Alpha Move: Be Hungry Like The Wolf

I apologize in advance for all of the errors I'm going to make in this post -- I got three hours of sleep last night between landing at the airport from a long weekend in Las Vegas and getting up this morning to get the kids off to school.  And yes, I may very well be suffering through the tail end of a hangover.  It's certainly within the realm of possibility.

A long weekend in Las Vegas has the potential to be life-changing if you do it right, and while that sort of thing didn't happen this weekend, I did make several very intriguing field observations about Game in the wild, untamed, anything-goes erotic landscape of Las Vegas.  I like Las Vegas, if you can't tell.  It's like Disney for adults.  While they used to call it Sin City, I prefer the more accurate term the "City of Id".  If you've got a sexual itch to scratch, Las Vegas is like a premier buffet.  

But before I expound about my Single Game in Vegas observations, I want to cover the Married Game advantages to a weekend away in this most decadent of environments.  Some couples fear the idea of Vegas, too insecure in their relationship to be tempted by the fleshpots of Nevada.  Me, I just needed a vacation, and Mrs. Ironwood had a conference there, so we killed two birds and while she was being all noble and saving the world I was getting wasted around the clock and spending my kids' inheritance on penny slots and fruity rum drinks.

This was my third trip to the burgh, and after Mrs. I's conference was over and I was able to sober up enough to go and be social with her, we decided to blow off the closing  session for something a little more . . . intimate.  

"Intimate" in this case meant dirty dancing with my wife in front of a crowd of drunken strangers.

Look, everyone wants a hot sex weekend in Vegas, and as you get older your expectations for such events go up even as they become more infrequent.  And there was plenty of sex -- but that wasn't the draw for either of us.  We already have plenty of sex, thanks to the Red Pill.  But what is often missing from the lives of middle-aged married couples is that sense of excitement and intensity that may have faded over the years as you get used to each others' personal sexual idiosyncrasies.  The stuff that turns into hypergamy and/or infidelity if you aren't careful.  There is real danger in relationship ennui, and as Athol points out in yesterday's insightful post, you just can't count on a regular Date Night to keep things spicy and interesting.

But a drunken weekend in Vegas ...

We hit the buffet at Harrah's and pigged out, which did both of our stomachs good.  We were actually planning on heading over to the Erotic Museum, which I've planned on attending each of the three times I've been in Vegas and never quite making, and this time was no different.  We were even headed to the taxi stand to splurge on a cab there when we walked passed the open-air Carnaval bar at Harrah's and decided to stop inside for a smoke and get our bearings. We ended up staying there for over six hours.

The reason was the band.  Now, you can find every kind of entertainment known to man in Las Vegas, from transvestite lounge acts to comedy to acrobatics to a donkey show, if you know where to look.  The entertainment options are truly limitless.  But the mid-Sunday-afternoon band at the bar, an 80s tribute band called the Nancy Rayguns was free, enthusiastic, and actually quite good.  Throw in some drink specials, a flair bartender named Flippy, and a crowd of middle-aged Gen Xers who actually remember the songs that the band played, and you have one hell of a pink-and-teal acid-washed party.

But I had the nascent beginnings of a plan.  The point of this exercise wasn't merely to be entertained: it was to pay some very public attention to my wife in a way she would be reluctant to see if we weren't in the land of the 24 hour hooker, surrounded by a sea of Asian tourists and drunken old farts. The point was to show her that I'm still hungry.  Like the wolf.

I think that's a trap too many Blue Pill dudes fall into: once they are safely in a relationship, they forget the need to publicly express their desire for their woman.  Mrs. Ironwood and I went into that bar as a middle-aged husband and wife, and while that didn't change ostensibly, in actuality it was far more like a boyfriend taking out his girlfriend to a show than a husband and wife enjoying a quiet afternoon of entertainment.

