I Like to Watch

April 8, 2007 | Men and women are different. Thank god we're all old enough to know that now. Thank god we no longer waste our time asking each other impossible questions, like "Why can't we communicate soulfully, like Gwyneth Paltrow probably does with Chris Martin? Why can't you smell that smell that I'm smelling? Where are your pants? What's that on your face? Are you insane or just very stupid? Should I have another margarita?"

If only we knew when we were younger what we know now, that men and women come from different planets, both of them spilling over with their own distinct clichés. Women can try to date touchy-feely types who fold their clothes neatly and put stuff away and meditate, men can try to date "SportsCenter"-watching, back-slapping gals who know how to "hang," but the divide between the sexes is still too great. Women like to overanalyze, digress, split hairs, muse, contemplate, obsess. Men like to stare at pictures of ass cheeks.

Eventually we figure it out: "I already have to spend the rest of my life with me, why would I want to spend the rest of my life with another person who's just like me? Isn't one of me enough?" Ask any gay man: Communing with a like-minded soul mate is no walk in the park. Better to cohabitate with a complete alien whose odd habits and non sequiturs confuse and confound you, since these endless differences will distract you from your own flaws, thus freeing you up to luxuriate in the comfort of self-righteous indignation for the balance of your days on Earth. Dr. Phil be damned: Intimacy is a small price to pay for always being right!

California McDreaming
I know what you're thinking. "How does this have anything to do with TV?" Or, if you're a man, "Did she just say 'ass cheeks'? What about ass cheeks?" Well, we're going to tackle TV and ass cheeks promptly, because I've recently abandoned the new wave of terrible reality shows like "Dancing With the Stars" for terrible old-school classics like "The Bachelor."

Excuse me! I mean "The Bachelor: Officer and a Gentleman" (9:30 p.m. EDT Mondays). Yes, that's right. ABC, the network run by big, dumb girls, actually added that absurdly dorky subtitle -- you know, the one that really makes you want to watch the show even though you already know from experience that you hate it?

I can't explain how this happens. I loved "Dancing With the Stars" the first season it aired. It was so deliciously cheesy, so charmingly stupid, so repetitive and corny and achingly bad. But I watched the two-hour season premiere the other night, and I couldn't stand it: the sequined outfits, the horrible music, the braying judges. Plus, how many times can you sit through a really bad fox trot?

Then I tune in for "The Bachelor" and even though I've hated the show for years, I find myself taken in by the story of "Lieutenant McDreamy" as one contestant described him: He was a Navy ROTC at Duke, he's a doctor, he's into charity, he does Ironman triathlons, he loves his family, he loves this country, and joining the Navy was, hands down, the best thing that ever happened to him. Apparently, "The Bachelor's" producers decided to abandon their typical Rich Jackass prototype, replacing him with the Most Sincere Man Who's Ever Lived.

Not only that, but Lt. McDreamy, M.D., says that he can't believe how smart and successful all of the women are! He actually mentions their big brains and their jobs, as if those are good things, things that matter almost as much as how their ass cheeks look underneath the 15 or so pounds of hot-pink taffeta most of them seem to be wearing. Then Dr. Aw Shucks announces that it's his birthday and adds, without irony, that he can't believe he's going to meet the woman he's going to marry on this incredible day. What a wonderful birthday present it will be!

In case you doubt that this guy is the real deal, check this out: One of the lovely ladies (only about a third of them are extremely pretty this season -- reality shows must've fallen out of favor among the beauty pageant set) decides to sing to him, and what does she choose to sing? The national anthem! But not only doesn't Officer/Gentleman laugh so hard that his martini blows out of his nose, he sits there and listens with a sweet, happy look on his face, and then he actually wipes away real tears as she gets to the good part.

It was a shockingly corny moment, in the best possible way, the kind of moment that provides a nation of high-strung women a brief, fleeting respite from the unbearable, unrelenting burden of being right all the time.

It was also cool when the mean sea donkey called the falling-down-drunk sea donkey a jackass, but needless to say both sea donkeys were dismissed by the end of the episode because Lt. McDreamy, M.D., didn't think they were smart enough or successful enough or down-to-earth enough to hold his attention. Impressive!

Not that I think this guy is going to make a good choice or anything. He's a hopeless romantic, he's starry-eyed and sweet and idealistic and full of big dreams. In other words, he's dead meat. Those sea donkerellas are going to eat him alive. Muhahaha!

Next page: "Entourage's" ample ass cheeks!