"Why do you ask questions to which you already know the answers?" ~Magneto

I have a theory. It is untested, but sound. I believe that women never want to know a man's answer to any question the women ask. Okay, "never" sounds a bit harsh -- let's stick with "hardly ever." Which is a scientific term, yes.

So, everybody already knows some examples proving my theory. Every man worth his salt should know about fat questions and beauty questions. If a woman says to you "Does this bracelet make me look fat?" or "Do you think Kathy Griffin is prettier than I am?" you immediately respond with a resounding and emphatic "NO." This is pretty much old hat; I would venture to guess that any man that is still having sex on any kind of a regular basis already has this part figured out.

But my theory extends much further than what you might learn in Answers to Women's Questions 101. For example, let's say a man and a woman are both innocently getting dressed in the morning (and by "getting dressed" I mean that she is getting dressed and he is sitting on the bed watching for whatever gratuitous glimpses he might be awarded). The woman turns to the man and says "Do you think I should wear the peach shirt or the lavendar shirt?" This is a classic example of a question that might sometimes take the man off-guard and lead him to believe that she really wants his opinion. She doesn't, and that's okay -- but it's a cruel trick to his already-waivering ego. Note that this example is not limited to clothes; it can be used when asking for opinions on any number of topics -- from attending baby showers, to re-gifting, to restaurant options.

But my favorite example of tricksy womanses asking questions simply to make us men believe we have a choice is the ever-dangerous "Do-It-Or-Else Question." This is a tactic that a woman uses (it is NEVER, EVER used by a man) which sneakily gives us the impression that we have a choice. Examples of this kind of question are: "Would you like to take out the garbage?" "Do you think it would be a good idea to turn here?" "Do you want to dust the living room before our friends get here?" "Do you think maybe you've eaten too many Swedish Fish today?" "Will you help me during the commercial break?" These questions are very misleading because, on the surface, they are asking for your opinion. Men, do not be fooled! You have no choice in the matter; you will do it, or else. The question mark so offhandedly attached to the end of the sentence means nothing.

The interesting part of my theory is that most women don't even recognize their unnatural non-need for a man's feedback. I wonder why...

“If you have to be in a soap opera try not to get the worst role” ~Judy Garland

Maybe I'm just naive, but I miss the days of primetime television that wasn't about sex. I would like to examine some of my favorite primetime shows and question why writers are no longer able to come up with refreshing content that doesn't involve complicated relationships (for the moment, I shall ignore the entire genre of "reality TV" because I don't even consider that television).

Friends: Where to start? This show was so filled with everyone sleeping with everyone else that -- in my humble opinion -- it started to ruin the show. What could be an extremely funny concept (i.e., Joey sleeping with Rachel) is always tainted by the thought of "Oh my gosh! But how will this affect _____'s relationship with ______ (fill in the blanks)??" After about the seventh season, it was no longer a comedy; it was strictly a serial love drama.

Scrubs: See Friends. Started funny, ended up trying to make us care too much about the characters.

Lost: What an amazing show! New concept, very gripping, this show kept us all entranced for years! But then, of course, it ultimately ended up being about the love triangle between Jack and Kate and Sawyer... and Juliet? (Would that be a love parallelogram?) How were Sawyer and Juliet even believable as a couple anyway? But we finally ended up with two different couples in two different decades and everyone was happy... until they brought Kate back to tempt him. *sigh* Who cares? Just tell us who the man in black is, already!

Fringe (a.k.a. X-Files II): Another fantastic show, pushing the boundaries of our imaginations into other worlds and other possibilities. It starts out with Olivia in a relationship with John (her partner), but then he dies in, like, the third episode and from there the show just got better and better. Until Peter slept with Oliviernate thinking it was Olivia, and then Olivia found out and hated him, and then slept with him anyway, and now Peter has to choose between the Olivias, and Oliviernate is pregnant with Peter's child... There are now whole episodes that have no fringe science concepts in them at all -- only interpersonal drama. *snooze*

The Big Bang Theory: See Friends. Started out funny; still funny for the most part; I give it two more years. They are only in the fourth season, and already the interweaving is beginning. Penny and Leonard, on again, off again, on again -- can you say "Rachel and Ross?" And then Penny slept with Rajesh?? Who believed that tripe? I threw up a little bit in the back of my mouth watching it. If Sheldon sleeps with anybody I'm finished watching that show for good.

