Miss USA: Unusually Sexy (Stupid?) Americans

I’m a very patriotic guy, so you can imagine how intently I was paying attention to the recent contest. No, not the primary elections; the 2010 Miss USA pageant. Frankly, hot women strutting around is a little higher on my priority list than a bunch of old men who write stupid laws while they aren’t molesting their aides. And just as a disclaimer, I will be keeping track of the sexist jokes I make in this column in honor of this event (the pageant, not the elections). Remember ladies, these are all jokes and I don’t mean any of it. If only any of you had a sense of humor (#1).

Now, I’ll admit that I didn’t get to watch most of this year’s show (and on a bit of a tangent, does anyone find it ironic that one of the weirdest looking people, Donald Trump, hosts the search for the most beautiful woman in the country?). I tuned in just in time to see the final five and the announcement of the winner, Miss Michigan Rima Fakih, who became only the second Arab-America to win the award (and yes, I do research, but only when research involves beauty queens).

Now, am I saying that this was a big PR stunt? No, you said that (assuming that for some reason you read this out loud). But I was a little suspicious. Now, Rima is a good-looking girl, but she placed last among the finalists in the swimsuit portion (which, let’s not kid ourselves here, is the most important competition). Plus, she somehow beat out Miss Oklahoma Morgan Woolard, who looks like this. At one point during her final walk, she stared at the camera in a way that probably killed any male that sat too close to the TV.

Of course, as with any event that involves more than two women, these pageants are the subject of a lot of unnecessary drama (#2). This year’s big scandal is that apparently Miss USA has some risqué photos floating around on the Internet (then again, who doesn’t these days?). Of course, by risqué, I mean this. Yeah, a tank top and shorts. And organizers are thinking of taking away her crown over this, which you have to admit is a little hypocritical. I mean, they have bikini contests on their show and the girls can’t take a few pictures? That’s like Jesse Jackson asking for peace before threatening to rip a guy’s balls off (oh wait…). Of course even if she does lose her title, I’m sort of okay with that because once again, let me remind you what the runner-up looks like.

Another thing that always draws a lot of controversy is the question and answer portion of the contest. Of course, I think that this is an easy controversy to avoid. Don’t do it. Just have the evening gown and swimsuit portions and call it a night. We don’t need the talent portion; if I wanted to watch hot women sing bad karaoke I would just watch Katy Perry videos. In my opinion, looking good in a bikini is the best talent there is. Besides, we know that women have no real talents (#3), unless you count making sandwiches (#4). Okay, I’m going to stop right there with the sexist jokes before one of the two females that are still reading this for some reason decide to kill me. Good thing only a few women know how to read (#5, I’m sorry I couldn’t help it; I had to get one more in).

Anyway, as a bastion of sexist ideals, the Miss USA pageant doesn’t need to prove these women are smart. If anything, having the questions proves the opposite; that these women are blonde mannequins who couldn’t wet a sponge in the Pacific Ocean. Of course, 2007’s Miss South Carolina couldn’t even find the Pacific Ocean if she was tossed off the Golden Gate Bridge. I don’t really care whether or not these women are rocket scientists. It’s not like they promised to teach young children in inner cities how to read (oh, wait…). I’ll be honest, I feel bad for some of these girls. These judges ask some hard questions; the sorts of questions that have no right answer and are politically charged and will piss somebody off no matter the answer.

For instance, this year Miss Oklahoma was asked about Arizona’s immigration laws. For those of you who have somehow not heard about these new laws, it’s the latest hot topic. Arizona enacted a law that basically allows officers to demand to see a person’s documents saying that they are there legally, which some people say will lead to racial profiling.

Miss Oklahoma, in addition to being hot, should have won based on her answer, which I couldn’t have said better myself. She basically said “What can we do about it? Arizona will do what Arizona wants to do.” Now, I honestly don’t give a flying whoop about this law. Do you know why? Because I don’t live in Arizona, and I don’t particularly like Arizona. They are like that kid who always does stupid stuff just to be different. For instance, they are in the Mountain Time zone but they don’t observe daylight savings time, unlike the rest of the time zone. Their basketball team is led by a Canadian guy, their biggest landmark is a big hole, and the only scientific contributions that Arizona State University makes to the world are new STDs. I say we just give Arizona to Mexico and laugh as the Mexican police start racially profiling all the old white people in Glendale.

