The arrival of the book Twelve Fail-Safe Ways to Charm Witches in Ron Weasley’s life marks a substantial change in his fortune with the ladies. I liken this to my tendency to google all of my boy problems, which unfortunately has never returned the same good results.
However, there are a couple of great pieces of advice I can take from Ron. The first is compliments, so I carefully lay my groundwork by telling my boyfriend I like his hair. This is actually a double-win because it turns out he’d had a haircut, and I hadn’t noticed. Thanks, Ron!
Second is trying to replicate the incredible maneuver Ron pulls off during the Battle of Hogwarts, when he tells Harry and Hermione they can’t ask the house-elves to die for them and, through showing that he cares deeply about what Hermione cares about, is rewarded with the kiss of a lifetime.
This move is otherwise known as the “being a nice person” and is surprisingly easy to pull off. I didn’t have house-elf rights as a convenient subject, because that’s not something my boyfriend cares about, but I did surprise him with a question about whether anything interesting was happening in Chinese politics at the moment.
Once he was done talking, we had a very nice evening.
A very nice evening.
