Good Advice

This week was kind of crazy, what with dropping my iPhone at the gym and rendering it useless, dealing with feeling really run down, a vitamin that has destroyed my skin, and other apartment related things that suck. But I held fast and managed to feel optimistic despite it all. I know, a true American heroine, right?

Some great things about the week? I read a funny book, called I Don't Care About Your Band: What I Learned from Indie Rockers, Trust Funders, Pornographers, Felons, Faux-Sensitive Hipsters, and Other Guys I've Dated by Julie Klausner.
Not all books about dating losers are good. In fact, a lot of them are more like cautionary tales for married ladies. Like, "stay married, the single life is frightening!!" But this one was really great. There's a lot of funny stuff in there that I could totally relate to, and I like that the author seemed to understand there was a difference between dating losers because you have low self-esteem and dating losers because you are optimistic about someone's potential. She does both, but knows the difference. I am a sucker for these kinds of books because I have made my share of bad romantic choices. I am a blogger, a sarcastic one at that, so this is right up my alley, but I could never do this kind of writing. I guess because I didn't do a lot of dating before I met my husband, so not only would it be a short book, but it would be really obvious who I'm talking about! I couldn't be this revealing, because the internet bites back you know. All in good time.

Anyway, some gems from the book:

After a narcissistic asshole explains to her (lying in her bed no less) that they can't go out that night because he has a date, she gets furious with him, and he does the worst thing ever. He cries.

"Have you ever seen a grown man in the act of working himself up into a lather so that he can cry real tears in front of you? It's an excellent cure for being attracted to someone."

She starts one story with the excuse that she was drunk and says, "I know stories about "how wasted you were" are little-league, but the truth remains that when you drink, stupid things become silly, and who doesn't like laughing at things that are silly? That's right, nobody, and assholes."

It's not all quips and jokes, though. She gives some good advice. This one kind of embodies her optimism in the face of all these losers:

"If I'm iffy about being attracted to somebody right away, but he goes about pursuing me in a way I think is upstanding, I always give the guy a second chance. It's a way about being strict about your standards, but open minded about your contenders. Men are way more likely to become more appealing to you over time than they are to magically grow manners."

On dating a guy in a band, she reminisces on how boring it is to go to your boyfriends shows, and to talk to people about music. She also discusses that girlfriends will already be outsiders to the band comraderie, because "if you're going to be a musician's girlfriend, you have to know that your man will always love his band mates in a way you can't touch, because they are the guys that help him create music. You can only help him create a living human being, with your dumb uterus."

She then implores women who like guys in bands to try and learn an instrument and play in a band, because only then will they realize that a) it's not hard, and b) maybe it turns out you are more into musicians because you want to be one. Excellent advice!

I loved it. You should get it. The end.