Three Ways In Which To Become A More Impressive Man

Herewith follows an email that I wrote to a friend over a year ago. It was always intended that this become a blog post but I dared not publish it for fear of my tactics, which I was keen to employ myself, becoming known to those that I wished to use them on. I thought it best, for the sake of transparency, that these now be made public.

1. Walk about eating an apple. Walking about eating an apple is not only impressive but stylish. It is hard not to be impressed by a man who is eating an apple. A man who walks about eating an apple is in illustrious company: in one episode of Hugh’s Chicken Run Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall eats an apple whilst inspecting the hall in Axminster that he uses to launch his Chicken Out campaign. In a podcast, Joe Cornish says he sometimes walks down the street eating an apple and that when he does this he feels superior. You should munch through your apple as if it had the consistency of butter; like a cartoon character would. In reality, people often wear an unsightly grimace when they bite into apples – this is unattractive. Method Of Consumption For The Man Seeking To Impress: pluck your apple from a convenient tree and bounce it deftly off your elbow before taking a crescent shaped bite all the while serenading your lady-prey with an old-timey number such as Just Around The Corner. Later, you will be able to ravish her in a crepuscular setting.
2. Use of the word ‘delight’. As in, “To see you was a delight,” and, “I delight in your eyes.” Or advice, “Let small things delight you: a bright, very clean, check tablecloth; some flowers standing in a blue and white striped mug on the table; that big marmalade cat that came and made confidence to you; the excellent omelette and the carafe of rough wine. How good it all was.”
3. Not wearing a rucksack. Wearing a rucksack encumbers a man. The apple eating is all of a sudden more prosaic. The rucksack-wearer is already too awkward to have the confidence to use the word ‘delight’. Rucksack-wearing has its purposes. If, for example, you have risen early and exercised before heading off to work in a library or wherever you will amplify the feeling of industriousness by wearing a rucksack. Suicide bombers, presumably feel this way when they wear heavily laden rucksacks on the way to Underground stations.