I've been receiving a lot of messages the last couple days and I must admit - I'm torn. Half of me gets totally pumped when I read the "good luck!" and the "you can do it!" well wishes, and the other half wants to pretend this is any other week with any other long run coming up this weekend. Appreciation and avoidance all wrapped in one neat little post-race aluminum foil blanket.
Welcome to my brain's typical inner workings. Yes...No. Do it...Don't. Go...Stay. Why...Why not? If I didn't know my Irish-Italian family, I'd go Jewish. Yep, I would peg me for a Jew as I question the hell out of everything. I would kill it on Jeopardy. Even if I didn't have the right answer, I'd at least ask it the right way.
Once when I was on trial in Columbus, I remember asking the lawyer why he wanted an answer to whatever question he posed. There were chuckles in the jury, but I wasn't laughing. I was serious (and quite young so I'm sure it seemed disrespectful, but whatever, he was an old idiot).
So imagine my surprise and subsequent restraint when one of my girlfriends asked me last weekend if I was going to watch the new season of The Bachelorette. "Are you kidding me?" is what I wanted to ask her, followed by, "Are you sure we're friends? Aren't friends supposed to like, oh I don't know...know each other?"
Yet in true kismet of my sarcasm form, last night when I was unable to sleep or concentrate on any words on a page, I grabbed the TV remote and there it was. And it was even more painful and unimaginable than previously assumed.
There was this very pretty (albeit, a bit Jiminy Cricket-eyed and too much gloss on the lips) blond woman in a very pretty (albeit, way too crazy ornamental for any non-Taj Mahal establishment) evening gown welcoming all the bachelors to the show. Ok, really? Just the premise makes me want to puke wedding mints.
This reason-stereotypes-exist-woman is standing at the end of a promenade under an of course gigantic crystal chandelier that made the sparkly sheen on her augmented lips even more blinding. I was looking for any indication that the prop people are as dumb as the "actors" so maybe the thing would come crashing down on her head and put us all out of our misery. Except my friend, who would be so bored she'd probably have to re-read Fifty Shades of Grey.
So out of some form of transportation come the potential suitors to introduce themselves to a pretty woman that they want to marry. Oh, yes. Of course they want to marry her. Don't be silly. Why wouldn't they want to marry a total stranger that they meet for the very first time under an unfortunately sturdy crystal chandelier? Every keeper's dream.
Contemptuously I'm watching this, wishing I had my iPhone near by to un-friend my moron friend. The first guy, kinda cute, rolls up in a limo and is shockingly normal. Dressed well, nice smile, reasonably genuine, he introduces himself, gives her a quick hug and departs. Fine. Tolerable.
The second guy, however, rolls up in a skateboard. Totally out of place. Sure, if there were ramps and chain link fences and dogs barking and a the only glass was from a bong instead of a giant light fixture, it would have been appropriate. If the dude would have yelled, "Veni-Vidi-Vici!" I may have been interested. Instead, my bitterness was affirmed.
And then. Then there was the guy who comes in walking as if he had just tossed back 62 shots of protein shake, maintaining such forced eye-contact that you expected his future bride to immediately transform into an alien and a giant "V" come flashing up in PowerPoint transition style across the screen. He immediately drops to one knee, kisses her hand and says the following in a Barry White meets 900# telemarketer voice: It's not the number of breaths you take, it's the moments that take your breath away and this is one of them.
Sometimes, I burst into laughter at such stupidity. And other times, I just give thanks for finally being able to fall asleep. Alone. No questions asked.
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