From Gut Check to Dinner Check
Yesterday, I put up a survey for dudes to vote whether or not they were interested in a girl. On Day 1 of the series, I guessed that 60-75% of guys are interested in someone at any given time. As of this writing, 68% of guys who took the poll said they’re interested in someone. For the rookies out there who are scared of asking a girl out simply because of the logistics, here’s my best shot at how to setup a date.

Girls, Poll Time
No, not pole time. Poll time. Take the poll over on the right! Then back to reading!

Before the Phone Call
Dudes, notice I said phone call! You have to ask her out in person or on the phone. Don’t use Facebook/email/Twitter/text message to ask her out. I did that back in November not thinking anything about it, but as I’ve told the story to my girl friends, they’ve all dogged me for it. I thought I was being chill and not pressuring the girl I asked out. Turns out a lot of girls view it as lame. I personally don’t think they should (and not all do) because it’s not always a passive thing, but I don’t want to be shot down because of my method.

Don’t Be “That Guy”
Ok, full disclosure: I also wish to avoid my name being told in stories of how lame it is to ask someone out through Facebook – “Do you know Andy Merrick? That clown asked me out through Facebook.” No. Thank. You. Been there. Done that. Got ridiculed. Go ahead. Leave me a comment and mock me. But let my mistakes be your gain! Ask her out in person or find her phone number from someone. Remember, there’s a line between stalking and reconnaissance. I hereby absolve myself of legal responsibility from any creepers taking my advice to the extreme.

Two More Tips

1. What does the next week look like for you? Make a list of when you’re free – both days and times.
2. What restaurant(s) interest you? Pick a chill, but nice place. It doesn’t need to be expensive. Only 20 or 30 bucks. DO NOT MAKE HER PICK WHERE YOU GO! Pick a few places in case she doesn’t like one or the other – sushi, coffee, cool café/deli. As best you can, avoid chain restaurants. Show some creativity!

During the Phone Call
Because this can be a high stress situation, here are the basics.

• Who are you? “Hey, this is McFly.”
• Why are you calling? “I wanted to see if you’d like to go out sometime in the next week – to go get food or coffee? NOTE: Ask about the next 7 days, don’t leave it open ended. If she says she’s not interested, say, “That’s fine. I was just going to tell you face-to-face how heartless you are.” No, just kidding. Be gracious. You got shot down. I’ve been shot down. No big deal. There’s girls you don’t want to ask out. Surprise! Not every girl wants to go out with you. ‘Twill be ok!
• When can she go? If she says, “Yes” – great. Ask her, “when can you do it? Let her give you availability.
• The Meet and Eat. If both of you have open time, YOU will do the following: 1. Suggest a time to meet. 2. Suggest a place to eat (from the list you made earlier). YOU PICK!!!!

Before You Go
What do you want to know about her? Figure out a little list of questions to ask her. Also, make sure you have money to pay.

At the Restaurant
You’re paying, bro! This is the big leagues and you’ve got a big league salary (even if you don’t). Unless the girl seems angry that you want to pay for it, this meal is on daddy. You’re probably not Dutch and you probably don’t live in The Netherlands, either. So splitting the bill is out.

Kissing
In almost every situation, I highly discourage the first date kiss. As nice as it is, nothing will take you from 0 to awkward like a first date kiss. This isn’t I Kissed Kissing Goodbye but take some time to process things before you touch her face with your lips.

Transportation
In my estimation, about the only time it’s been cool for a girl to pick you up was when your mom rolled up in a Ford Aerostar to get you from tee ball practice. You can pick her up or, if picking her up seems a little too awkward (or your car looks like it hasn’t been cleaned in 4 years), it’s cool – say you’ll meet her at the restaurant. But get there before her.

The Challenge
1 girl to date.
2 hours to talk.
20 bucks to eat.

That’s it and that’s all, guys! Some hottie is waiting for you to call her. Own it.

Plug This!
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In case you missed it, check out Part 1 – The Challenge.

The Poll
First – dudes…take the poll over on the right. And…moving along.

The Team
I hung out with some of my friends last night and a couple girls (Annie and Betsy) pointed out that I gave guys an “out” in yesterday’s post by mentioning that some of us are bench players – that is, we don’t have anyone we’re interested in. Here’s my advice: guys, we shouldn’t just label ourselves a “bench player” by default. This whole challenge is about – well, challenging ourselves! Here are a list of excuses I often make in not asking girls out…and what I’ve learned.

