Others suggest techniques that might have worked for the Anatolian cliffdwellers but are not necessarily applicable to 21st century America. Some of these precious tomes offer sensible counsel. Whether you’re having trouble getting a date, keeping a boy/girlfriend, hapless in bed, or trying to keep your marriage fresh despite the Adorable Little Trots – whoops, wrong diary! children bursting in at the worst possible time, there’s an advice book for you. They’re there, written by psychologists and social workers and housewives who only want you (yes, you!) to find the Man of Your Dreams, Give Your Woman 10,000 Orgasms a Night, and Stay Married for Your Next Ten Incarnations. It was all because I’d read and mocked a fine example of one of the most common, and in some ways silliest, of self-help books: the relationship advice manual.ĭon’t pretend you haven’t seen them, shelved neatly beside the likes of Wendish Women Never Count Calories or Vandal in the Corner Office: Ten Management Tips from History’s Greatest Barbarians.
We laughed about it often, and even now, years after we broke up, it’s still one of my happiest memories of that relationship. However, I do love terrible books, and it is entirely due to one of these that I made and lost that bet. It was only the second time I’d ever made a bet with him (two words: blue lobsters) and it was assuredly the last.īefore anyone gets the impression that I’m a weekend boozer or have a fetish for oddly colored sea creatures with large clacking claws, let me assure you that neither is true. I also nearly spilled a strawberry daiquiri all over his side of the bed, scared the cat, and generally made a fool of myself on that long ago Saturday morning. I once bet my boyfriend he wouldn’t remember something that I said a year later.