tanning: what's the big deal?

what's the obsession with looking sun-tanned?

i don't get it. i don't get what's so great about looking bronzed, or what's so wrong with looking pale if you're just naturally that way.

that thought hit me earlier today, when i ran out to the drugstore. one of the cashiers had the worst fake tan i had ever seen. as in...take a look at the blogger logo. it was that kind of awful.

my thoughts jumped as follows:

• this looks ridiculous.
• it's absurd that she would do that to herself.
• as absurd as it is that she would slather such bad fake tanner on herself, it's still more absurd that people would spend time in the sun, or in a tanning bed, to do something similar to themselves. sure, that doesn't turn you orange, but it may give you cancer, and it makes your skin look wrinkled and tough by the time you're thirty-five.
  

so, what's the big deal about tanning, anyway? i don't find myself more attracted to tan people than to non-tanned people. maybe i'm in the minority in that regard, i don't know. but, the fact that people go to such absurd lengths to look sunny and bronzed just doesn't compute.

good thing i don't eat popcorn.

you've all seen the Orville Redenbacher SmartPop ad with the frisky women having the 100 calorie party where they throw the popcorn at each other, right? i'll never watch that ad the same way again after something that one of my roommates said tonight. after the ad concluded, he remarked:

"i have a sudden urge to eat popcorn. i think it has something to do with the pillow fight all those women are having after the party. [long pause] you're gonna get some cunnilingus, or my name isn't Orville Redenbacher!!!"

even though he said this in real life, he wins at least five internets for saying that. he wins a real-life or two as well.