Talking to Women is Damn Near Impossible (for Dave)
Last night during dinner preparation, I noticed something out of the ordinary: my wife was listening to some decent music (Andrew Bird) and she had consciously selected this music, so I wanted to compliment her on her choice, but apparently when you compliment someone, not only is the sentiment itself important but you also have to watch your tone . . . she decided there was some sarcasm in my amazement at her great leap forward in musical taste, but when I vociferously insisted that this was not the case, she still thought the compliment was backhanded-- she inverted the statement and considered it a general condemnation of all the other music she listens to (and while she may have been right in this assumption, I readily admit I'm not crafty enough to couch my true intentions with lies and deception) and so then I tried to ameliorate the situation by discussing this nifty chart correlating SAT scores and musical predilection . . . on Google Play Music, if you play Andrew Bird, then the #1 suggestion is Sufjan Stevens, who is associated with high SAT scores . . . I think this tangential internet foray may have blunted the impact of my failed compliment, but the moral here is when you're talking to women about music, you have to watch your step.
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11 comments:
I’m challenging the notion that you are unaware that your statement was a backhanded complement. The first line of this post is “I noticed something out of the ordinary: my wife was listening to some decent music.”
Cat is a saint.
you are a very astute reader . . . there are multiple levels of tone in this post, causing it to plunge downward into an inception-like spiral of irony and self-deprecating meta-silliness.
welcome to sentence of dave.
Why can I picture this conversation verbatim, as well as the tone? I could have also predicted the transition to some ridiculous article about SAT scores. What is Radiohead samples Little Wayne for the irony? Catherine likes you why?
Ugh, "if" Radiohead
Is it really self deprecation if the intent is actually to explain how superior your intellect or musical taste is while sacrificing an unimportant shortcoming, the inability of a late 40’s, swarthy, happily married man to talk to women?
We need to hire a cameraman to follow Dave around. “YouTube of Dave” would be awesome.
I can't believe your wife puts up with this shit. I also can't find Greasetruck on any of those graphs.
Further, I think that this isn't a sex-specific quandary--if you spoke that way to anyone of either sex you'd get the same response. What made this interaction difficult (for you) was that you likely intend on having sex at some point in the future, and doing so requires maintaining some modicum of conviviality with your wife, so rather than clap back at her with your usual brusque banteryou had to modulate your behavior into something approaching social acceptability, and as anyone who ever read this sentence can attest that's probably not the easiest thing for you to do.
i was trying to pay her a compliment! because i'm a nice guy! and you should hear some of the stuff she plays in the car.
I would point out this quote from the article:
Neurotics and introverts tend to enjoy reflective and complex music.
Maybe that will make Cat feel better about you criticizing her tastes.
The top music in West Virginia is jazz???????
“Listening to Bjork is a sign of high intelligence, while listening to Lynyrd Skynyrd is a sign of low intelligence.”
As Dave is proving, it doesn't correlate to getting laid necessarily.
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