We Are Not Idiots

When I was in tenth grade, my marketing teacher offended me while showing us a movie in class. It wasn't the specific movie that was the problem. It was the fact that she showed the movie over several days, and each day after the first, she would rewind the movie by 15-20 minutes to "remind everyone what was happening." It offended me so much that she thought we couldn't remember what was happening for 24 hours.  Looking back, it's clear she just didn't feel like teaching and was trying to drag out the movie as much as possible. Also offensive.

Bitchy gossipy moment: I am 38. That teacher is on Facebook, and claims she's 41. I was 15 when she was my teacher. Grow up woman! Own your age.

For the last several years, I've noticed tv shows do this as well. The first minute of a tv show recaps what happened on the last episode. What the fuck? We can remember what happened a week ago. This is just ridiculous and once again, I'm offended.

Still Got It

When I was 12, I started babysitting. My first babysitting kid was a one-year old named Andrew who called himself Ah-new. After he'd go to sleep, I would watch VH1's Standup Spotlight or whatever it was called. Rosie O'Donnell hosted, and what I remember most are two things:

1. That I wished she wouldn't bother introducing other comedians, and she would just do all the comedy for the entire show; and
2. That she would stop introducing every single comedian by saying, "Coming to the stage right now, is a very funny friend of mine ..."

To this day I'm very sensitive about tossing around the term "friend" and was the same way as a 12 year old. I was sure she couldn't possibly be friends with ALL those comedians. I had no understanding of the comedy circuit - that they all played the same clubs, all studied at Groundlings or that other place together - and that they truly were, all friends.

When Rosie got her talk show, I was thrilled. Of course, I thought she overdid talking about her crush on Tom Cruise so much (maybe that was my gaydar that I didn't know existed?), but still found her hilarious. As I am, she was from Long Island. She never watered down her thick New York accent. Like Rosie Perez, or Tony Danza, it was part of her schtick.

Eventually I kind of ... forgot about her? Kathy Griffin has been so much more prominent the last decade or so. Everyone including me loves Jimmy Fallon. Lately I've been digging Michael McIntyre for comedy, though I seem to be the only American who knows of him.

Recently though, Rosie was in the news for getting a divorce, and then doing a comedy special last month. I just watched it (on Youtube) and you know what? She's just as funny as she was when I was 12. Maybe I'm wildly immature, but maybe, just maybe she can appeal to a 12 year old AND a 38 year old all at the same time. I wish she did more comedy specials. I don't need to see her argue with Elizabeth Hasselback.

*The only thing I didn't like about her comedy special was how much time she spent making jokes about her 18 yr old's penis. I was embarrassed for him. Rosie O'Donnell is so funny she could have spent that time joking about so many other things without talking about that.