Blonde I Go Tanning Girl

The Christmas Shopping Season offered me the chance to not only verify the accuracy of my recent analysis of the soon-to-be-late Abercrombie and Fitch Co. (then again, perhaps they'll go back to what John Steinbeck said they did best - barometers), but also to check the status of the Blonde I Go Tanning Girl.

Upon mentioning her, even the dog's ears prick up and the suspicion in his eyes is readable. It seems the Blonde I Go Tanning girl can just by name arouse all the fear of a bath in even the most loving canine. But clearly the dog, I and anyone else that are rather, to put it bluntly, freaked out by the Blonde I Go Tanning girl are in the minority, because she's multiplying.

And how! I was privvy to her inception years back. There were always one or two tanning places in town, eeking out an existence until the last of the 1980s trophy wives moved to Florida. Then, suddently, Malignant Melanoma Mania was born! Who or what is to blame? "Baywatch?" Perhaps Pam, Donna, Gena and the cadre of blonde lifeguards really were taking up too much time among the adolescents and, by the looks of it, of the neglectful husbands too! The 1990s? Did the pre-dot com burst really leave suburbanites with so much cash that they invested in tanning because there was nowhere else to put the income!?

I think it's simply teenage immediacy reinforced by education and pitiful experience. Life does, after all, end at 30, if not 25. Didn't you see Logan's Run? Okay, so she hasn't, either. But seriously! Come home from cheerleading practice and see Mom mixing Prozac and Valium while sneaking swigs of Smirnoff after a rough-and-tumble day of doing anything to not look so much over 30 while Dad comes home in his prized Boxster to retire to his den with Johnnie Walker because today's Wednesday and the fellas can't play golf until Thursday...

If they went to Church, they'd probably pray for cancer!

Of course one mustn't generalize so they say, but 9/10 times this is a pretty fair bet. Whatever the cause, she arose! If blondes have more fun, the Blonde I Go Tanning Girl is the queen of fun. She arises to High School drama which will soon enough be State College drama (no difference) with endless nights at the bar or in his arms (he has many names by the time she graduates) all drowned by the screams of "Bitch, finish that shit!" from a fellow girl who can, you know, relate. Their teachers in high school and now even moreso in college are teaching them little more than just how awesome they are, so bottom's up! Take the keys to the Jag and joy-ride that thing down the highway until the tank runs dry. Top out at 180 and go with it, blurred visions on the side of the road all that you'll have when she finally stalls out.

Did I say freaked out? Clearly this is only half my attitude, because pity is what I see resonating from my words. No freaked here.

But I am repulsed by the Blonde I Go Tanning Girl. Especially the19 or 20 year old that started when she was 15. Week in, week out, perhaps even 3 times a week for 5 years. No melanoma yet, that's years away, but... whoa...

LEATHERFACE!

Caked Revlon compounds, moisturizer and all that UV... throw in a chainsaw and I'll pay a quarter to see it around Halloween. But Christmas? No. It's become an obsession, and ironically she'll look 30 well before she's 25 thanks to those "beds." But for now she's living the life, empowered by all the literature, Dad's pocketbook and her own set of keys, perhaps well on her way to a Gender Studies major before finally settling down to life after 30, or death.

*Sigh*

Clarification

It did not happen because of this blog or through people who actually know me, but I need to start spreading a little bit of knowledge just in case this latest rumor hits major media outlets and people get the impression I was trying to put on some kind of ploy to feed off another's fire.

Clarification: I am not Gary Busey.

I am not related to Gary Busey, did not serve as his stunt double in Predator 2, and cannot lay claim to influencing son Jake Busey's fine performance in Starship Troopers. Silly, right? Given the sexy pictures I post of myself, it's not too hard to differentiate me from him:

(Killed his Landlord)

Alas, because of my local prominence, I don't have complete control over all of the numerous amounts of photographs taken of me on a daily basis. As a result, it might be that I just had a headache or something when this happened:

(Mike Glud)	(Gary Busey circa 1987)

There you have it - oh, the confusion!

I've been forwarding all the fan mail to Gary, and will continue to do so until people get the message. I don't know if that's a good thing, though, because I unknowingly opened a few of the letters ('cause who checks the address when it's at your door, anyway?) and 2/3 started off something like "You starred in Point Break. What was Keanu like before he was famous? Oh, I just love his performance! He really brings out the..." I had to stop there, and immediately lit a candle for Gary Busey.

Guns Don't Kill People...

What, me, Worry?

On or about March 13, 1993 the phrase "Take a Chill Pill" officially died. I was not there to witness it, but this was the day Mrs. Penny Joy of one Bird Elementary School in Plymouth, Michigan offered this advice to calm down a rambunctious third grader who was more than a little bit upset that a fifth grader had taken his basketball at recess. The adaptation of hip slang worked, if only out of shocking the young lad into a five minute catatonic trance.

MTV, which isn't good for much of anything, did a fine job describing the death of "Bling Bling" after its eventual use in Wine Spectator or something like that, but nobody was really sad to see it go. Honestly, it probably took some effort by the powers that be to supplant that afer the miserable failure of getting "Who Dat" and "Hoody Hoo" into white mainstream, who make up about 90% of the Hip Hop and Rap market.

But "Take a Chill Pill" died all too soon. Granted, "Chill Out" and its younger brother "Chill" are still around, and if Mrs. Joy hadn't been so bold perhaps five years later Ritalin could have found a cool street name (or, even by that time, Valium coulda taken the title), but it had a nice ring to it. While "Chill" is just a spontaneous act of calming down, "Take a Chill Pill" implies recognition of one's problems and conscious mental medication.

Sure, I can Chill Out, but that's just rejecting my problems for the time being only to unleash my pent up frustrations later on down the road. Why not stop, do a little self-analysis, and just drop that stress like a bad habit? Take a chill... pill, if you will.

Now, I know better than to get into psychology. Frankly, I don't know anything about psychology. This girl told me last year that if you dream and there's a clock that means something dirty, which frankly I think is hogwash. What I do know is that, since there's no universal Chill Pill, and because winners don't do drugs, maybe a little mental fixation on something that could be your personal Pill of Chill is in order...

You know, if there was any way to say "Chill Pill" in any combination without sounding like a complete tool, this would be a lot easier.

...In my case, behold:

(See! No fingertips!)

For anyone that had to ask, the "lady who's sure..." in Led Zeppelin's "Stairway to Heaven" is buying the stairway for about $.99 a step. The steps are metaphors for cups of Wendy's chilli. Accept no substitutes - believe me, I've tried. While I wouldn't recommend eating it, adding a cup of Burger King chilli to your tank will add about 4 HP to your engine, and every little bit helps when you're riding a behemoth like mine.