I am the type of person that paid money to watch Hitch in the theater. And not only did I watch it in the theater ON A FRIDAY NIGHT but I still watch it everytime it is on TBS and I still get teary eyed in that scene when Eva Mendez is watching Jerry Maguire and crying hysterically as she squirts a bottle of whip cream into her mouth.

My gyno tells me I have too much estrogen.

But my favorite part about Hitch is Kevin James’s character. He is the character that I most closely identify with. Yes, the pudgy, bespectacled, socially awkward guy who drops mustard on his crotch and likes to dance to Usher. So subtract about two hundred pounds and add “drinks too much when nervous”, “makes offensive comments at holiday dinners” and “passes out at inopportune moments” and…that’s me!

And damn Hollywood for making you believe that the flawed character will get the girl because she likes you for who you are. Barf!

I was thinking about this because in real life, it never seems like “being yourself” gets you anywhere. The line that guys give me right before they’re about to tell me that they’re getting back together with their boring yet mentally stable ex girlfriend is “Ji, I think you’re alot of fun, but…”

And in my head I’m saying, “No, wait! There’s more to me to being fun! I can be NOT fun! Really!”

And being the “fun girl” was always just this albatross hanging around my neck, strangling my chances of dating happiness.I was always the “in between” girl. The girl that the guy has his fun with before he gets over his commitment issues and settles down with his ex.

And I was always jealous that I would never be that kind of girl. The kind of girl who would never go out with a run in her stocking.  The kind of girl who would never leave the house with clothes she picked off the floor because she was running late and they were the only clothes that smelled okay. The kind of girl who would never make an std joke at Thanksgiving dinner. The kind of girl who would never set pasta on fire. The kind of girl who would never watch an entire season of Crank Yankers on a Saturday night.

What do those kind of girls watch anyway? Law and Order??

And because of this, every once in a while, I think, “Well, maybe instead of std jokes I should just talk about…sailing….or junk bonds! Or real estate. Boring people are always talking about real estate!!!

But then last night I was having dinner with my friend Brian and he was telling me about the movie Waitress and the tragic story about how the writer/director of the movie was gruesomely murdered in her apartment right before the movie was released. And the movie is now out on video and they have a special section at the end where the cast talks about their favorite memories of her and the very last segment is one of the last interviews with the writer and she says something like “And remember the most important thing guys: Just have fun.”

And then that reminded me of one of my favorite quotes by Brendan Gill, an old school New Yorker writer who said:

…not a shred of evidence exists in favor of the argument that life is serious, though it is often hard and sometimes terrible.  And saying that, I am prompted to add what follows out of it.  That since everything ends badly for us in the inevitable catastrophe of death, it seems obvious that the first rule of life is to have a good time; and that the second rule of life is to hurt as few people as possible in the course of doing so.  There is no third rule.”


So I guess, dear readers, this is my circuitous way of saying:

1. Be yourself
2. Have fun
3. Be nice to people
4. Sub-par romantic comedies are good for soothing the soul on Saturday nights

Happy Monday.