Metro - One Girl's Opinion

Do you like them buffed or not? No, I didn’t say “BUFF” as in muscularly built. (If I had, then the answer is a great big HELL YES, GIVE ME SOME MORE PLEASE!) But I’m referring to a guy’s fingernails. Ala the Metro-sexual…


Just so we are all on the same page, from Merriam-Webster.com:

Main Entry: met•ro•sex•u•al

Pronunciation: \ˌme-trə-ˈsek-sh(ə-)wəl, -ˈsek-shəl\

Function: noun

Etymology: metropolitan + -sexual (as in heterosexual)

Date: 1994

: a usually urban heterosexual male given to enhancing his personal appearance by fastidious grooming, beauty treatments, and fashionable clothes


I would like to point out that there is a big difference between a guy having good hygiene (showering, shaving, keeping his fingernails clean and non-jagged) and a guy who gets manicures with clear polish, pedicures, eyebrow waxing, maybe even back and chest waxing, spa facials, etc. on a regular basis.


There are men who severely need some of the above treatments. I can personally think of more than one man in my acquaintance that appears to have mammoth-sized wooly caterpillars sporting afro’s growing on his brow. Maybe guys think they look more intelligent (see: Albert Einstein) like this, but mostly I think it’s because they cringe at the thought of tweezers or hot wax coming anywhere near their face. These men could definitely do with an eyebrow waxing! Come on guys, we girls do it all the time, you can handle an eyebrow waxing, it’s not that bad! And while you’re at it, please, get rid of the excess hair coming out of your ears and nose too!


The same with a manicure or pedicure, if a guy has horrible nails, especially if they are in-grown… we girls won’t think you less manly if you get a professional to help fix the issue, we might actually appreciate not getting cut by your jagged toenails and scraped by your rough calluses when we warm our cold feet on yours at night when snuggled up in bed. In fact, most girls have come to realize that pedicures are one of life’s most exquisite pleasures. But most men would not dream of getting a pedicure, especially not in a (gasp!) public salon. Someone might see them!

On the other hand… I do think this trend toward male grooming can be carried too far. My personal preference is very “masculine” men. Rugged. Big build. Muscular. Slightly rough around the edges. Football player or “strongman” competitor variety. Facials and pedicures and waxings… don’t really fit well with this type. I can’t really picture my favorite Denver Bronco Defensive Lineman sitting in a spa with cucumber slices on his closed eyes and a green avocado mask smeared on his face while one person buffs his fingernails and another person paints a coat of clear polish on his newly trimmed and massaged toes. It would ruin the whole image for me.

 

So, guys, girls…. Metro or not? Where do you draw the line?

Extreme Makeover

It’s a universal truth even if women don’t want to admit it – we see “potential” in men and date/court that, not necessarily the reality of the man before us. I don’t blame men for resenting that. But women will invest their time and attention in men whom we consider to have the potential to be what we are looking for. It may be how they dress, do their hair, the interests they have cultivated etc but the honest truth is that most women see a man and measure what could be, not the current status quo.




It’s not a case of loving someone the way they are. We can delude ourselves that we do…but the truth is – there are things we want to change about you guys.



You would be a great catch if only you…



1. Dressed better

2. Got a good hair cut

3. Invested in a good skin care line

4. Changed the kind of music you listen to

5. Worked out just a little

6. Quit watching Star Trek

7. Threw out the comic books

8. Had different friends

9. Drove a great car

10. Read a book



You get the idea. Of course this list varies with each girl according to our values, our taste, and the image we want to present to our friends. Because make no mistake – how our friends view you is incredibly important to us. You will not be appreciated if you ruin our “rep” with our best girlfriends. You see, we have an image of ourselves that we want other people to see. If you don’t fall in line with that, well, there’s only one of two things that can happen. You either change to conform to our image or you’re not affiliated with us anymore. Simple as that.



So yeah… Guys, there’s a reason we want to change you. You have to be compatible with our self image, our persona. If you don’t enhance that projection of ourselves then we just aren’t too sure we can let our name be linked to yours. This is why women will introduce a very good looking guy to their friends quickly, because that man enhances our rep, even if he is a jerk and treats us bad. But we will be slow and loathe to introduce our new beau who is the best, greatest guy in the world who treats us like gold …except he needs a new wardrobe and to be introduced into the 21st century, and steered gently to get rid of his obsession with Babylon 6 and clear out all the accumulated years of Star Wars action figures and directed to a more attractive “Mad Men” style of coolness prior to being publicly acknowledged by us as someone significant in our lives.



Girls, have you ever had a friend suddenly become all secretive about the new guy they are dating? It’s probably because they are early in the “my fair lady” makeover process. They don’t want you to meet the new guy until the “Steve Urkel” has been transformed into Johnny Depp.

This rule doesn’t hold as true for the long time couples. All a girl has to do there is avoid introducing the spouse or significant other and allow them to be a nebulous entity better left to the imagination. No one questions it, it works fine.



But when the relationship is new, our current and long standing friends who know us well will want to meet our new man. AND THEY WILL HAVE AN OPINION! And we don’t want that opinion to be negative. So we will be tempted to see if we can rent a Robert Downey Jr. look-alike.



Is this desire of women to change a man wrong? Yes of course! But it’s a fact of life. Women want their guy to be a credit to them, not make them pitied by friends. So the next time you start dating a girl and she oh so tactfully suggests you would look so great in this kind of shirt or if you wore that kind of pants or if you did your hair this cool new way… take it with a grain of salt. She sees your value, she just wants her girlfriends to do so also. Make her proud, bite the bullet. Embrace the makeover she is about to give you. You might find out you like it.