But I’m getting off topic. I’m sure Miss USA will go on to do many great things. Like… uh, whatever it is that Miss USAs do. I assume that it has something to do with running around in a tiara and a bikini trying to facilitate world peace. She can start in Arizona. Of course, since she’s Arab-American, the police will probably arrest her.

Combat Barbie: Complete With Butt-Kicking Action

I’ve always thought that British people were a little weird. For one thing, they voluntarily choose to live in a miserable, cold, rainy country. Now, I will admit that I know very little about England. In fact, I had no idea where England was until I looked them up on Google Maps (did you know that they are actually on an island?). But every once in awhile a story comes along that reminds me why these people used to rule the entire world. Like this one.

Now I love this story for a lot of reasons. I’ve never been one of those guys who thought that only straight white males should be allowed in the army. When it comes to getting shot at by lunatics, I believe in equal opportunity, so I have no problem with women in the army. In fact, I prefer that women who know how to handle guns be sent as far away from me as possible. I also think it is twice as demoralizing for a guy who believes women are second class citizens to be shot at by a woman holding automatic assault weapons and hair straighteners.

But what makes this story different is that this girl Katrina is ridiculously hot. I mean she is a beauty queen and a lingerie model and she still is choosing to serve in Iraq. On the other hand, most beauty queens couldn’t find Iraq on a map (and half of them probably couldn’t spell “map”). Of course technically, she was the runner-up to be Miss England, but the winner beat the crap out of another beauty queen at a bar (apparently one of the events in an English beauty pageant is a pub brawl) and so was asked to step down. So Katrina will be going to the Miss Universe pageant in December even while remaining in the army.

What is also interesting is how she ended up in the army. Her brother just dared her to sign up for the army, saying she couldn’t pull it off. So the next thing you know, she shows up at training camp in heels and fake eyelashes, earning her the nickname “Combat Barbie.” Am I the only one who thinks this sounds like a blend between G.I Jane and Legally Blonde? (aw dammit I just admitted to watching both of those movies). I tried to dare my sister to do the same thing, but if you have ever seen my sister, then you would know that she has about the same chance of getting into the army as Michael J. Fox does of becoming a brain surgeon. The recoil from the gun alone would fly her back 100 yards.

Of course, I’m sure that Katrina faces a lot less resentment than those movie characters did. Nothing boosts “army morale” by having a supermodel walking around all day. Besides, I bet it serves as good motivation; nobody wants to be the guy who lost to the lingerie model in the obstacle course. I always find it funny when old, irritating actors like Sean Penn go over to Iraq thinking they are boosting the spirits of the troops. Sean Penn is thinking “Boy, these soldiers must be so happy to see that I, a celebrity, have taken time out of my busy schedule to fly here and shake some hands and sign autographs and get great publicity.” The soldiers are probably thinking “What an arrogant a**hole, riding here in his private jet because he thinks he is doing us such a great favor by merely showing up for five minutes.”

The greatest thing about this story though is that this girl is actually a great soldier (which, if you’ve ever made a woman angry, doesn’t surprise you). She was awarded a medal for disarming a prisoner with her bare hands after he managed to get two rifles. She was then promoted to a Lance Corporal, whatever that means. I never could remember all these darn army ranks. I think the army should really take advantage of her to enlist new recruits and curry favor for the war. Imagine the possibilities. She could appear in bra ads with slogans like “Support Our Troops,” “I Got Your WMDs Right Here,” “It’s DD-Day” and “got milk?” (okay maybe that last one doesn’t fit but I ran out of puns).

Anyway, the army gave her a few months leave, and she is preparing for her run at Miss Universe, though she has pledged to remain in the army even if she wins. All kidding aside, I really do hope she wins. After Miss California and Miss South Carolina, I’m tired of blonde bimbo beauty queens. This girl not only said she was going to strive for world peace, she went out and did something about it and shot at people to get it. I think she would be a great role model, and with her feel-good story and feel-good looks (does that even make sense?) she might have a chance. Plus I heard she is going to launch grenades at dissenting judges for her talent section.

Love Is In the Air, and It's Starting To Set Off My Allergies

So this past weekend was Valentine’s Day. For being a very short month, February is filled with a lot of random holidays (by the way, does anyone else think it’s a little suspicious we made the shortest month of the year Black History Month?). Luckily Valentine’s Day only comes once every four years and compensates for the rotation of the Earth. Wait a minute… dammit wrong February Holiday.