Simply put, the moment I heard the first rockabilly strains of "Goody Two-Shoes", it was like it was 1987 all over again.  Sure, there was an element of nostalgia for my lost youth -- but it was far more a reminder of how far I've come in my life.  In 1987 I was overweight, underconfident, and mired in Blue Pill ideology that saw me get my heart handed to me by a series of women.  Hearing that band brought me back to my youth, sure.  Only this time I knew what the hell I was doing when it came to girls.  And I had conveniently packed my own.

So it was SHOWTIME for Ian.

Back when all of these songs came out, I had been stunted by insecurity and brow-beaten by the Blue Pill: it made me either a sullen wallflower or an over-the-top spaz when it came to girls.  It was the Age of AIDS and date rape seminars, the height of the cultural purge of masculinity the feminists waged throughout the Age of Teal.  I had been awkward, ugly, low-value, and sullenly embittered by the unfairness of it all and the hopelessness going forward.  You know, Teen Stuff.

Now . . . . not so much.  It took that nostalgic, painful flash of teenage angst associated with that music to make me appreciate just how far I have come.  The dude I was would never have dared to nuzzle a chick's neck in a public place without three pieces of signed and notarized documentation stating in advance that said neck-nuzzling was an acceptable and mutually consensual act agreed upon before hand that in no way obligated either party to any further activity not covered herein.

But now, I brazenly nibbled and more or less felt her up in an affectionate-and-socially-acceptable way in front of a crowd of drunken strangers.  I knew now what all of her Indicators of Interest were, and how I could arouse them through a combination of brazen cockiness and bold Alpha displays, especially in the social context of fellow adults engaged in similar pursuits.

I knew that the ragged strains of Joan Jett and the smooth crooning of Boy George, not to mention the naked , raw sexuality of Oates (sorry, Hall not so much) triggered a similar sexual nostalgia for her, taking her back to when sex revolved around cute boys and marrying someone rich and famous, not the titanic interpersonal struggle it evolved into as we matured.  I knew, without a shred of doubt or a hint of insecurity that I looked good, I was out with my chick, I could exhibit my social prowess through a series of increasingly-humorous and sexy displays, and, with a degree of certainty usually reserved for a cash transaction, that Ian would be getting lucky in Vegas that night.

The band played "Lets Get Physical" and I cavorted around Mrs. Ironwood's chair like a drunken teen, up to and including borderline obscene pelvic thrusts.  Then we had another drink and the time of our lives.  A drink later, I hit the jackpot.  They played Duran Duran's Hungry Like A Wolf.

Now, while I really didn't know Mrs. Ironwood back in the 1980s, I've picked up enough about her personal history to know which songs and performers elicit specific memories.  And I know for a fact that there has always been a certain damp spot in her panties for Duran Duran.  Something to do with a middle school crush, perhaps, I'm not sure of the details but based on memorabilia and previous response, Duran Duran -- Simon Le Bon, Nick Rhodes, John Taylor, Andy Taylor and Roger Taylor -- just does something to Mrs. I.  Live Duran Duran, after three rounds of fruity rum drinks and a free pour-in-your-mouth shot courtesy of Flippy the flair bartender, and I could only imagine what was going on in her libido.  And I knew just how to turn it up.

All the way to 11.

(It's like everyone else just goes to 10, but ...)

When Hungry Like The Wolf came on, I got up in front of everyone and started dancing with the two drunk chicks who were celebrating their 40th birthday and reliving their own nostalgic moments on the dance floor. Mrs. Ironwood giggled girlishly as I paid them some nasty (but tasteful) attention, and got some solid preselection points in return.  Then I went back to the table, grabbed her by the hand, and led her out on the dance floor.

Now, Mrs. I, as a rule, doesn't dance.  She's still recovering from breaking her heel and other foot injuries, so the entire trip revolved on her walking as little as possible.  But three drinks drunk, with her husband boyfriend insisting that he wanted her -- her and only her -- so much, so publicly, that he was willing to risk looking utterly ridiculous in an effort to impress her with his manly strutting.  But I owed it to her.

 No one puts Baby in a corner. 

