatever and I didn’t want to interrupt them. Besides, I have two fully functioning arms. I am capable of scanning and bagging my own ice cream.

However, after I scanned my items, the computer started beeping.

“You have selected an age restricted item. Please wait for a cashier,” it said.

“What the Hell?” I mused, “Ice cream and Nyquil is age restricted now?”

A teenager with a lip piercing and bad dye job came rushing over. “Can I see your ID?” she chirped.

“What did I order that needs ID?” I asked.

She looked over my purchases and shrugged. “I guess it’s the Nyquil.”

I sighed deeply and handed her my driver’s license. She glanced at it quickly, typed my birthday into the computer, handed it back, and scurried away. Even though I didn’t show it, I was all kinds of annoyed.

I mean, what kind of nanny state am I living in right now? I can’t even buy cold medicine anymore without the government all up in my shit? Why is my right to privacy being invaded in favor of incompetent police officers who lack the ability to catch drug dealers without spying on the average law abiding citizen?

Then, out of nowhere, I thought, I wonder what would happen if I tried to buy all the Nyquil on the shelf?

Would they laugh? Would they get angry? Would they sell it to me? Would they call the cops? Would they interrogate me until I told them what it was for?

No matter how many years pass, I remain easily seduced by my curiosity. The harder I try to shake the wondering thoughts from my head, the more they burrow into my brain and demand recognition. By the time I got home from the grocery store, I simply had to know what would happen if I tried to buy an entire shelf full of Nyquil.

The next morning, I woke up bright and early with the intent of carrying out my plan. Now I’m not really sure how the typical Meth Head dresses, so I took a guess. I clad myself in an old T-shirt and a ripped pair of pants that were covered in paint. I pulled my hair back in a ratty ponytail and slipped on a pair of dirty sandals. My goal was to look as shady as possible without overdoing it.

Upon entering the store, I grabbed one of those hand-held shopping baskets and walked with single minded purpose over to the drug isle. I then proceeded to fill my basket with every bottle of Nyquil sitting on the shelf. There weren’t that many and I really wanted to be obvious, so I decided to buy all the generic versions as well. Then I marched my ass right over to the cashier and emptied my basket onto the conveyor belt. At first she wasn’t really paying attention as she grabbed bottle after bottle and flipped them through the scanner. Then a little light must have gone off in her head because she suddenly paused.

“Are these on sale or something?” she asked.

“Nope.” I replied noncommittally.

“I’m going to need to see your ID,” she responded.

“Sure.” I said as I handed it over.

“I’ll be right back,” she told me as she scampered over to the customer service desk to show my ID to who I assumed was the manager.

The guy in line behind me asked, “Someone sick?”

“I’m having a yard sale,” I replied. Yeah, my answer didn’t make much sense. But it was none of his business, so fuck him.

After about 10 minutes, the cashier came back and gave me my ID. Then she finished ringing me up and handed over two bags of Nyquil. “Um, have a nice day,” she said.

I thanked her politely and headed out to my car thinking to myself that the whole scenario ended up being fairly anticlimactic. This time, bending to the will of my curiosity earned me nothing more than 10 minutes of inconvenience and 25 bottles of unneeded Nyquil. Fucking fantastic.

I went home, unloaded my spoils onto my kitchen table and decided to take a nap on my couch. Right before I fell asleep, I thought to myself, I really need to stop playing that game.

A couple of hours later, my brother and his girlfriend woke me up.

“What the hell is with all the Nyquil?” he asked.

I told him about my game and how nothing really exciting happened. Then, he said, “Probably because you bought the wrong shit.”

I said, “Huh?”

With a smirk on his face, my brother explained, “The ingredient in Nyquil that is used to make crystal meth is called pseudoephedrine. But these don’t have it in them. Look! It even says right here on the front, ‘Now Made without pseudoephedrine.’

“Then why did they card me for them?”

