In Defense of the Asshole

I've been a bad bad boy.


Sometimes being an asshole is a viable defense. Last night I was driving home from a friend's housewarming party, and I really didn't want to go home. It was only midnight, but since I will be in Miami Beach for a week this summer fencing, partying, and getting hammered - I kinda need to conserve funds. As I started driving up I-75 towards home, I sped past my exit as my feet decided to side with my dick and head up to Lassiter's on Cobb Parkway.

There are few things special about Lassiter's. The beer isn't all that cheap, the food is tasty but not special. It looks and feels like a dive, and it sits in a minor shopping center. In terms of Hotlanta trendiness, its not even on the radar screen. Even so, it has a charm all it's own - from the exhaustive poster of bad blonde jokes above the john in the men's bathroom, to the tiny dancefloor that sits in the doorway between the game room and the dining area.

In terms of talent, there is some, but not a lot. The competition for that talent, however, is non-existent. In other words, I am the only guy who ever bothers to talk to the two cute girls in the room. In this case there was a cute thirtysomething blonde, and her quiet brunette friend. The two were playing pool, the blonde seemed to be kicking ass, the brunette really didn't know what she was doing. After making my way over to a table near theirs - the three of us started talking, and when the waiter moved my beer to their hightop table - well, he did my work for me. After many beers, a few games of pool, and dancing on the tiny dancefloor - I wasn't sure where things were going to go. Both girls had boyfriends, and the blonde, Megan, insisted on my number so she could set me up with a friend or something. Claire, the brunette, protested that they don't know me, and that I could be just pretending to be a nice guy.

At that point I said, "Claire, I'm an asshole." Megan argued that I wasn't, but I declared I was. It seems counterintuitive, but I've found when talking to women for the first time you are better off declaring your bad intentions than promoting your good ones, however sincere they may or may not be. Women are afraid of being lied to in a bar, and rightly so. Being upfront about the fact that you aren't trying to impress anyone, that you are only interested in having a good time - gives whoever you are talking to the opportunity to understand what they are dealing with, and to take it or leave it. With friends of their boyfriends watching, the girls were in a complex situation, because since I had hands and a bit of lipstick all over me, I knew they were interested in being bad. We would have never approached this juncture if I tried to mask myself with the veil of being "a nice guy."