Wanna Rip It Up?

Everytime the clueless skater dude from the Domino's XLP commercial utters that line, I crack up.

The whole commercial is funny. Part of it, is him riding a big ass scooter in the hallway of an apartment building wearing a bike helmet. The other part is his ultra skater-dude vernacular.

Even, I - the very unskater-like Queen of Cliqueness - knows that ripping it up is a term used in extreme sports to reference getting your skate on. But skater dude's voice came to me very clearly as I was lying in bed watching The Apprentice, Monday night.

With hubby watching something else downstairs and Princess A on the PC myspacing, I had no one to talk to. Most times watching television by my lonely is okay. When viewing Medium, Cold Case and Law & Order: CI - it's mandatory. Momma's only "me" time.

But reality TV is a communal viewing experience. You need someone there, by your side, to dissect the stupidity of the contestants, tear them a new butt hole when idiotic decisions quickly become the order of the day, and gripe about the ones you love to hate.

Shout out to Jade! Here's to hating ya, Boo.

In other words, reality tv ain't jack without someone to help you rip it up, literally.

I came to this realization only last week as I was reading ANTM updates on various blogs. When I was done, I had visited no less than three sites. The meaner the blog in ripping the show apart the more gleeful, was I - think giggling, laughing and co-signing with every entry.

Now, in all honesty, this could very well be a sickness. I mean, how healthy is it mentally to feel good about digging into a person's public missteps? Or, getting a joyful release from calling them names when they don't get "it" right - it being anything you disagree with.

I'm thinking not very.

Still, it's RTV, a genre that will and has taken itself to the lowest lows to catch a rating.

Temptation Island, anyone?

Even the shows that have a shred of dignity left...wait? Which ones are those?

The Apprentice? Does anyone even play that silly "Beat The Trump" contest? It screams of copying Deal or No Deal's pick the case with the 10K, only much much stupider!

Survivor? True, they're still holding on. But the last four seasons I've skipped the middle and watched the last two eps. Even with this season's twist, the solo banishment for a night, wasn't enough to picque my interest.

Side note: Did you know Survivor is on season 12? How scary is that?

The mother of RTV, the Real World? Please! First, it's NOTHING like the real world, at all. At least it used to be a little more realistic-ish, before they started choosing candidates whose only goal in life was to make it on Real World.

Yikes! Now that is some scary insight into our future leaders, there.

Being among the original demographic of Real World back in the early 90's, I stayed tune for a long time. But now the show is a walking cliche - hot tub shots, streaking, boob flashing and drunken nights on the town. None of that ish is interesting for longer than 60 seconds.

Ay, Real World, do us all a favor and put yourself out to pasture, already.

Maybe dignity isn't a good word to use to describe the traits of any RTV show. My original point was, good RTV or bad, watching it alone is like watching bad porn by yourself - it just ain't fun.

Watching it solo gives it too much power. Pushes it too far up on your priority list as if it's actually more worthy of your time than the million and one other important things you could be doing like exercising, washing your hair or de-linting your cat.

I can justify blowing off writing for an hour to watch Law & Order: CI because it's a good, edge-of-your-seat, procedural.

But, unless I can lump spending some quality time with the fam in there, watching The Apprentice should not be a gotta watch event.

Yet, I watched both it and
America's Next Top Model alone, this week. And now I feel all shallow and self-absorbed.

So here's my solution: next week I'll trick the fam into watching it with me. I haven't worked out the deets yet...but I'll find something.

Now, just in case I can't sweet talk, cajole, or threaten them into it, I'm gonna need the following bloggers to promise to post about ANTM immediately after the show:
BitterVibes
Novaslim
Fourfour:Learning is for suckas

Shoot, I gotta have somebody to rip it up with me!