I'm not going to name any names here, but I am getting REALLY tired of the fangirlishness that has been going on in my house lately. I'm built like a cross between Tim Robbins and Jeff Bridges in the "Big Lebowsk" and I am finding it incredibly difficult to compete with the barrage of androgynous elf-things that seem to make the women I'm immediately connected to wiggle. I'm sorry if it's weird for a guy to actually be sensitive about his appearance and make unfair comparisons to whatever is around him. It's one of the reasons why I don't watch broadcast television anymore. But now I'm being inundated by pictures and stories of Italian homosexual vampire castratis. (Or whatever they are, I'm tired and it's taking a great effort for me even to type this shit down and it's just off the top of my head.) I stopped being cute and androgynous when I turned 20, thanks to an incredibly abusive, controlling, and stifling relationship who at least kept me well-fed during my final stages of development. In the span of 3 years I grew from being 6'6" and barely 190 lbs, to 6'6" and 270 lbs. I'm pretty active, but I'm nowhere near "well-developed" I still have a bit of garbage in front of me and my arms and legs aren't nearly as toned as I'd like them to be. And yeah, it's nice to know that you guys still find me attractive, but when you can the sigh over the Ziggy Stardust figure that just walked in front of our car in the same goddamned breath, it kinda invalidates that statement. (Or to use a GUY example here: How would you feel if I told you that I found you beautiful, but then ended that comment with: "You're blocking the set though, honey, Angelina Jolie just took her top off is starting to writhe.") It's great that you think I'm attractive, ladies, honestly. But I know for a fact that when I walk by I don't turn any of you into a slack-jawed, bulging-eye, puddle of nonsensical syllables. And yeah you can sour-grapes it by saying "But I bet he's a lousy lay" or "I bet he's gay." Since when have EITHER of those theoretical qualities derailed a woman from pursuing a guy who gives her the throbbing wet-stains? Quite a few women I know of are willing to overlook mediocre sex, and others still see a homosexual man as nothing more than a challenge. It makes me wonder sometimes if the people around me are going to start carrying roofies the next time they hit Ember's so that they can drag some lithe man-woman home and chain him to the bedposts. (Great, now I've GIVEN them the idea to do it. Sheesh.) Yeah, you can call me your hot Numenorian stud all you want, but guess what, Viggo Mortenson is now about as passe as Ricardo Montalban these days. It's great for people to tell me how attractive I am, but people don't exactly demonstrate it to me anymore.

It's getting to the point where I thinking about spending the next three years glued to a Nautilus machine while mainlining baby formula in order to tone down to whatever lofty goal is the feminine ideal. And even still I don't have any guarantee that I'll be considered any woman's masturbation fantasy, because probably by the time I get the Brad Pitt Seal of Approval things will change so that Ray Romano is considered the new hotness. You know, I find a wide array of women attractive, but I don't look at every pretty face that passes by and say "Well, I got something new to think about it the shower." There are days when I look at myself in the mirror, sigh, and say "The reason why women aren't passing out from arousal when you enter a room is because: 1, you're over 6 feet; 2, you have the physical build of silly putty that's been left out too long; and 3, you're not gay." Yes people, being homosexual seems to make women all the more attracted to you, and then people wonder why ugly right-wingers persecute the gays. I don't know what I'm gonna do to change this shite state of affairs, folks. I've been working out for the last year, but I haven't even achieved a half-way decent set of abs. (But my thighs have actually gotten BIGGER because of the walking I do.) If I'm going to be working out and getting back in shape, it's going to be for my benefit, not yours. And plus, for the amount of work that I'd need to achieve what is currently considered insta-hot for you guys, you'd barely see me, let alone see me naked. And before you point at my stacks of pornography and counter how I'm attracted to women who are probably more interested in maintaining appearances before anythig else, let me say this: You don't hear me get wistful about the S-curve between Miss February's bust and waist on a regular basis, do you? Yes, I know you guys claim to be attracted to more body types than those who are emaciated, androgynous, and Annie Lennox-esque, but for the last month and a half I've been bombarded by images of reedy European 19-somethings that look longingly into each others eyes. Hell, it's getting to the point where I've been thing about hanging around the leather-bear set, not because you're turning me gay, but at least I'll be in an environment where people actually DO appreciate guys who look like a stray Kodiak that's gotten into your depilatory. Yeah, I know that in order to look better to other people, I need to feel better about myself, but currently I feel like Camryn Manheim in the dressing room for Miss Teen USA. It just isn't an environment that's conductive for positive image building. Hell, I'd be better off chopping wood out in some remote cabin in the Yukon than surrounded by women who still act like they're 12 years old and watching Labyrinth at a sleepover.

And you can go ahead and tell me how attractive you find the forementioned Mortensen and Liam Neeson and try making comparisons in that direction. But I can count the times you've gotten fluttery over either of those two gentlemen in the last 3 years on one hand. Hell, I have to wake up to a poster of Johnny Depp playing the piano with a hangover and a cigarette dangling from his mouth and know for a fact that I look like the ass-end of a badger that's been shaved first thing in the morning. I'm sorry if I continue to get insecure about my appearance, but honestly people, you guys aren't making it any easier. For fuck's sake, I find myself longing for the era when Burt Reynolds was considered Man Supreme. And that was the *70s*, people: a decade of manufactured fabrics and nausea-inducing color coordination. I'm hoping that with the cracking of the human genome, they'll find out what the androgynous gene is and render it down to pill form. It'd make Eli Lilly a killing. I know I'm ranting here, and much of what I've has been on the exagerrated side. But telling me to feel better about myself is like telling a Jenny Craig member to get positive by strapping a safe to her back and have her march up a steep hill lined with jeering frat boys. I'm sure the Bataan death march was a more encouraging environment. And yeah, you guys aren't going out of your way to make me feel bad about myself. But you've been talking about the same goddamned thing for a fucking month. Most Republicans can't even focus for that long. And if pretty guys are one of the few things that make you happy, where the hell does that put me? You guys have already voiced your disgust about Braunschweiger, which doesn't make my situation any better because I currently feel like fucking chopped liver. So you guys are gonna have to excuse me for the next few weeks while I try to prise my way out of my mental funk with a truckload of lesbian pornography involving Russ Meyer-esque women, okay? I know that Dita Von Teese would probably be offended by the idea that I'm breathing the same atmosphere as she does, but she's got a great ass.