Sushi

To me, Sushi is gross. Fire and fish go together, like rehab and rock stars. I can't think of pulling a fish out of a river or ocean and chowing down (like Gollum from Lord of the Rings, for example), but that's me.

Women love Sushi. If you want get a group of women talking, just mention Sushi (or lunch, for that matter). Women are communal creatures, and love shared experiences, and Sushi is one of those experiences.

Women that work in an office, for an example. One of the ladies in the lunch group will mention Sushi for lunch, and there will be IMs, emails and breaktime discussions about who is going, which day to go, and most importantly, which Sushi place to go to.

I believe that woman are great info sharing creatures. We all know that women talk more than men, but they are constantly giving out reviews on things, and filtering it through other reviews they've heard from others. Female discussions have always been the purest form of a Social Networking platform.

So, back to the Sushi lunch at the office. It really is a miracle that a group if women go anywhere together. The first women tosses out a day, time and place to eat Sushi via an electronic message. The message now goes through a multitude if challenges;

Certain ladies send private messages to other stating they won't be going if "so and so" goes,
then the day chosen for doesn't work for others,
then the proposed Sushi place is challenged by other places offered as alternatives.

To a guy, it is almost possible to keep up with all the variations and changes of a simple request for lunch. If a guy happens to be part of the lunch group, he will at some point give up the mental strain of the discussion and decision process, and say, "Just tell me where to show up when everyone's decided".

So, much later, when the Femme UN have conquered the negotiation deadlock, and made the decision of who will go, and where and when the Sushi will be eaten. To me, there should be a ticker tape parade every time this happens, but that's me.

Now, I know there is a list of things that are gross to women, and I would think Sushi would come up pretty high on that list. Women generally would never eat Slimy, uncooked things, but if it swims in the ocean (and it doesn't have a name like Nemo, Flipper or Willy), women seem to love it.

The only way I would eat fish straight out of the water is if Salmon jumped into a hot spring for an appropriate amount of time, then (and only then) I would scoop it out and eat it.

Then, there is the cost. It's expensive for the "good" Sushi places. Now, if I don't like Sushi, and I ended up at a bad Sushi place, I don't even want to think about that.

If the ladies want to flirt with getting hepatitis or parasites from eating raw fish, be my guest, but I'll be a neanderthal and continue to eat cooked fish, thank you.

I suppose if a doctor wanted to find new ways to pick up chicks, he could leave his card on tables at Sushi places, "Got Parasites? Call Me".

It could work.