So strut I did.  I pulled every 80s dance move but the Robot (even I have some pride) my tired old body could manage.  I put on my my my my my boogie shoes.  There was moonwalking involved.  There was more funky pelvic thrusting . . . and drop-to-your-knees grinding in a most indecent fashion, my face making scenic detours through her cleavage on both legs of the round trip.  There was gyrating and spins.  There was Footloose-style white people dancing.  I even attempted a half-split that didn't end too badly.

 I dragged Mrs. I out of her safe chair near the stage and into and out of my contortions on the dance floor, never loosing eye-contact, never letting my full intention waver from her and her alone.  There was macho struttery and arrogant posturing.  There was lurid movements and gratuitous crotch-grabbing.  I was on like Donkey Kong, putting it out there, working hard for the money.

And Mrs. Ironwood ate it up like Pop-Rocks.

That's when I went to 11.  I popped my collar.  Like The Outsiders. For real. And I meant it.

You could almost hear the gush, and not just from her.  The horny birthday girls (with mommy bobs -- sorry ladies, thank you for playing) were visibly envious.  The crowd, already watching my antics, went wild.  The band called it to everyone's attention.  Flippy flipped out.  I'm not great-looking, but comparatively speaking I was on the high side of the Sex Rank at that club, and I knew it.  I was one of only a handful of guys dancing, and by far the most flamboyant and arguably the most enthusiastic.  I worked it.  Dance-wise, I was AMOG.  

Me. Nerd Boy.  Damn.

In 1987 I never would have considered being that, in any venue.  In 1987 every glance at a woman was plagued with Betacized doubt and cowering fear.  Dance in public?  With women?  With a girlfriend?  Not me, man.  I'm not that dude.  I'm the nerd, over in the corner.

Now I'm the nerd at the center of attention.  I'm the nerd boldly going where I never would have dreamt I'd go.  I was a nerd with Game, and that made me mighty.

It also made Mrs. I terribly, terribly enchanted with my display.  For one brief shining moment, the kids, the house, the jobs, the career track, the money issues and all the responsibilities were gone, and it was just me showing my chick how badly I wanted her in front of the whole world, without pause or reservation (or, apparently, any sense of propriety).  Just me demonstrating how badly I wanted to do wicked things to her body and delight her soul.  How I was hungry like the alpha wolf I was.  The Red Pill kicked into Extended Release, and I commenced to do nasty things to her leg while I nibbled on her ear while the crowd cheered us on. We concluded the song with a heartfelt public kiss with tongue and my hand on her ass and everything, and we got a round of drunken applause from the crowd that I'd never have imagined I'd be getting back when leg warmers walked the earth..

Thanks to a timely royalty check, we'd been able to do Vegas without looking at our bank balance for once. Which meant I hemorrhaged money over four days.  I haven't even figured out how extravagant I was yet, because I'm afraid to total up the receipts.

But honestly, I don't care how much it cost, or how much energy I devoted to making the trip happen, dirty dancing with your wife girlfriend in a crowd of drunken strangers and making every woman there envy her your devotion and attention, that, Gentlemen, made it worth every fucking penny.  It was pure, primal Game. It slashed through years of accumulated bullshit and brought us back to the primal boy-meets-girl that got the whole thing started.  It was Game made manifest.

It's all right there in the 16 Commandments, Number 2 (Make Her Jealous), Number 6 (Keep Her Guessing -- no one expects a popped collar . . . until it's too late), Number 9 (Connect With Her Emotions), Number 11 (Be Irrationally Self-Confident -- I told you I went to 11), Number 12 (Maximize Your Strengths - goofiness and gratuitous displays of ego, check!) . . . and especially Number 13.

Ah, Number 13.  Always Err On The Side Of Too Much Boldness, Not Too Little.

Too often we married dudes forget that.  There's a timidity that can arise from long acquaintance, a mix of boredom and familiarity that needs to be regularly washed away like a bad stain on your Members Only jacket.   Blue Pill dudes don't get it at all -- it might as well still be 1987.  But as far as Married Game goes, this is a tricky but essential way of keeping your woman's interest high.  You must be bold.  You must find some way to reach beyond the mundanities of middle-age and grasp the essential testosterone-poisoned, horny-enough-to-screw-a-goat teenage libido and all the reckless abandon it represents . . . without doing something stupid like cheating on her.

