The ironic thing is ...

It all began with an ex. She was intensely interested in The Game - it fed into her love of human interaction, her adventurelust. I was bored, she was discussing it with Lex at the bar. All the abstruse terminology and acronyms began to annoy me. I told them if I heard them mention IOI one more time I was going to get up and go home.

She was reading the book; she'd borrowed it from Sue. The main reason I read it after she did - actually when she stalled for three weeks about 100 pages deep - was that I wanted to be included in their new little club. I was dating someone new and didn't feel like I needed any help, but the only reason I was dating was loneliness. Besides, Rapunzel told me she thought I should - I thought if I succeeded that it might shock her, show her that I was a valuable commodity.

I went through three stages when I read the book. I suspect that most men do.

First was revulsion. I can remember reading passages to my female roommate, detailing the psychological justifications that Mystery used for why negs work. I remember thinking that the only reason I wanted to finish the book was to spot these PUAs and stop them dead in their tracks, rescue these gullible women from exploitation.

Second was awe. When Style number closed the Playmate of the Year, when Mystery pawned his way through three sets in a dead bar to get to the one attractive girl, and then won the stare-down with her armed (ex)boyfriend, I was enthralled. It was Bond with all the extraneous espionage removed. All I wanted was to watch these men run game.

Third was hope. Style was an incurable geek, Mystery had always been an emotional trainwreck, and the cast of supporting characters was even more dysfunctional. But these men had found a set of rules that could be learned, practiced and perfected. It was a memoir, but it was also a playbook.

Initially I wasn't sure it was something I wanted to do. I saw what the game did to Style, and the dead-enders it enabled, like Tyler. But in the end, the allure of walking up to the best looking girl in the bar and walking out with her a few hours later won out. The realization that every time I'd attracted a girl I had inadvertently been running some game won out. My curiosity, my perfectionism, and my libido won out.



You shouldn't expect every detail, nor should you expect real names or even real bars. I've learned from experience that anonymity is a valuable friend.

At the moment, I have a backlog of content which will find the way here, interspersed with current adventures. Maybe you'll learn something. Maybe you'll be able to stay awake at work while you're reading this. Maybe with some help, you'll have your own bulletproof nights.