Nobody really knows how Valentine’s Day began (okay so by that I mean me). I’m pretty sure it is a holiday conceived by women in order to get flowers and candy. And like many cherished female traditions, this one started with an innocent man suffering. Saint Valentine was some poor soul who lived a long time ago and was killed by somebody. I don’t really know how he died, the Wikipedia article started to get really boring and it began involving French people so I stopped reading and decided to make up the rest of the facts. Besides, if you read this to learn things, you have bigger issues.

Anyway, what better way to celebrate some guy’s life than by connecting with that special someone. And by “connecting” I mean “buying them a whole lot of s**t.” At least that’s the case if you are a guy on Valentine’s Day. You have to buy cards, jewelry, dinner, and lots of chocolates (which they never eat because they say it will go to their hips but still insist you buy). Let’s think for a second who Valentine’s Day truly benefits. Women in a relationship get a whole bunch of stuff, men in a relationship have to buy a whole bunch of stuff, single women are reminded how single they are (which is when they need all that chocolate), and single guys laugh the laugh of the carefree and then go to the store the day after Valentine’s to take advantage of all the cheap candy on sale.

Or at least that’s what I did on Monday night. I went to Safeway and ended up buying a box of Twinkies (which I have been subliminally craving since “Zombie Land”) and Ding-Dongs as part of my new diet, the “Have a Stroke Before You Can Gain More Weight” plan. As if that weren’t enough, there was a Girl Scout stand outside. And I just couldn’t turn down the chance to help out my community by supporting the scouts by stuffing my face with cookies (and for some reason, it took the retarded girl scout almost ten minutes to give me change, so they need all the help they can get).

Anyway, Valentine’s Day is not just about food (or so they say). It actually helps men out in their relationships, because while women are in touch with their emotions all the time and can talk about them any day of the year, men need some advance notice. So having a set day gives men time to prepare to have emotions and communicate and all that other mumbo jumbo. A great example occurred in my journalism class the other day. We were all asked to name our favorite Super Bowl commercial. The women all named the Google one about finding love in France as their favorite, whereas the men in the class had trouble even remembering the ad. We were a little too busy thinking about the Megan Fox ad, thumb doubles and all (which was stupid, because Megan Fox could have gills and antennae and she would still be one of the hottest women in the world).

Do you want to know what men think of true love? Just watch one of the fifty dating reality shows that are on TV at the moment. It always consists of about twenty very emotionally unstable women who think they are there to win the love of a celebrity and one celebrity who is there because the producers told him he could make out with twenty women in a mansion and then ditch all but one of them (and the last one too if he wants another season).

I bring this up because I recently watched the finale and reunion of “For the Love of Ray J 2,” (and for the record, both my roommate and I think he made the wrong choice). Now, Ray J would get mad at the girls for doubting his ability to settle down even though he 1. didn’t bother to learn their names but instead gave them stripper nicknames, 2. spent the entire show making out with twenty women at a time and 3. was on his second season. Yep… can’t see why they wouldn’t trust him.

I feel like I would do well on that type of show. It would be called “For the Love of Mitchell,” and the entire episode would show me trying to choose between a Twinkie and a Ding-Dong.

The Gender War: The Women May Be Winning, But That's Cause They're Cheating

Sometimes I get the impression that some women are a little confusing. And by “sometimes” I mean “everyday.” And by “some women” I mean “all women.” And by “a little confusing” I mean “bat-shit crazy.”

Now before all of you women out there start freaking out and calling me a sexist pig, might I point out that if you have ever spent any time with me you should already know this and if you are especially offended by sexist stereo-types you should stop reading and go back to knitting. It’s definitely not that I don’t like women; it’s just that I, like every other honest man in the world will admit, understand women about as well as the British understand the concept of oral hygiene. And it’s not like this is a new problem. Men for centuries have tried to solve women, and most of them have died. To prove my point, we welcome back cavemen Wog and Oog.

Wog: Why are you sleeping outside the cave?

Oog: My wife is mad at me for something.

Wog: What could she be mad at you for? They haven’t invented sports so you could ignore her, there aren’t toilet seats to leave down, we don’t know how to make alcohol that we can abuse, and we don’t have computers so she can’t find your porn. So what did you do?

