Red Green's Beginner's Guide to Women

by Red Green

  So my advice is to do that math in your head long before you open your mouth. If the total cost of your ridiculous expenditures is greater than the total cost of her ridiculous expenditures, instead of calling her on them, you need to stay quiet and hope she does the same.

  ONE THING AT A TIME

  A common pattern we’ve all seen over the last few years is that someone will try some new behaviour, give it a fancy name and then present it as something we all should be doing. Before you know it, the activity reaches critical mass and each one of us starts to feel the pressure to change and start doing whatever this new thing is.

  It happened with jogging and spinning and Zumba and Pilates and Texas hold ’em and unprotected sex. It seems like once these things gain some momentum, it’s too late for the individual to evaluate and decline. Instead, you either have to participate or risk being left behind.

  Well, under certain circumstances I’m saying it’s better to be left behind. The one that comes to mind in particular is what they call multitasking. This is not a good or a natural way for a man to act. Women are much more suited to multitasking. God made them in such a way that they are able to produce offspring while holding down full-time employment. That’s natural for them. So adding a few more simultaneous jobs to any workday is like falling off a log when you’re a woman.

  But since men have historically fallen off a lot more logs than women have, I’m here to tell you it’s a stretch to make a man into a multitasker, and one of the best things you can do for your marriage is to convince your wife that multitasking is not your thing.

  You don’t want to take a bunch of jobs and do them all half-assed. You want to take one job and do it fully assed. That’s what men do. When David slew Goliath, he didn’t also have a load of laundry in. When Noah built the ark, he wasn’t also managing a convenience store. The great accomplishments in history have not come from multitasking. They’ve come from uni-tasking—one thing at a time.

  You need to explain to your wife that your mind and skill set are not as sophisticated as hers. And they never will be, if you have anything to say about it. You are a born uni-tasker and proud of it. You will do anything for her as long as you can do it as a free-standing project. You like songs, not medleys; you like roses, not bouquets; your favourite colour is blue, not plaid. Being a uni-tasker allows you to focus on one job at a time and, more important, it forces your wife to focus on just one of your jobs at a time. That way, if you’re going off track, it’s only in one area, not in the entire range of marital activity.

  You were born a uni-tasker and that’s the way you and God want to keep it. Point out to her that whenever a man is forced to be a multitasker, he ends up living in a compound with seven wives.

  WE ARE NOT WORTHY

  When I was a kid, I used to watch the Wild Kingdom TV show with Marlin Perkins, an old guy who would go out into the wilderness of Africa in a veiled attempt to kill his assistant, Jim.

  The spring episodes were the best, the ones showing the males of the herd fighting for supremacy. There could only be one top dog, or in this case, antelope or ram or lion or elephant or rhinoceros or elk. It would start with one male honking his horn or bellowing his bellows or stomping on the ground or sending some other signal that he was in charge and that he would be the alpha male for the entire herd, deciding where they would go and where they would live and who would do what and that, most important, he would have his pick of all the females. Some of the other males would just accept that as a no-brainer. This guy was bigger and stronger than them and they didn’t have any issues with accepting authority.

  But there would always be a couple of males who questioned this guy’s right to be in charge. If we’re talking about rams, for example, whichever of them felt like it could challenge the guy to a head-butting contest. So they’d run at each other headfirst a couple of times. Pretty soon, the one with the softer head would reconsider. Suddenly, making the headache stop seemed a more pressing objective than being king of the herd. Maybe he’d start to think that even the best-looking female sheep aren’t all that attractive.

  But the interesting part of the process to me, was that the next day everything was fine. The lead guy didn’t kill anybody and the one who lost totally accepted the supremacy of the winner. Life goes on and the herd flourishes in peace.

  I don’t think human beings are a lot different than that. Men don’t fight over who gets his pick of the women, because we’ve evolved to the point where women make their own choices. But men still need to know who’s in charge, and they need to feel that whoever is in charge is doing not necessarily a good job, but certainly a better job than they would do.

  People may think that men need to be the boss, but that’s not true. If they’re the one best suited to be the boss, then sure, that’s what they should be, but if they know the current boss is doing at least as good a job as they would, they’re fine with being in a subordinate role.

  The two unhappiest men in the world are the one who isn’t the boss and should be, and the one who shouldn’t be the boss, but is. And when it comes to marriage, my opinion is that the man should never be the boss. Be an adviser to the boss, be a consultant to the boss, always be at the ready with prompt and courteous service.

  I know this is a tough message for all you alpha males out there. I know you want to be the one making the decisions, but if the only decisions that stick are the ones your wife approves of, that means they really aren’t your decisions in the first place.

  So just accept the subordinate position, as if the big showdown was yesterday and now it’s time for your personal herd to flourish in peace. Otherwise, you’re going to have a lifetime of head-butting.