“How the hell am I supposed to know? All I know is that you can’t make meth out of these.”

“Son of a bitch!” I exclaimed.

“You are the worst fake drug dealer ever,” my brother admonished.

His girlfriend cut in, “You know what you should get? Sudafed. They sell it behind the counter at the pharmacy and they probably won’t give you more than one or two. But it might be funny if you asked to exchange your Nyquil for 25 boxes of Sudafed.”

For me, failure tends to make me more determined, so I decided that was exactly what I was going to do. But, this time, I wanted to start my adventure with a bit more planning. I decided to call the grocery store and ask if it was even possible to return Nyquil since it was technically a medicine. The manager I spoke to assured me that as long as I had the receipt and the seal wasn’t broken, they would take it back.

So the next day, I packed up my bags of Nyquil and headed back to the grocery store. I plopped the bags on the counter of the customer service desk and amicably said, “I’d like to return these, please.”

The cashier looked shocked. “All of these?”

“Yes please,” I answered mildly, “Here is the receipt.”

“How many bottles are in here?”

“25.”

“25? You bought 25 bottles of Nyquil? Why would you do that?” she asked.

“I wasn’t feeling well.” I answered.

“So why are you returning them now?” She countered.

I slightly hardened my voice. “I’m feeling better.”

“Normal people don’t buy 25 bottles of Nyquil!” she exclaimed.

“So?” I snapped.

She started stammering. “Well….its just that I don’t….I don’t know…if we can take this many back. We’d have to throw them away and….I….uh….”

“I called and spoke to a manager yesterday,” I informed her, “And he told me that as long as the seal wasn’t broken and I had the receipt, you would take them back.”

“Well I’m sure he didn’t know how many you bought!”

“Does it matter?” I questioned, “Is there some sort of store policy that states you can only return so many things at a time?”

“I’m going to get my manger,” she replied.

“Fine.”

The manger came over, obviously perturbed, and we argued back and forth for a few minutes. Finally she said, “I’ll take them back this time. But next time, I won’t.”

“That’s fine by me,” I agreed.

I filled out a form with my name, address, and phone number, got my cash back and walked directly over to the pharmacy.

An older lady walked over to wait on me. “Can I please buy some Sudafed?” I requested.

“Sure!” she said as she held out her hand, “I’m going to need some proof that you’re over 18, though.”

“That’s fine,” I told her, “But I’m going to need more than one.”

“How many do you need?”

“25.”

“25 tablets?”

“No, 25 boxes.”

I’m not sure if my answer extremely shocked her or extremely angered her, but her response was to shriek, “NO!”

Calmly, I asked, “Why not?”

“NO!” she bellowed again.

“But why not?” I repeated.

“BECAUSE OF THE METH!” she hollered.

I smiled a little and said, “I promise I won’t use it to make meth.”

Again: “NO!”

A concerned Pharmacist walked around the counter. “What seems to be the problem here?” he questioned.

“I’m just trying to by some Sudafed.” I answered.

The cashier squawked again, “NO! YOU CAN’T HAVE ANY!”

And I was supposed to be the crazy one!

The Pharmacist gave her a confused look and she said to him, “She wants 25 boxes!”

“Whoa, wait a minute, ma’am!” he said to me.

Just then, out of the corner of my eye, I realized that the manager who did my return and a couple of stock boys were walking up behind me. They were closing in on me!

I thought to myself what better time to walk away, all shifty, like I was a real drug dealer than now. So I abruptly did an about-face and briskly started striding towards the door.

The Pharmacist tried to stop me. “Ma’am!” he called after me, “Ma’am! I’m going to need you to come back here! Ma’am!”

Seriously, I couldn’t believe he actually thought I would fall for that. I mean, what am I? 12 years old? Did he actually think I would be naïve enough to believe that a goddamn Pharmacist had the legal right to forcibly detain me in a grocery store?

