Hitting it off with the ladies
Brittney rightfully calls someone a tool for taking off their wedding band. The dude’s definitely a tool but I’ve found wedding rings make da women pay more attention to men. This guy has his game all wrong. In fact, I’ve found four specific things that happened to me that made women more attracted to me. Unfortunately, only the first one happened before I got hitched so I didn’t get the full benefit. They are:
1 – First job after grad school: Almost overnight, I went from some poor-as-Hell student renting a room in a friend’s basement who drove a 1989 Nissan Sentra (this was 1999) to a guy with a nice condo in a good part of town who drove a snazzy new convertible. I got rid of the old couch I found on the side of the road somewhere and got some hip furniture and a solid oak dining room set, which apparently the women like – seriously, more women commented on the dining room than the leather recliner, loveseat and couch. I was single and had some bling to buy drinks. The women liked that.
I also upgraded the wardrobe from jeans and T-shirts that were as old as the Nissan to attire more attuned to the business professional/casual world. Bought Rockports instead of no-name brands. The women seemed to like that style as opposed to the dude who bought his threads at K-Mart.
Had that not happened, I probably wouldn’t be married to Mrs. Uncle.
2 – Got married: Not sure why, but more women talk to me now that I’m hitched. I’m not sure if it’s because the ring makes me less threatening or if it indicates that I’ve been domesticated but it happened.
3 – Got a dog: Me and the Mrs. used to take the dog to the local park for a stroll. One week, the Mrs. went out of town and one day I loaded up Politically Incorrect Dog and went to the park. In the mild spring, all the jogging hotties with their jiggly bits barely covered by sports bras would stop to pet the dog. Why not? He’s cute and darn sociable. And they’d strike up a conversation (with me, not the dog). Seriously, that one walk, I chatted it up with about 7 different women who ordinarily wouldn’t have stopped to talk to me. Alas, I was a married man. This never happened when the Mrs. and I went. I should have got the dog when I was single.
4 – Had a baby: Take an adorable little girl to the mall and baby talk with her, hold her hand, and be the caring father you are, then the women line up to talk to you so long as mom isn’t around.
It’s all true. Your mileage may vary.
May 24th, 2006 at 1:30 am
I agree with most of your points including wearing a band somehow attracting the ladies. I quite often don’t wear my band for various reasons. For example, it’s dangerous to wear one (or a watch for that matter) when working around many machines and it hurts my fingers to wear one while shooting pistols with two hands. Other than reasons such as those there is no reason not to but, no direspect to my wife, over the last five years or so I’ve fallen out of the habit.
Mary (my beautiful wife), on the other hand, has several sets of wedding/engagement rings and likes to change them out depending on the occasion.
May 24th, 2006 at 8:25 am
I’ve heard that the guys get more attention when they get married and have kids. My male co-worker who is getting ready to tie the knot believes it’s because you guys are more relaxed around women since you’re not concerned about what they will think of you. That, in turn, gives you more confidence and confidence is sexy. I guess the theory has merits. The increased confidence that you experienced as you were going through situation 1 probably added to your value as a potential mate for women you met.
I can definitely say that I know a couple of married men who I would want to date in a heartbeat if they were single. Of course those attractive qualities are probably what made them attractive to their wives in the first place. After my last relationship ended nearly two years into it, I came to realize that if guys are single past a certain age, there’s probably a reason. It doesn’t mean they can’t eventually settle down with a woman who is great for them, but there is likely a quality about them that makes many other women pass them over.
May 24th, 2006 at 10:26 am
Ditto on the dog. Babe magnets, it seems. Heck, almost everybody likes dogs. On wedding bands, I’ve never worn one. Hate jewelry for the most part, except for an occasional watch.
May 24th, 2006 at 10:34 am
I always hated jewelry too. But I wore the ring after the wedding and it just kind of stuck. Now, I notice when it’s gone instead of noticing when it’s there.
May 24th, 2006 at 4:50 pm
I agree on all counts (although I can’t personally speak to the kids thing), but on #2, I don’t think it’s the ring. Why do I say this? Because I’ve noticed this effect, and I’ve never worn a wedding ring. We didn’t have much money when we got married, so we spent like $200 to get a band for my wife and that’s all we got. (For those who care, within the next few weeks, she’ll finally be getting her engagement ring — at a damn sight more than $200! — but this is after nearly nine years of marriage).
