Thursday, 6/5/97 Realizing what’s important in life Looking back
at the many great times shared with the girls
Much has been made of the war between the sexes, but I’m here to
tell you, the girls are going to win. It’s a simple matter of
strategy; we have it, and boys do not. Girls love to talk, and what
we talk about most is boys. Boys simply do not have the time or
energy to talk as much as we do, because they’re too busy working
those 60-hour-a-week jobs so they can afford to take us out. And
what little time they have, they waste on ridiculous subjects like
football, pizza and Star Wars. Last year, I lived in the girliest
of girly apartments, and every Saturday and Sunday morning, like
clockwork, we would convene at our dinner table and hold a
conference, discussing our dates from the previous evening. Our
agenda: untangling the mysteries of the male mind. Item 1: Is the
phrase "male mind" inherently oxymoronic? But to be perfectly
honest (and I always am), we spend very little time discussing the
questionable existence of the male brain. We concentrate our
energies on another, far more important organ. That’s right, we
talk about click size. All the time. We can’t get enough. We talk
about shape, color, angle, but mostly size. We compare notes, draw
pictures, make graphs; it’s a fixation. We talk about ways to
predetermine how big someone will be. I personally have a method
that is almost guaranteed to work. It has nothing to do with hands,
or feet or height. Let me dispel that little myth; height has
nothing to do with it. No, when I meet someone, and they shake my
hand, I have a little voice that tells me how big they are. They’re
saying, "Nice to meet you," but I’m hearing, "Hi, I have a large
penis." It’s like they’re sending out a signal and I’m tuned in to
that frequency. If you’re worried about how you measure up, you
should be. You ever go to some girl’s house to pick her up for a
date and her roommates look at you kind of funny? They know. We
don’t discuss penises because we envy them, or because we’re
actually obsessed with genitalia. In fact, I challenge you to find
me one woman who wants to look at a penis at any other point than
when sex is about to take place. I’m willing to bet she doesn’t
exist. We talk about penises (and while we’re at it, yeast
infections and foot odor), because we’re relieved to finally have
an opportunity to speak our minds. A funny thing happens when there
aren’t any boys around. We relax; we get crazy; nothing is sacred.
Girls have gotten a bum rap for being competitive. You want to talk
about competitive? Sometimes when I get drunk, I like to talk shit.
I mean crazy talk – challenging complete strangers to fist fights
and drinking contests. Because I think I’m hilarious when I’m
drunk. But there are boys that will take me waaaay too seriously. I
was wrestling this guy in a bar one time, and after I mock-pinned
him, he decided to flip me over, onto my head. When your
masculinity is threatened by a fake wrestling match with a
100-pound girl, you’ve got some issues. You are way too
competitive. Why is it always the boys who act this way, and then
blame us for being the competitive ones? I freely admit that 99
percent of the U.S. population, not just the guys either, can kick
my ass. When I sit around with my girlfriends, I feel nothing but
support (despite the brutal insults and rampant name-calling).
Everyone has a chance to talk; no one interrupts. Somehow, when
boys are around, they tend to dominate the conversation. We’re
expected to listen, to be amused. I was on a date recently where I
only managed to squeeze in five or six sentences during the course
of an entire evening. My date regaled me with boring anecdotes and
inappropriate stories for four hours straight, then asked me at the
end of the evening why I hadn’t appeared to have as great a time as
he had. I can’t remember the last time I felt it was acceptable to
talk for even one hour straight, much less four. So when I come
home from an unfortunate date, it is a great comfort to talk to my
friends about it, and remember the sound of my own voice. And it is
an even greater comfort to mock my date’s haircut, outfit or penis.
Friendship isn’t just about having someone to complain to. Most of
the time, we just try to make each other laugh hard enough to shoot
beer (or gravy, jello or whatever we happen to be drinking/eating)
through our noses. It’s a competition, and I think I’m winning not
because I’m funnier than my friends, but because I have greater
nasal control. I like to test my pick-up lines on my friends. I’m
legendary for my pick-up technique (I’m the quicker picker upper).
Here’s my new one: "I’m afraid I’m going to have to place you under
citizen’s arrest … you’re criminally hot." I also show my friends
my columns before they run. They’re probably not the best test
audience. June, my dear friend and roommate, laughs at everything.
Absolutely everything. We think she might be insane. And my other
friends are always smashed, so everything is funny to them. But
I’ve always preferred short term ego gratification over honest,
constructive criticism. I’ve given up on quality and content, and
have decided to settle for style and cheap laughs. Make that cheap
laughs from a bunch of drunkards. In fact, it is the tipsy
encouragement of my friends which encourages me to push things to
extremes, the territory of any successful comic. Take the following
train of thought, which began as, "What do you want?" ("George
Clooney, on a stick, hold the stick.") After a few minutes with my
friends, I had launched onto the following diatribe: "George
Clooney just keeps getting hotter and hotter, and just when you
think he can’t get any hotter, he does. And your head spontaneously
combusts; you’re sitting in front of the TV, crying tears of blood,
when suddenly your arms fly off your body, thrown free from the
sheer force of hottie, emanating from the screen, so strong, it
manifests itself as a palpable, physical force of nature …" My
friends are great because they’re always up for drink. We go out to
the bars, and anything goes. Alcohol is the key to any successful
friendship. Friends who drink together, vomit in the sink together.
Even in the middle of dead week, we are down at Maloney’s: Jessica
"the alkie" Morgan, Phung "Satan" Tran and Jen "Asian flush"
Conway. We’re down there trying to make sure Sam doesn’t harass too
many girls, and Bob doesn’t beat anyone up. We’re just trying to
keep the boys in line. The reason why straight people can’t sleep
together and remain friends is that our guy friends know that if we
ever saw their penises, they would never hear the end of it. Who
but a true friend could stand to listen to weeks of "why hasn’t he
called?" "I hope he calls soon," and "I’m going to kill that son of
a bitch with my bare hands!" Who else knows exactly when you need a
shoulder to cry on, when you just need a beer, and when a vodka
tonic would be more fitting? Who else understands why it’s OK to
call you "cootch-wad," but breathe a hint of "Kathy," and they are
dead meat? You may wonder why my article ended up being such a
hodgepodge of topics. I told my editor I wanted my last column to
be all about click size. Dick size and impotence. But what I really
wanted to write about in this, my last column ever, is how much I
love my friends, and how important they are to me, how much they
understand my particular version of insanity, and how I hope we’ll
always keep in touch. Katherine Tom Tom bids The Bruin a fond
farewell.