But the ridiculousness of the situation was only a fleeting thought in my mind. At that precise moment, I had more pressing matters to concern myself with. Namely, how I was going to shake the manager and the stock boy goons who were in the process of following me out of the store.

I increased my walking speed a little and made it outside. I paused for a second, thinking the chase was over, but I was wrong. The manager had tailed me into the parking lot. Frantically, she started waving the cart boys over to her and pointing in my direction. Before I knew it, I had a small army of grocery store employees following me around the parking lot. It was fucking surreal. I felt like I was starring in the deleted scenes of one of those Terminator movies.

My theory was that they were waiting until I got into my car so they could write down my license plate number. To me, this was odd, considering the fact that they had my name, address, and phone number written on a slip of paper behind the customer service desk.

Anyway, I finally thwarted them for good by electing to simply walk home. Because I live a couple of miles from the grocery store, I decided to call my brother.

“Hey, if the cops show up at my door, do not let them in without a warrant,” I told him, “That’s a violation of my 4th amendment rights!”

“No problem.” He said. He’s learned to quit asking questions.

The end result of my little escapade, however, produced no angry police officers ruthlessly pounding on my door. In fact, outside of a couple of grocery store employees who briefly pretended to be Rambo, nothing really exciting happened at all.

All in all, I ended up fairly disappointed with my most recent game of ‘What would happen if….’ You see, that’s the problem with letting yourself become randomly consumed by curiosity. Things rarely live up to your expectations.

My Great Grandmother was born in 1904 and immigrated to America with her family shortly thereafter. When she turned 12, her Mother forced her to drop out of school and work twelve hours a day in a tire factory so the family could pay the bills. When she was 17, her family pressured her to marry a man she didn’t love in order to gain financial security. Shortly after she said ‘I do,’ my Grandmother came to her senses and demanded a divorce.

Back then, divorce wasn’t as common as it is now and her demand caused a lot of controversy in her community. No one could understand why a woman wouldn’t want to be with the nice man who wanted to provide for her and many dubbed her a strumpet. But my Grandmother stood her ground and dissolved her marriage. However, upon returning home, her family had decided in her absence that she must be crazy. Literally. They had her forcibly committed to a mental institution.

Mental institutions were not the nice, clean, white places of healing they are today. Instead, they were filled to the brim with incompetent doctors who made snap diagnoses and ordered experimental shock treatments. Patients often spent hours strapped down in beds and force fed drugs that made them feel even worse. Some of them were raped, beaten, or otherwise abused. After all, they were crazy. Who would believe them?

My Grandmother told me all of this for the first time shortly after my 19th birthday. I had recently found out something pretty shocking about my past (Another story for another day, don’t worry) and I went to her for confirmation because there wasn’t anyone else I could trust to tell me the truth. She did confirm what I had learned and apologized for her part in it. Destroyed by the news, I confessed to her that I was thinking about going into therapy. My desire for a Doctor to ‘fix me’ is what inspired her story.

When she was finished, she said to me, “All the time I spent in that hellhole, people were constantly trying to convince me that I felt sad because there was something wrong with my brain. But do you want to know what I really learned?”

I leaned in closer, absolutely absorbed by the image of my tough Grandmother who raised her children, nurtured her (Second!) marriage, and was one of the first successful business women of her era spending time in a mental institution. “What Grandma?” I breathlessly inquired.

“I learned that I wasn’t sad because there was something wrong with my brain. I learned that I was sad because my life sucked.”

Initially, I laughed because it was funny to hear my old Grandma use the word ‘sucked’ in a sentence. But after that, I worriedly asked, “Are you saying I shouldn’t seek therapy?”

“No,” she replied, “I’m not saying that at all. What I am saying is that you should be wary of the Doctor who tells you a pill is a fix for your broken mind. The way I see it, you have a lot of reasons to be sad right now. So if that’s what you’re feeling, that seems about right to me.”

