Hey! First night of PU...ever. I've been reading the stuff for literally years now, but about 2 years ago got into an LTR and only recently have been going out.

I started the night by opening on a group of girls on the street. "Hey," I said, "where are you girls going?"

"Piss off," they replied. "We're having a girls' night."

"Just wondering where one would go to meet girls," I said, and they told me that I hadn't decided yet.

I considered that a warm-up, and decided to break myself into pickup by going into a bar and using the Apocalypse opener on the first girl I saw. My original aim when I went out was to get 20 rejections (I figured that would be a pretty good learning experience) but I ended up running into some mates after talking to 3 girls and hanging out with them for the rest of the night, so I wimped out on that.

The first girl I saw said a simple "No." to the Apocalypse opener. She told me that she was training to be a paramedic and out with some girlfriends and was really unreceptive to any attempts I made to start conversations. Her friends joined her at the bar and she froze me out, so I moved on.

I soon realized that I was out way, way too early to be meeting people - it was 8pm, and here in Australia, there's much more of a "bar with friends" culture. Later, when I was hanging out with my mates, I spotted a huge number of opportunities to open, so I think 10:30-11 is the ideal starting time, instead of the ridiculously early 8pm.

At the next bar I went to I spoke to a girl who was standing by herself looking bored - turns out she was the big act for the evening, and was preparing for her show. I was pretty deterred by the rejections that I'd gotten so far, so I didn't really go for any kind of close, just had a good few minutes chatting to her and then left her to get ready.

Outside the bar I used "Hey I know the singer" as an excuse to talk to an Italian girl who was smoking - she was there to listen to the band. We ended up talking for about 10 minutes - I got her to teach me some Italian, but again I didn't go for any kind of close.

After that my friends arrived, and I used their company as an opportunity to get comfortable in a pub/bar environment (something that I've struggled with for years). A bit of an uninteresting field report, I know, but I'm keen to start logging them right from the get-go, in the hopes that I can look back one day and see how much I've learned.

Lessons learned tonight:

  • Get there much later. 8pm is way too early, especially since I don't really enjoy a hugely long night out.
  • I can enjoy myself in a bar!
  • ABC - always be closing. I don't know what kind of close, if any, I could have gotten from the Italian girl, because I didn't even go for it.

Thanks for reading! If anything jumps out at you, let me know - I'm here to learn!