EXPENSIVE ADVICE TO THE LOVELORN

What's breaking is the bank
once Jordan marries hm.

Whenever I'm feeling a little too good about myself, I make sure to read a few
statistics to even things out. These usually involve relationships, such as the latest that claims one in three women admitted they "settled" when choosing their husband. That doesn't apply to my wife, although I have only her word to go by. 

Ironically, the best way to pick myself up is to be happy I am married to my wife. Because if the singles scene is really as bad as it's made out to be for young men, give me old age any time. 

Guys are going online paying anywhere from $1,200 to $10,000 to "dating experts" like Dr. Orion Taraban to crack the code how to score with women. Their advice involves "status, confidence, appearance, and wealth". 

Mistake #1: giving this guy $1,200 to learn what
you already knew.

No kidding. Those are the things that have always been important. Plus, if you've got 10-grand to drop for that kind of advice, you definitely have the status and wealth aspects already tied up. 

As for confidence and appearance, all you need is a new suit and remembering that you can afford to overspend on information that the rest of us have known all our lives. My charge? Buy me a cup of coffee and we'll call it even.

If you saw the original, you'd
know why I wouldn't post it.

Then there's a site called Digital Black Belt which charges $300 a week to get you laid. Their services include "enhancing" your bio and making A.I. photos of yourself. 

By that measure, all I'd have to do is post the A.I.-enhanced selfie to the right and refer to myself as a "semi-retired actor and award-winning writer". Are the photo and C.V. accurate? Yes, but...

The $10,000 advisor, Michael Sartain, promises to help "build social circles of incredible women and elite men in just 30 days". To which I repeat, if you have that kind of scratch lying around, you probably don't need this "former nightclub manager" to get you rich friends. And if you don't have that dough, believe me, you won't make rich friends in 30 years.

I never dated any women who looked
like them, and thank God for it.

As for "incredible women", if the photos of Sartain like the one to the left are any indication, the only thing incredible about them is the amount of plastic surgery they've undergone. 

The most interesting tip comes from yet another expert who claims, "Women crave to see that you have the ability to leave them and walk away and not communicate."

I ran that past my wife just to see if it was true. Rather than giving me a yes or no, she asked of the source, "Wait, is that the asshole online?" She didn't name which specific asshole online, but it sounded like I should ignore him.

Since everybody else has the secret to dating success, I thought I'd put in my one-cent to desperate men:

• Have good hygiene.
• Skip going out for food and drinks for a few weeks and buy new clothes instead.
• Get a good cookbook -- women are impressed by guys who can make dinner themselves.
• Put away 10% of your salary in a high-yield savings account. 
• When on a first date, ask questions and let her do the talking. 

You're probably not going to find your alleged dream girl, but you just might find yourself "settling" for the real one. And by following my free advice, you'll find that you've saved the money you would have otherwise splurged online for a really nice engagement ring, no A.I. photo required.

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