You Must Boldly Go, if you want her loins to ache for you.  Show her, in public if need be.  Fuck propriety. Fuck mature wisdom.  Fuck middle age reserve. (And while you're at it, remember Number 14). Show her that you're still the same horny, groping teen you were back in the day.  Show her how she makes you throb, and do it unashamedly, without reservation.  That she's sweeter than wine.  Bust a move on her behalf.  Show her that you have that wolfy hunger that made you do awkwardly stupid things in your adolescence . . . but now you have the wit and wisdom to boldly display every nasty shred of Alpha in your aging body.  Show her that you're the MAN, and that she's damn lucky to have found you, and damn special for being the center of your personal universe.

And if you do it right, you'll never have to worry about Number 16.  Because you've got Game, son.  That's the key.  Game.  Understanding the complex interplay of heterosexual dynamics that leads to high-quality interpersonal and physical encounters with an ever-increasing level of satisfaction, and being able to play those emotional notes like a Moog synthesizer until she's practically begging to do simply nasty things to you once you get back to the hotel room.  Like a virgin . . . only not so much Madonna as whore.

The rest of the evening was eventful, but I'm going to stop the narrative here.  We made it back to the hotel after a few adventures -- Vegas is a hell of a town.  Once we recovered sufficiently, and we were far from prying eyes (they're watching you), I continued a display utilizing good old Number 14.  I don't need to relate the details here, for dramatic reasons.  Use your imagination.

Let's just say . . . I was hungry like the wolf.  And there are other things I've gotten much, much better at since 1987.

More later.  Must sleep soon.

Ian out.

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Beta Move: Wash Her Face

Mrs. Ironwood likes cosmetics and makeup the way that I like cooking and food.

She's not vain, not at all.  And she's not hopelessly insecure (not any more than any other woman, and better than the vast majority -- when your husband is constantly trying to have sex with you, it's kinda hard to feel unattractive), she just likes putting on and wearing makeup. She understands the powerful importance of presentation in the professional world, especially in terms of positioning in the Female Social Matrix, and she considers it a kind of artistic expression as well.  She's gotten good at it by necessity, and even did a brief pre-career stint as a retail cosmetics manager in a mall store.  She's intrigued by the science behind the glamour as well.

She spends a fair amount on cosmetics.  But then she's a professional woman who meets with clients and colleagues and the general public, and she wants to make a good professional presentation.  Makeup and wardrobe and nails are part of the job.  Having worked in offices for decades, I can appreciate just how much a woman's success or failure in an endeavor can depend upon her self confidence . . . and if she feels that she has to spackle on the self-confidence every morning, then I'm not one to argue.

It makes her happy and feel better about herself, it amuses me and the kids to watch her make faces in the mirror, and it's something that's uniquely feminine, like me tending to my facial hair is uniquely masculine.  I admit I indulge her when there's a sale on something she likes, and she cooperates by limiting her purchases within a self-imposed budget and working the free samples shamelessly.

All that being said, at the end of the day -- and they all seem like long, hard, stressful days, recently -- when she's dragging home late after yet-another meeting, after eating dinner, kissing the kids goodnight and reviewing their homework, collapsing into bed exhausted and passing out without another thought is one of her favorite things to do.  Sometimes she barely has the strength or initiative to get undressed (I'm happy to help her with that), much less do the full de-bureaucratiization process.  If that means sleeping in makeup and smearing her pillow (and sometimes mine) with makeup, well, I'm not that picky.  I usually follow the Guy Rule when it comes to clothing and such ("If it doesn't have Shit, Blood Or Puke on it, It Ain't That Bad") and a little mascara smear never bothers me.

