4 Tips for Being Awkward Like Me
It’s exciting that so many new people seem to be reading Awkward Things these days. If you are reading this, then you aren’t like one of those people who only come to learn why geeks make good lovers and, like guys who have something early to do tomorrow and, like, need to get going so they can get some sleep, scuttle away without so much as the approximation of a cuddle. Thanks for staying around to hold me.
See, right there. That was a little awkward, right? That’s pretty much how I roll on a regular basis. But if I wasn’t so awkward, I wouldn’t be able to have this awesome website, now, would I? Nope.
So, to help you learn to be awkward like me, I’ve created these four helpful tips:
- Lose any ability to tell how awkward you are being. Feel awkward about asking for the electronica section in a music store, but not awkward at all about telling a girl that you need more of her in your lifestyle. If you have literally no ability to predict in advance how awkward a situation is, you’ll be way more likely to have a ton of awkward conversations.
It’s like if you were, say, colorblind, and your fear of making fashion mistakes plus your legitimate innate inability to judge colors properly causes you to get dark uncoordinated untrendy clothes all the time, if not fully outsourcing the clothes purchasing decision to a seriously un-hip (in terms of young men’s fashion, but in other ways surprisingly hip) mother. Personally I don’t know anybody who would be in danger of that specific problem requiring some friends to stage a literal intervention culminating in an actual shopping trip to, say, Express, which apparently does indeed sell men’s clothing.
Anyway, it’s like that, although that example was 100% fabricated, naturally.
- Be scared of mundane interactions. This is how you get people to laugh at you while you’re ordering a pizza. Maybe normal people are able to confidently handle the myriad complications and ways to optimize information flow during the pizza ordering conversation, but the awkward person will not hesitate to be terrified that they’re going to somehow offend, confuse, or make a mistake when ordering a pizza. The resulting “I, uh, need to make an order to pick up” is apparently awkwardly hilarious enough to cause multiple people to independently burst into laughter.
I don’t see what’s funny, but then again, I apparently don’t know my own awkwardness.
- Screw up the timing. Try this exercise: take any perfectly normal joke. It could be the next witty thing you think to say in response to something someone else says. Now, instead of saying it right away, give everyone the opportunity to drift into the next thought. Maybe if you’re talking to a waitress, let her take one step away before you call your witty thing after her, like you’re giving advice to a kid getting onto a schoolbus.
“That’s why they call it a catfish!” you could say.
Except since the comic timing is totally unambiguously disrupted, she kind of only has the ability to look back at you with a half-forced smile and think, oh gosh, not one of those. Ugh.
And lastly . . .
- Start a website about the awkward things you say to girls.
March 23rd, 2007 at 10:19 am
I’m half way there…
March 23rd, 2007 at 12:12 pm
I’m doing well! I’m following most of the tips, but not the fourth quite yet.
March 23rd, 2007 at 2:23 pm
My favorite is when someone says something and you don’t quite hear it, so you ask them to repeat themselves, to a point. Then you don’t hear it again and just blurt out a ‘Yeah, totally!’ E.g. ‘What did you say your name was?’ ‘Yeah, totally!’
March 23rd, 2007 at 7:11 pm
Of course, for me it would be awkward to ask for the electronica in a music store because, in order to do so, I would have to talk to a human.
So, #2 and #1 are the same for me.
March 24th, 2007 at 1:08 pm
This blog seems to be getting awkward by the day, keep it up :)
March 25th, 2007 at 4:27 pm
You need to add a 5th tip in, because sure verbal awkwardness is something to strive for, but to be truly awkward you must be physically awkward as well. I, for instance, have perfected the art of spazzy hand movements during normal conversation. Just try it, and see how your awkardness grows!
March 25th, 2007 at 6:16 pm
Oh my goodness, how could I forget!
March 26th, 2007 at 2:18 am
Dude, I am so with you on all of the above (as one of the most awkward hominids ever). Even (or perhaps especially) in social situations that should, objectively, allow me to channel some external ‘cool’ personality (like this recent one), my behavior is simply dorktastic.
I am, in fact, such a dork that, just now, I googled my own apparently made-up word of ‘dorktastic’ to see what references, if any, I might find by others on the topic. First, Google informs me that there are already “about 18,500″ references to “dorktastic,” while the Urban Dictionary offers a definition: “Used to describe something that is considered awesome by people of a dorky nature.”
So I’m not just a dork, I’m a redundant dork.
Solidarity!
- V.
March 29th, 2007 at 5:24 pm
OMG this blog is hilarious. every post makes me laugh.
April 22nd, 2007 at 12:45 am
Ahaa I thought I was the last of the awkwardichans , apparently not. keep it up man, loving it.
May 29th, 2007 at 9:20 pm
well i think i have a natural talent in this whole category.
my special skill is making the most basic of basic human interactions
so awkward you can almost feel the pity off of others transcend into your soul.
seriously.
today my teacher asked me what my name was and i forgot.
i ended up just getting too much saliva from nervousness since the whole class was waiting for my response and having to remember how to swalow it then actually swallowing.
it was great.
oh and i was standing noticably close to the teacher too. i was wondering why he kept backing up with every step i took forwards.
oh well.
thats why i always feel so unwanted especially by guys. ill probably end up with 80 cats and a bland apartment knitting legwarmers.
oh sorry…did i do it again?
June 27th, 2007 at 11:03 pm
Thanks for this blog. When I’m feeling particularly stupid about the latest spectacularly dorky thing I’ve done, it helps to know I’m not alone in the universe.
As an example, I recently managed to tell a new male friend that I “ended up getting together with my husband by following him around for six months”. While that’s technically true, I managed to omit the fact that he was a willing participant in the exercise. You know, the part which separates dating/hanging out from stalking.
I also have a gift for convincing purely platonic male friends that I’m interested in them, which is bad in that (a. I am not, in fact, interested, (b. I am fat, so therefore generally speaking *they’re* not interested, and, just to complete the whole awkward equation (c. I’m married.
Anyway, cheers on an awesome blog.