A Man's Guide to Shopping

Extracted from the Husband's Survival Manual, Chapter 7 - Preparing One's Self for a Shopping Expedition.

1. Remember for women, shopping is something to do. For men, shopping is something to get done. Women shop. Men raid.
   
   
2. A man will spend $2 for a $1 item he needs. A woman will spend $1 for a $2 item she doesn't need.
   
   
3. Learn the art of self-hypnosis. Attaining an ambulatory catatonic state will make the time go by a lot faster.
   
   
4. Shopping locations are like watering holes. Women congregate there. Take advantage of the situation to get a couple of good sightings.
   
   
5. Stay away from a room of women in full shopping fever. You are less likely to get harmed if you rolled on the floor of a slaughterhouse then took a dip in the shark tank at the aquarium.
   
   
6. Do not come between a woman and her prey (anything marked "sale" or "50% off").
   
   
7. Listen to a tape reciting the words "cute" and "adorable" over and over again until you can no longer hear the words. This will prepare you for trips where baby clothing or clothing for little girls is to be purchased.
   
   
8. Get used to it: women comprise only 50% of the population, but they own 80% of the clothes and buy 90% of the remaining 20%. Make that 99% if taking about underwear.
   
   
9. There is no such thing as "too many shoes."* If you don't believe me, why does the average mall have one electronics shop, two bookstores and 32 shoe stores?
   
   
10. Having an item in pink does not preclude having the same item in not-pink.
    
    
11. The two things that will frustrate a woman the most when shopping are: having no choice, and having more than two choices. Remember, a woman can spend more time shopping for a dress than she does buying a house.
    
    
12. Do not try to keep pace with a woman in full power shopping mode. You will just burn yourself out. Hang back in loose trail formation and try close the distance in the turns.
    
    
13. Resign yourself to the fact that there is no correct answer to "which one looks better" or "does this make me look fat?"
    
    
14. Scientific studies indicate that the average house fly has a more predictable flight pattern than a woman traversing a shopping center. Traveling in a straight line is an anathema to her, and having already been in a store or aisle does not mean she will not return. For those who wish to know more about this phenomena, read up on Brownian Motion and Chaos Theory.
    
    
15. Do not argue with women about color. The average woman can name over a thousand different colors. The average heterosexual man can name 8 - those in the basic box of Crayolas used in kindergarten.
    
    
16. Bring plenty of money.

* Paleontologists of the future when excavating the closet of the average house will come to the following conclusion about the species Homo Sapiens: the males of the species were bipedal; the females of the species were centipedal.