But last night, for no particular reason, when she finally stumbled in after her meeting and it was time for night-night, I noted that she was in no mood to de-spackle her face.  She doesn't like sleeping in makeup (she says it reminds her of the Walk of Shame in the morning) but once she's down, she's down.  So I grabbed a couple of makeup removing wipes and washed her face -- or at least got the lion's share of the goop off of it so she wouldn't look like Tammy Faye Baker in the morning.  I mean, it wouldn't kill my morning wood or anything (and if you know of something that can, Mrs. Ironwood would dearly like to know) but it's not the best look to wake up to.

The experience of washing her face turned into something more, however.  The kinesthetic sense of my fingers on her face, gently rubbing away the makeup, grime, sweat, and cares of the day, felt wonderful to her.  I explored every square millimeter of he face as I wiped the gunk off, and whispered soothing things to her while she just laid there and made sex noises.  I had to be careful, of course, and ended up going back for a third wipe (she loves makeup, in case I hadn't mentioned that) but at the end of the experience she looked up with a beatific expression that put a warm glow in my heart and a tent pole in my pants.

"I feel so loved and taken care of," she said with a sigh.  "That's the nicest thing that's happened to me all day.  Can you do that again tomorrow?"

I shrugged.  "Baby, whatever kinda foreplay you want!"

She giggled.  "Actually, as nurturing and caring as that felt, it was also pretty dominant.  All I could do was lay there and let it happen to me.   That was very sweet, Ian, thoughtful and considerate.  I felt like a kitten being licked by an attentive parent."  

"I'm suddenly not feeling particularly parental," I noted.  The face washing had definitely been erotic, and gosh, that's hard for a dude to hide even when he wants to.  I had no such inclination.  Hilarity ensued.

So wash her face.  It's a deeply intimate, yet utterly utilitarian way to bond with your girl over something girly.   And it would be a shame to let a freshly-scrubbed face go unkissed . . .

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Alpha Move: Midnight Picnic

This was one of my earliest "Alpha Moves", and was born out of poverty and desperation as much as romance and lust.   After so many long, philosophical posts I figured I'd toss y'all a dating bone.

When Mrs. Ironwood and I first started going out, we were the typical poor college students living in a student hovel.  "Going out" meant the Wendy's Hot Bar (Wendy's had a hot bar back then) and drinking an embarrassingly cheap bottle of wine at home.

But after a few months the complacency had begun to set into our relationship, and I saw the need, even then, to inject a healthy dose of lusty romance into it to keep us both interested.  Fancy restaurants or theater being far out of our reach, I instead searched for some way to get her in a sensuous, romantic place for some serious no-one-can-hear-you-scream nookie, with accouterments, for less than fifty bucks.  After doing a little basic research, I figured it out.  In retrospect, it was a good Red Pill date moment, simple and elegant, but instructive.  And it made quite an impression.

I took Mrs. Ironwood on a midnight picnic.

PREPARATION

This took a bit of prep, of course.   I chose a late Spring, early Summer day, after the pollen but before the mosquitoes, and I carefully selected a secluded site.  Luckily we lived on the edge of the rural/urban interface, so finding a place far enough away from people to ensure privacy, yet close enough to keep it from being a chore to get their in the dark, wasn't that much of a problem.  Even then Mrs. Ironwood could trip over her own shadow.

The spot I selected was a long-abandoned horse pasture, still mostly fenced in, well behind the old stable.  It was at the far end of the pasture, which had been long-trodden and overgrown for years, and was now covered with moss.  It was quite meadowy.  Overhanging cedar trees provided both a screen for seclusion and a place to hang stuff -- and hang stuff I did.

This was the Age Before LEDs, so instead I used several hurricane lamps and candles, distributed around the blanket I pre-positioned.  I used the space behind a largish rock for a staging area, dragging a cooler and a boom box there and setting up both.  I borrowed a few wind chimes from my mother's back porch and hid them in the trees for effect.  I set up an unobtrusive cone of incense far back away from our picnic to keep from triggering her asthma.  In the cooler I added a selection of  three types of cheese, crackers, summer sausage, grapes, strawberries and sugar, wine glasses, cutting board, knife, corkscrew (OK, it wasn't screw-cap cheap wine, but close), a citronella candle, and napkins.  The boom-box was set up with a mix tape (!) of George Winston tunes, soft rock, and vocal Celtic music (which I didn't know at the time, but my future wife absolutely loathed).