My “I-Don’t-Care-About-Nuance-Or-Thoroughness” Excuse Explosion List

• “I don’t want to be rejected.” I asked a girl out and got turned down a few months ago. She probably didn’t dig me and that’s cool. I’m still breathing! Fellas, girls want dudes who will take risks. At a minimum, that means you have to risk looking like an idiot. You have to risk her saying no.
• “I hardly know her and want to hang in a group to find out what she’s like.” It should only take a few hangs to figure it out. Don’t use this wise practice as a copout. If you’ve hung out 5 times, she uses deodorant semi-regularly, and is still attractive to you, it’s time for a call-up.
• “I have poor social skills and wouldn’t be able to carry a conversation on the date.” Figure out how not to be boring. Make a list of questions to ask her (but don’t read from it on the date! . And practice YOUR answers to them because she’ll probably shoot your questions back to you to answer.
• “I’m afraid of ruining a friendship.” Listen, if things don’t work, you’ll figure it out. If the date makes things weird, it’s only because you rocked the boat a little. After a period of time, things will come back to center.
• “She’s already seeing someone (or one of my friends is already into her).” Either wait it out or move along and get your mind off her. Or, if you’re especially bold, talk to your friend who likes her and tell him to make a move or move out of the way (a little more diplomatically than that).
• “I don’t have enough money to take a girl out.” All it takes is 20-30 bucks! Go donate plasma or bet your friends you’ll eat a whole bag of Totinos Pizza Rolls in an hour. The latter would be profitable both monetarily and delicious-arily.
• “If I ask a girl out, people are going to think I like her. I don’t want other girls to think I’m interested in her.” This is also called “keeping my options open.” In many situations, social pressure can be a deterrent from destructive behavior. Randomly making out with girls in your friend group is a bad idea. That’s good social pressure. But taking a girl out for a meal shouldn’t be in this category. Strange enough, T.I.’s song “Live Your Life” has been a real help to me in this regard. If someone wants to judge you for asking a girl out then let them. Live your life! Don’t be paralyzed by what someone else thinks when the action you’re taking isn’t deceitful or bad. You’re the dude taking control and owning your life. Just because lots of other dudes are “playing it cool” doesn’t mean you have to.

There’s Talent in the System (or… You’re Probably Not a Bench Player)
So here’s my practical suggestion for today. Think you’re a bench player? You’ve got no prospects in your farm system? Don’t be so sure. I thought the same thing. Until I popped Facebook open. Here’s what I did…

1. Login to Facebook
2. On the left sidebar, you’ll see a link of how many friends you have (mine says 737 friends). Click it (orange arrow)



3. On the left bar of this page, click your city or organization. For me, it was Nashville, TN (again, Orange arrow)



4. Look through the list of girls you know. And get ready for your temperature to rise. You’ll be scrolling along and quickly dismiss them. “No, no, no, no, no, no, no.” And then you’ll come across a girl you dig. “Oh, crap!” It’s like you’ve just been convicted of robbing a bank. You’re getting hot and your heart is beating faster. You found a girl you wouldn’t mind taking out. Now what to do? You’re not a bench player anymore, homie! You just got put into the game. Time to call her. You’ve got to own it and take the challenge! (P.S. CALL HER! Don’t ask her out through Facebook/Twitter/email/text. I learned this the hard way and I’ll talk about it tomorrow).

1 girl to date.
2 hours to talk.
20 bucks to eat.

Welcome to the big leagues!

And for those of you wondering if I’ve been taking my own advice, the answer is yes. I’ve asked a couple girls out in the past month.

Bros, still skeptical or unsure of exactly how to go about making this a chill date? How to ask her? How to plan these two hours? I’ll write more tomorrow on how to make all that happen!

Now check out Part 3 – The Call.

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One of my favorite relationship questions to guys: “Do you have anyone in the farm system?” In baseball, the major league teams have “farm teams” where their organization’s brightest prospects are able to play and develop against other farm teams. Its meaning, when applied to girls, is simple: do you have any female prospects in your life? Anyone you’re interested in?

My unscientific guess is 60-75% of my friends are interested in someone at any given time – which brings us to my next term – conversion rate. When applied to girls, conversion rate is the percentage of guys who call a prospect up from the farm club (i.e. how many girls get called by a guy for an actual date). Conversion rates in most demographics are low. Abysmally low. Maybe 5%. Girls generally lament that guys aren’t asking them out more.

My Challenge
My challenge to every single guy reading this: 1 girl to date. 2 hours to talk. 20 bucks to eat.

If you’ve got interest in a girl, OWN IT! Ask her out for a meal or to coffee. Don’t make it expensive. Only spend 20 bucks. 30 max. Spend a couple hours talking. Then go home and evaluate how the date went.

The Scenarios
Bench Player. If you don’t have anyone you’re interested in, no worries. Nothing you can do about that. Sometimes, it’s slim pickens down in the farm system.

