The Tragedy of Showing Too Much of My Feminine Side

The other night I ran into a girl who my friends call "loofah girl".Her and her friend came to a Halloween party a few weeks back covered in strange material looking like puffballs. They asked a bunch of us guys if we could tell what they were. They looked strangely like these puffballs that hung in the shower that my sisters and I shared while growing up. Then it all hit me and I yelled out as if I had struck oil:

"Loofahs!!!"

Everyone, including the girls, looked at me incredulously. How did I know such a thing?

We've already discussed how I've brought up porn, and other "guy" topics with women which usually leads to complete failure. But, now it looks like I've gone the other direction, continuously brining up "girly" things.

There's this girl that I know through friends at work who told me she didn't have a tv or microwave (two of my favorite electronic devices on this earth) in her apartment. Aside from feeling very sorry for her (she is stuck eating non-microwave food and reading books), I offered to come over to her place and give her apartment a "makeover": the first step would be a giant flatscreen TV on the wall. But my friend who heard me make the offer, later said:

"yeah, you probably don't want to be telling girls thatyou're going to makeover or re-decorate their apartment."

I get along great with one of my biggest crushes in NYC, Julia. But, I'm afraid she thinks I'm gay. I was told by my friend Margaret that girls think it's weird when a guy knows too much about feminine things.

My first mistake with Julia was trying to make small talk with her at a friend's birthday by asking if the bag she had with her was new. She appreciated that I noticed, but then I pushed it further:

"Let me guess what kind of bag though: Fendi python? Coach? Louis Vuitton?"

By the time it was over, I realized that I had pretty much acted like a girlfriend to Julia. My strategy of showing her that I understood "girly" stuff may have looked peculiar.

Last weekend, I attended Julia's birthday. It didn't take me long to devolve into more "girl talk". In my defense, my buddy turned the conversation gay before I did. The girl came up to us to talk and I started off great:

"Your hair looks pretty."

I don't think any girl minds hearing that from a guy. She thanked me and told me she didn't do anything different, just the same blow drying routine. I wish the conversation ended there. My buddy pushed it gayer:

"So how long does it take you to blow dry your hair?'

She said: "Not too long, not like most girls."

Of course, I had to trump the entire thing with the gayest statement/knowledge of the evening: "Hmm, do you have one of those duck bill attachments for the end of your blow dryer?"

As soon as it came out, I was hoping she'd either answer with a simple "yes" or somehow get distracted from even remembering I said that. But she did worse. She hit me with the following compliment:

"Oh, Rich. You're so detail-oriented!"

I thought to myself: "My god. What guy wants to be called detail-oriented by a girl they wish they could make out with? Is that good? It can't be good."

Indeed, when I relayed that compliment to the girls I know, they said that it was only a matter of time before this girl invited me out shopping with her. Most women are just waiting for that gay friend. Sometimes, I'm just so proud I know something (such as the fact that the duck-billed thing exists for hairdryers-- courtesy of my gay hairdresser, Ricardo), that I can't resist trying to "impress" a girl with this knowledge. Perhaps this "feminine knowledge" can not be shown in excess. I'm looking more like potential gay friend than potential boyfriend!

What would oyu think of a guy who knew intricate feminine detail like I have tried to show Julia? Should I scale back my "showing off" of knowledge of this kind of stuff? Do you think it's weird when guys know too much "girl stuff"? Perhaps there's some magical middle point of feminine knowledge a man possesses: is it worse if a man isn't "manly" enough, or is it worse when he knows nothing about "girl" stuff?

Check out this interview I had with John DeVore, a writer at GuySpeak, where you can ask men questions about anything and get answers!

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