The blanket was a wide, fluffy one spread out over a tarp.  I brought a few pillows along for comfort, and just in case of rain I pitched my pup-tent discreetly on the other side of the barn.  Then I threw another tarp over the blanket and made sure that the path from the parking area to the pasture was clear of twigs, branches, and garden gnomes.

EXECUTION

That evening, I knew the future Mrs. I was working until at least 9:30 (restaurant job), and since her car was broken down, I picked her up from work.  We had some small talk, smoked a cigarette, and were headed home just like a normal night . . . when I took a strange turn off of the road.

"Uh, where are we going?" she asked, a little nervously.

"This way," I assured her, as we crept down the dirt road.  She bit her lip and then suddenly started looking all over the back seat of my gallant college POS, an AMC Pacer.  The future Mrs. Ironwood had decided to date me, anyway.

"What?  What are you looking for?" I asked, confused.

"An axe, duct tape, chainsaw, garbage bags, that sort of thing," she said, cheerfully as she turned back around.

"Oh, relax," I soothed.  "If I was that kind of dude, I would have done that months ago and moved on already.  Those guys are poseurs.  I'm not that afraid of commitment.  Sorry, but you're in for years of torment ahead of you," I joked.  "Besides, you keep that kind of shit in the trunk."

"You don't have a trunk," she pointed out.  "So where the hell are we going?" she demanded, her nostrils flaring prettily.

"On a date," I said, even more mysteriously.  "Fairy land, maybe.  Relax, enjoy the evening.  It's a full moon," I pointed out.

She grunted an agreement, but still looked worried.  But excited.  I finally stopped the car in the middle of nowhere and then asked her to wait a few moments.  She wasn't thrilled with that, out in the woods, but I told her she could lock the door and leave the lights on until I returned, if that made her feel better, so she agreed.

I ran down to the meadow and took the tarp off the blanket, lit the candles and lamps, and turned the music on softly before returning to the car.  I was only gone maybe two minutes.

"What now?" she asked, through a barely-slitted window.  The door was still locked.

"Now, we go on our date," I said, offering her my hand.  "Trust me."

We were still new in the relationship, so I can understand her hesitation.  But she also knew I had gone to a lot of trouble, and I probably really wasn't a serial killer because those guys are always loner neat-freaks and I was a social slob.  So she got out of the car and reluctantly followed me.

I'd lit the first candle in the path just out of sight of the car, so when we turned the corner she saw it.  Her eyes lit up a little.  Seven more tealight candles later, and she was staring at the picnic I'd laid out, wonder in her eyes.

"You did all this . . . for me?"

"My first date prospect fell through," I joked.  "And I figured you'd be my next easiest choice, emphasis on 'easy'," I quipped.  "Of course I did it for you.  Who else do I want to seduce by moonlight?"

"I'm sure you have a list," she mused, while looking around at all of the candles, augmented by the season's first fireflies.  "Ian, it's beautiful!"

We sat down, ate the picnic, had a lovely evening to soft music and candlelight, and even managed to slow dance a little under the stars and the bright, full moon.  Then we proceeded to the sweaty bits several times before the bugs finally overcame the inherent romance of the moment and forced a late retreat.

It's been nearly 20 years since I did that, but whenever Mrs. Ironwood discusses "the perfect date" with my nieces and daughter, she brings that one up without fail as one of her top five.  I've repeated it several times since -- always an unexpected surprise, always well-planned and executed, with contingencies for everything from wild animals, sudden showers or wandering law enforcement officials well-made.  She says it was one of the most Alpha dates she'd ever been on, since she had no idea it was going to happen and no input into what we did.  As such, it was a very, very interesting, hopelessly romantic surprise that helped cement in her head the idea that she wanted to have my babies.

