Not a member? Sign up now
July 15, 2011
American Idol
When I was sixteen-years old, my family took a trip to Los Angeles. It was me, my six-year-old sister, my parents, and my dog. I wasn’t a Hollywood-appropriate sixteen-year old — I was still going through a very awkward stage. Everyone in L.A. seemed so glamorous and put-together, and I still thought my over-sized Simpsons T-shirts and checkered Vans were the height of sophistication. I was also going through that very specific teen phase where I didn't want to talk to anyone, answer anyone, look anyone in the eye, or do anything other than sit in the room and watch TV. I was a real blast. The only member of my family with whom I was on speaking terms was my dog, Wally. Because we had him with us, we were put on a special dogs-allowed floor at the hotel.
It just so happened that every other room on that floor was occupied by that season's American Idol contestants — the final group, just selected to be on the show.
I wasn't a huge fan of American Idol, but I didn't live under a rock, so I was familiar enough with the show. I was playing with Wally in the hallway one afternoon while the rest of my family was at Grauman's Chinese Theatre, and this guy with long dark hair walked out into the hallway and started talking to me. He was, to my sixteen-year-old eyes, perfection. He was dark, aloof, and funny. And I was smitten.
He liked hanging out with me. Bad-skinned, gawky me.
Back home, guys wouldn't even look at me, but this guy spoke to me like I was an adult — and he really like playing with Wally. The other female contestants were obviously taken with him — they flirted with him constantly and tried to pry him away, but he liked hanging out with me. Bad-skinned, gawky me. I couldn't believe it. Over the next few days, we met up regularly in the hallway; he would play with Wally and tell me how much he hated the show and missed his friends, and I'd tell him about my love of Stan Lee and Alan Moore. He, for his part, pretended to be interested. On the night before my family was due to go back home, he invited me to his hotel room, and I lost my virginity to him.
He took my email and promised he'd write, which in hindsight I know was a complete lie and not even a very good one. I told him good luck with the show. He didn't make it very far, but last I saw he married to a blonde country starlet. I'm not bitter about him never keeping in touch — I'm glad I had the experience with someone who, at least at the time, seemed larger than life. — Andrea Casey
Commentarium (37 Comments)
Brandon has been watching "500 Days of Summer" far too much; the tropes in his piece are ridiculous.
That said, I really hope Wendy the rapping dwarf lesbian is real.
~hippie
every one of these was charming and authentic as fuck compared to brandon
I'm usually the first to defend hipster-hating on this site, but the sentence from alex's piece "So, on the first day, during the orientation activities, I was busy looking for the interesting kids: the smokers and the hipsters" made me heave a little...crazy pretentious
Pretentious yes, but at least Alex was honest about his definition of "interesting" ! I'm probably just biased because my definition includes his. Back to Brandon though - bleghhh. Nerve was doing spectacularly (4 for 4!) until this one. I don't and probably won't ever live in New York, but even I know that no actual local would utter the words "out New Yorked". Ick from start to finish.
I love it how Harlem is both "home of the models" and dangerous for a white guy to walk around at night - at the same time.
I think the best part of the Brandon one was how he tried to paint his totally intellectual and nerdy conversation with "the model": they've seen Doctor Who and don't like Twilight! I know /I'm/ impressed.
All this is pretty meaningless when it comes from a heterosexual female or even a gay male. The only type of person for whom the fraction [(ability to get sex when desired)/(amount of time sex is desired)] is a seriously small number is a single, average-to-below-average looking heterosexual male. On average, women in general just do not aspire to having random meaningless sex with even a potentially ugly partner anywhere near as frequently as the average male. No question about it. Straight women and gay men (in big cities) just don't know what having no options for sex is really like.
:(
:( :(
That's true. A woman saying, "I can't believe I got [this attractive/successful/famous guy] to have sex with me," deserves eyerolls. But it levels out a little bit once you start talking relationships. I know lots of great catch guys in marriages or long-term relationships with women who are less so, judged objectively (well, by societal criteria). I can cite the opposite as well. Cause for hope, I guess, if you're a comely, uninteresting loser, but of course in the best of cases each party ends up feeling like the lucky one.
it's so hard to be a straight white male you guys!
@gatsby it's pretty easy being a straight white guy, yes (although who said anything about being white?). But JPs$2)'s point is valid if scoring them on difficulty. But it doesn't really take away from reading about other people who are psyched to hook up with someone they think is hotter than they are.
", average-to-below-average looking heterosexual male" Yup that is the loser of the world. I was that until I hit my mid 30s and had a lot of money. Suddenly the world is my oyster. Sucks.
@gatsby You're telling me!
