by KRISTIAN GRAVENOR

There are some lesser-known details about living here that nobody else is telling you, so I will.

If you want to open a successful bar in Montreal, make it an authentic Irish pub. Shamrocks are money in the bank, other concepts aren't.

If you want to be a media celeb, pretend you're Greek. Montrealers love Greeks. One-time nobodies invented fake personas like Tasso on radio and Andreas Karavis in poetry and were suddenly stars.

Never pay an overdue book fine. Sneak the book back into the stacks and tell them they screwed up because you returned it long ago, or else hold onto it until the next amnesty period.

Never enter a hipster film contest with a film of a woman being senselessly tortured. I attended the 2880 Film Blitz Sunday, run by the accomplished documentarians Maureen Marovitch and David Finch (auteurs of an autobiographical doc about their schawinging polyamorous open-style relationship, among others). The annual shindig happens yearly at the Papineau and this time featured 12 films less than six minutes long, made entirely in two days.

The winner was a hypnotic dancey thing shot in a loft near the canal, starring a dog, a man and a pregnant woman. It was done by a team of 10, one of whom (Brett Gaylor) explained on stage that they shot it on film that they hastily developed in a bathtub. This disclosure caused an impressed buzz among the filmies in the audience and the flick won - quite deservedly, although many other entrants also presented captivating and charming little movies.

One bunch of frat-boy hillbillies submitted a film of a girl sitting on a chair being held captive and taunted and insulted for six minutes. The message at the end suggested she was getting what she deserved for dreaming of becoming famous.

To their credit, the team of young men who made the movie showed up on stage and tried to explain their insane little film, but let's just say people weren't asking for their business cards after the show.

Another truly super-vital piece of advice (go fetch scissors and a fridge magnet, I'll wait). Okay. Montreal men need to be macho three days a month. In other cities there's always some stumblebum walking by who looks like he wants to scrap, but something in the water here - perhaps the same toxin that has shown to cause male fish to turn female in the St. Lawrence - has made Montreal dudes generally a gentle bunch.

That's good because caring, nurturing, sensitive men are what women want, a fact confirmed by the movie of the same name. But there is a big but. During their ovulation - the period when women are most fertile - studies show that they prefer masculine men. This is a bad time for Mr. Sensitive Boyfriend, as estimates suggest that one in seven or 10 men is unknowingly not the real father of his children. One study suggests that poor guys are at higher risk of this, as "higher status" males move in on those special fertile moments (this fake-dad syndrome also partially explains the ridiculous interracial relationship taboo - it's harder to pass off another guy's baby as your husband's when it's clearly of another ethnicity).

So just as men are hardwired to impregnate as many women as possible, women's secret biological agenda is to make a baby with a macho dude then recruit some nurturing man to raise the kid.

Quebec's 50 per cent divorce rate means that our streets are teeming with single mothers impregnated by ultramacho überdudes they met at Le Lovers on Taschereau; now these women roam about town trying to recruit a more nurturing fellow.

Society values gentle, caring men. I do too. Macho, masculine dudes can be such a pain in the ass. But nature isn't always so keen on the gentle. So, regardless of the propaganda, women (except for those on the pill - they don't ovulate) want a few days each month of Fabio-style bulging pecs, chest medallions and rumbling muscle cars. Gentlemen, start your engines.

Comments? kgravy@openface.ca