So consider trying this one out.  It's cheap, it's easy (and we're dudes . . . we LOVE "cheap and easy"), it's impressive, it demonstrates foresight and sensitivity as well as your ability to plan and execute a simple date that doesn't involve tipping or being anywhere at a particular time.  Consider doubling the picnic with a telescope to look at the moon, or schedule it during a meteor shower where you spend the evening making wishes on falling stars.

It doesn't have to be midnight, but the next time you're trapped watching Dancing With The Stars with your wife before she yawns and goes to bed, remember that you could be dancing under the stars -- and getting some nookie au natural -- instead.

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Alpha Move: The Cold Cash Move

This one is a little different.

Most Red Pill dudes understand implicitly the role that money (security) plays in courtship.  It's the simplest way for a man to buff his Sex Rank -- billionaires get some play.  Now most women will insist that it isn't actually the money, per se, it's money a a sign of success, ambition, yadda yadda yadda, whatever their Hamster tells them to say to keep from being perceived as a money-grubbing goldigging bitch -- fair enough.  The fact is, most women aren't money-grubbing golddigging bitches, far from it.  Money is just a simple metric to measure potential security in a mate.  But that doesn't mean that money doesn't play a role in their sexuality.

Mrs. Ironwood is a case in point.  She was raised in relative affluence, thanks to an ancestor of hers inventing a popular over-the-counter drug and cashing in.  She lived in the "Old Money" part of town (although to be fair, since her family's fortune was post-Civil War and pre-Depression, it's technically counted as "New Old Money" -- that's just life in the South) and went to a private middle school and was a debutante and did other affluent things the extravagance of which now embarrass her.  I count myself fortunate among husbands in that my wife actively dislikes jewelry, thanks to a father who gave her far too much far too early to make up for being . . . well, her dad.  The only jewelry I've ever given her was her wedding ring.  Her ears aren't even pierced.

Of course, after her parents' divorce and subsequent financial implosion, the money went away, not that she really missed it.  I met her a few years later when she had just turned 19 and was living in a student slum and working as a receptionist, donating plasma to make rent.  Good times.

But thanks to her upbringing, she has no desire for ostentation or status symbols or any of the other crap her peers seem to be invested in.  Money doesn't impress her, save as resources to be devoted to her children and her family.  I found that intensely arousing, and an important quality in a wife.  Better, people with money don't impress her, and I've seen her snub millionaires and corporate CEOs to have a chance to speak with an Auschwitz survivor.  Money, as an abstract construct, just doesn't impress her.  One of the many things I love about her.

However . . . 

A year after we had moved in together (around 1992), while I was still in college, I sold my first published piece.  To be fair, I'd sold it three years before, it was just taking forever to run through the process.  But in early 1992 my first book came out, right after I met her.  Much to my delight it did well -- in fact, it hit the New York Times Best Seller's list.  And after riding that particular DHV for all it's worth ("Yes, Mom, he isn't just a loser Liberal Arts major -- he's a New York Times Best Selling Author!"  = GOLD) a month or so afterwards I caught a second wave.  My royalty check came.

Now, understand that in 1992 I was making about $15,000 a year in temp jobs, waiting tables and under-the-table stuff while I struggled to finish up my two bullshit majors that had no hope of finding me a job.  I had lived with my parents through most of that to save money, and I was driving a crappy old Vega station wagon (the first vehicle John Delorean ever designed, BTW).

Suddenly I had a check in my hands for a sizable portion of my annual income . . . and I had earned it with the power of my brain.  Mrs. Ironwood was certainly impressed.  And she was 19.  Do you know how an impressed, in-love 19 year old woman expresses herself?  Physically.  Noisily.  And with great eagerness.  

Yeah, it was like that.

But here's where it gets interesting.  After arranging to buy a new-to-me Mustang (another story, and a lot more sex) I secretly took out $2500 from my account in cash.  In $100 bills.