Now that we live in a culture where mental illness is so incredibly popular that you’re almost considered abnormal if you don’t have one, her words ring even truer. A lot of people nowadays seem to think that any sign of anxiousness or sadness signifies a broken brain, and immediately upon discovery will run with their asses on fire for their prescription of Happy Pills.

“My brain doesn’t produce enough serotonin!” they chirp. “This is why I’m always sad!”

It’s always the serotonin. It’s never the lousy job or the loveless marriage or the helplessness one feels when they finally realize they’ve been pressured into living a life they would have never chosen for themselves. No, it’s never that. It’s always a broken brain.

Now please don’t misunderstand me here. I am not trying to lambaste psychiatric treatment nor am I denying the existence of real, valid, medically proven mental disabilities. I realize there are people out there who downright suffer from hallucinations, irrational fears and compulsions, and crippling life debilitating illnesses that wreak havoc on their lives if left untreated. I do not fault these people for taking the drugs they need to feel better. In fact, I applaud them.

It’s the people who try to eradicate every hint of sadness and anger out of human existence I fault. Negative emotions are a vital part of the human condition and it isn’t until we experience them that we truly appreciate the positive opposites. In other words, one needs sadness in their lives to be able to fully recognize happiness when they come across it. Without anger, we can never appreciate the calm; our hatred and indifference emphasis our love. To deprive oneself of any emotion characteristic to our nature is to deny the very things that make us human. Our minds work the way they do for a reason. They are not broken.

Modern day Americans are often trapped in lousy, disappointing, soul crushing careers. If they are not divorced already, their marriages are on the rocks. They live far outside of their means, rack up thousands of dollars of debt, and then they work overtime to pay for the toys they never have time to play with. They dedicate their lives to pleasing ungrateful children who won’t amount to much more than they did. Hours of their downtime is spent in front of the television, switching from reality show to reality show, because it is easier to watch other people live life than it is to live their own. In a rare moment of creativity, they might write a secret out on a postcard and send it to a website because they don’t have a single person in real life that they trust enough to share their fears with. They feel all of this on top of the usual human maladies of sickness, death and grief.

To be perfectly honest, I would think it was weirder if most people didn’t entertain thoughts of suicide.

The majority of people aren’t sad because there is something wrong with their brain. They are sad because their lives suck. But rather than admit that to themselves, they run to the Doctor and beg for a diagnosis that alleviates their personal responsibility in this regard. After all, if a man in a white coat tells you’re broken, you never have to worry about fixing yourself. The sad reality is that they’ll spend the rest of their lives switching medications and wondering why nothing they take works and cures their disease. Never once do they consider that the disease is their life and true healing will come once attempts are made to repair it.

If you are sad right now, I want you to consider that perhaps there is nothing wrong with you. Perhaps you are seeing things the way they ought to be seen. Maybe there is just something wrong with the world right now? Instead of popping some pills in the hopes that they will put us on a perpetual even keel, maybe instead we should figure out what is wrong with our society…and fix it.

You’ve finally found the girl of your dreams barring one small exception: she doesn’t know you’re alive. To make matters worse, you strongly suspect she’s totally out of your league. She’s beautiful; you’re a fat slob. She’s wealthy; you’re struggling financially. She popular and social; you spend your Friday nights browsing your collection of Internet porn and playing World of Warcraft. In other words, she’s godiva and you’re a freaking tootsie roll.

Is there any hope at all for a love connection?

In a word? Yes.

See, here’s the thing men need to realize about women…they love to date losers. It doesn’t matter if the loser is a tattooed ex-con with quick fists or a socially inept computer nerd living in his Mother’s basement. Women will date them all given the opportunity.

Don’t believe me? Ask divorced women. They will bore you to tears with stories about their asshole ex-husbands.

So what’s the secret? Well, let me break it down to you in a few simple steps.

