my macho moment with the mailman truck

macho mail-truckOk.

This is about me … and about being macho. Manly. A manly man.

Oh.

And my race with the US Postal service.

Lets call this ‘fast & furious: going postal” version.

Just to be clear.

This wasn’t the little puttering delivery person at your mailbox. This is maybe a step up midsize delivery “van.”

And the bastard passed me on the highway.

So I picked it up. Pedal to the metal <as Dukes of Hazard would say>.

No mailman was gonna drive faster than me <dammit>.

Whew.

Maybe I was having a Miami Vice moment <without the pastels and blazer and the flamingos in the background>. Oops. Just dated myself there.

Now.

I am not a slow driver. Nor am I <typically> a racer.

But dammit … when out of the corner of my eye … as I am chugging along in the middle lane of a 3 lane highway … and a post man zips on by to my left … even subconsciously something must have kicked in because the next thing I knew I was racing the mailman.

macho mailmanI am not sure he even noticed <because he was actually going fast because he had something practical and productive to do … a commitment to get mail somewhere on time> but I noticed. And I was NOT going to let it happen.

Real men do not get passed by mailmen <or grandparents in cars so old they do not even have seatbelts>.

A real man would take up the challenge and pick up the speed regardless of the speed limit.

Yup.

A real man certainly has some rules … you know what I mean … they should not do this or that. We should not drink with straws, should not wear pink and admit we do not like beer <among some easy example>.

Even subconsciously we feel obligated to follow some rules of being a man.

Does it stem from some obscure buried insecurity of our own sexuality and some random homophobic thoughts <even if we are neither insecure nor homophobic>?

 

<I thought I would add in his somewhat irrelevant but psychological insight – mumbo jumbo – so that it may show my manly smarts in assessing the entire stupidity of this scenario>

 

All I truly know is that when we get passed by a mailman … or simply hang out within a group of men … we seem to feed off of our inner “maleness” … it’s like we have to subconsciously prove that we are a manly man … that we are manly and that no little mailman truck can handle us.

Regardless.

I beat the bastard to the exit <showing the mailman who was the real man> and along the way <after recognizing how stupid the whole scenario was> it made me think what other things I also do that makes me macho beyond racing a mailman on the highway.

This was me exploring the inner subconscious male.

Thank god some blog called “self help for happy people” actually thought about, and wrote about, this exact topic in 2011.

He developed a list of 25 things.

I made it 22 because I don’t like things neatly fitting within the 10, 20, 25 rules as well as several were obviously filler.

Regardless.

Men … take note. This is a good cheat sheet for what you already know subconsciously.

Women? … take note … there are some things you should just let a man do because … well … he is a man.

 

The Manly Guide to Being Manly: 25 <now 22> Manly Things to Do

 

Men fight. It’s what we do. We drink, fight, fart and laugh. We laugh at the drinking, the fighting and especially the farting. We’re simple creatures. Hunting, fishing, and sex … these are things that make men manly. Unfortunately, modern society dictates that we cannot always make these things the sole purpose of our existence. Instead, we have to find other ways of being manly.

There’s something incredibly manly about standing there cooking bacon without a shirt on. It’s manly in a way that loading a dishwasher isn’t, even if you do load it half naked! I shallow fry my bacon. Some people grill it; fuck that. That is not manly. I’m a man I can take the fat!

There aren’t enough opportunities to be manly in life. So I thought I’d make a list of manly tips to improve your sense of manliness. We’re not sexist here at Self Help for Happy People. Women can be manly too.

 

  1. Be in charge of the barbeque.

macho barbeque rainCooking raw meat over fire; this is one of the mostly manly pursuits in modern times. There’s a prestige about being the man in charge of the barbeque. And barbecuing in a storm? The ultimate. Because we’re not going to let the rain stop us. But. If the host of an event isn’t the one in charge of the tongs then you can expect to see men queuing up to be centre of female attention as they sweat over raw-in-the-middle, black-on-the-outside burger.

  1. Light the fireworks

Fireworks explode. We get to be responsible for letting that happen. If we could get our hands on more powerful explosives we would. In fact, real men make thermite in their spare time.

  1. DIY

Fixing things is manly. Putting up a fence or a wall is very manly. It gives a sense of this is mine and I am building a wall around it. It is manly to build walls around all sorts of things – houses, gardens, fields and emotions. Plumbing, electrical wiring, fixing the TV, fixing the wobbly table, building a vibrator from scratch… it is extremely satisfying to Do It Yourself rather than paying some other guy to come and do it for you faster and better than you can.

  1. Make pancakes

Yes, Pancake Day is that time of year where fathers all over the globe take to the kitchen to “show how it’s really done”. Making pancakes from scratch is more manly than it sounds, and a must if you have children in your life.

  1. Shine Shoes

I mean properly shining them, with brushes. None of this wet flannel or easy sponges for cleaning shoes shite. Brush like you’ve never brushed before. Get those black bits all over the newspaper on the floor.

