Don't Stand Too Close To A Naked Man

In Don’t Stand Too Close to a Naked Man, Tim Allen takes us through the rites of passage, from fixing up his banana-seat Stingray—which was fine until he decided to spray-paint it purple—to a discourse on the various “sugar food groups”. He ponders why parents believe that kids don’t want to eat the same thing every night, the nature of his mom’s cooking (“What is cubed steak, anyway?”), and fun with BB guns. He reveals his earliest moment of sexual awareness, which occurred when he saw his first Playboy pinup, and realized that every woman is naked underneath her clothes.

In the chapter “The Wonderful World of Guys”, Tim explains male behavior in all its glory, including how guys behave around their best friends’ girlfriends, guys at parties, and Things Men Never Want to Hear (“Gee, I’ve never seen one quite that misshapen”). He shows how to tell the difference between flirting and hitting on someone, and recalls his early dating experiences, as well as his first (rejected) marriage proposal to his wife. There are helpful tips for dealing with women, such as how to answer the question, “How do I look in this?” (Clue: Never comment on a woman’s derriere), on women’s accoutrements (“A woman will have sixty purses, and I still have the wallet I made in camp”), and on women’s magazines. He ponders such questions as why women are always “chilly”, when men are burning up; why men don’t mind being called pigs; why women can’t understand what men do in the garage all morning; and why the boats in bass fishing tournaments have to be so fast (“Are bass particularly fast little fish? Are Jim Bob and Sam Bob trying to run them down?”).

Tim reveals how he used comedy to extract himself from dangerous situations while he served time in prison. He discusses the impact upon his life of his father’s sudden death in a car accident, as well as other issues such as the value of monogamy in marriage, the creative forces inherent in all men, and his belief that men without women are violent, sad, uninspired, and one-sided.

There are hilarious meditations on everything from butt cracks to why men lie, to why women think they’re always right, to how to tell when a woman isn’t interested (Tip: these are not female courting clues: when she’d sucking her own elbow, scratching anyplace, or aadjusting her underpants)—all with Tim Allen’s trademark wit. It’s a world of supercharged hemis, fart-lighting, beef jerky, and ogling “Victoria’s Secret” catalogs.