Blowing out the Venue

So on Friday night, I went out with absolut_beirut and cafepuck. We had a fantastic time.

I started out by going solo to one of the standard venues right as it opened. There was almost no one there, so I set my goal at opening five sets. This wasn't hard, and helped to get me into state. Here are some highlights. I ended up crashing a birthday party (I opened one set and then bounced to another adjacent set and asked "are you with the party?" That got me in, even though I told them that I wasn't with the party. The second set was a mixed 2-set who appeared to be together (we talked about the Simpsons for a while).

I remember talking to another chick at the bar - her boyfriend was there. I seem to end up talking to a lot of girls with boyfriends or husbands - often times they are in the venue but not in the set. I think that part of my goal of being nonreactive is plowing on in the face of this sort of adversity. I'm totally uninterested in stealing a girl from her boyfriend, but if I can hang in when there is a real boyfriend, the fake boyfriends can go fuck themselves.

Opening mixed sets has been interesting - I find that they are actually together a lot more than 20% of the time. Although, now that I think of it, when there is a real boyfriend, he is often off on the side chatting with his buddies. The only guys who hang around the girls are orbiter chodes who want to date her.

I opened a seated two-set, who seemed pretty cool. We talked for a little while (I made fun of the target's chocolate martini) - I'm guessing that they were a little older. I should have gone for the digit jack, but didn't.

Next I bounced to Faneuil Hall. The first venue had a long line, so we met up outside and bounced elsewhere.
We went into an Irish Pub-type place, and started opening. My first set hooked (the chick works for an auction house), and I digit jacked.

Nothing else seemed to go all that well at the first venue - I opened some girls who turned out to be with their boyfriends. They were the hottest girls in the bar, so I had to open. I actually plowed through after they told me that they were with boyfriends - I have gotten a lot better at doing this.

AB opened a 2-set who called him out on being a pickup artist. They had seen the VH1 show, and thought the whole thing was amusing. I went in to wing him, but he managed to do alright by himself, so I ejected.

Cafepuck opened and ran this cougar set for a while. There was a pretty cute cougar with her UG friend in the corner of the bar. No one was talking to them, so he saw it as his civic duty to go and open. I started winging him after a while, and took the friend. After a while, he digit jacked, and we moved on to the next venue.

We bounced to our final destination for the evening, a 3-level dance club. The basement is for dancing (super-loud), while the upper two floors are more club-like. We opened every single set in the venue. This was fun, and it was great to be able to say "we can leave because we literally opened every set here."

I can't remember every set, because there were many. Sometimes, I would eject from a set and immediately open the next group I saw - this is powerful because your state doesn't fade if you can stay constantly in set. I think that I might try doing that more often - even if I have to open guys, I have to talk to the next group of people I see as soon as I come out of set.

I opened a set upstairs, and Cafepuck came in to wing. He ended up getting his girl to dance with him - she was super into him. My target told me that she is engaged, but he managed to get her number. She was really cute. I kind of blew out with my target - she was seated and I was standing. This caused it to stall out after a while.

At the very end, I opened a 2-set at the bar. I had seen them a couple of times, and knew that I had to open them. The obstacle was a real biznatch - she was busy with her drink when I entered, so I didn't talk to her and went immediately for her cute friend - big mistake. She noticed that I had been talking to everyone, and decided to call me out on it. I should have just plowed through. I didn't argue with her, but I wasn't completely nonreactive. On the way out, I waved at the target, and she waved back and smiled. The obstacle was busy, so I should have gone in and attempted to rescue digits, but for some reason I didn't.

When there was nothing left to open (and they had stopped letting new people in), we headed out. Cafepuck actually digit jacked a girl on the way out - we had been talking to them earlier.
Her friend was super-hot, and I was kind of afraid to talk to her because she was so cute. She was also surrounded by guys. I need to get better at that.

Lessons learned:
- Going out alone is a great way to get in state. Maybe going out alone is a great thing to do, period. Funny how its stigmatized, because when you think about it, the only way to get friends when you don't have any is to go out alone.
- Girls who are surrounded by guys are often better targets than girls who are alone or with other girls.
- You have to hit approach indifference, where it doesn't affect you to approach a set. You just go in, and talk to them like you were talking to the last group of people.
- Bounce from set to set. As soon as you stop, your state falls.
- Plow. Keep talking. Sometimes a set will be going nowhere, you plow, and then magically it hooks.
- GO FOR THE DIGIT JACK. Come on, this one isn't that hard.