Building the perfectly dateable 'College Male'

In the name of scientific advancement and the good of 18- to 22-year-olds everywhere, I hereby volunteer to become The Perfect College Male.

"Gentlemen, we have the technology. We can rebuild him."

The first step is to transfer to a new college out of state. Too many people here already know I'm not The Perfect College Male (in fact, the light from The Perfect College Male won't hit me for another several hundred years). So I must start anew and transform myself into the man that no undergraduate female could resist.

James Miller Miller on Tap

Next, I need a new body. To be blunt, my God-given form tends to be uncoordinated and remind women of their gay theater group friend or their dark, sexually repressed English teacher. On top of that, I have a crooked leg and 15 pounds of Labatt anchored to my waist.

If I'm to be the darling of the psych lecture, I'll need a host body. At least 5-foot-9, narrow waist and slightly curly, dark hair. Eddie Haskell smile, good-sized pecs (but not too big. We're not capable of being shallow now, are we ladies?).

The important thing is that I have to be attractive enough so the sort of women that all live together can sit around an episode of "ER" and argue about whether I look more like Noah Wyle or George Clooney, but not so pretty that I make them feel self-conscious or guilty for having sex dreams about me.

The specifics are not too important. Anyone from a male fashion layout or an Abercrombie and Fitch bag will do - that kind of raffish, beatnik-of-the-soccer-team effect. As long as he looks deep, we're money. Interested applicants should sent a photo and current EEG to James Miller, c/o The Michigan Daily.

History: Worldly and well-traveled is ideal. Perhaps the child of Peace Corps volunteers or an Army brat. Being a dorky child is always good too because it creates the illusion that attractive people have the same problems that we trolls do. (Hint: They don't.)

So my new past will include a few embarrassing stories from elementary school, the perfect first-date fodder. When she sees that I've turned into such a "hottie" after coming from such Poindexterish roots, I'll look all the more accomplished and human instead of the calculating trim hunter that I am.

Subsection, romantic history: The jilted-yet-resilient lover. Let me explain: We're going for kind of a Lloyd Dobbler thing here. I'll pretend I used to be a little pimpdaddy, white boy player in high school and the first two years of college.

Further, I'll pretend like I'm not proud of it, making generous references to how "that sort of thing really degrades both people, doesn't it?" But at some point, I met this cruel, blond-haired mean mistreater of a woman. Das ubershiksa. And she cast my love aside.

Now, armed with my new knowledge of pain and sorrow, I've learned temperance and respect. The advantage of this fiction is that it will make me look experienced, so she won't have to worry about whether or not I can get her to scream like a banshee on Guy Fawkes Day, but I'll also look softened by heartbreak and neutered enough to lull her into complacency. It's great.

My new identity: I have to be in a band. It seems like a cliché that women like guys in bands, but it's true that musical talent goes a long way to enhancing one's sex appeal. But not just any Blind Pig-playing slob with long, thin sideburns. Something that seems like it has a lot of character, if you don't think about it too hard. Say, the trombone player in a ska band.

That way, I can have that kind of outlaw appeal but still have the hipster flavor, with John Coltrane records scattered "accidentally" about my room. ("He played a Billie Holiday record while we did it. I'll bet no one's ever done that!")

Apart from that, I'll have to work at a day care or after school center, because, well, because this works and works like crazy and everybody knows it. "Oh no, he's not mine. I just work with him for a few days a week. His real mommy didn't want him."

So the next time one of your friends at another school says she met this super-groovy guy in her pottery class, just think. It may be my disease in his six-million dollar body.

Happy dating.

- James Miller can be reached over e-mail at jamespm@umich.edu.

03-25-98