For a number of years now the expression I’ve have been aiming to post up on my face when I am reacting to nothing in particular is disinterested but alert. Disinterested but alert.This has seemed to me to be the right solution. This works nicely with one of my new mantras which goes empathy yes; sympathy no. In the gym you see a lot of poor choice faces. Men do angry in  the gym. It is allied to aggressive, which men like to do as a default setting. Women do preoccupied. Preoccupied is part of the business of avoiding men. Hence the great fuss with the smartphone and the i-pod. However, the other day I saw myself doing disinterested but alert on a series of photos and was disappointed to note that disinterested but alert was beginning to slide into what you might call vacant and confused. And unhappy. Vacant, confused and unhappy. If I do some trick with the mouth, give it the inkling of a smile (nothing too overt, just the ghost of a smile), I might get away with it. Unhappy would go. A smile would occupy the vacant. Confused would necessarily disappear if I’m inhabited. The only problem, looking in the mirror now, is that a new attribute has arrived. Smug. 

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