I had an amazing day today. I appreciated 5 women and #-closed 1 all on the way to work and back, without going out of my way.

1) Name: Steph
Approach: I like the colour of your overcoat. What is that shade of yellow called?
What's unique about her: We talked for ages. She is moving to Brighton next year. Is being made redundant in June as her company is moving to Paris due to Brexit. She has a boyfriend in Brighton, and she travels back every weekend. She has spent a year in India. She speaks a little bit of Hindi. She speaks a little French as well as her parents spend half their year in the south of France. She lives in Holborn in London.
Improvement: Better I perspectives ending on a different topic, bigger questions, appreciation "you're ...., I like that about you", an SOI and disqualification.

2) Name: ??
Approach: Excuse me. I like your Simpson Badge
Her: Thanks (smiling broadly, and taking her ear phones off)
Me: I like watching cartoons like Simpsons, Family guy. My friends think its a little bit silly. But I love watching cartoons. Have you seen all the Simpsons episodes?
Her: Yes, Simpsons is the best (and puts her earphones back on)


3) Name: Reka
What was unique: We spoke for 30 minutes. She's from Hungary. First job. Boy friend is in Nottingham. She travels 3/4 weekends a month to Nottingham. Wants to move to India just for the experience. I appreciated her "You're adventurous. I like that about you".

4) Name: ??
Approach: She finished a Sudoko in front of me and I said "Well done!"
She giggled "Thanks".
Me: "You look like you are good at Suduku. How often do you play?"
What was unique: We got talking. She was an acturial student at the Bank of England. Lives in Hassocks. The challenge with her was she was extremely shy. She was beautiful. But she kept giving me very short answers.
Improvement:
(1) Talk more slowly and pause longer - as that draws the other person in and gains more commitment
(2) Vacuum her - pause for longer than it feels comfortable still staring at her.
(3) Make I perspectives juicier as I would ideally like her response. Then ask a clarifying question which deepens my original question - sort of like a repeat of the same question but using her brief response. e.g. I asked "How are you colleagues at work? She said "Yeah they are all really nice". Then I answered my question. Then I could ask her "In what way are your colleagues nice in order to get a longer answer from her"
(4) I could literally vacuum her and simply say ... tell me more

5) Name: ??
What happened: I was changing trains at Haywards Heath and I spotted a beautiful women on a 4 seater as the train was coming in. I ran along the train and sat opposite her. Her scarf was on the table in front of me.
I said "Hi" and she moved her scarf, and I said at the same time "Can you move your scarf for me to place my laptop?" She laughed nicely. I said "That's a nice scarf". She smiled and said "Thanks". (a) She went back to her work.
I then was about to go the the toilet and I tried again saying "Excuse me" "Would you mind looking after my bag while I go to the toilet". I came back said nothing (b). Then I tried a third time, when we were getting up from the seat I timed packing my laptop so that it matched hers. She got out of the seat just in front of me, but pretty much at the same time. The Universe helped me as the exit doors stopped working. So I said "Oh no they have stopped working", and then when I tried them, they started working again so I commented on that. And then just as we stepped out of the train I said "It has suddenly become very cold hasn't it?". She said "Yes, its freezing". (c)
Improvement:
(1) At point (a), I could have used a presumption "You look like you are working very dedicatedly on something. Do you have a deadline approaching?"
(2) At point (b), I could have said "By the way, Thanks for looking after my bag" and then done the presumption thing above. An even better version would have been with an open ended question. "You look like you are working towards a deadline. What kind of work do you do?"
(3) At this point again (c) I could have used the presumption.
Moral of the story, presumptions are a great way to spark a conversation. I just wasn't thinking presumptions with this women, but 100% marks to me for commitment. I did really well.