To break that down in mathematic terms, the prime factors of being a chick magnet are juvenile behavior and seeing one's self as God's gift to those of the fairer sex.
I was reminded of this while helping out with the youth at church this week. I helped drive and chaperone a trip to do a service project to the Bishop's Storehouse.
No one wanted to ride with stuffy old The Scoutmaster (not even my own daughter, sob sob)... all the young men rode with the YM's president, except for one who rode with the girls, and the two YM who got bumped and ended up having to ride with The Scoutmaster because there wasn't room anywhere else.
Anyway, one of the Teachers, you know, the one who is well known for being a total goofball, got to ride with the girls (the Miamaids and Beehives), much to the chagrin of one of the youngest Deacons. The Deacon obviously felt he had something to offer the girls, but ended up having to ride shotgun with The Scoutmaster... kid said probably all of 5 sentences to me during the 45 minute trip down. The other unfortunate Teacher who had to ride with me took it in stride, deciding to sit all the way back in the rear of the van, sprawled out. He is of the age where he is beginning to be aware of his awkwardness around those of the female gender, but doesn't make a big deal out of it. I see him developing into a fine young gentleman.
Oh, back to the goofball. It seems in his effort to be the center of attention, he let the girls do his hair and rolled his jeans up into capris and talked like a girl (falsetto voice and mannerisms) with the girls, spoofing how they talk about what a hunk so-in-so (other young men in the ward) is. According to my daughter, he had them in stitches... One girl who was visiting her friend in our ward thought maybe this young man was more than just play acting... that maybe he had a screw loose in the gender identification department...
Anyway, for the ride down, and for the time spent at that clown Ronald's loosely described fast food eatery, McGrossies, he was a chick magnet. And my daughter was one of the chicks! (weird huh?)
That brings me to me.
This week, aside from the fact my wife and baby daughter have been happy to see me every day, and my two older daughters have tolerated my existence, I wouldn't say I've been a chick magnet.
Oh, I've been a magnet, but of something else.
I have been an elderly driver magnet.
Everyday, sometimes nearly everytime I got in the car and started off down the road, I seemed to get stuck behind an elderly driver... usually an old man who is talking to another old man in the passenger seat. Sometimes there has been an old lady sitting in the passenger side. On occasion, there has been no one sitting there. And once or twice, the driver was even an old lady.
But most of the time, the driver of these vehicles that travel 5 to 10 mph slower than the rest of traffic and/or posted speed limits was a male.
Now, I'm not trying to disrespect our senior citizens or those whose hair has long ago took on some shade of winter camoflouge -- heaven knows, someday I may be an old man driver -- but really folks, does my vehicle have some sort of homing beacon that indicates I'm coming up, so get in front of me and make it impossible for me to get around you until you turn or all drivers behind me have availed themselves of the inner lane on boulevards or the passing lane on highways? Is it really fair for me to get honked at by the yuppie chick in the SUV behind me when I stop at the proper side of an intersection in rush hour so that I am not blocking the intersection, and then three of you elderly drivers assume that means the light has turned green for you (when in fact it is still red but you don't look at the light) and you zoom out from the cross street and fill in the intersection I just left open and obeyed the law for not blocking? I guess it was, because this yuppie chick may have had to put her brake on earlier than she wanted, or maybe she had to interrupt her cell phone conversation or withhold taking a drag on her cigarrette.
If I need to get somewhere in a timely fashion, forget it. Someone up ahead of me is going to drive slow and not be sure of where they are going. Hey, I can't help it that more times than not, it is someone who is driving in a tentative manner like an old man. It is times like this where I wish we had Star Trek transporter technology. But, with my luck, if we did, my magnetic personality would probably just shift to attracting transporter malfunctions and engineers with fake Scottish accents telling me "Cap'n, the circuitry is all fried! I canno' take the risk of turnin' this beastie on and scattering your molecules across the universe!"
Which would mean I get to rely on my magnetic personality again... Could someone please determine what the prime factors of being an elderly driver magnet are?
