Stretch! (Love Lessons from a Dog Groomer Who Lives in a Caravan)

Originally posted by Redmole88 on PUAF:

I read this article on a Men's Health magazine some years ago. Maybe in 2004. Anyway, back on those days I couldn't even say hi to a girl, and reading about this guy gave some hope...lol.

A picture:


Stretch: Portrait of a serial seducer

Love lessons from a dog groomer who lives in a caravan? Form an orderly queue, gentlemen


By Chris Connolly

Men, meet your master. He’s a scruffy, cantankerous man called Stretch, and he lives in a caravan behind my house. The caravan was sunk into a hillside about a decade ago and converted into a lounge with a kitchen. It’s connected by three steps to a small outpost containing a bedroom and a bathroom, and when I sit out in my garden to write, Stretch frequently sticks his head out of the bathroom window to talk. Since I spend a lot of time writing, and Stretch spends a lot of time in the bathroom, I’ve learnt many things about him.

He’s 25, works as a groomer at My Beautiful Dog and dog-sits neighbourhood pups for extra cash. He has long brown hair, wears the same pair of jeans with the pocket falling off every day, and eats mostly Chinese chicken takeaways. Oh, and one more thing: he can get any woman he wants.

I’ve never seen a man attract more women than Stretch does. But I have, on more than one occasion, seen a beautiful woman stop by the caravan for a “visit”, only to find another equally beautiful woman already inside. I’ve never seen Stretch agonise about how to approach a woman. But I have seen him pick up two women at a concert by burping at them. Stretch may seem an unlikely seduction guru, but hey, Yoda isn’t too impressive at first blush, either.

So what does Stretch know that other guys don’t? I decided to observe him for a few weeks to see what I could learn. As I watched, I spoke to him about dating and romance as much as I could. I even ran my observations past Lisa Daily, a dating coach and author of Stop Getting Dumped. The following, in Stretch’s own words, is the result of my study.

Stretch Secret No. 1 “Stretch don’t chase chicks. Chicks chase Stretch”

When Stretch first said this to me, I laughed. Then I realised that it’s true. He doesn’t chase women. He’ll approach them, sure, but he doesn’t go out of his way to impress any of them. He makes his intentions clear, then leaves the decision to her. If she likes him too, that’s great. But, more important, if she doesn’t like him, that’s great, too. Obviously, he’d prefer that she respond positively, but, like all successful seducers, once he lays his cards out on the table, he’s prepared to deal with the results.

“It comes down to confidence,” says Daily, also the founder of [link] “There's something very sexy about someone who can take you or leave you.” Of course, we’re not all blessed with such self-confidence, but that’s not an insurmountable problem, according to Daily. “It is possible to ‘fake it till you make it’,” she says. “The perception of confidence has a lot to do with the approach. Less confident men will spend half the night seeking eye contact. With a confident guy, it’s three looks and he’s in.”

So if you want to enter Stretchdom, project confidence and act quickly. If you find yourself thinking, “Did she just...?”, you’re already too late.

Stretch Secret No. 2 “Stretch only likes women Stretch likes”

While Stretch won’t turn down offers from women who approach him, he won’t extend himself unless he’s really interested. Although it’s doubtful he’s read it, a study in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin suggests that Stretch is on to something.

The study found that people look for relationship partners who provide them with self-verification or self-enhancement. This means we’re attracted to relationship partners who see us as we see ourselves (verification), or to people who find us more attractive than we find ourselves (enhancement). Pursuing only people you’re boom-box-over-the-head crazy about plays into this perfectly. If you go only after women whom you find really, really attractive, they’ll sense how much you desire them and respond positively. When you aim low and settle for someone you’re not crazy about, you’ll lower your chances of success and also risk being rejected by someone you didn’t really like in the first place. Ouch.

Stretch Secret No. 3 “Stretch likes the da-donka-donk!”

