Track 5

Man Points

May 6, 2026

Ah, that’s good. I’m sitting here drinking a nice cold beer. Now, this isn’t just any beer. It’s a sorry I screwed that up beer. And who gave it to me was a tenant’s girlfriend. And why she gave me six of these beers is actually because it’s a I’m sorry that HE screwed this up beer. But before I get to that, I wanted to talk about man points.

Now, Man Points is a thing that ALL women do, and they have a system. And I don’t think necessarily we know they’re keeping score. I think, for most of us, we don’t know how the scores work. When I look at my own life and my friends and the conversations I’ve had over beers and whiskey at bars, I’m positive, that most of us men don’t know what the heck is going on with this game. I think we just know we got to play it. So I’m hoping this will help give some clarity to the game and man points.

When I was a kid, my dad would go to work Monday to Friday, often pretty grumpy. Sometimes he’d have to go to work on Saturdays for half the day, but usually not. And Saturday kind of became my dad’s day. So if he didn’t have anything to do, he would often go out in service, which meant knocking on doors, talking to people about the Bible. And then he would come home and he’d do some yard work, which usually meant cut the grass.

And it’s kind of funny because he might go all week and my mom and him would have little scraps and arguments like a lot of married people do and did. But somehow on Saturday, I think half those things got wiped out because he would go outside, peel off his shirt on a hot day, and cut the grass, chest bearing out with his big arms on the mower, and my mom, although she probably never would admit it, would randomly peek out the windows to take a peek at her handsome man. And I know just for cutting that grass and keeping himself in pretty good shape, my dad scored a pile of man points, enough to wipe the slate clean of a lot of the transgressions that he put on the scoreboard by being grumpy during the week because he wasn’t very good handling stress.

I think my dad knew it too, because when he was done, he would feel pretty good. And he’d say, “hey, why don’t you go get a couple of frosty mugs?” That’s what my dad kept in the freezer. He often put two mugs there, one for his beer and one for my root beer. And when he was near done, I would go grab them. He’d set up the lawn chairs and we’d sit out in the sun, tarps off, and drink our beers. And in a lot of those conversations, my dad would give me what he could in the ways of knowledge of a young man might need. I’m not sure I remembered a lot of it or what he actually taught me. But I think it was mostly take off your shirt when you cut the grass.

Now circling back to why I’m drinking this beer. So last night I get a message around dinner time from a tenant who decided he was going to unclog the sink from the hair. And he did that by taking apart everything underneath the sink. And he didn’t know how to put it all back. And when he tried, it was leaking. Now in trouble from his girlfriend. He had to do the thing he really hated to do, which is text me and say he screwed it up. “Can you come and fix it for me?”

This was truly a self-inflicted wound and I guarantee you he didn’t know what he was doing nor should he have bothered to try to take it apart. It’s not that he isn’t an intelligent person. It’s not that he lacked initiative. It wasn’t his place to do it. I am paid to do this job. It’s an older building, old pipes. No one should be monkeying around with the pipes and usually they do not for exactly this reason. If something comes apart, causes damage, that’s now on the tenant, makes my job harder.

He simply had to say, “hey man, my sink is draining slow.” I would have went down there with my little hair removal thing I got for five bucks at Home Depot, cleaned it out for him, showed him how to do it, and I would have handed him the tool that would have scored him free man points. “Honey, I unclogged the sink!” No woman wants to do that job. Which is funny because every woman clogs the drain, at least the ones I’ve ever been with. If you got hair and you’re a woman, it’s you......Let’s just go with that.

Anyways, back to the story. So now I’m in there with his girlfriend, “so......did you tell him off?” Oh, she told him off. We have a laugh about man points. “So did you want him doing this?” She says to me, “Well I complained about it and he really wanted to do it.” “Okay so lets ratio this. Help me out. Help me see if my scoring is accurate here. So if he does the sink, he unclogs it, he gets what, like what 10 free man points?” She thinks and says, “Yeah, that sounds about right.” “So now that he messed it up and I’m here and you’re embarrassed, had to tell him off and hand me six cold beers?” “Oh, that’s minus 100!”

Now here’s the thing. She never once bothered to ask me what man points or the scoring was for. SHE KNEW......All women know. They have evolved that way for survival reasons. So if you are a man out there in a relationship, the important thing is there are free man points to be had. I’m thinking it lands in the world of cut the grass, kill the spider, take out the recycling and the garbage. I call these things blue jobs. I’m not saying a woman can’t do them. I am saying a man should try to do them first without her asking. And I know the world doesn’t really like man-woman language right now, but I think we’ve thrown the baby out with the bathwater here a bit. And there are plenty of guys like me still alive. And as long as we’re still kicking, we’re going to still want those man points. And there are still women, thankfully, who appreciate when we do the blue jobs. So I’m talking to those people and if this offends you then try another one of my other singles.

My point here is, save yourself the negative man points and six beers if you’re about to do something and you don’t know how to do it. Google it. Check it out on YouTube first. Watch a video. There’s a million videos out there to help you. And if it still seems too complicated, don’t do it. Just get someone else to do it or ask a guy like me. Find a friend. “Hey man, I gotta unclog my sink, do you mind helping me. I’ll give you a beer.” One beer out and 10 points is better than six beers out and minus a hundred. That’s the math......I know, it’s not fair. Just you know, that if she has to do it when you could have or she has to fix it or clean up your mess, you lost points.

Now I’m going to go back to enjoying HIS beer.

Anyways cats that’s what I have cookin’ in my scene. Remember it’s your life and there’s always a choice to be had. If something isn’t groovy throw some chaos at it. Go play and see you on the flip side.

—Jhöl

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