Last August our au pair Janey arrived from Germany. She was gorgeous, positively stunning. To quote my mother-in-law “Janey looks like a movie star!”
As evidenced by the #MeToo movement, men always act respectfully and appropriately in the presence of beautiful young women. The gents in our town were no different. Regardless of where our family went, what we were doing or what Janey was wearing, for instance a full length parka and balaclava, men would hit on her. I’ve decided to rank their efforts, seeing as I had the privilege of witnessing all their amorous attempts to woo our au pair.

Suitor #1
The saying goes that “In spring a woman’s thoughts turn to fancy” this man clearly completed his required reading, because he knew the saying finished with “and they become randy when covered in baby puke”. I mean there’s nothing like the scent of someone else’s bodily fluids to get young people’s hearts a racing. Not only do I admire this man’s timing, I also applaud his respect for the women’s movement. Janey met suitor #1 in the hall of a hotel as she was unloading the car while I was stuck in the hotel washroom with a projectile vomiting toddler. Although she wasn’t covered head to toe in barf, most of the items she was ferrying to the hotel room were. This gentlemen looked right past all that, stuck to his feminism respecting guns and refrained from offering help, instead he asked her out.

Verdict? For his timing and gallant behavior, I award Suitor #1 three overstuffed, yogurt-puke soaked suitcases out of five.

Suitor #2
Everyone knows that weddings are a great place to pick up women, but oft overlooked meat markets are emergency rooms. There’s nothing like the shared experience of crippling abdominal pain to light the spark of romance. Holding his head in pain and smelling vaguely of feces, Suitor #2 spent a solid fifteen minutes looking at our son’s caregiver like she was a steak. Not even the presence of both her host mom and host dad or the two year old on Janey’s hip could deter this wannabe lover’s smoldering gaze.

Verdict? Suitor #2 ultimately didn’t act on his passion so I give him only one ruptured appendix out of five.

Suitor #3
Ah the May-December romance. There’s nothing sexier than a wrinkled man older than your Dad with a saggy flat butt. What young woman doesn’t want to supper at four o’clock then watch “The Antiques Roadshow” while falling asleep at seven pm? Suitor #3 recognized this and upped the ante; he showed his youthful street cred by offering to take her and another German fellow from the community for an afternoon of bird watching. This paramour also recognized that, too frequently, parents represent obstacles to young love and separated Janey from me while we were out together. His arguments were so persistent that he managed to score her phone number, ostensibly to pass along to the other young German fellow.

Verdict? I give Suitor #3 four creepy Playboy smoking jackets out of five. His persistence almost paid off had it not been for both Janey’s host mom and her mother swooping in to shout “Absolutely not!” when Suitor #3 tried to arrange a date.
Suitor #4
Now here was a man who understood what women want. Right off the bat he told Janey that he was unemployed- meaning that he had all the time in the world to devote to her. This Suitor then brought out the big guns; he complimented Janey’s caregiving abilities and intimated that she’d make an excellent stepmom to his child. As if all that wasn’t enough, he had bathed in the cologne of adulthood- alcohol. Never in her life had Janey encountered such an attractive potential mate. Suitor #4 recognized that our au pair might be overwhelmed by all his remarkable qualities so he continued to woo Janey, following her around the park. Where the previous suitor had been persistent, Suitor #4 was relentless, going so far as to follow her home when she refused his first twenty offers of a date.

Verdict? I give Suitor #4 five restraining orders out of five. He was irresistible in every way.
Although many attempted to win our au pair’s heart, Janey still managed to return to Germany single. Tragic, especially given the plethora of appropriate mates that our town was brimming with, perhaps her standards were just too high.