Guys, don't put your hands in your pockets

It doesn't make you look cool.

At all.

Especially on a date.

Seriously, I know. I've been there and I've done that.

Going home from school today, I spotted a couple which from how I deduce it are in the mushy bashful stage of their relationship. It was kindof annoying since they were in front of me in the tricycle stand line (in case you don't know what a tricycle is, it's a motorcycle bolted to a sidecar used in public transport, probably exclusively in third world countries). I got there and they were at the end of the line already; which means I'm next in line to get a trike (contracted version of tricycle) home. But for some reason they were so bashful and shy they were arguing who gets to ride the trike first! This would have mattered if they were riding separate trikes but they were going to ride just one! Took them a good part of forever before finally deciding who gets to go inside the trike first. As if it matters.

The worst part in this silly anecdote? The guy, trying to look cool the entire time, kept one if his hands inside his pocket! Even when he sat down inside the friggin trike! Which made him look really stupid by the way, imagine curling your arm inside a small sidecar just so it would remain inside your pocket (trike's have notoriously small passenger accommodation, usually each trike is good for three or four: two inside the sidecar and one or two hitching a back ride on the motorcycle).

I dunno if it's a natural tendency of men to place their hands in their pockets when they're idle. I guess it's the effect of mass media or something, that sometime ago it was cool to place your hands in your pockets. Not that I'm not a victim to this too, but at least I know when to shove them in and when not to! I don't know if people would agree when I say that yeah, sometimes hands-in-pockets makes a guy (or a girl) look cool, but it's a volatile thing that while it might work for some, it definitely won't work for all, and not at all times too.

Mass media has that much of an insane effect in people don't you think? Take the hand-in-pocket mannerism for example. What about cramming a person's hand inside a tight pocket? What's so special about that? So does it mean that back in the day when there were no pockets, people have one less mannerism to make them look cool? And what about placing hands in pockets make it cool anyway? I mean, it's a friggin hand in a friggin pocket!

Anyways, sometimes things like these puzzle me to no end. It's like an unwritten rulebook of cool. Certain mannerisms make a person look cool and attractive to the opposite sex; mastering these mannerisms becomes more than a necessity if one intends to impress. And yet it's also very fickle, as the hands-in-pockets mannerism is a definite no no during corporate occasions, and yet is perfectly OK in formal occasions, provided you can pull it off.

I don't know really. I'm naturally cool so I don't really need to impress.

Do you know of any mannerisms that fall in the same vein?