At Television Without Pity headquarters there’s a special room where people in hazmat suits hose you down after you finish writing a recap of a really toxic show, and usually you’re okay. But I think I was exposed to unsafe levels of the Liza Minnelli and David Gest wedding special on VH1 last year, because now I am actually kind of sad that they’re separating.

By the way, that link to the recap will take you to Page 4–the halfway point–for safety reasons. And also because last night someone told me that TWoP recaps are too long. (Here it is from the beginning if you disagree.)

Shut up: shopping carts are scary.

I really should mention that the nightmare shopping carts were METAL ones. Dorky plastic ones like this do not inspire terror in me.

Also, an alert reader wrote in to ask me if I’d seen 28 Days Later…, which had a scene involving “a whole mess of shopping carts.” And hey–I did see it. Maybe that’s where the creepiness comes from.

The house where I lived in the bad dream I had last night was here in the city, and it stood close to the street. I was renting an upstairs room there. The tiny front yard was paved over, and it was filled with shopping carts; the woman who was my landlady used them or maybe rented them out. In the story of the dream in my head, the lady would stomp down the front steps and shove the carts together or else against the chain link fence; she would move and rearrange and struggle with them every morning.

I didn’t know the landlady. Somehow I had never spoken with her. I supposed I would, someday.

Then it was night and I was in bed, listening to the sounds outside–the little wheels scraping around, the carts agitating; somebody was pushing them around hard, then harder. The landlady must be upset, I thought. And then suddenly I could hear her downstairs. She was screaming. First, one wordless, hysterical, angry sentence of a scream. I wanted to block it out as soon as I heard it. Then the screaming continued. She was completely losing her shit. I didn’t want to be where I was.

It seemed she was coming up the stairs with that voice of hers. She was screaming something but I couldn’t make out what. My head was foggy from sleep, and but I knew I had to figure out what was going on. I didn’t know what I was going to do when she got to my room but I would have to act quickly. She was definitely coming up the stairs and I could hear her feet. My head was so heavy and it was all I could do to lift it, and my mind pushed and pushed until it woke me up.

And how was your Sunday night?

Somebody emailed me and took issue with my whole boy denouncement and wanted to know if it was a universal thing or what. Just so I am not biting off the head of EVERYONE here, I will permit occasional, conversational use of the “b” word. Chronic usage of “Boy” for purposes of narrative continuity is still frowned upon. Or is petulantly stomped upon. Or has eyes rolled at it. Okay, mostly that last one.

For some reason I hate it when women use the word “boy” to refer to their current, past, or potential love interests. I hate it compulsively. I hate it even more when the word is capitalized (The Boy and I went to the museum today…) or else modified for cutesy characterization purposes (Bookstore Boy left me a voice mail!). I know: people do this a lot. Maybe you do this. That’s fine, but please know that when you say boy it makes me want to shove you until you lose a shoe or else drop your purse or some other accessory that I could then pick up and use to smack you.

And don’t go telling me it’s okay to say “boy” because guys call us “girls.” Yes, it’s annoying and patronizing; no, it’s not the same thing. When guys say girls instead of women it’s a pain in the ass, but it’s somehow a democratic one: girls are everywhere, girls are in songs; girls, girls, girls are the crazy sexy army guys are up against, and that’s a whole other war game I won’t get into here, but it’s one I grew up dealing with, and I can sort of see the truth of it all, even from my side of things. But boys are something else; you rarely hear them spoken of in the plural form. It’s always The Boy; the one; the boy band, even, where three to six guys become sublimated into the one idea, the single entity, the He Who Only Exists In Relation To You–every boy is that, you see; which is to say, every guy that you decide to call boy, one at a time, whenever you try to tell the story of yourself. I get sick of hearing it, that’s all.

But go on, say it. Say “Boy.” Say “I am Pretty Princess Protagonist and the whole world is my very own fucking pony party.” And then grow up.

I touched *BOB*!!!! And I got to talk to her, too. I went to this show on Saturday night. Some of the pictures on that last link might not be work-appropriate, and of course I mean that in the best way.

Also went to the Gaper’s Block party on Friday. That was fun, too, although there weren’t quite as many pasties there.