Hi everyone!

I just got back from an open mic night at my favorite bar, and let me tell you, I sure learned a lot about approaching people, and I thought you might get a kick out of a view "from the other side", as it were.

The biggest lesson I learned tonight was "say yes every once in a while". I was initially going to just have a drink, listen to some bands play for a bit, and go home. I wasn't going to talk to anyone, and I was just going to chill out and enjoy myself. Don't get me wrong, as a female I certainly dressed to impress, but I wasn't going to go out of my way.

2 songs in, I got my drink and headed back to my table. Suddenly I was approached by a married man whose wife was enthralled with my boobs. He invited me to hang out at his table with his wife and their friends. I had seen them around a few times (I often go to open mic for a good "stage practice" with my band), but had never actually spoken to them. Ordinarily, I would have said "no, but thanks", continued on my merry way and not thought about it for the rest of the night. Instead I decided to say "Sure" and perhaps practice some of the things I learned.

I'm not entirely sure if you would have loved or hated the girls at the table. They were, as we used to say back in college, "barsexual". They were putting on a nice show of groping, fondling, making out, and just "not caring what anyone thought about what they were doing". The married guy was for me a good HD7 (that's "hot dude"), and he kept giving me some pretty strong IOIs. But hell, so was his wife. I didn't want to get involved in something complicated like that, so I just kept it to friendly banter.

Now, tonight was not a night of getting laid for me, but instead about learning how to contribute to a conversation in a group that I wasn't familiar with. With that I think I did fairly well for the most part. I know that I still need to learn to keep engaging in conversation (I kept tuning out to listen to the music).

Later in the evening, another friend of the group came up. He's not bad looking, a 5 or a 6. He tried to engage me in conversation, but the music was so loud that he couldn't hear a word I was saying. I tried practicing a bit of escalation with him (not much mind you), such as a bit of kino, suggesting we go outside so we can hear each other better, etc. He basically had a confused look on his face the entire time, and really didn't talk except to ask the same question over and over again. I treated this as a form of rejection and move on.

I'm friends with the house band, and we shot the shit while they were on break. They brought more people over, and I basically went between my newly made friends and the house band the entire night. It was good for me to learn to flit about and try and be more involved in what's going on around me instead of being the introvert in the circle and never saying anything.

Towards the end of the night, pretty much everyone was shitfaced except for me. The girls were full on grinding and making out and flashing the bar by this point. I was getting ready to say my goodbyes (I had to get up early in the morning), when I saw one of the bartenders hanging out. Turned out he got a better job at another bar and was just visiting. This guy is an 8: fit, well dressed, gorgeous eyes, and sober. We ended up chatting at the bar for a while. Again, I attempted a bit of escalation: playfully touching arms, eye contact, subtly pulling down my top to show a bit more cleavage...You know, the works. This time it was effective. I told him that I was leaving for the night, and he asked for my number "since he was leaving the bar and probably wouldn't hang out there much anymore". Naturally, I gave it to him and had him call my phone (so I totally count it as a #close).

All in all, I think it was a successful night. I had a really good time just trying to make friends at the bar. I used what I learned here, and got hit on by a guy who is way hotter than me. Score :D

tl;dr - sometimes, you gotta say yes when people ask you to hang out with them.