Playboy After Hours

Here's another harvest from the columns of Ann Landers and Abigail Van Buren (as released by the Chicago Sun-Times and McNaught Syndicate). For those of our readers who may be coming in late, be it known that every so often we print verbatim letters to Ann and Abby and their answers, then add, in italics, our male amendments to their feminine flights of fancy.

Dear Abby: I am a single man, age 35, and I live in a rooming house. There is a young woman (about 27) who has a room in the back apartment; mine is in front and there is a bathroom in between us. She has a clothesline strung up in the bathroom and every night she washes out her underwear and hangs it up. I get up first and see these things in the bathroom every morning. She must have only two sets of underwear because one set is on the line every single morning. Both sets are getting very ragged so I guess that's all she has. Would it be too personal a gift for me to give her some new underwear? I am not very forward and it might be a good way to get better acquainted.

Square Shooter

Dear Square: A gift of intimate apparel would be out of order. If you want to know her better, engage her in conversation casually like a gentleman Duz. Good Lux.

Vel, you know that time and TIDE wait for no man. All you need to do is spend a little SILVER DUST and give her the pants. Then be of good CHEER: if she gets enough JOY from the present, you may be able to talk her out of them. If you do WISK her off her feet, just be careful about founding an AMERICAN FAMILY.

Dear Ann: I'm in my first year of college and in dire need of help. My steady girl and I agreed when I went off to school we would both date others. During Easter vacation I dated my former steady and also another girl who is a close friend of hers. Girl No. 2 didn't have the high standards of my former steady and we became intimate after just a couple of dates. I know it was wrong, and I'm particularly ashamed because she never meant anything to me. I don't plan to date her again. Now my former steady has started to write very warm letters. She says she's beginning to think of me as THE man in her life. In her last three letters she asked what went on during vacation between me and the other girl. I've ignored the question as I don't want to damage a reputation. At the same time, she may know more than I think and if I don't level with her she may cool off on me. Please help.

A Troubled Student

You are a brass-plated, four-door heel to have used the girl so shabbily. Your statement that her standards weren't as high as the other girl's was interesting. What about YOUR standards, Bub? Do you raise and lower them like an elevator, according to the company you keep? The confession that the girl never meant anything to you supports what I've been trying to drill into the heads of teenage girls. If a fellow has respect for a young lady he won't try to sell her on such shenanigans. You behaved like a cad. Don't compound the felony by blabbing. Continue to ignore the written question. If she confronts you in person, tell her she's out of order, and what went on with you and a third party is none of her business.

Don't be a schnook, you schnook. Everybody knows that a girl who's eager enough can have any normal young man complying, without half trying. It is from this fact that several pungent phrases have entered our language, like "cherchez la femme," "getting married" and "raising a family." Stop kicking yourself, and wise up: Girl No. 1 has obviously consulted, with Girl No. 2, and digs what she's heard. In a nice way, she's telling you she wants to sample your technique. If you don't act soon, she Will cool off on you. Strike while this siren is hot.

Dear Abby: I've been going with this Chief Petty Officer for 12 years and the best I can get out of him is that I am a "good kid." I tell him I love him, trying to get him to say the same to me, but he just laughs and avoids saying the words. He bought me a card table set and made the down payment on my car for me and I showed my appreciation the same way any other grateful woman would, but I can't get him to talk marriage. Do you think I am wasting my time?

Sweetie Pie

Dear Sweetie: I am afraid you suffered considerable "depreciation" when you showed your "appreciation." If you really want to hear a man say, "I do" -- don't!

There's nothing petty about this Chief. Any guy who isn't chained, yet sticks around while his girl ages 12 years, is really a find. Count your blessings and don't bug the guy about marriage unless you want to lose him.

Dear Abby: Not wishing to reveal my identity, let's just say I am a man whose business takes me into the homes of my clients. While on a business call (to present the bill) a very attractive woman practically "threw herself" at me. Being human, I "caught" her. When I presented my bill for what she owed me (labor and materials), she tore it into little pieces. It amounted to $400. I took it to my lawyer and he advised me to forget the bill, the woman and the incident. Should I?

"Homo Sapien"

Dear Sap: Take your lawyer's advice. You're lucky she didn't add an amusement tax.

You're the only guy who can judge whether it was worth it. If it was, quit beefing. If not, deduct whatever you think her service was worth and continue to collect the balance due you on the installment plan.

Dear Abby: I was sitting in a restaurant minding my own business when a nice-looking girl (about 22) came up to me and said, "Can I have your phone number or do you want mine?" I was so stunned I said, "Sorry, but you must have me confused with somebody else." Then she went away and I saw her go sit with a man who I presume was her date. She looked like a lady. She was pretty and well-dressed and very clean looking. Am I just a green hick or is this the way people get acquainted nowadays? Maybe I'm missing something.

Still Stunned

Dear Stunned: You got what is commonly known as the "direct approach." She may have looked like a lady, but I assure you she was not. You missed something all right -- a lot of trouble!

What you're missing is your marbles. But don't brood about it, just climb back in the freezer with the other cubes.

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A recent issue of Punch made public that publication's opinion of a current social phenomenon. Our English cousins reported that "Mr. Edwin Malendine claims that the need for public opinion polls can only be determined by a public opinion poll. We'd like a public opinion poll on this."

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That the world of big business is still often a dog-eat-dog arena was borne out recently by a headline that appeared in the Willimantic(Connecticut) Daily Chronicle:

"Textron Inc. Makes Offer To Screw Co. Stockholders."

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The murky workings of the academic mind are often awesome for the layman to behold. But perhaps no ways of academe are stranger than those used by the Mental Health Research Institute of the University of Michigan, which attempts to entice subscriptions to its publication, Behavioral Science, by describing one of its articles thusly:

"Social groups as entities do not have an epistemological status different from such middle-sized entities as stones and rats, but are apt to be fuzzier, less discrete, less multiply confirmed, and in this sense less real. The degree of entitativity and the possibility of a sociology at a level of analysis separate from psychology is a matter for empirical determination rather than a priori decision."

Well, we're only a fuzzy middle-sized entity (like maybe a stoned rat) but, reading this, we began to suspect that the author of the article was apt to be fuzzier, less discrete, less multiply confirmed and, in this sense, less real.

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For those of our readers interested in new ways to make the cold war between the sexes a little warmer, here's the latest tactical maneuver to come our way: You say, "Do you like to make love?" If she says "Yes!" you simply press on, of course, toward unconditional surrender. If she says "No!" the proper reply is, "Neither do I. Let's hurry up and get it over with."