That money was destined to be spent -- I had bills to pay.  But I wanted to try an experiment, perhaps one of the earliest Red Pill experiments I ever did.  I went home to find the future Mrs. Ironwood doing something or other, and I pulled her into the bedroom.  And then without a word I stripped her naked.  Then I reclined her on the bed.  Then I started laying $100 bills across her skin, all over her naked body.




I was testing a theory of one of my all-time favorite sci-fi authors, Robert Heinlein, who had mentioned in the Notebooks of Lazarus Long that "Money is the best aphrodisiac, but flowers work almost as well."  I was young, goofy, and had just written a NYTBS novel -- I was at the apex of my mid-20s cockiness.  And I wanted to see if the future Mrs. Ironwood, considering her affluent upbringing, would respond with anything other than "Ick!  You don't know where that's been!", which is what I expected.

What actually happened was very different.  I witnessed the incredible sight of her rolling around in $100 bills in a state of sexual excitement that I had, at that point, never before seen in a woman.  She was a lusty babe when I met her, but put her on a bed of $100 bills and she writhed like a slut in heat with the fleet in town.  Minstrels will one day write songs about the intensity of that crazy afternoon of sex.  At least one neighbor complained of the noise.

Afterwards, when we talked about it, she revealed that yes, indeed, the sight (and smell) of that much cash had a quite unexpected erotic effect on her, one that had embarrassed her, but one which she understood in part because of her affluent upbringing.

She explained that the boldness of the move -- "It was pure Bull Alpha!" -- combined with the fact that I had made the money out of my own talent and skill and imagination (also, she admits 20 years later, combined with the fact that she was a super-horny 19 year old girl with a nerd fetish) had taken the usual excitement about a visible sign of security like the cash and magnified it in her brain.  It was the ballsiest, nerdiest power-move she'd ever seen.  Damp panties, natch.



I wasn't just demonstrating my ability to provide security, she explained, I was doing it in a bold and deliberate display of nerd power, as primal as beating my chest.  This was MY money that I had earned . . . and of all the women in the world I wanted to writhe around naked in it with, I had chosen her.  She was aroused because even though she knew the money wasn't hers, the fact that I trusted her enough to roll around naked in a pile of my dough was just too hot to resist.  This was me waving my intellectual dick around, she explained, as dominant a move as I've ever done.  She still has fantasies about that afternoon, she tells me.  Hell, so do I.

A friend of mine (single, successful player) has a similar trick, a move he plays when he's on the road sarging for fresh poon in states he doesn't live in.  He sits at a bar and orders a drink and just starts playing around with five $100 bills -- oragami, bar tricks, etc.  He doesn't spend it, he just plays with it.  And before the night is over, he's gotten huge attention (doesn't hurt that he's not bad looking, either) from women.  I've watched him fan out his money and lightly trail it over a girl's face, and then follow it with the line "Have you ever had  five hundred bucks rubbed on your nipples?" with an innocent expression on his face.  One of the best closings I've ever seen.  He's occasionally lost a hundred or so, but considering how many times it's paid off, the Hooker Math is more than adequate.  The thing is, he's not even giving the money to the chick -- he's just showing it off in a cocky, playful, masculine way . . . the kind of thing that drops panties.

So if you want a quick, surprise Alpha buff, and you can afford it, consider this move.  It's best if the money is something you earned or won with your manly skill-set (it doesn't work as well when she knows you just took it out of savings) but any naked display of wealth like that, particularly with an aggressive and cocky presentation, is a serious DHV.  If you can't afford $100s, then consider $50s or even $20s (NOTE: a big pile of change on the bed DOES NOT WORK FOR THIS and it can get pennies stuck in unusual places.  You've been warned.).

Oh, and before you ask, I asked Mrs. Ironwood's permission to share this with y'all.  She hopes you won't think less of her for it.

And what she doesn't know is that I'm planning a reprise of this move in a few months when I get a big pay-out from one of my successful Kindle books.  Only this time I'm thinking 50 $100 bills instead of 25.

It's been twenty years, after all.  Inflation.

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