If my descriptions of Stretch as a bummy, slummy, chicken-eating weirdo have given you the wrong impression, let me set things straight: he’s also one sexy bastard. And by sexy, I mean sexual. He exudes sexuality, according not only to the women queueing outside his caravan, but also to Daily. Successful seducers make sure women see them as potential sex partners. A 2002 telephone survey revealed that 50 percent of people do not see opposite-sex friends as potential sex partners. One thing Stretch and other lady-killers avoid is being categorised this way. “If you try to sneak in with a woman by being friends,” says Daily, “you’ll project that, and you’ll end up as friends.”

Stretch Secret No. 4 “Stretch don’t lie. Honestly”

Actually, that is a lie. Stretch lies all the time. “My family owns a castle.” “I must have been going 190.” “I had 30 beers.” And on and on. But those are guy lies. When it comes to women, Stretch is a regular Truthful Tom. Daily condones this approach. “If you lie to a woman about anything – your intentions, where you see the relationship going, anything – it can trip you up,” she confirms. It goes back to confidence. When you know you’ve been upfront with a woman, you can actually avoid most entanglements that would ensue if you’d been lying to her along the way. Stretch is unerringly honest with the women he dates. He tells them what he wants and what he doesn’t want, what he likes and what he doesn’t like. He agrees with them honestly, and, more importantly, he disagrees with them honestly. Come to think of it, it’s downright sneaky how honest he is.

Stretch Secret No. 5 “Stretch interests people by being interesting”

In the right situation, with the right lighting and music, Stretch might strike the right person as handsome. Yet it’s clearly not his looks that draw women to him. Unless you’re Brad Pitt, your personality is far more important than your baby blues. You hear all the time that a sense of humour is the key to success with women, and it’s certainly great if you can make witty, disarming comments that leave the assemblage in stitches. But for most guys, “sense of humour” translates more closely to making people smile than to making them crack up. It’s about gumption, not guffaws. Stretch isn’t funny in a stand-up kind of way. If he tried to be, he’d come off as a big fake. What he is, though, is an undeniable personality. Recently, he wore a bunny suit – yes, a bunny suit – to a rock concert. He made a huge splash, got in the newspaper, and met a ton of women.

Now, I’m not suggesting you attempt the Raging Rabbit Routine. But you’re going to need something to get the ball rolling, and you could do worse than “Remember that time you wore your bunny suit to a rock concert?” for a conversation starter.

Stretch Secret No. 6 “Stretch don’t make rules”

People who establish rules regarding whom they will date are making a big mistake, say both Stretch and Daily. “I don’t date actresses.” “I don’t date people from the office.” If Cameron Diaz started temping in your office and wanted to date you, you’d break those rules in a second, so why make them at all? The only rule successful seducers obey is: “Thou shalt not date family.” They’re open to everyone else.

Stretch Secret No. 7 “If you want to touch a woman, you have to touch her”

When it comes to women, Stretch is touchy-feely. Not in a creepy way, but in a way that takes all the inhibitions out of physical contact.

“Successful seducers initiate contact fairly early, in a non-threatening way,” Daily says. It can be something as simple as taking a woman’s hand to help her out of a car or placing your hand lightly on her back as she goes through a doorway. Just make sure to create physical contact in the first few minutes of any encounter so it doesn’t develop into “a thing”. “Try touching a knee or an arm,” Daily advises. Stretch plays with hair and initiates thumb-wrestling matches. It’s never calculated, and therefore it’s never creepy. And it makes everything later on much less tense.

Stretch Secret No. 8 “Stretch don’t have routines”

Stretch has met women at bus stops, at parks, at police stations, on Chinese junks, everywhere. In fact, he credits a lot of his success to his openness to meeting women anywhere. “If you go to the same club every Friday, you’re only going to meet the people who go to that club every Friday,” he says. Daily concurs: “Shoe shops are great on Friday nights because it’s easy to start conversations.”

You: “Are these too funky for the head of a blue-chip company?”
Gorgeous brunette (melting): “N-no...”

Or take a girl pal to your next office party and introduce her to the single guys you work with. Then have her return the favour. It’s a great way to meet like-minded people, says Daily.

Good post man.