Grey's Anatomy: For the sake of screen space, I won't even begin to try and unravel the twisted web of sex and lies in this show. Suffice it to say that if Torres doesn't have some horrible disease by now, it's only because she's stealing powerful antibiotics from the hospital pharmacy. Someday I'll dedicate an entire blog to proving that, within three degrees of connection, she has slept with every single person on that entire show.

CSI: One of the harder shows for me to criticize, the writers here have chosen to show more and more graphic violence to make up for the lack of trysts. They have an interesting way of creating on-screen romances, right before "killing off" one of the lovers. Nick and Kristi were cute, and then she died. We don't find out Grissom and Sara are couple until two years into it, and since then one of them has consistently been in Costa Rica. Hodges and Wendy have a (VERY bizarre) relationship-type-thing, and then she leaves for Portland with no notice.

Bones: Booth and Bones, Booth and Cam, Hodgins and Angela... *yawn* Stop getting people pregnant already and show us more burn victims!

This bombastic post has gotten so long even I'm bored of it. The point I'm trying to make is: what happened to the good shows? What happened to Alf, Mork and Mindy, MASH, The Cosby Show, Married with Children, King of Queens? Why do we even HAVE shows like Modern Family and That 70's Show?

"If you have nothing to say, say nothing" ~Mark Twain

So I was chatting about blogs this morning with a guy at my work. Well, not so much chatting as trying to get past him and back to my office as quickly as possible without being rude. You know the type: you say "Hi Mike! How's it going?" but you don't really care how it's going; you're just trying to be polite and friendly and adhere to the social norms that prove beyond a doubt that you are normal and definitely not antisocial. Which reminds me, did you know that, according to the American Psychiatric Association, Antisocial Personality disorder is diagnosed in 3% of all males and only 1% of all females? That hardly seems fair. Men are quite social. Picture a group of guys, for example, sitting up at a cabin for the weekend. Imagine all of the socializing that would go on! But anyway, social norms. Society has such strange rules and pressures. Nymph sometimes calls me insensitive because I do some things in social situations that are refreshingly honest... and yet eschewed for some reason. If somebody comes to my door to sell me something that I'm not interested in buying, it doesn't sway me at all if it's a one-armed Girl Scout trying to raise enough money to send her big brother to a country with absolute non-extradition laws -- the answer is still no. What would I do with a 16 oz. bottle of cleaner that's concentrated enough to clean every type of surface in my house for the next 10 years? And besides, what does the American Psychiatric Association know, anyway? I mean, for goodness' sake, aren't they the group that admitted a couple of years ago to accepting kickbacks and bribes from the pharmaceutical industry and directly leading to the over-use of medication and neglect of other traditional psychiatric treatment approaches? That doesn't sound like a company whose statistics can be trusted. For all I know, they probably took bribes from the ... whatever group it is that women are in ... to get that number down to 1%. And I know women are all in some support group, too -- don't try and tell me they're not. They have this, like, secret code they all have to learn that is completely unbreakable. Two women can be having a conversation right out in the open, in front of a man, and the man can even be an active participant in said conversation... and the women could be talking about something completely different that the man knows nothing about! Talk about antisocial. Sheesh. If there were two women included in our hypothetical weekend at the cabin, I can only imagine what would happen. They'd probably try and get everyone to talk about stuff, instead of happily socializing like they were before. That's just plain cruel and unusual.

So anyway, this guy Mike and I were talking about blogs and he said he won't start one because he never has anything to say, and nothing exciting ever happens to talk about.

I don't get that.