I generally just pick out the prettiest or most interesting looking girl in a bar, cautiously meander over to her, maybe swap eye contact once or twice and smile… And then I get out one of those scary mountaineering ice-pick things, and thrust it around in front of her face in terrifyingly fervent stabbing motion, and when she inevitably starts screaming something like “What are you doing!?”, I just say “Hey… Relax. I’m only trying to break the ice.”

Works every time.