I was down in the city visiting some friends and I stopped to grab a bite to eat. I was feeling lively, so I went in this little greasy spoon cafe festooned with all sorts of interesting characters.

So I'm sitting there with my food when all of a sudden these two VERY gay Italian men sit at the table across from me. I mean it - they couldn't have been more flaming if you'd doused them with kerosene.

Immediately, the more daring of the pair (wearing a blue silk shirt) begins hitting on me. He takes his hotdog and begins eating it very suggestively.

Deep down inside I am laughing my ass off, but I keep a cool exterior. So I give him my best not bad face. Immediately he flicks his head as if to say "let's get out of here". Again without words, I politely excuse myself by giving him the universal straight-sex hand gesture. He shrugs and I give him an appreciative smile. After all, he did just compliment me. We both smile and return to our business.

As it turns out, this openly playful frame was just the ticket.

Once I was done with lunch, I still had time to kill so I went to an electronics store in the same shopping centre. I'm checking out the TVs when I see this lovely brunette "Roxanne" working the floor. I point to her and gesture for her to come over. Even at a distance, I keep eye contact and she smiles sheepishly the whole time as she walks over. She's smiling brightly and her eyes are wide open waiting for me to speak. Big green light.

I escalate fast. When she's close, I put my hand lightly on her far shoulder and draw her close. "Can you tell me a little more about this fine specimen here?" We're standing next to a TV, but I'm looking in her eyes as I say it. She's a little flustered and stumbles on her words (god I love it when women do that). She says she'll go check on a price and she purposefully brushes my shoulder as she walks past.

When Roxanne comes back, she's all wide-eyed and smiles like before, but apologetic. Problem is, she's really nervous. She's attracted, but she's too afraid to stay still - perhaps out of fear of embarrassing herself in front of me. She wanders around briefly looking for someone else who can help (because she genuinely wants to help me), and I'm trying to think of how to calm her down so I can escalate.

Then, out of nowhere, the two Italian gentlemen are in the store. Blue shirt sees me kinoing Roxanne and watches briefly from a distance before coming over. I'm about to eject from the set since she's nervous and I'm out of ideas, when Blue shirt puts his hand on her shoulder and says, in the literally the gayest Italian accent you could possibly imagine: "He's the last one in the store sweetie. Get him while he's hot."

Roxanne's head drops deep between her shoulders and her hand comes up to cover her huge grin. She turns around and gives him an "oh my god" mottled in laughter. Blue shirt looks me up and down once more -- our eyes meet and I give him an affirmative nod. He smiles warmly without a word and walks back to his partner. The number close was easy from there. Phone out of the pocket and handed to her. Roxanne is beaming.

You never know where new friends and allies might come from, so be open to anything. Keep that open-minded social frame, and just have fun with people. Things may turn out better than you expect.