In the course of wasting time on the internet today, I came across an article with advice on picking people up. This is, of course, purely theoretical reading for me, much as I might read an article on bee-keeping. Nonetheless, aside from my general distaste for the subject, the article suggests a technique which I can't imagine myself executing successfully.
They suggest that you keep a selection of useless trivia on-hand and use it to start conversations. You're supposed to mention the trivia, they suggest something like "A goldfish has a three-second attention span," and then transition straight into conversation. I guess the idea is that it distracts the target, gets them thinking, and is somewhat unconventional so that what they're thinking is not "what a lame pick-up line." From there you can begin chatting.
This would completely not work for me. Sure, I have a wide selection of useless trivia readily available (I wasn't MVP of the Varsity Academic League in High School for nothing!) but I would utterly fail in the "transitioning to regular conversation" part. I would start with something like, say, "Hey! Did you know that one of the most influential figures in Medieval history was an imaginary king created by a con artist?" Then, rather than transitioning into conversation, I would embark upon a twenty minute lecture about Prester John. Or however many minutes before she politely excused herself to go feed her goldfish, which by the way did you know has an attention span of only three seconds?
