OLD GIRLFRIENDS are crawling out of the woodwork. Girls who you have been trying to make a play for all year suddenly start giving you the eyes. Check your calendar, Romeo. It's not you, it's Christmas.
I don't know if it is something in the air but the women seem a lot more amorous. Red is suddenly in: red mini-skirts, red toenails, reindeer sweaters, and tacky clothes with Xmas motifs. The women at the office bat their pretty eyes at you in the elevators, send their girlfriends with come-hither messages, and if you just say 'hi!' to a girl on the road, once elusive cellie numbers come fast and furious.
Ho, ho, ho. Oh no.
I agree that Xmas is the time of romance with Noel belles, Dean Martin crooning about elves and snow and whatever, Christmas movies, and of course, the Big Kahuna lavish spending.
Come on, man. Don't be fooled.
It happens to us guys every year.
And I'd like to use this opportunity to send a message to all the guys out there to beware some of the women they have met during the course of November and will meet later this week.
Many chicks are on the prowl, seeking that 'Christmas Mate', someone who will buy them expensive presents just for this festive season. Some men will get caught in the net, and left to rue their credit card bills come January.
However, the seasoned campaigners have already gone into 'semi-hibernation' this Xmas. If you go downtown, you will see men snapping up trendy overnight bags or answering machines. The battle lines have been clearly drawn.
It's the pressure. No one knows the pressures peculiar to the typical Jamaican male at Christmas season, where many of the women you have been associated with over the past year suddenly become a little more warm and receptive to your innocent advances.
Suddenly, you find yourself in long conversations with women who you've just met on the phone, girls smile at you more. Don't be fooled, guys, they are seeking a 'Krismas Man'. It's time to head for the hills.
There are a lot of Yuletide predators out there waiting for you to make that slip, and suddenly you find yourself with yet another person to buy a present for in an already tight Christmas situation. Some girls have openly admitted that they try to hook as many men as possible at this time of year, just to ensure that there will be a batch of Christmas presents under her tree come Christmas morn.
Men, watch out!
Christmas is a pretty expensive undertaking. You've got to buy presents for the wife, the kids, (the mistress...?) one or two friends, and then comes the X factor women who approach you with green in their eyes Christmas dollas, that is.
Remember that gold-digging Christmas carol, 'Twelve Days of Christmas'. When that song first came out in 1780, the most expensive items back in 1780 would have been the products, and even then, the men grumbled.
Try pulling that stunt today and the services and specialised labour will kill you. What with the nine ladies dancing, 10 lords-a-leaping, 11 pipers piping and 12 drummers drumming. Just try that at today's overinflated prices.
Christmas is not a good time for men. The silly season only comes up roses for the kids and women only. Men get a financial battering that they spend the whole year trying to recover from, and this year will be no different.
Claude Mills