Be Funny

Most women are almost irresistibly attracted to funny guys, so cultivateyour sense of humor now. It is especially helpful if you possess what can be described as a ‘dry wit.’ The girl of your dreams will welcome your sarcasm just as long as it’s not aimed at her or her friends. Women are generally bitter, insecurity ridden hags, so feel free to ruthlessly skewer any woman your love interest perceives as a rival and she’ll be making goo-goo eyes at you in no time.

Show Absolutely No Interest in Her Whatsoever Outside of Friendship

Women love a challenge so become a challenge. If a woman thinks she’s has you in the bag, she’ll turn up her nose. On the other hand, if you make her think she doesn’t have a chance in Hell with you, she’ll work that much harder to woo you.

If you’re having a friendly drink with a woman you’re interested in, become easily distracted. Flirt a little with the attractive bartender. Be a little too quick to point out that the girl you’re with is just a friend. Fill the contact list of your cell phone with names of other girls (Even if the numbers actually belong to your guy friends), excuse yourself while you go to the restroom, and leave your phone on the bar. If you come back and notice that your love interest suddenly wants to cozy up to you, you can bet it finally hit home for her that you are a challenge.

Never Compliment Her

If you could somehow liquefy compliments, women would buy them all and use them as perfume. Most women have been told how beautiful and special they are nonstop since birth, so a compliment from you means jack shit in the grand scheme of things. Hell, if the girl is particularly hot, giving her a compliment could actively work against you being that it signifies you are no different from every other limp dick retard that drools all over her.

If you really want to get a girl to notice you, don’t compliment her. Compliments are the life blood of women; lack of compliments is their Kryptonite. They can’t function without their steady stream of flattery. Cutting out the sweet talk will effectively stop the blood from traveling all the way to their brains which means they will be oblivious to the mustard stain on your shirt. The only thing they will notice is that you’re not complimenting them.

If She Fishes For a Compliment, Tell Her She Looks ‘Fine.’

Just because you’re not actively complimenting a woman doesn’t mean you should be mean to her. If you insult a hot woman, she will most likely roll her eyes and think to herself that you’re only treating her this way because you know you could never nail her. This is counterproductive to your goals.

When a woman asks you, ‘How do I look?’ she is really saying, ‘Here is your cue to lavish me with praise.’ Don’t fall for this crap. Instead, blink your eyes as if you’re confused and say, ‘Fine.’ Then, subtly change the subject.

You will know you have got a woman by the ovaries if she persists in questioning you about her looks. Desperate woman will often say, ‘Fine? What’s that supposed to mean? You don’t think this dress makes me look [fat/slutty/short/etc], do you?’ Stick to your guns here, men. Keep repeating the word ‘fine’ over and over again until you see that hysterical little gleam in her eyes and hear the quaver in her voice. After that, you can revise your ‘fine’ to ‘Good….I guess.’

All night long she will be wondering what she can do to get your attention.

She’s Like a Little Sister

To maximize the results of this technique you will need to enlist in the help of a friend. Also, this friend must be 100% trustworthy, because if your love interest ever finds out you used this on her, she will own your balls for life.

In a casual group setting, have your friend remark to you and your potential girlfriend that you two would make a really great couple. Before she can say a word, roll your eyes, laugh a little, and say, ‘Oh please. She’s like a little sister to me!’

I guarantee you she will be up all night staring at the ceiling and wringing her hands.

Subtly Let Her Know That Other Girls are Interested in You

It doesn’t matter if this is a bold faced lie and a woman hasn’t been interested in you since Cindy with scoliosis sent you a love letter in the second grade. If the girl you’re hot for invites you to see a movie, turn her down by letting her know you have a date. Then, hang out in your house all night and bask in the glow of your collection of Internet porn.

Rest assured that her night is going worse. She’s probably getting drunk and crying to her sympathetic girlfriends that you don’t even know she’s alive.

