A woman’s penetrating gaze is a terrifying thing. How many microscopic details of a man’s appearance can we notice, just by saying hello in the office hallway? And while the average man is generously willing to overlook a mayonnaise-stained blouse, provided there’s a luscious breast languishing invitingly beneath, we’re not.
Well, we can’t. We don’t know how. It doesn’t work.
The most offensive thing is that we, in fact, are the first victims of such nonsense. Sometimes, how we long to “unsee” the sparse red hair above a new acquaintance’s upper lip—and instantly fall head over heels in love with them. Fall head over heels in love with their deep, Olya Buzova-like IQ voice, their pure mind, and their sunny kindness. But no.
We don’t get to either intelligence or kindness. We sit and stupidly rub our fingers through this damn hair with dried drops of the soup we just ate.
• White shorts paired with knee-length socks. A timeless piece of Ukrainian men’s style.
• A shiny bald spot, cleverly disguised by three thin, long, faded hairs combed over the entire head. (Why disguise it? After all, a bald spot in itself is very sexy.)
• The characteristic, soaked skin tone, as if hinting that life is hard and mom was right: entering the Kharkiv history department in 1995 was definitely not the best idea.
• Confident second size bust.
• Cheap belts with huge metal buckles depicting eagles, saber-toothed tigers, the “Don’t enter – you’ll be killed!” sign, pistols, skulls, women bent over in ecstasy, and flags of economically developed countries.
• Smoked solarium tan. If you misspelled one letter of the first word, no problem, this option also works.
• Blue tattoos with traditional prison scenes. Signet rings. Chunky chains over a T-shirt. A long yellow nail on the pinky. (And you thought 90s nostalgia was only a rainbow spring on your desk and the taste of cherry “Love is” in your mouth?).
• Panties sticking out from under pants. The only thing worse is panties sticking out from under pink pants. Thong panties sticking out from under pink pants – like this.
• The killer smell of men’s cologne, used on a scale of medium-expansion fire foam.
• Pants that start at the armpits. Especially when paired with pointed shoes. Especially when paired with a hefty handbag. Especially without a hint of self-irony.
• Long-dried sweat stains on the back of a shirt. (Contrary to popular belief, women without olfactory system pathologies are only aroused by freshly squeezed sweat.)
• Thickly fused eyebrows. It seems like just one small detail, but you’re already imagining yourself a hostage in a small brothel with cut telephone wires, passports crackling peacefully in the fireplace, and a torture chamber in the tear-stained attic…