And how much of your life have you spent as a gay man or a heterosexual female? Being psyched to hook up with someone who you thought was out of your league is a universal emotion. If women didn't get rejected too you'd see them doing more asking out. Quit being so self-centered.
Except this isn't just about getting laid, it's about getting someone who's significantly hotter than you. How many really hot guys do you see with average-looking girls? It's rare as fuck. But hot girls with average-looking guys? Happens a lot more. Dunno if it's because girls aren't as superficial, it's more socially acceptable, or just the simple fact that there are more hot girls than hot guys, but I'm way more impressed by a 7 that nailed a 10 when the 7 is a chick.
>"If women didn't get rejected too you'd see them doing more asking out."
Oh boo hoo. Women don't ask out more because they're lazy cowards, but can get away with waiting for guys. Guys might like to be lazy cowards too, but they learn that with that comes guaranteed celibacy. So they walk the balance between celibacy, and dealing with rejection. Women should grow up.
The first story hurts just a little. Makes me think of more than a couple of times when I found out too late that a very hot woman was interested in me and I had no idea. Of course I wasn't making any moves because I didn't think I had any chance. More than couple of times..... *sigh*
I second that
forgot to send this one in--when phish played new years in miami, i had sex with a harvard chemist. not the best sex, but the coolest story.
Sorry, Andrea, 16 is too young to have legal sex, even in So Cal
Point being...?
Point being, everyone in America waits until the legal age to have sex. For Christ's sake, hormones are one thing, but the law is the law!
Everyone in America waits for the legal age? Do you know a TV program called "Sixteen and Pregnant"?
That was sarcasm man.
Stories where both sex partners felt "lucky" when it was over? Much to be wished for! Where's the downside?
An older guy at work once said, "I didn't realize how shallow women could be until I bought a sports car". GT-R here I come.
The world would be a better place if nobody worried about having a chance or not! To add to that the world would also be a better place if talking to strangers isn't regarded as making a move.
I call bullshit on Brandon. It's not the model thing, but the fact that who in the hell is going to get it on for two hours under a tree in the middle of the night IN THE DEAD OF WINTER. I'd be afraid of sex fluids freezing us together. He may have scored a smoking hottie, but i bet the story is a lot more boring than what he says.
Andrea didn't bag someone out of her league, she "bagged" a pedo.
Sorry, a "pedo" is someone who goes after children, not anyone under the legal age of consent. While your definition might hold up in court, it is insulting to Andrea and others like her who at 16 have perfectly healthy sexual desires and yet have to function in a legal and social environment that prefers to pretend that "(my goodness!) she's just a baby!"
Pretty much all girls have full sexual development, function, and desire by the time they are 16, and are mostly just as capable of making responsible sexual choices as an 18 year old would be. Not only that, but she said nothing of the guy's age.
Let's see:
American Idol contestant
+ capable of holding mutually interesting conversation with a 16-year old girl
+ physically appealing to a 16-year old girl
= probably somewhere close to her age.
Even if he wasn't, Andrea seemed at the time to know what she wanted and what she was getting into, and she in her adulthood obviously remembers the experience fondly, so what is your problem?
That you and your kind are comfortable making this kind of comment, and (likely smugly) believe that everyone else must naturally, readily, and rabidly agree with you, is itself a sad comment on how the exploitation of women's bodies has evolved from a simply degrading colonization to a fully dehumanizing politicization, often led by so-called "feminists".
americans abroad. always a treasure. "I pointed him out to my new friends" you met those people days ago, they are not your friends.
He said "NEW friends," not "good friends" or "old friends".
Given the tone of the story, the fact that he was 20 years old at the time, struggling to communicate in a second language, and doing his best to make use of the "friend-making" window of opportunity provided by his circumstances, I think his use of the phrase "new friend" is appropriate. What would you have suggested he used?
"Fellow students of recent acquaintance"?
Or was it that you were really just grabbing at a weak opportunity to trash on Americans abroad? Are you that bitter about us?
I've been traveling abroad for 4 years now, and I am now and from the day I left the USA have always been perfectly capable of assessing the relative quality of my relationships, which I can consider friendships, and which I would take no serious stock in. If I call someone a new friend, it means that we have a mutual interest in becoming better friends, and have so far encountered no obstacle to that object.
We're not all idiots, as you seem to want to think, or at least to paint us as.
Wowza, pobrelm solved like it never happened.
Kudos! What a neat way of tihnknig about it.
Romantic conquests that give me hope!
I have a few stories like that, but being a straight woman, I acknowledge that it's not hard to get laid.
Still, I'm chubby and average-looking, and scoring "out of your league" is awesome anyway. I love it and look back on these experiences very fondly. Thanks for the fucks, hotties.