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The
Really Real "Real World"
Reality television is on every channel, every day and appears
to continue to be in full swing. We have "Who Wants to Marry My Dad?", "The
Bachelor", "For Love or Money 2" just to name a few really re-re ones. The
most recent one I've noticed is on Spike TV. It's called "Joe Schmo" and
it's about a fellow who thinks he's on a reality show, when in fact, he's
the only one out of the cast who doesn't know the show is actually just
about him. Do I watch any of these shows? Meh. I dabbled in a few Real
Worlds, got a little hyped over the first season of Survivor, then promptly
bowed out of the sensation before any permanent brain damage set in. Well,
I'm assuming I have no brain damage, but you can be the judge.
You see, lately, my normal boring life has taken a
stress-filled and manic turn. What used to be up is now down. Good and
evil can no longer be differentiated. I swear to God, I'm in a reality
television show and just have not found the cameras or the sweet, sweet
compensation.
In the last few articles I've written, I've shared the odd
story how my garbage can was repossessed. I mentioned how my best friend
has moved away. Since then, I've had my grandfather enter the hospital, my
checking account suddenly become seriously withdrawn when I thought there
was over $160 in it. I was up for a big job at General Motors, and lost it
to the stooliest meat puppet co-worker that no one can stand to be around
for more than five minutes without contemplating a wicked, messy suicide.
This girl who got the job is such a drama queen, and talks with such
suckingly sweet false interest that you'd like to thrust a red hot railroad
spike in your temple to save your soul. My house is infested with bees…
yeah bees, my 120 lb. friend had an 8 lb. 14 oz. baby (which is good news,
but scientifically weird), and I was served papers on Saturday that I'm
being sued for $17, 000 for a fender bender that wasn't my fault and
happened last July, because the dude who pulled out in front of me had a
stroke five hours later! So… SHOW ME THE FRIGGIN' CAMERAS!!! I'M ON TO
YOU!
I'm a waitress and mother. The extent of my life is waking,
making breakfast (boring Pop Tarts or cold cereal), getting the kids to
school and then going to work. After work I come home, mother some more
then go to bed. Snore! So I figure I'm the perfect patsy for some big time
television exec to prey upon. Ruffle me around the edges, throw in a little
law suit, throw a handful of stinging insects in my heating vent and they've
got themselves some high drama. How would an everyday Jane handle two weeks
of straight emotional assault?
What points fingers even more to this theory is that people
who rarely call me, are now calling me all the time. Suddenly, my sister
who lives the next town over, and who is abnormally busy with work, has free
time daily to see what I'm up to. "Hey, wanna go to the fair?", as if I'm
up to being dragged by a show pony, or assaulted by a Carnie just for good
television ratings. She also asks "How are you? Is everything fine?" a
lot. That's when I check my living room out of the corner of my eye and
listen closely for that zoom noise cameras make when panning in and out.
So now as I type this, I'm waiting and ever watching. The
kids are in on it, the mailman is in on it, my sister is in on it. My job
has to be in on it, because I swear to all the baseball gods, that I never
noticed a huge three foot poster of Manny Ramirez from the BoSox adorning
one of the walls at the restaurant yet there it is by the employee break
table staring at my Yankee eyes and challenging me to NOT go insane. The
sanitation department, the court systems and the local hospital are in on
it. It appears, as I swat a bee, that Mother Nature plays a character role
in it. Hells, you all are probably in on it.
But we'll see who has the last laugh when Joe Rogan appears,
smarmy and chuckly, and hands me my big fat check. My closet doors will
open and all those who set me up will step forward grinning as if I just had
an Oprah make-over. "Surprise!" they'll cheer, "You've been on Who Wants to
Marry a Basket Case!!" Then, as they try to hug me and wait for my good
humoured side to laugh… I'll tear all their heads off with my bare hands and
chuck them at the cameras. Growling and gnashing my teeth, the corporation
will realise they'll be sued by millions of innocent (yet moronic) viewers
that had to watch the grisly massacre on FOX right before switching to
Monday Night Football. I'll become a headline, then an urban legend. I'll
be remembered longer than Joe Millionaire and his whore.
So, in short…
I win. Turn the cameras off and read a friggin' book. |
