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Trophy Wives and Luxury Hotels
Mar. 13th, 2007 07:17 amForget Botox, boob implants, facelifts. The real cosmetic difference between the haves and have-nots is their teeth. Dental hygiene is the closest thing we have to a barometer for social Darwinism. You listen to someone who opens his mouth and flashes great big shiny white incisors. The same words are garbled and lost when the speaker's front teeth are yellowing and irregular.
I was reminded of this once again when after a loooong weekend at the store - things are starting to perk up! - I staggered home to watch back-to-back episodes of The Real Housewives of Orange County, a show with which I've become mildly obsessed.
Why?
Well, I'd like to be a Trophy Wife.
It's not gonna happen. But hey! an overworked, exhausted, struggling middle-aged girl can dream.
And as far as I can tell, all that stands between me and my dreams is 20 pounds, breast implants and about $15,000 worth of Smile Enhancement, a cosmetic procedure I could snag for approximately one-third of its American price tag by flying to Bangkok. (Extra added bonus: I could see the Emerald Buddha up close and personal plus spend a couple of relaxing afternoons in a brothel!)
The most interesting of The Real Housewives to me is Jeana, the portly, stoic real estate agent - among the top closers of multi-million dollar properties in California - philosophically making the best of a bad marriage, blunt and unapologetic about her own materialism: "Why have three Mercedes when you can have four?"
Jeana pulled off the Trophy Wife thing right. She cemented the deal when she was young and beautiful. Former Playmate; parlayed the Playboy Mansion fixture gig into marriage to a successful baseball player. Blow jobs? Been there; done that. Now that she's middle-aged, the only thing that passes her lips are the forbidden foods of her girlhood - ice cream, chocolate cake - although she never eats where the camera can see her.
One senses on the other hand that Lauri - recent fiancée of a rich land developer - spends a lot of time on her knees, fighting that gag reflex. Lauri perforce is my Trophy Wife role model! Lauri is blonde, of course. I'm not. The Trophy Wife bylaws don't strictly stipulate "blonde" but the vast majority of club members are. Plus Lauri is athletic and except for my bicycle riding, I'm really not. (And I can't take up tennis because I have no hand eye coordination whatsoever!) But I suppose a really good trainer could figure out Nautilus embraces that after four months or so would make my body look athletic, right? (Okay, maybe six months.) And appearances are everything.
Of course, the main thing standing between me and my dream is my attitude - I fucking hate rich white men. I want to beat them to death with their own sense of entitlement. But surely I could keep my mouth closed - yet open when a flaccid Viagra-teased cock was about to be inserted into it - until the pre-nup was signed and the tasteful, beach-side ceremony at the Pebble Beach Lodge concluded?
I mean, couldn't I?
A girl can dream…
In other news, the Little Store had an almost okay weekend - meaning just under my sales projections. We're tracking to last year's figures. Good given that Cannery Row is one big ugly construction zone and therefore tourism in general is down. Bad in that the business is not showing growth. I would say two-thirds of our sales are to repeat customers - we have incredibly high retention, a devoted customer following.
At some indeterminate point in the future, the construction will be a new luxury hotel. Ridiculous! 'The one thing Cannery Row does not need is a new luxury hotel. The luxury hotels in Pebble Beach do well enough all year round but that's because Pebble Beach has all those golf courses, and tucked away on a private road you have to pay eight bucks to even drive on, is the enclave of the wealthy and discrete.
As far as I can tell -- and the the tourism revenue figures, publicly available, support this -- the other luxury hotels on the peninsula sit empty most of the year. I mean, c'mon! If you had the money to burn on a luxury suite with a wood-burning fireplace and a pink Jacuzzi, would you really want a view of Kitsch Central and Bubba Gump's outside your glass-enclosed balcony? I think not.
