Mamba Condoms

Well, I did make a concerted effort, and asked for a deadline extension, and enlisted the assistance of my women’s book group, but it appears that product testing in this case is indefinitely delayed. I’m in good company: one of the most attractive members of the reading circle, a doe-eyed, winsome, gamin brunette, has informed me that she’s also given up. Another responded, “Oh, yeah—I read the e-mail. But I have a dozen in my drawer, gathering dust.” This is sad. Prospective co-testers were eliminated or declined under the following circumstances:

• skittish endomorph guaranteed to disappoint me
• visitor from a demographic far, far away
• aesthetic atrocity
• married
• asexual
• older than my Dad

I even trolled the vast wasteland of the digital world, stating the task at hand (or other parts), and set the bar relatively high by insisting that respondents name a feminist in the subject line of their reply. I decided to accept Edith Piaf. The best writer in terms of volume, literacy and humor displayed discouraging signs, so I asked him if he was married. He said yes, and I declined. He immediately began to prevaricate, saying that he had never expressly stated that he was married, just suggested that I might “enjoy the illicit thrill…”

“What are you?” I typed. “A lawyer?”

Right again. Nature’s way of saying "don’t touch."

There was one individual with whom I would have product-tested on the spot, but he was met in a context that precluded the possibility of follow-through, tragically enough. Even my mother was impressed, and she’s a tough audience. “Wow,” she said when he left the room. “Could you come back and stand there and be handsome and articulate some more?” All males should be of such caliber. Why schtupp a homely dolt? I may be unrealistic, but I decline to product-test until I meet an available male of such grade: physically attractive, personal chemistry, quick and verbal, and knowledgeable in a field that I respect.

Wish me luck.

(Just got another e-mail. Is Liz Phair a feminist…?)

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