MEETING your new girlfriend’s friends socially is to be tried in court for a serious offence. Here’s what you must never say if you hope to survive:
‘I’m an office drone’
So Emma could do a lot better. Your casual semi-joke suggests the need for matchmaking with a single corporate lawyer friend. The correct thing to say was: ‘I’m thinking of doing an MBA.’
‘I was so hungover the next day was a write-off’
Clearly late-stage alcoholism. Do not relate booze anecdotes, however amusing. ‘I’m thinking of buying an ISA’ is better. Her pisshead mates will approve of that.
‘Did you know it’s a myth dogs can only see in black and white?’
Dismissed. Worthwhile conversations have a clear linear structure: Are you buying a house? What sort of house? What is the house worth? Is it better than my house?
‘I haven’t got a car’
A sign of failure. How do you get about? More importantly, how will you take Emma to the maternity ward and have family days out at safari parks?
‘My dad worked in a factory’
Unfortunate, but where will you get the deposit for a house? Emma’s last boyfriend’s parents had a massive house in Surrey and a villa in Tuscany? She should be reminded of that.
‘Never really thought about kids’
That you’ve been going out three weeks is irrelevant. Shows lack of commitment and possibly a deliberate, evil scheme to leave Emma childless and unfulfilled.
‘I’m rereading Watchmen’
Oh God he’s into comics. Do you still play with toy soldiers too? If you’re going to mention books make it cool ones like Bernadine Evaristo or Elizabeth Strout.
‘I’d like to have a creative career’
You want to live in a filthy artist’s garret borrowing money off Emma all the time. You should have specified something like advertising copywriter thinking up butter slogans for six figures. That’s the acceptable face of creativity.
‘So you’ve been friends with Emma since university?’
No. Emma’s friend hated her then for some impenetrable reason. However you now have a black mark against you for reminding her of something you could never have known about.
‘I like to cook’
50/50 chance whether this earns you ‘modern man’ points or you’re plotting to be a stay-at-home husband while Emma goes to work and pays for everything.
‘In an infinite multiverse there could be a lizard version of everyone’
Who has thoughts like that? Does Emma know you believe lizard people secretly control the world?
‘I hit a school bully at primary school’
Your masculinity is toxic. Emma should be texted the number of a women’s refuge.
‘Suicide Squad is shit but I liked Margot Robbie in it’
You fancy Margot Robbie more than Emma, you bastard. The fact that Margot Robbie is a movie star at least in part due to her attractiveness does not make this any less disloyal.
‘Sometimes I’d like to pack it all in and rear haggises in Scotland’
OMG. He’s changing career to farmer, Emma. He’s right-wing like Clarkson. He f**king loves Brexit.
‘I’m more of a dog person’
Case closed, and not in your favour. Emma is more of a cat person. She should dump you immediately and hook up with fellow cat person Iain. He is extremely boring, prone to sulking and collects toby jugs, but the cat/dog issue is insurmountable.
