What's Your Excuse?

Another T-shirt seen on the National Mall yesterday:

"I get paid to make an ass of myself...WHAT'S YOUR EXCUSE?" (signed, Richard Pryor)

Very good point. The same behavior can be very good in one context, such as a comedy performance, and quite problematic in another, such as an office meeting or the dinner table.

Or as a long-lost acquaintance of mine, Steve Coile, liked to say: "Maturity is knowing when and where to act immature." (Also check out this recent roommate ad.)

Happy Fourth of July, my American readers!

Kids Wear The Darndest Things

Seen at the National Mall in Washington, DC today:

A young boy wearing a T-shirt saying: "You're not that bad - I'm just that awesome".

Yeah, it seems a little pompous. On the other hand, it also avoids putting down others - a model for anyone.

Good salespeople don't insult the competition, and in fact may compliment them a bit. The idea is that the prospective customer sees that the salesperson seems confident enough about one's own product. And that attracts customers.

Don't just take my word for it - Dale Carnegie makes just the same point in his classic How to Win Friends and Influence People.

Sometimes, we should build ourselves up. But tearing others down doesn't work - not with those you'll really want to deal with.

What do you think?

Putting Your Best Foot Forward With Women

Ali Wisch, a recent college graduate and now a writer and producer in the New York metropolitan area, has written an interesting article on how men can approach women they don't already know and not seem creepy (Not completely SFW).

In particular, note Ms. Wisch's emphasis on reading body language and other subtle signals. Maybe guys in general are perfectly able to infer whether or not a woman is interested without being told so in so many words, as she seems to believe. Or maybe not.

In any case, she gives a few good signs to look for either way. And she's certainly right in that the more able we are to use nonverbal signals - both ways - the better we can communicate and hence the luckier we will get in the dating game.

What do you think?

Halftime Show

I went back to Subway today. The manager was there again - and as soon as he saw me come in he told the worker just how to prepare my sandwich, and had my cookies ready for me. Things went much better; just to be sure I took the tray with my sandwich and cookies to the table, then went back and filled up my drink and carried it separately. When I went to the men's room I put the (very large) key ring around my arm so I wouldn't forget it.

This little episode straddles the midpoint of 2010. Hopefully the second half will go as well as the first half has!

Dangit, What Was My Horoscope For Today?

I went into Subway a little while ago, where I

• spilled most of my drink on the tray all over the table, chair and floor as soon as I set the tray down,

• caught my shirt's short sleeve on the door lever to the men's room (fortunately, it wasn't damaged),

• mistakenly thought the door was locked, so someone tried to walk in on me while I was drying my hands,

• locked the door and then forgot both that I had done so and that I had brought the key in with me, so I locked the key in the men's room, forcing all customers (including the one who almost walked in on me and then snapped at me for leaving the door unlocked) to use the ladies' room for the time being and

• got some meatball sauce on my silk shirt which will now need to be dry-cleaned.

(Of course I profusely apologized for [1] and [4] multiple times. And they know and like me there.)

I take a sort of pleasure out of getting all of my bad luck out of the way in one sitting.

At least I wasn't unlucky the way so many Germans were 76 years ago today.

Good Manners When Job Hunting

Yesterday afternoon, at a drinking fountain by the boardwalk in Ocean City, Maryland:

Young Man #1: Don't say "understaffed" - that's insulting.

Young Man #2: (Interested look.)

Young Man #1: Say "I understand that you may need people sometime in the future."

Dishing Out Subtlety

Hello,

Emily and I just got back from a 25-hour vacation* to Ocean City, Maryland - a family-oriented seashore vacation area.

After we finished breakfast, I left our cash tip on the table. Emily asked me to put it under the lip of her dish, which confused me just a tad. After all, the dish would cover maybe one-fifth of the tip (which was paper), so the money would be out in plain sight anyway. Being a thoughtful well-trained husband, I put it under the lip of the dish.

When I asked her what good she thought it would do, she said it would be more subtle.

That's like much of what NTs do that I have difficulty understanding: If something is going to be obvious one way or the other, what's gained by doing it more "subtlely"?

What do you think?

[*] We pulled out of our parking spot at home just after 5pm yesterday; we opened our front door again just before 6pm today.