A Guide to Nerd Guys Meeting and Dating Women: Grooming Part 1
Whoops. Forgot to publish this one. A little out of order but pretty good IMO.
This part of the presentation was both surprisingly well received and needed. If you think I am off base even presenting this information, I invite you to attend any comic or Star Trek convention towards the end of the day. The funk can be overwhelming in power, volume, and variety. The sad fact is that a symptom of certain types of nerds is a belief that grooming is something that happens to other people. I have a few theories as to why this happens:
Theory 1: They don’t smell their own funk, and therefore assume no one else does. WRONG. The fact is you can get used to anything, especially something that creeps up on you like body funk (this, by the way, was my excuse for not bathing through most of high school). This belief also tends to expand to the belief that a shower every few days is sufficient. Believe me, it isn’t. Incidentally, I have found about 100 articles about how women have a much more sensitive olfactory sense than men, so what might be a slight odor to you could easily bowl a woman over. Note-never ask women their opinion of your body odor. They will ALWAYS lie. This is one thing they seem incapable of giving their honest opinion of. They perceive being honest in this realm as cruel, but at the same time have pretty much decided they aren’t going to date you. If you must, ask a guy, or better yet, just assume the worst and take a fraking shower.
Theory 2: The nerd believes that he will not be in a circumstance wherein he will be meeting girls. WRONG. As we will expand later on, you are surrounded by women. You could be stinking up your local comic book store 
in your favorite Punisher t shirt and run into a girl who happens to have a Frank Castle thing. If, on the off chance this miracle happens, do you really want to push off your one chance to date a comic book chick because you haven’t bathed in three days? You never know when you might run into her.
Theory 3: “I am a wild, crazy barbarian that some woman will dig.” Yeah, this plan sucks. There may be women out there who dig grubby, smelly guys, but for every one out there I can promise there are at least 100,000 other women who like clean, non-smelly guys. Also, women who dig grubby guys generally look like they dig grubby, smelly guys if you know what I mean. Granted, there are situations where a guy looks dirty and women feel like he is sexy, but what women generally like is guys who look dirty after doing something (changing oil, putting out a fire, etc) but who will then shower and look clean again.
Theory 4: The nerd has more or less given up all hope of meeting someone and has more or less said “To hell with it“. This is the saddest case, since it is a very strong self fulfilling prophesy. If you believe you will never meet someone, and therefore stop grooming or doing anything else to enhance your chances, odds are you will not. At least you will have the satisfaction of feeling like you can predict the future, but that sort of self gratification is destined to leave you lonely for a long time. You have to believe it is possible, and if you can’t believe it then lie to yourself until you do. As you believe, so shall you achieve.
Anyway, those are my main theories behind why certain nerds don’t like to bath. If, on the other hand, you bath frequently, remember this is not directed at any one person. I am sure you are the fragrant delight of your workplace.
Anyway, I’ll boil bathing down to a couple simple rules. They are:
1. Every morning. This is pretty critical
2. After doing anything that causes you to perspire. Exercise causes BO. For the more advance students we can talk about masculine pheromones caused by perspiration being attractive to women, but lets face it. If you produced those pheromones odds naturally odds are you would not be reading this.
3. Before any kind of social interaction that may or may not include women.
Bottom line, if you ever find yourself asking the question “Do I need a shower” the answer is always 100% yes. There is no gray area in this matter.
As for the mechanics of bathing, you should have learned this at age 4 or so, so I will make it short. Bathe every inch of your skin with soap, paying particular attention to the feet, groin, and armpits. Shampoo your hair, and then use conditioner (this is actually pretty important. More on hair later). Get out, dry off completely, and then immediately apply deodorant! I cannot stress the importance of this. A stick of deodorant might cost $1.50, but the value of not stinking is priceless. While buying it go nuts and get a deodorant with an antiperspirant.
That’s it for now. Next post: Grooming Part 2 (shaving)