  1. Build a camp fire

Fire, it is the ultimate of manly things. All men are pyromaniacs. Getting to be a pyromaniac in the wilderness on a cold dark night with the stars ahead is beautiful. Everyone should do it. Sit back watch the flames burn, sit quietly and contemplate whether you should really have put that much wood on the fire, or whether it is a little too close to the nearest tree, and listen to the fire crackling as the embers glow. Seriously, what is more manly and awesome than that?

  1. Sharpen a knife

You can do this whilst sitting next to the fire. The knife may well end up blunter than when you started. Still, it feels very manly while you are doing it.

  1. Catch a fish

Sitting in a boat all day, doing nothing, it sounds like bliss. Apart from the boat part it sounds great. Still, fishing is a manly pursuit (as is hunting), and there is something manly about killing something and then eating it. It also stops those pesky vegetarians stating “well you get your meat in shrink wrapped form, you wouldn’t go out and kill and gut it yourself”. Fuck them, tell them you can and you have and it tasted great. Then ask if they have any pets.

  1. Cut down a tree

Destruction, it’s a manly thing. Cutting down a tree is a manly thing to do. Not that I advocate chopping down trees willy-nilly. Trees deserve respect. Anything that can still be standing upright after hundreds of years is a worthy adversary. Cutting down a tree with a chainsaw may speed the process up, but for a full dose of manliness use real saws.

  1. Chop firewood

Because once you’ve chopped down a tree you need to prove your mastery through further destruction. Chopping wood is great. It’s almost like a form of meditation. Use an axe or a machete. Axes are manly. For smaller pieces a good machete is also suitably manly. These are also items that you can sharpen for extra manpoints.

  1. Get outrageously drunk

Not a little tipsy. Not drunk to the state of rudeness. Wipe a week out of your memory. Out-drink everyone around you, make an arse of yourself, forget where you live, pee against a wall, sit on a bench for a little while, remember where you live, pass out in bed fully clothed and then get the fuck back out there the next day and do it all again. Last a week. Every man should spend one week of his life recovering from that week.

  1. Take a punch

Every man wants to know he can take a good punch. In fact, men probably brag more about hard they have been hit than how hard they can hit. It’s because we’re solid. We cannot be broken. We are invincible. We are Thor the hammer-wielding god of thunder, lighting, strength, destruction, fertility and protection. We can take that goddamned punch and we can…

  1. Throw one back

Yes, we took it, then we gave it back – with interest. Real men can throw a straight punch. We can throw a haymaker too, but we don’t need to. We have finesse. We want to throw a backhand to your solar plexus, uppercut to your chin and follow it with a hook to your liver. We want it to hurt. If we can’t kill you we can at least make you hurt. Hitting things is manly.

  1. Take up a manly sport

Rugby, football, and boxing are manly sports. There is nothing manly about badminton. Nothing. I don’t care who you are. Pool is not a sport. Sports are games where you have to change your shoes. Pool is a game. It is manly though.

  1. Play a musical instrument

There’s a reason why most rock bands are male. Guitars and drums are manly. We like to make noise. It ranks right up there with fire, destruction and hitting things. If you’re a drummer you get to do all four.

  1. Have the last word

Men need to have the last word in arguments. We need to be right, even if we both know that we’re wrong. Seriously, all you women out there, we’re not trying to continue the argument, we’re not trying to upset you, we just need that last word. There’s nothing you can say or do to change this so don’t try. My word is final.

changing a tire

changing a tire

  1. Change a car tire

If you are a man and you have to call out your breakdown cover because you can’t change a tire then I pity you. Just picture it.

  1. Ride a motorcycle

Motorcycles can be dangerous and so they will always be cooler than cars. Riding a motorcycle provides freedom, it provides fun, it provides that little moment of excitement when you’re not sure you’re going to make that corner. Motorcycling is that time when it is perfectly acceptable for men to dress in leather and have something powerful between their legs.

  1. Read a real map

Fuck satnav and fuck asking a stranger for directions. I can read a map and I am going to prove it. Maps are a source of interest for men generally. We love knowing where stuff is, which is ironic because we can never find our keys. Maps are manly and follow similar rules to remote controls, under no circumstances are the females allowed to touch the map.

  1. Carve a turkey

Yes, another food related one, but again, Sunday lunch, Christmas dinner, etc… as a man it is necessary for you to sit at the head of the table and carve that turkey. You will inevitably fail to resist the temptation to ask any adolescent present whether they’d prefer a leg or the breast.

  1. Hold hot stuff

“Careful that plate is hot” is something women should never utter. That’s pretty much the only encouragement we need to prove that we have asbestos fingers. That’s right, we can prove our manliness by taking hot plates through to the dining room without using a tea towel.

  1. Carry heavy stuffmacho carrying heavy stuff

Sometimes men like to carry large, heavy things around. It may be easier to get someone else to help carry that table, but I’ll be damned if I’ll let it beat me, it’s going where I want it to go and I’ll do it on my own!

 

There you go.

Being a manly man is simple.

Barbequing, carrying heavy stuff, not drinking with a straw … and beating the mailman in a car race.

This, my friends, is enlightenment at its best.

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Written by Bruce