SomaCow

Can you feel the excitement building, and the wafting odor of chum and rotting fish?

No, it’s not the “Oprah” studio audience. It’s Shark Week!

For those guys who are so unbelievably effeminate that you don’t know what Shark Week is, stop reading my blog, set down your white zinfandel, and go
look up the lyrics to some Enya songs. Fairies.

For those of you who are female, I will explain what Shark Week is, and what it means to a man.

Every summer, the Discovery Channel takes a break from its inane programming of giving trivia quizzes in a taxicab to people who were too stupid to hire
a limo, busting the myth that holding an Alka-Seltzer in your mouth while administering oral sex will make your partner squeal with anything other than
revulsion and pity-laughter, and trying their best to make grimy, illiterate fishermen seem like they are doing something adventurous with their lives
(when, in fact, we all suspect that after being out chasing their deadliest catch for about two weeks with no women, they probably start trying the
Alka-Seltzer thing on each other), and dishes up an actual MANLY series of programs that actual MEN are interested in: the fury of nature’s perfect
predator, the shark, with semi-pornographic voice-overs by Sigourney Weaver.

Why do men love sharks? Because we envy them. They eat the way we wish we could eat. They mate the way we wish we could mate. Then there is the
tiny, rudimentary, prehistoric brain. The sharks wish they had one. Like mine. Sharks are the briny equivalent of ninjas, and you KNOW how men love
ninjas. If you happen to walk into the room while the man in your life is watching Shark Week, and he is grimacing, it isn’t because he is disgusted by
what YOU perceive as a repulsive, gory, frenzy of destruction. It’s because he is practicing making a shark face to use with you later in the bedroom.

Granted, most of the videos shown during Shark Week were shot in the late 1980s and feature men with tufts of gray chest hair that are so long they stick
up out of their wetsuits against their throats, like geriatric chinterbush, but we tolerate that in order to see the sharks, man, the SHARKS!

To guys, sharks represent freedom and rebellion. Sometimes, in a fit of shark-like frustration and rage, I will gnash my teeth, thrash my head wildly from
side to side and make a noise that I think sounds like a shark*. This rarely makes the waitress bring my petite bruschetta appetizer any faster, but it does
usually make my wife agree for us to leave the antique shop/jewelry store/nail salon sooner.

Since women are not so much into sharks, they really don’t understand them. Here are some shark facts to bring you ladies up to speed:

Other fearsome creatures that a shark would beat in a fight:
Bull rhino
Bengal tiger
Ryan Seacrest

Things that a shark would say at a cocktail party:
“wrorrrrragh!”
“blubglupbuhlup”
“Does this Ryan Seacrest taste funny to you?”

Things you could make out of a shark’s extremely rough skin, if you could kill one:
Scary wallet
Ferocious underpants
Truly unpleasant condoms

So, let your man revel during this year’s Shark Week. Let him dream. Let him indulge his inner shark.

Just don’t let him near you with an Alka-Seltzer.

*According to women, it actually sounds like I am choking on bad clams.

Marriage is an institution within which a man can aspire to become better than he already is, through the guidance of a woman leading him on the road to enlightenment.

(Just kiddin’, guys, I only put that up there because I figured your wives were reading over your shoulders right now. At this point, though, I think it’s safe to assume that she is off attending to some important cleaning behind the refrigerator, or ordering ridiculously expensive “window treatments” (what you and I call “bed sheets”), so we can now talk openly.)

Don’t get me wrong, I love women, but there is a sure-fire indicator that a wife has driven her husband totally nuts: he starts sentences by saying “Don’t get me wrong, I love women, but…”

As far as I can tell, there are only two problems with marriage:

1. There are too many women involved.
2. Those women are reluctant to wear the sexy Little Bo Peep costume that you rented from “Whores D’Oeuvres”.

Mickey seems to have a big problem with the fact that wives can become ex-wives, at which point it costs you half of your hard-earned money. But when you consider that women make up over half of the work force, half of every penny that you currently earn and spend goes straight to them anyway. The women then spend that money on purchases from diet and fitness infomercials featuring Suzanne Somers. The difference appears to be that when you hand your money to a cashier (or waitress, or stripper), you get satisfying goods and/or services in return; whereas, when you hand your money to your ex-wife, you get stories about how her new boyfriend Todd managed to convince her finally to try anal sex, and now she can’t get enough of it.

As far as grounds for divorce goes, Florida appropriately treats it like car insurance: we’re a no-fault state. We should thank God for this, guys, because, in other states, your wife can divorce you for using the ice dispenser while Grey’s Anatomy is on, or for not refilling the potpourri containers in a timely manner. In those states, YOU, an innocent bystander in your marriage, can have the blame placed squarely on your shoulders for not seeing mediocre, quarterly sex as sufficient motive to get out of bed at 3am to check the house, because your wife dreamed that lawn maintenance workers had invaded the living room and were putting their muddy feet up on the chaise lounge while smoking cigars with no ashtrays.

Mickey’s vision also contains a crapload of paperwork. I hate paperwork more than you will someday hate Todd.
I went paperless in 1998 and, apart from some bathroom scenarios that I’m still working on, it has been smooth sailing ever since.
My solution is simple: don’t get married by a minister with a bible, get married by a judge with a video camera. This way, if there is ever any question about what the expectations were going in, you can just call up the judge and say “Your Honor, did she or did she not agree that it is perfectly allowable for me to throw my boxer-briefs NEAR the hamper, not necessarily IN the hamper?”
Case closed.

My best advice to you guys is to wait before getting married. This means two things: you should wait until later in life, when your schedule is not so much driven by which Playstation games were released that week; and that ,you should wait until later in your relationship with a woman before deciding to get married. Remember, every day that you are with her and DON’T get married is another day that you have at least a CHANCE of saying or doing something right for once; a day that you have at least a CHANCE to convince her that a threesome with the hot, busty receptionist at her office would really be a treat for HER; a day that you have at least a CHANCE of discovering a reason that you two should go ahead and break up now, while it’s still free.

I’m going to let you guys figure out the rest on your own. I’ll be over here hacking Todd’s Facebook to make fictitious posts saying how much he likes little boys. And lawn maintenance workers.