Wait For It

After a few months of this, even the hottest girl alive with crumple like a cookie. She finally break down and do one of two things:

1. Write you a long, heartfelt letter in which she confesses her secret love for you.
2. Get sloppy drunk and confess her secret love for you in person.

At this point you can tell her she’s pretty, but don’t overdo it. Usually this will be all takes to get her in the sack. Call her 2 days later and Wam! You’ll have a new girlfriend.

After you’re knee deep in hot girl pussy, I know you’ll want to email me and thank me for this list. However, your adulation is completely unnecessary. As far as I’m concerned, seeing dumb girls with losers is all the thanks I need.

The first time I ever masturbated was in the middle of 7th grade English class.

Our school happened to have a sustained silent reading program and once a week our teacher was obligated to force us to read something, anything, (preferably without pictures) in a vain attempt to improve our overall vocabulary. Personally, I relished the time. Rarely did I need an excuse to read.

It was during silent reading time that I suddenly found myself overcome by an almost irresistible urge to pee. Briefly, I thought about raising my hand and requesting a hall pass. However, I was in the middle of a particularly smutty sex scene in my book and I was reluctant to put it down for even the 10 minutes it would take me to run to the restroom and back. Instead, I resigned myself to doing the ‘pee dance’ in my seat, shifting around from side to side like an excited second grader, as I gobbled up sentence after sentence with my eyes on the page before me.

Out of nowhere, my thighs started to spasm. Panicked, I looked up from my book to see if anyone was watching me. Luckily, everyone was obediently reading or sleeping, so I was free to conduct my mini break down in relative peace. With a choking sigh, I slumped over on my desk and forced myself to breath slowly.

After a few moments, the feeling finally passed. When the bell rang a couple of minutes later, I escaped into the hall without the vaguest notion of what had happened to me.

It took 2 full weeks jam packed full of fresh incidents before I made the connection that the episodes nearly always occurred when I was reading a book. It took another week on top of that for me to realize they happened whenever I was reading a sex scene, in particular. But even as I made the connections, I tried to deny what was happening. I told myself that my body was being ‘all weird’ and I had nothing to do with it.

But the truth was I was masturbating.

What was so foolish and silly about the whole thing was my aversion to touching myself. I would twist around in my seat. I would rub up against my blankets, spray myself with water, or gyrate in my clothes. Yet…yet…I could not bring myself to connect my finger to my clit.

It was almost as if my lack of finger action gave me some sort of victim status. After all, if I never made the conscious decision to diddle myself, I could continue to pretend that my body had a mind of its own and I was helpless against it. Right?

This went on for months. It might have gone on forever, if not for the fact that every instance of muffled masturbation produced a more and more muffled orgasm. Like a heroin addict who needs more drugs to achieve the same high, I found myself pacing my room frantically wondering how I could intensify the feeling between my legs.

Finally, that fateful, desperate day arrived where finger finally connected with clit and life became an almost nonstop blur of chronic masturbation. I masturbated when I woke up in the morning. I masturbated in between classes at school, hidden in the rarely used 3rd floor restroom. When I gothome from school, I holed up in my room with my hand permanently attached to my crotch. I touched myself so often that a few times my wrist literally gave out on me. But even as I clutched it, moaning with pain, I would find myself eying my room looking for alternative ways to get myself off.

I was a goddamn fiend.

Anyway, the reason I bring this up now is because a friend and I were recently discussing all the odd fetish porn out there nowadays. One of us brought up balloon porn (girls masturbating with a balloons, yes, there is a market for this shit) and I started laughing as I remembered all the fucked up shit I masturbated with as a teenager while I waited for my poor wrist to heal.

However, after thinking about it in depth some more, I was struck by how hard it was for me to actually touch myself in the first goddamn place. Never in my life had anyone told me that touching my nether regions was gross or dirty or anything like that, either. In fact, no one had mentioned masturbation at all. Still, I was definitely skeeved out by the idea.

To this day, I have no idea why.