Even though I am currently on summer break, my sister (who is a sophomore in high school) is still in school. Unfortunately for me, this means I have to drop her off at school in the morning, which means waking up early, something that I generally try to avoid. So now that I’m up in the morning, I’ve resumed an embarrassing habit that I have never told anyone about before: watching Live with Regis and Kelly. What, were you expecting me to say cocaine? Why would I have to wake up early in the morning to use cocaine? Why is cocaine use embarrassing? Anyway, I love watching that show. Mainly because of Kelly Ripa, who is funny and pretty and for some reason has really muscular arms. Whereas Regis Philbin looks like a sad gerbil. I would probably still watch the show if it was called Live with a Random Hobo and Kelly, or Live with a Trained Monkey and Kelly. Regis just sits there and mumbles on about things that nobody outside of lower New York cares about while Kelly makes funny jokes and looks good. Plus, Regis has the worst taste in sports; I mean he’s a fan of the New York Yankees and Notre Dame football, which are both in my top ten list of sports teams I wouldn’t mind seeing deported to Sweden (along with the Lakers, University of Florida, and the entire National Hockey League).
I realize I may be ragging on Regis here, but I frankly think I am justified. My family used to watch Who Wants to be a Millionaire back when Regis hosted it and to me, deciding who to punch, Regis or the retarded contestant, was harder than the actual questions on the show. I mean, they would get a $1000 question that asked something like “Which of these fruits has seeds on the outside: a) strawberries b) peaches c) potatoes d) Ford F-150s.” And instead of just saying the correct answer (kiwis), the contestant will start to explain what interesting (as in boring to everybody else) event in their sad lives enlightened them to such an earth shattering realization as strawberries having seeds on the outside. It’s like therapy or those stupid ice breakers they always make you do when you go to club conventions. (Has anyone else noticed that when they ask you to name something interesting about yourself, everyone always talks about the bones they’ve broken? You don’t see me talking about my STDs to break the ice, so I don’t care that you once broke your collarbone.) Anyway, once this is done, Regis would ask “final answer?” as many times as possible, as if he were getting paid each time he said it. If one child died every time Regis said “final answer” China could stop drowning baby girls.
Anyway, getting back to my point, which was… er… oh yeah, Regis and Kelly. So anyway, I was watching an episode last week where Regis challenges a 100-year old woman named Emma Hendrickson to a bowling match. Sadly, she did not beat Regis, but she was still impressive none the less. She bowled a 64, which actually is below the average she normally posts in her bowling club. On a good day I can maybe bowl a 55. Since bowling is one of the few things to do at night in Kona, my friends and I used to go bowling a lot in high school, which most people are surprised to find out once they see how badly we suck. We would get our butts kicked in a Special Olympics bowling tournament. A friend and I once failed to break 50… with our scores combined (I had a 33, he had 10). So the fact that this 100-year old woman is still bowling these kinds of scores is inspiring. I would be happy if was peeing without any help at 50, much less still coherent at 100.
But anyway, watching Regis and Kelly along with countless elderly people around the world (the only other people in the world who wake up early) and watching this 100-year-old woman made me start thinking about getting old. I often felt that I would make a great old person. Sitting on a porch wearing adult diapers with a shotgun while farting and scowling freely sounds like something that I could get used to (actually, I already do these things). Also, nobody would tease me when I forget everything and don’t speak proper English. They would say “Aw, look at the old man.” Whereas now they just say “How the hell did you make it into college?” Speaking of college, I think dorm life is great preparation for retirement life. Think about it, we lived with other people our age, ate dinner at 5, anxiously waited for mail, and Jeopardy was a major event in our day. The only things missing were bocce ball tournaments and Viagra parties (well, at least the bocce ball…).
Anyway, I have been inspired by Ms. Hendrickson to live a long and fulfilling life. So I’ve decided that once I retire, I’m going to go on tour doing those eating challenges. You know the ones where if you eat an entire cow’s worth of steak you get it for free and they give you a cheap T-shirt? Those. I also plan to die while doing one of these when I’m 100. I’ll just fall face first into a five-pound steak in the middle of one of my greatest feats, like Houdini. Maybe Regis and Kelly will do a story on me and I will be a Jeopardy clue. And of course Regis Philbin and Alex Trebek will still be hosting these shows. Because evil never dies.
No comments:
Post a Comment