Starter. If you do have someone you’re interested in, own it. You’re the George Steinbrenner of your clubhouse (he owns the New York Yankees). Make a call to the girl. Do it in the next 24 hours. Heck, do it now!!

Injured Reserve. If you do have someone you like, but can’t own it (because you have baggage or something else), you HAVE to start working through those things. Your organization needs an overhaul and YOU’RE the one to make it happen!

At the end of the day, dudes, this is a small step in leadership. Ask her out. Plan a nice meal. Pay for it. And head home. 1 girl to date. 2 hours to talk. 20 bucks to eat. It’s a date. Make it happen, captain! Interested in a girl? Own it.

Up Next
In the next two days, we’ll look at two additional topics: common excuses us guys give to rationalize not asking girls out and some tips on how to go on a date without being a chach bag.

Plug In
Big ups if you end up asking a girl out! If you do, would you leave a comment and say “I owned it!” I want to see 100 comments from dudes before the month of May is over. I actually want to see 1,000, but that seems outrageous, so I’m keeping it simple.

Plug It
But 1,000 would be awesome.To see 1,000 comments of dudes asking girls out, it means YOU, dear reader, would need to be bouty bout the Own It Challenge. Want to plug it on your blog? Here are a couple banners. When you link it on your blog, just switch to the HTML view of your blog editor and paste the code in below one of these pictures to make them work on your site (it will automatically direct to this post). Also, there are little Twitter and Facebook buttons at the very bottom. Click one of those to post it there!
Now check out Part 2 – The Excuses.

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My final 5 days at work begin today! This is the last Monday (maybe ever) I’ll work as a full-time computer programmer. It doesn’t bother me a bit!

This weekend, I sat down for a number of hours and finally outlined the rest of the Why Guys Aren’t Asking You Out series. I was shocked and frustrated simultaneously.

Panda Bear With Me
With the challenging work week. I may not be able to write for the series every day (maybe only a couple days), but NEXT WEEK, Lord-willing, I’ll be writing daily since I will have plenty of time during the day to do so. I am really excited to spend my days reading, thinking, and writing. More excited than I’ve been about something for quite some time!

The Outline
I had previously said there was plenty of content for closing the series. I imagined it would only take me 3 parts (10-12) to cover everything. Not exactly true. When I compiled my notes from all my notebooks, emails, and Word docs, I came up with the outline below (the shocking part). Without any more delay, this is how I envision the series ending.

Competition Between Guys | 1 part
Guys aren’t asking you out because we’re competing for the biggest harem.

Porn | 1-2 parts
Guys aren’t asking you out because we’re meeting some of our needs illegitimately.

Sexualization of Girls | 1 part
Guys aren’t asking you out because lots of us guys and girls have bought into the idea that girls are sexual first and spiritual someplace down the list.

Healing a Broken Heart | 1-2 parts
Guys aren’t asking you out because we can’t keep our mouths shut and you may not be able to open your heart up.

No Vacancy – Dating Loser Guys | 1 post
Guys aren’t asking you out because you’re occupied – dating foolish guys.

The Purpose Of Marriage | 1-2 posts
Guys aren’t asking you out because we don’t understand God’s design for marriage.

Better Tomorrows | 2-3 posts
How should singles (and those who love them) move forward? We’ll cover spiritual and practical advice with a conclusion.

How Much More!?
If you count all this up, it means we’re looking at another 8-12 parts. That seems outrageous to me – in a bad way. This is the frustrating part. It feels to me like I’m dragging this out. BUT, there are a couple reasons this has ballooned from 12 parts to a 17- to 21-parter.

1. I’m working on making smaller posts (1000-1300 words) instead of the longer previous posts (2000-2600 words) so it’s easier to read.
2. All the content is legit and, I think, helpful in establishing new thought categories for us to talk about relationships.

It’s totally not postmodern to layout a roadmap like this, but I don’t like being lost in the wilderness and I don’t want you to be either. Onward! Onward! Happy Monday, peeps!! More to come this week!

Book It
Oh, PS and by the way, unless God changes something (and because the first comment from Alison references it), this topic of dating is going to be the first book I write. And for those wondering, I still haven’t read or seen He’s Just Not That Into You, but I’m going to. A bunch of my crew (dudes) and I are going to see it this week. Psych! But seriously, I’m probably going to see it one night soon. Not because I’m interested but for “research.” Ok, I’m interested. It’ll come close to rivaling the time I went to see Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants by myself. In the theater. AWK-WARD! The 40-hour countdown to finish my season as a computer programmer is about to commence! Ain’t no psych’ing about that! HOLLA! FIST PUMP! HIGH FIVE!