Do whistling and cat calling really work?

Because I would love to be proved wrong on this one. LOVE it. I want to get flooded with e-mails from women saying how they met the love of their life, father of their future children through the open window of a gardening truck.

Really I do.

But until those stories start poring in can I please just vent a little about how much I hate being cat-called? I remember this one time (at band camp) about 5 or 6 years ago I was walking back to my office from grabbing lunch. When I heard it behind me for the first time:

"Hey Baby" "Woo Hoo" "Hey, What's Your Name" and so on.

And of course I had to fight the uncontrollable urge to just run right over and hop in the back of that pick-up and ride away into the night. I did. But I am the Queen of Self Control. In fact I managed to not turn around at all until I heard honking. From other cars. They had seriously stopped the truck on the street and were holding up nice, non-cat-calling citizens from going about their days.

All to do what? Embarrass me? Annoy me? Show off for their friends? I'm serious. WTF?

And I'll never forget what my boss at the time said when I finally got back into the building, looking more than a little harassed. She said, "You should be happy they whistle at all because one day they stop noticing all together."

And I thought hmmm...

Until it happened again. And again. And again. Seriously y'all it's an epidemic.

I'm actually pretty good a ignoring it now. I've even gone so far as to ignore legitimate friends of mine who pull up beside me and start honking. But now I'm wondering...

Why do they do this? Is it something of an urban legend? Like Billy Bob back in '72 whistled at this "foxy" girl from the window of his 'stang and she turned around and it was love at first sight and now they have a passle of brats that have a passle of brats and all is right with the world? And if it worked for good old Billy Bob there's hope for other guys so they all just give it a shot every now and then just in case?

Please tell me why.

And bring on the love stories. I'm a sucker for a good love story.