Hell — and Fanwood — Freeze Over

Maybe it is possible that Starr Jones... er, excuse me, Mrs. Al Reynolds really is the Messiah. You see, since it snowed up to my knees over the weekend, Mom is home from school today. This means that she'll not only spend today invading my personal space, like a long, long weekend, but I'll have to put up with Mom's desperate housewife morning television routine: Live with Regis and Kelly at nine, Ellen (who's honestly not all that grating) at ten, and, God help us, The View at eleven. So about ten minutes ago, I catch Mom watching Meredith Vierra, et al, so I steal the remote from her and turn the idiot box off. Which leads to the following conversation:

Mom: Hey, I was watching that!

Me: Well, you shouldn't support Barbara Walters. Did you see her interview with President Bush? She asked him, "Are you a cat person or a dog person?" Seriously, she's a professional journalist, for Christ's sake. Does that question really help create an informed public?

Mom: (agreeing with me although she doesn't want to say it yet) I didn't see that interview.

Me: And Starr Jones... I mean, Starr Jones-Reynolds. She really enlightens the public discourse.

Mom: Okay, put it on channel four.

Not that Jane Pauley is Walter Cronkite or Oprah or anything. I mean, she's barely Montel. But she's still better than Starr Jones-Reynolds, who, if you weren't aware, recently got hitched to some dude named Al. Also, she's under the delusion that her wedding reception from last month somehow spilled over onto the red carpet at the Golden Globes. Anyway...

Me: See Mom, I'm trying to el-e-vate society and you're just happy keeping it down.

All said with appropriate hand motions for "el-e-vate" and "keeping it down."

I was victorious. But that's not why Starr Jones-Reynolds, Princess of Avalon is likely the new Messiah. Mom can't figure out how to use the remote control for the life of her, so it's actually pretty easy for me win a television show victory over her.

Me: Seriously, who has a corporate-sponsored wedding anyway??!!

Mom: I guess you have a point.

Amazing! I got Mom to concede that a non-Paris Hilton celebrity overstepped the bounds of good taste! Mom believes that if you've been featured on "Access Hollywood," you're suddenly sacrosanct — J. Lo could have roasted infant for her Thanksgiving dinner and Mom would tell me I'm being unduly harsh judging her. "The media's just going after her because she's a celebrity and a powerful woman." Yeah, right, Mom.

But there's more...

Me: And did you hear what Starr Jones said about the tsunami?

Mom: No, what did she say?

Me: She said it was a "miracle" she wasn't there because she was just there a month before for her honeymoon, and even though 186,000 people died it's a miracle she wasn't there.

Mom: Okay, that's obnoxious.

In Starr's defense, she probably didn't mean it that way, but it just goes to show how massive her ego is, that she could think of how God chose to spare her before thinking of the tragedy that befell the poor guys serving her margaritas on the beach a month before. I know she's a big girl, but I'm totally stymied as to how that ego of hers manages to cram itself into her corpulent body. Okay, that turned out to not really be in her defense, did it?

Here's the kicker...

Me: Doesn't that make you angry?

Mom: Yes it does.



Thanks to Starr Jones' unbelievably insensitive behavior, I made Mom feel a little bit of the fury that permeates my daily existence! Yay! Now if I could only get her to feel this upset about the non-existent weapons of mass destruction and the appointment of right-wing psycho-Christian federal justices.