Meeting women has never been my forte. And having a wife and kids and going bald haven’t helped. So I was eager to get hold of a copy of How to Pick Up Beautiful Women in Nightclubs or Any Other Place, a book that's received a fair amount of buzz lately, especially from Howard Stern after its author, John Eagan, helped some of the psyches, dwarfs, and assistant producers on Howard's staff meet potential mates on a recent expedition to a singles bar.

John bases his expertise in this crowded field of study not on any advanced degrees in anthropology or sociology (though he proudly puts "B.A." after his name on his book's cover) but on 23 years as a bartender watching guys crash and burn as they tried to pick up beautiful women. He also claims to have interviewed 2,000 babes about what drives them to throw drinks at some guys and happily perform oral sex in the parking lot on others.

John's basic message is one of hope which goes without saying if he plans to sell enough copies of his book to get out of the beverage business in New Jersey and retire to Mexico. He, claims that beautiful women are misunderstood; that, their body language and bored expressions to the contrary notwithstanding, they're actually dying to meet us. They just have strange ways of showing it. When they sit at their local hangout smoking cigarettes and staring right through us, it's not because they find us beneath them but because they're suffering from stage fright.

"Beautiful women are afraid to come out of the ladies' room," John contends in chapter four. "Beautiful women have fewer choices in men than average looking women."

With all due respect to John, a delightful fellow with whom I recently went barhopping, together with my friend Bill (whom I'll put up against Howard Stern's lowlifes anytime), in my opinion if these babes are starved for company, it's not because men are afraid to approach them ---- it's amazing what a pitcher of beer will do for a guy's self confidence it's because the babes are too picky. I mean, I don't think the reason I'm not dating Cindy Crawford simply because I haven't mustered the chutzpah to ask.

They're saving themselves for some Brad Pitt look-alike, or for an 80-year-old millionaire with a heart condition who will thoughtfully drop dead on their wedding night. Call me cynical and bitter, but I've been doing research on this timely issue myself. I recently visited an overpriced Eurotrash restaurant in Manhattan where I had the privilege of sitting next to a famous fat, bald, middle-aged billionaire who was breaking breadsticks with one of the most beautiful women I'd ever seen, who was about a third his age. I

This was a guy who obviously never got laid in college, let alone high school, and was making up for lost time. On every previous visit I'd made to the restaurant’s inflated prices prevent me from going too often, even though the people watching is unsurpassed this same Master of the Universe had been seated at the same table with a different but equally beguiling goddess who seemed to be in a lovestruck trance as he entertained her with tales of how many people he'd fired that day.

So what's my point? Only that to persuade a beautiful woman to give you 30 seconds of her time to make your case in a crowded, noisy bar with five other guys hitting on her simultaneously much less to persuade her to have sex with you, you've got to have something that distinguishes you from the pack. And if it's not Hollywood looks or the controlling shares in Amazon.com, it better be implacable self-confidence.

"They're not looking for a loser," John instructs Bill, our crash dummy for the evening, as he gives him a pep talk before sending him behind enemy lines at the first bar we visit. As I mentioned, John's got his work cut out for himself with Bill, who's an antiques dealer (somehow that doesn't have the same ring as "investment banker") in his forties, balding, wears glasses, and sports an ill advised goatee.

John doesn't see Bill's profession, per se, as a big problem, though its stereotypical representative would probably be hanging out downtown at a bar like The Anvil and, I dare say, having an easier time meeting people. "Are you successful in your business?" John inquires. Bill says yes in a way that leaves substantial room for doubt.

"No man has to be a loser," continues the bartender, ignoring Bill's slightly crazed expression, "as long as he has a job and a future and he's heading for that future."

So how does one develop this all-important self-confidence? While I suspect it has something to do with being blessed with parents who loved you unequivocally, John unsurprisingly thinks it comes from following the instructions in his book.

The bartender considerately includes ten pickup lines that he contends are "guaranteed" to work, not that you'll get your money back if they don’t.

Gambit No. 1, typical of the rest: "As I was standing there I noticed how beautiful you are. I thought perhaps we could spend our time more agreeably together. May I join you in a drink?"

I know I couldn't imagine those words coming out of my mouth either, no matter how many shots of tequila I'd had. Nor, apparently, could Bill.