  THE QUICKEST WAY

  We’ve all heard that the quickest way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. I’m not sure everyone believes that, and I especially hope the cardio surgeons don’t. But there is probably some logic behind the theory that, since men enjoy eating in a basic, visceral way—not as a social endeavour, but as a plain and simple physical pleasure—that fact creates a vulnerability that women don’t have. Which means that men could be capable of taking their positive feeling from eating and equating that to love.

  Men are certainly capable of going the other way—taking a feeling of love and equating it to physical pleasure by the third date at the latest. Maybe some of you out there are married to a woman who is a great cook, and maybe it’s one of the reasons you were attracted to her in the first place and continue to live your life with her despite some other incompatibilities in the marriage. After all, the average couple only has sex once a week, but almost everybody eats three times a day.

  But at this moment I’m not talking to any guy whose wife is a great cook. I’m talking to the other guys—the ones whose wives regularly make meals that are barely edible. I know you’re disappointed, I know you feel cheated. Maybe this is all coming as a shock to you. Perhaps you should have focused less on premarital sex and more on premarital home-cooked meals.

  I also know that you are strongly tempted to criticize your wife for being incompetent in that area. You may even want to point out what a great cook your mother was, if you have the guts. But this is not a question of guts; this is about stupidity. It is absolutely idiotic for you to criticize your wife’s cooking. Instead, here’s the path I suggest.

  After you’ve been married long enough to realize your wife has some serious deficiencies when it comes to preparing meals, start to secretly save samples of various meals in a thermos or hermetically sealed container of some kind. I don’t actually know what a hermetically sealed container is, but I really enjoyed saying it.

  After a week or so of collecting these samples, take them to a chemist or a doctor or a toxicologist, anybody who can determine the health risks of consuming these foods. Chances are the results will show that your wife is not trying to kill you. That’s always good news, and in this case it’s all you need to know. My advice is to immediately stop
yourself from complaining about anything she cooks. Even if you have to stop breathing so you don’t taste it, or consciously quell your gag reflex, it’s in your best interest not to be negative.

  Instead, dwell on the positive. If she ever does cook anything that’s half-decent, make a big deal out of it so she’ll do it again. Your reaction to her cooking should be either positive or nonexistent. No negative stuff. Mainly you should express gratitude, and I’ll tell you why: the difference in cost between you eating at home and eating at a restaurant is, conservatively, $50 per day, which translates to $18,250 a year, which, over a fifty-year marriage, totals almost a million dollars. No matter how bad your wife’s cooking is, it’s going to make you a millionaire. And you’ll never get fat from overeating. I don’t see a downside.

  HANDSOME HANDY

  Despite your best efforts to make her happy, after a while your wife may seem to lose some of her enthusiasm for the marriage and, if she can sustain her dark mood for long enough, there’s a chance you will eventually notice.

  There are a lot of potential reasons why your relationship has lost some of its lustre since the wedding, but in most cases she’s unhappy because she doesn’t have enough closet space. This is an excellent opportunity for you to demonstrate that you are the perfect husband as you show off your handyman skills to solve the problem quickly and cost-effectively.

  Here’s an ideal project for those of you who live in rural areas, where there are no inspectors or building codes. You city dwellers are out of luck, but that’s what you get for trying to show off.

  The first thing you need is a 1985 or older Dodge Magic Wagon. These babies have fallen on hard times since the introduction of emissions testing, and nobody knows how to get rid of them. They have no resale value, they’re too big to bury and it’s hard to burn one without drawing attention. You should try to get a dark green model so that the combination of the forest hue with the rusty edges makes the van blend right in with your shrubbery.

  Now, pick an outside wall of your bedroom. You’re going to knock a hole in that wall to provide access to your minivan closet. If the minivan runs, you can actually use it to knock out the hole, and as a bonus, it will be the perfect size.

  Next, get a large child’s inflatable wading pool—no, wait, make that a child’s large inflatable wading pool. Blow it up and mount it over the hole, with the floor of the pool up against the outside wall of the house.

  Cut out the floor of the pool and save it to use as a waterproof bedsheet in case you ever have kids or get old. Next, parallel-park the van in such a way that the sliding side door forms a weatherproof seal with the inflated pool rings.

  Take all the seats out of the van and use them to redo your family room. (Make sure you and your wife get the front seats. They’re recliners.) Get yourself a dozen or more toilet plungers. (Try gas station restrooms.) Smear the edges of the plungers with Vaseline. (If you’ve ever been to a frat party, you’ve done this before.) Now install the plungers on the inside of the van windows, using their own suction. Stagger them to maximize the storage capacity. Remove the convex mirror from the passenger door and mount it on the inside wall of the van. The wide-angle image will allow your wife to model her entire outfit and is also very slimming. It’s a win-win.

  Place a couple of small stepladders side by side in the cargo area. Use empty pizza boxes (small to extra-large) as shelves to hold her shoes—that’s logical; they’re stepladders. (Let’s all take a moment to enjoy that one.)