But just as "Rosebud" was engraved on Charles Foster Kane's heart, and "Why have ten Mercedes when you can have twelve?" on Jeana's, so the phrase "luxury hotel" is incised on ___ __________, Mister Cannery Row Company's black, corroding aorta. It will bubble up in mucous and despair when he finally expires. And in twenty years - thanks, Global Warming! - all vestiges of his empire will be gone.
I was reminded of this once again when after a loooong weekend at the store - things are starting to perk up! - I staggered home to watch back-to-back episodes of The Real Housewives of Orange County, a show with which I've become mildly obsessed.
Why?
Well, I'd like to be a Trophy Wife.
It's not gonna happen. But hey! an overworked, exhausted, struggling middle-aged girl can dream.
And as far as I can tell, all that stands between me and my dreams is 20 pounds, breast implants and about $15,000 worth of Smile Enhancement, a cosmetic procedure I could snag for approximately one-third of its American price tag by flying to Bangkok. (Extra added bonus: I could see the Emerald Buddha up close and personal plus spend a couple of relaxing afternoons in a brothel!)
The most interesting of The Real Housewives to me is Jeana, the portly, stoic real estate agent - among the top closers of multi-million dollar properties in California - philosophically making the best of a bad marriage, blunt and unapologetic about her own materialism: "Why have three Mercedes when you can have four?"
Jeana pulled off the Trophy Wife thing right. She cemented the deal when she was young and beautiful. Former Playmate; parlayed the Playboy Mansion fixture gig into marriage to a successful baseball player. Blow jobs? Been there; done that. Now that she's middle-aged, the only thing that passes her lips are the forbidden foods of her girlhood - ice cream, chocolate cake - although she never eats where the camera can see her.
One senses on the other hand that Lauri - recent fiancée of a rich land developer - spends a lot of time on her knees, fighting that gag reflex. Lauri perforce is my Trophy Wife role model! Lauri is blonde, of course. I'm not. The Trophy Wife bylaws don't strictly stipulate "blonde" but the vast majority of club members are. Plus Lauri is athletic and except for my bicycle riding, I'm really not. (And I can't take up tennis because I have no hand eye coordination whatsoever!) But I suppose a really good trainer could figure out Nautilus embraces that after four months or so would make my body look athletic, right? (Okay, maybe six months.) And appearances are everything.
Of course, the main thing standing between me and my dream is my attitude - I fucking hate rich white men. I want to beat them to death with their own sense of entitlement. But surely I could keep my mouth closed - yet open when a flaccid Viagra-teased cock was about to be inserted into it - until the pre-nup was signed and the tasteful, beach-side ceremony at the Pebble Beach Lodge concluded?
I mean, couldn't I?
A girl can dream…
In other news, the Little Store had an almost okay weekend - meaning just under my sales projections. We're tracking to last year's figures. Good given that Cannery Row is one big ugly construction zone and therefore tourism in general is down. Bad in that the business is not showing growth. I would say two-thirds of our sales are to repeat customers - we have incredibly high retention, a devoted customer following.
At some indeterminate point in the future, the construction will be a new luxury hotel. Ridiculous! 'The one thing Cannery Row does not need is a new luxury hotel. The luxury hotels in Pebble Beach do well enough all year round but that's because Pebble Beach has all those golf courses, and tucked away on a private road you have to pay eight bucks to even drive on, is the enclave of the wealthy and discrete.
As far as I can tell -- and the the tourism revenue figures, publicly available, support this -- the other luxury hotels on the peninsula sit empty most of the year. I mean, c'mon! If you had the money to burn on a luxury suite with a wood-burning fireplace and a pink Jacuzzi, would you really want a view of Kitsch Central and Bubba Gump's outside your glass-enclosed balcony? I think not.
But just as "Rosebud" was engraved on Charles Foster Kane's heart, and "Why have ten Mercedes when you can have twelve?" on Jeana's, so the phrase "luxury hotel" is incised on ___ __________, Mister Cannery Row Company's black, corroding aorta. It will bubble up in mucous and despair when he finally expires. And in twenty years - thanks, Global Warming! - all vestiges of his empire will be gone.