"Is 'beautiful' a nineties word?" he asked nervously.

"It seems to work in any era," John insisted.

Since I wasn't totally confident of the author's instincts no matter how high Howard Stern is on this guy (the fact that he showed up at the preppy bar where we agreed to meet wearing a black shirt and a white tie didn't help), I decided to run his lines by my friend Lauren, a jaded veteran of the bar scene.

She wasn't impressed either, but she said it doesn’t matter. "People can fucking say anything to break the ice if you want the ice broken with that particular person," she said. "They can say, 'My pet guinea pig has escaped in the bar. Have you seen it?' It depends on who's asking, the way they ask, their eye contact when they ask."

Perhaps the most valuable aspect of How to Pick Up Beautiful Women is the questionnaires that John persuaded several dozen "beautiful women" to fill out and that, by the way, take up more than 100 pages in his 263 page book. While the semiliterate responses make you wonder about John's sample population, one issue on which all the women seem to agree is the inadvisability of trying to pick them up by being too blatant,or showering compliments on their body parts.

For example, one of John's respondents reported that when a hopeful gentleman, undoubtedly speaking from the heart, said to her, "I'm dying to get in your pants," the heartless vixen replied,, "I already have one asshole in there."

"We're not going to mention sex," John cautioned Bill as the antique dealer prepared to introduce himself to a gorgeous brunette at the end of the bar. "No matter how well endowed she is, don't bring it up. No matter how well endowed you are, don't bring it up.", just to be on the safe side, John also suggested Bill send her a drink first. The importance of alcohol happens to be an area in which John and I are in total accord though I esteem it primarily as a social lubricant, whereas John sees the purchase of a drink

more as a show of chivalry, of which inebriation and sexual promiscuity are but lucky byproducts.

Which brings us to John's "Super Technique," which he implored Bill to use on his next target after the brunette reluctantly slipped out, at the urging of her ugly and unpleasant girl friend, after the latter learned the somewhat unfortunate title of the bartender's book. The Super Technique, which comes as the crescendo to How to Pick Up Beautiful Women, involves scoring a female's office phone number by setting up a lunch date and promising to send her roses. The deal is she gets to keep the flowers even if she cancels the date.

"Either way," John insists, "she's going to get something she wants. She will give you her number, guaranteed."

I suspect that most women aren't going to share their phone number with Ted Kaczynski just because he offers to send them free flowers even though part of the bargain is that you promise never to bug the broad again if she refuses to take your call. Bill, who found How to Pick Up Beautiful Women worth while, nonetheless felt it suffered from a certain "crassness" and resisted John's repeated efforts to get him to use the Super Technique. Then again, Bill's a real cheapskate' (By the way, if you can't afford a dozen roses, John says one will do, as long as it's nicely presented.)

To me, the most enlightening part of my evening with John was watching the guru himself in action. Even though by his own admission he's not the most attractive guy in the world, John came closer than any of us to getting laid and with a very lovely ostensibly married woman whose company John kept while Bill tried to put the moves on her less attractive girlfriend.

"I'll probably get in trouble for saying this," said John, who's married himself, supposedly to a beautiful model, "but lots of married women are available. I say, if they're here, they're here."

"He's got the confidence," acknowledged Bill, who obtained three women's phone numbers that night just by feeding off John's self-assurance. "Nothing fazes him. I can safely say if I went to a bar now there's no one I wouldn't go after if I wanted to."

Ironically, John, the so-called expert, was unable to ascribe his success with the ladies to anything more specific than "chemistry." "I use it because I think it's happening," he said, sounding almost like a Zen master. "I create a certain sexual tension."

I suspect the real reason guys write books like John's isn't for the bucks or the 15 minutes of fame on Howard Stem, or because they're trying to make the world a better place, but because they believe in their hearts that they, and perhaps they alone, possess the secret to getting laid. Some men approach their creative potential running back a football, others building Websites, and still others trading commodities. John Eagan does so hitting on chicks at bars. And he wants to share his joy with us.

The truest words he uttered all night didn't come from the pages of his book but while Bill was off trying to score with a beautiful young law student and John and I stood by the bar at our last joint of the evening, admiring the scenery.

"She's very attractive," he said, nodding in the direction of a vixen in a- tight-fitting white top. "The one in black is extremely attractive too."