BLOG TOUR: Men Actually Do Listen To Women... But Only To The Good Stuff by Nic Tatano

In my new novel "Boss Girl" women take over a television network and turn it into a huge ratings success. Therefore, the men listen to them. Especially since they're talking about sex.

  

But in real life the old complaint of "men don't listen" is based partly on fact. I say "partly" because in reality, guys are very selective about what they hear.  So as a public service I'm going to illustrate how you can get the guy in your life to pay attention and ease your concerns that you may be in a serious relationship with a garden tool.

First, you must fully understand the care and feeding of men in recliners, so you'll need a few examples, as there are "degrees" of not listening. (All of which feature the one-size-fits-all response of "that's nice.")

- The husband-tuning-out-wife-bobblehead, which is the garden variety version of not listening:

Wife (talking to husband in recliner): "I got these cool black shoes for fifty percent off!"

Husband (nodding): "That's nice."

In this case the man is not listening because he doesn't understand his wife's source of excitement. Besides, the man was not born with the shoe chromosome so he cannot differentiate the new black shoes from the other 17 pairs of black shoes in the closet.

- The totally oblivious husband. Common version of husband completely tuning out wife while watching sports:

Wife (realizing he's not listening): "I was abducted by aliens today during lunch hour. They took me up on the mother ship. We swung by Jupiter."

Husband: "That's nice. Did you remember to pick up beer?"

So, by now you've realized guys simply filter out the stuff they don't care about, don't understand, or anything that might interrupt the game. Except for...

Sex? Now you're talkin'.

Let's turn the time machine back to the eighties when I was a TV reporter in a newsroom with a lot of single women. They talked about their weekend escapades in great detail every Monday morning. The guys realized this was useful stuff, a peek into the woman's playbook, so we developed the talent of looking like we weren't listening when we were actually hanging on every word. We'd bang out gibberish on the typewriter and appear totally focused while taking in details that would make 50 Shades look like Nancy Drew.

This went on for quite awhile until we finally got busted.

Female reporter at next desk: "And then the next morning..." She stops and notices a male reporter is smiling. "You're listening to us!"

Male reporter (pretending she interrupted his train of thought): "I'm sorry, what?"

"I saw that look on your face! You were listening!"

The guy points at his typewriter. "I'm working on a story."

She gets up, walks to his desk and looks at the paper in the typewriter.

Now he's turning red.

"Why are you listening to us?"

"How are we supposed to not listen to stuff like that?"

"Oh, now you men listen."

See, we can't win. We get flak if we don't listen, then get chastised when we do.

Anyway, you gals should be able to develop a strategy to get your significant other to listen. Take some of the sexy stuff you've read in romance novels, throw a bit into any comment, and trust me, he'll put down the remote.

That's nice, huh?

Like what you read? Why not treat yourself to Nic's new novel, Boss Girl which will be out on Feb 20th!