(Crickets chirping in background)

Oog: It must have something to do with emotions or communication or something.

Of course, since man still has yet to discover the concept of emotions, we still find ourselves facing the same problems as Wog and Oog. When you think about it, cavemen had it easy. If women got mad at them, the odds were good that they were just eaten by saber-toothed tigers or something and their pain ended right there. We men in modern times, however, are reduced to hoping that we get run over in our driveways by women drivers who are trying to back out of their garages while also drinking coffee, eating tofu, putting on makeup, texting on their phones, playing checkers and whatever else they are doing in their cars while they are ignoring road signs.

Now I’m not saying women are inferior to men (I’m simply implying it). There are many things that women do better than men, like yelling. What I’m saying is that women think… differently. Let’s face it, men are relatively uncomplicated. We feel three emotions: hunger, thirst, and sleepiness. If you don’t think those are true emotions that can tear at a man’s heart, than you are probably a woman. Also, when men want things, we tend to tell you we want things. We frankly are too busy to be inventing mind games to convey what we want. It always cracks me up when I see all these articles in women’s magazines that say things like “Figure out what your man wants” (if he’s not already eating it, you should just ask him) or “What turns men on” (answer: pretty much anything and everything). Don’t ask why I read women’s magazines; you're missing the point. If a man’s trail of thought were a road, it would be a one way straight lane.

A woman’s thought train on the other hand more closely resembles the US Interstate Highway system. It’s littered with all kinds of random exits, signs that don’t make sense, and dead animals. I’m going use my friends as an example. To protect their identities, I’m simply going to refer to them as “Baddie” and “Midget.” The other night, I was at their place when a friend of mine stole their phone. After several seconds of debating, they came up with a plan to get their phone back: they slapped me. Once again, let me make it clear that I had not stolen the phone. In fact, I had not moved from my spot on the couch the entire time. But somewhere in their twisted female minds, slapping me in the chest twenty times would somehow get the other guy to give them their phone.

Then last night, a group of us (and I have no interest in protecting their identities so I am just going to say it was Kyle, Chris, and Stephen) for some reason decided to let these same women put makeup on us. Now before you go and start reaching all sorts of conclusions and start buying me Zac Effron posters, let me establish that previous to this we had consumed a large amount of a certain beverage that tends to make you do stupid things like letting two giggling girls put make up on four grown men. Also, it was Chris’s idea. It was one of many bright ideas he had that night, some of which included stubbing his baby toe on a door, trying to fight a small parrot, and attaching a clothespin to his nipples (all of which is on video somewhere).

Now when we woke up this morning (or afternoon if you want to be picky), we began to realize the makeup was not necessarily coming off. Since we did not want to go out in public looking like tranny hookers/raccoons we began to panic and asked the girls how to remove the makeup. They then revealed that they had used waterproof makeup and suggested baby oil or makeup remover. Now as you could imagine, we didn’t exactly have those supplies with us. The only “supplies” we had in our apartment were beer and rum, which did not work by the way. I of course asked why they would need waterproof mascara and they answered “for when we go to water parks.” Because heaven forbid you go to a water park not looking like Marilyn Manson.

While I’m giving examples, I’m going to use my sister, who is a junior in high school. One day earlier this year, she decides to go to school in what appeared to me to be something Paris Hilton would wear to a club. I politely and tactfully informed her that the dress would never pass dress code and that she looked like a hooker. She explained that since she was going to wear a jacket over the dress, then nobody would see what she was wearing and she wouldn’t get written up for dress code. I then asked that since nobody was going to see what she was wearing, then WHY ARE YOU WEARING A DRESS THAT COSTS MORE THAN MY ENTIRE CLOSET TO STUDY ALGEBRA! At that point she resorted to trying to change the subject by swearing at me, which I find is a common theme with women talking to me.

Anyway, somebody eventually figured out how to land a man on the moon, so I’m sure one of these days some brave man will figure out women. Unfortunately, he will instantly be assassinated by said women, because keeping secrets is how they maintain power. Like secrets about how to remove waterproof mascara. If you have any ideas I’m listening. In the meantime, since my face is soaked in rum anyway I’m going to try to burn it off. It’s waterproof, but they never said anything about fireproof.