  Dedicate the centre console to holding her frilly undergarments. As an added touch of elegance, throw in a car air freshener. There’s nothing sexier than a woman in silk lingerie with just a hint of pine scent. Clip her brooches and hair accessories onto the steering wheel and slide her rings and bracelets onto the turn-signal lever.

  Now just put her clothes in there and get ready for the look on her face! If the van runs, she can have the closet heated and air-conditioned. Even if it doesn’t, leave the battery hooked up so the light will go on when she opens the door and she can listen to AM or FM radio or her favourite 8-tracks. You can even give her the key so she can lock you out. And I’m pretty sure she will.

  CARING IS THE HARDEST PART

  Anybody who works as a negotiator or a mediator or a marriage counsellor or a broadloom salesman knows that the most important factor when offering service is to find the common ground between the two parties. Or between the customer and a braided twill Oriental rug that’s been sitting in your showroom for seven years. And the first step in finding that common ground is to identify what is important to each person.

  One of the biggest challenges facing men and women who are trying to cohabitate is the startling differences in what they care about. And it applies to all areas of their lives. I’m not going to include every one of them here because it will take up too much time and space and it may prevent me from getting to write another book. So here are just enough to prove my point.

  1) What we care about on a date.

  Women: Looking my best.

  Being treated with respect.

  Being able to tell my friends how great the date was.

  Being able to tell my dad that he was wrong about Herb.

  Men: Surviving the date.

  Avoiding criticism.

  Getting as far into the date as possible before the hope of any kind of intimacy becomes completely out of the question.

  2) What we care about when we’re driving.

  Women: Driving safely.

  Being courteous and law-abiding.

  Looking good.

  Arriving at the destination at some point.

  Men: Nobody passes me.

  Nobody tailgates me.

  Nobody holds me up.

  Looking tough.

  Arriving at the destination at least ten minutes faster than the last time I went there.

  3) What we care about when we’re dining.

  Women: Looking refined and elegant.

  Undereating.

  Making intelligent conversation.

  Men: Demonstrating appetite as a measure of manliness.

  I shouldn’t have to pay and eat vegetables.

  If I buy dinner, I will have expectations.

  If I buy an expensive dinner, I will have great expectations.

  4) What we care about when we’re watching a movie.

  Women: Something that touches my heart and my mind.

  A well-written, compelling story, performed by great actors.

  Men: Action. Or huge belly laughs. Or the ultimate: action that causes huge belly laughs.

  Popcorn.

  Necking.

  5) What we care about when going shopping.

  Women: This is a sightseeing adventure where I’ll have fun discovering all of the retail items that are currently available at all price levels and in all colours.

  I don’t care how long it takes.

  Men: This is a mission. I’m going to go in there, buy the specific item I went for and get the hell out.

  I’ll give it ten minutes plus travel time.

  6) What we care about when making a purchase.

  Women: Value.

  Brand name.

  Sophistication.

  Men: The lowest price.

  The salesman needs to know that I am richer than him.

  My buddies are gonna be so jealous when I tell them I bought this.

  7) What we care about when our kids play sports.

  Women: My child needs to treat the other team with respect and kindness.

  My child will learn the importance of getting along with others.

  Men: My child needs to win the game.

  My child needs to win the fights.

  I will show my child how to berate the referee/umpire/other coach/other team/parents of the other team.

  8) What we care about when our spouse is upset.

  Women: Identifying the cause of the upset.

  What can I do to help?

&nbs
p; I love you no matter what.

  Men: How long is this gonna go on?

  It’s not my problem, what can I do?

  This is not my fault no matter what.

  A CLOSED SYSTEM

  I thought this might be a good moment to remind you of why you’re making all this effort and all these compromises and radical changes to your life just to keep your wife happy, and to encourage you to keep doing it for as long as humanly possible.

  Let’s start by observing a man who is the exact opposite of a fully functioning husband. This is a man who has no interaction with anyone—not physical, not spiritual, not confrontational, not even conversational. This is a guy who has no family and no friends. A complete and total loner. There isn’t one person in the world he can share ideas or stories with, which would be fine except that humans are social animals and have a basic need to share ideas and stories. Because of that, this guy begins to share ideas and stories with himself.

  And it goes really well. No arguments, no disagreements, no eye-rolling. Just the satisfying feeling of laying out this litany of amazing theories with absolutely no opposition.

  After doing this for a while, this man starts to believe he must be the smartest person who ever lived. Everything he says is accepted by his audience (him) as yet another inspired revelation. Pretty soon he feels that he needs to share this brilliance with the world, not for the purpose of having them benefit from his insights, but for the purpose of having them stand in awe and then bow down.

  So he starts standing on street corners and advising passing strangers about how he would balance the budget and how to get all the toothpaste out of the tube. It’s only a matter of time until he’s living under a bridge in a cardboard box and talking to squirrels.