i read it in the bottom of a trash can

I’m glad that Jimbo’s girlfriend is not the heiress to the throne of some foreign country. If she was and someone from one of the tabloid newspapers saw us together, the press would have a field day reminding everyone that Jimbo is not a really attractive man. As a matter of fact, they would make constant humor about how grotesquely ugly I was.

The particular notion that has me thanking my lucky stars this evening is the press coverage of the marriage of Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles. Now I will be the first to concede that Ms. Bowles is not blessed with super-model looks, nor is her fiancé likely to grace the cover of GQ anytime soon. I would say they are an average-looking couple and there is nothing wrong with that. I would also strongly argue that neither of them are ghoulish in appearance, but if you read about them-- especially Ms. Bowles-- you might conclude that a lengthy observation of them would induce projectile vomiting. We are a society that tends toward hyperbole, especially those in the tabloid newspapers and on tabloid television. Am I wrong or are the racks ahead of the supermarket checkout lanes and the televised airways way too full of the tabloid crap? It’s like our lives are so meaningless that the only way we can be fulfilled is to have minute-to-minute updates on the doings of Brad and Jennifer, or reading about a space alien mother who repeatedly ejaculates tiny Elvis clones.

I think we need to get over the fact that Prince Charles and Ms. Bowles are not the world’s homeliest couple and that Jen and Brad can live their lives in peace and the invasion of Elvis clones is not coming. Why do we set the standards for our celebrities so high and our politicians so low?

All I can hope for tonight is that the tabloids don’t start following my girlfriend around and Entertainment Tonight doesn’t interrupt their coverage of Brad and Jen to question Jimbo’s girlfriend’s taste in men. Or wondering aloud if she may be dating a James Lipton look-alike. Or the headline blazes from the National Enquirer:

Jimbo’s girlfriend dates ghoul from another world

And they have pictures to prove it. It is likely, however, we will sneak under the radar of the pulp media and my fears about ridicule by the tabloids will be unrealized.

Sometimes in Jimbo’s world dreams do come true.