“I’d lifted my right leg slightly….”

THIS IS NOW AVAILABLE ON KINDLE, PEOPLE!

Where to start with something as epic and all-consuming as How To Lose A Girl In Ten Ways, which I couldn’t take my head out of and finished in a day?

Mr. Smithson does not beat around the bush with his debut offering. In fact, he actively invites you into the bush…. o god. Pun not intended but it’s staying in as it’s rather apt.

Let’s just have a little look at a few of the methods that Mr. Smithson recommends we employ to lose a girl.

#1 Totally misread the situation
#2 Turn up with a guy who has more money than you
#4 Watch porn
#6 Try to sleep with her best friend
#9 Order the hot wings before your date

And how, you might ask, has he become such an expert on girl-losing?

Now, maybe it’s the fear of an ordinary life or low confidence levels, but Mr. Smithson continues to find himself (read: put himself) in pretty crazy situations when it comes to women. And luckily for him, it makes for a great story!

We silently thank the girl who responds to his advances on the bus because he can then tell us about how he ends up in the hotel lobby, casually urinating on the carpet while booking a room (the receptionist doesn’t realise it’s happening – Sean is the master of stealth).

We love that the posh girl noticed Mr. Smithson and liked him enough to take him home, because then he got to tell us about how he ruined the evening with porn.

And yet, we are shocked when he does tell us about it. We are incredulous about the offhand manner in which he announces, “Within seconds, I’d managed to shit myself” and goes on to describe his barecheeked dash for the sink to clean away the ‘evidence.’ We are outraged, on behalf of women everywhere, about how he drunkenly approaches a girl’s best friend, having already slept with the girl. We are disgusted at the regularity with which this man frequents strip clubs.

But then, you know what? We’re actually not. We love him. We love the ridiculous madness that ensues when he has had a drink*. We love that he spends so long holding a grudge against a stripper, who then turns her attention to him, and within a second, he’s in love with her. We love his self-awareness, his willingness to point out his least desirable qualities to us. And he’s certainly not afraid to tell us about hookers.

* A sober Mr. Smithson, I’m led to believe, is quite a different story. Well-spoken, well-dressed and rather handsome, is the rumour?

Every so often, someone comes along and tells a story so well that they could be telling you anything and you’d read it. You’d read it if it were about the rules of golfing or the intricacies of computer programming.

Sean Smithson is one of those people. Of course, his material is fantastic and you can’t help but gasp when told about the right-leg-raising during the shit-himself escapade. But he is also a fantastic story-teller. He could write anything and people would want to read it.

It started with Fjaroabyaggo

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to meet another blogger? One you didn’t already know outside the blogging world. Have you ever wondered what it would be like if that blogger also wrote one of your favourite blogs, a blog that made you laugh out loud or gasp in horror? There are few blogs I love more than Sean Smithson’s. I love seeing that there’s another post there to read. And every time that little email notification comes through telling me “Sean Smithson” has liked one of my posts, I silently high-five myself and think, “Yes, Laura, today’s post was good.”

My blog, edgy as I like to imagine it is, has got nothing on Sean’s, which, by the way, is not his name. I’ll get onto that. Sean’s blog leaves mine in the dust. He gets stuck straight in, in a way that is almost-brave/almost-stupid. A fine example comes from his ‘How to stay single in your 30s’ post: “If you find that ladies are just drawn to you or that your friends absolutely insist on trying to set you up, then try the following – Be a mildly obnoxious asshole on dates. You need to get the balance just right so that she’ll sleep with you but won’t want you to call her ever again.”

Honesty is definitely the best policy in Sean’s world. O yeh, so that’s totally not his name. But it’s close enough and easier to work out how to pronounce. It was certainly a new experience to be quite far into a conversation and have someone say, “O, by the way, wanna know my real name?”

I forget what was written about Fjaroabyaggo to prompt the joke that there was going to be a trip there but that is how it started. It somehow grew from that into a fully breathing, walking, talking person at the tube station. He didn’t look slightly loser-ish or studenty. He wasn’t clutching a crumpled balance sheet or accompanied by a hooker.

He was tall-ish, well-dressed and well-spoken. He was also courteous and eloquent, quite a surprise after the Sean of the blog. It’s not like I was expecting a total knob end but, you know, something a little more rough around the edges. The thing is, he is also the person in the blog, the person who lands himself in these brilliant/stupid situations. It’s not something you’d realise unless you knew the blog. And it’s kinda fun once you have realised it and he mentions calling hookers to come over to his parents’ house while they’re in bed.

What’s not to love?

The reason for this post is taking me forever to get to. I guess because I’m trying to make you realise how brilliant this man is so that by the time I get to my point, you’ll already like him.

Well, he’s writing a book. Could there be anything better than a good writer with no inhibitions telling you about all the most ridiculous situations he’s been in? A quick peek inside the book is going to look something like this email conversation we recently had:

Sean: “It’s going to be a book of short stories. That way, they can read about the time I was with a hooker on my mum’s living room floor while she slept upstairs on Tuesday’s tube journey. And perhaps on Thursday, they could read about the time I shit my pants before a date…”

Laura: “I would love to read about the time you shit your pants before a date. What’s the general gist of that story?”

Sean : “Just that I was on my way to a date and shit myself whilst trying to fart. Obviously things got a lot worse during the course of that day.”

Need I say anything more?

This book of utter fabulousness (that’s a word) will be out in January. Good job there’s Christmas inbetween to keep me entertained during the wait. And don’t you worry, I’ll do the remembering for you and keep reminding you about it 🙂