Despite being ringless, I’ve noticed that I get a lot more attention married than I did single. Which is doubly confusing because there is now about 50 pounds more tgirsch than there was when I got married.
I’ve always joked that when you get hitched, your S.O. pees on you to leave their scent, and that others then smell this and think “Aha! A good one!” But in all seriousness, I think being attached changes your attitude in ways you don’t notice. When you’re attached (and happy) you simply aren’t trying, you’re acting more natural, and to be crude about it, chicks dig that.
Anyway, I’ll probably never wear a ring because I hate wearing one, my wife doesn’t mind much that I don’t, I don’t need it as a reminder that I ought to be faithful, and other women seem to figure out quickly that I’m spoken for, even without it.
Now, I notice when it’s gone instead of noticing when it’s there.
That’s how I feel about a watch. I never used to wear one (a fact which drove my wife nuts), but have since taken up the habit. In fact, if I forget to put on my watch, I’m constantly wondering what time it is and forgetting that both my cell phone and my pager have the time on them.
May 24th, 2006 at 4:53 pm
Bitter:
After my last relationship ended nearly two years into it, I came to realize that if guys are single past a certain age, there’s probably a reason. It doesn’t mean they can’t eventually settle down with a woman who is great for them, but there is likely a quality about them that makes many other women pass them over.
That’s excessively cynical, even by my highly cynical standards. It’s certainly possible that there’s “a reason” a man is single past a certain age, but it’s entirely possible that a man is single past a certain age simply because he hasn’t found the right someone, or because the person he thought was the right someone didn’t reciprocate. In any case, everyone has serious flaws if you’re willing to look for them. The biggest thing is being able to find someone whose serious flaws you’re able to look past.
May 24th, 2006 at 8:51 pm
Having a young child most definitely has that effect. When I first started taking my daughter to the beach, bikini-clad women would come up to talk who would never have noticed my existence otherwise. Several times they took the trouble to walk between my daughter and I while I was videotaping her playing in the water.
Nothing like having the camera zoomed in on your baby girl and suddenly there’s adult cleavage in the shot. The first time it happened I nearly dropped the camera.
May 24th, 2006 at 8:53 pm
“I came to realize that if guys are single past a certain age, there’s probably a reason.”
They’re smart?
May 25th, 2006 at 2:14 am
I discovered the baby thing when I was just past 16. My brother is 16 years younger than I and if I wasn’t at work or school he was with me. I liked the little freak and the girls were crazy about him, when I realized what a magnet he was, I didn’t go anywhere without him.
I have never been especially good looking, I’m outspoken, not a charismatic person. However, one other thing I noticed when I was single. Women can’t stand to be ignored or even just not fawned over in a social setting. They take personally if every man in the room is falling all over themselves to impress them, except you. They just won’t tolerate that. They’ll “By God, show you what you’re missing.” Of course, when they have, you haven’t missed it.
Oh yeah, one other thing. A gentleman doesn’t kiss and tell. But ladies do. If you make one happy, before you know what’s happening you have pleased all her friends too.
Funny about that, though. I was never really satisfied until I met my wife, though my life is a lot tamer than I would ever have imagined. I guess being in love with every atom of your makes the difference.
May 25th, 2006 at 8:58 am
TGirsch, I agree. My first instinct was to respond to Bitter’s cynicism, but my second was to let it go because her statement was technically true; there’s always some reason why somebody is or isn’t single; it’s just that that reason may be a benign one.
May 25th, 2006 at 9:11 am
that reason may be a benign one
Which I fully recognize. I never said that every reason was a bad one. Considering I don’t think I’ve dated anyone within 8 years of my age (always older) since I was in college, I have never assumed that any reason some of the guys are single is always a bad thing for me. There’s a chance that I could have been the woman to look past their particular set of flaws. I’m just saying that if I go out with a guy over 36 or so who hasn’t been at least engaged before, I consider that there may be reasons other women haven’t made more of an effort to snag him or why he might not have been willing to settle down before. This doesn’t mean I write him off as undesirable.
May 25th, 2006 at 9:24 am
“that reason may be a benign one”
Hrmm, the laundry list here… owns house (kills weekends with yardwork and cleaning), works two jobs (13 hours a day), gets maybe 5, 6 hours a week free time… yeah, I’ll be single for a while.