Why I disturb myself sometimes.

I've begun noticing more and more lately the tendency of people to harbor, whether they admit to it or not, a sick, twisted fetish for the grotesque and macabre. The same disturbing curiousity that makes you slow down to peer at a ugly car wreck on the highway (hoping you'll see something, praying you won't) also compels you to pick up the remote and flip to American Idol or Shot of Love with Tila Tequila. How can something so wrong seem so right?

So, It made me wonder... what unlikely things make me go hot and cold at the same time? When my schadenfreude sense starts tingling, these are a few of my favorite guilty pleasures:

1. Jack the Ripper/Other Faceless True Crime Serial Killer types: Mmmmm, true crime makes me giddy. Jack the Ripper is, in my head, no less than a Victorian Mr. Darcy; imagine, a look of titillatingly evil glee on his handsome face as he wields a scapel and some basic anatomical knowledge and slices confidently through the pox-ridden whores of Whitechapel with an irresistibly unreadable gleam in his eye and a leer curling his lips. Being trivisected has never sounded so hot.
Not like I think murdering people is acceptable. No no no. Well.... no. But still... his lack of identity and ability to escape detection in as many as eleven murders (even in the days pre-CSI) has turned him into a daring, rakish (albeit bloodstained) cavalier of romance and bloody intrigue in my fevered world. Well played, sir. Very well played indeed.

2. Frat boys: You know the ones I'm talking about... deliciously awkward, horridly blonde spiky highlighted hair, Abercrombie t-shirt, baseball cap, God's gift to... anyone too unconcious to resist them, usually saying, "I'm SO totally waaaaaasted right now, dude" or chanting someone's name in between primal grunts. You know that guy. You see him in Chili's... you see him outside Walmart late Saturday night... you almost want to have pity sex with him so he'll stop trying SO HARD. Then, maybe he'll fall asleep and be quiet for a while. Hmm. That's a thought.

3. Awkwardness of any kind. Mmm. Awkward people, awkward product placement, awkward lesbian beverages, awkward dates, awkward silence, awkward pimple constellations... I'll take it! Saying awkward and irrelevant things? My spiritual gift. See how my natural ability feeds my creepy fetish for awkwardness? It's positively serendipitous.

4. Getting in front of wretched impatient obnoxious ignorant bitchfag drivers on a highway and slowing down when they have no way of passing me: Speaks for itself. Try to tell me you haven't done it too. I feel no remorse.

5. Anything bad that can happen to someone in Hollywood: Oh no, Paris Hilton is in jail? Nicole Richie looks like she jus crawled out of Auschwitz? Britney Spears is still alive? My confession: TMZ.com. Shameful, I know. I just want to know what crazy sexual hijinks celebrities got up to this weekend, and who might have had to miss that party in Vegas because they ran over a child south of the Valley. Heeeeeee. And now they're all spawning! Now there's a new generation of overpaid, really really ridiculously good looking trained monkeys to amuse me with their sex tape scandals and DUI's. Wouldn't it be so totally awesome if Jamie Lynn Spear's kid was cruising with, like, Nicole Richie's CelebuSpawn in her Barbie DreamYukon and got pulled over for DUI? Now THAT's comedy.

6. The Other Sister: Go out and rent it but don't you dare judge me if you do.

7. Any instructional video made to introduce adolescents to the brave new world of puberty: Periods 101, What's Happening to my Body, etc. Hormone-driven teen awkwardness? Yes, please.

8. Facebook stalking: I never saw myself as Creepy Peeping Tina, but with the advent of Facebook and it's constant information feed, it's now entirely possible for my to spy on people's conversations, know where everyone is at all times, know everything about who everyone is dating... oh my god, the great and terrible beauty of it. Skulking is an important part of life, people.

9. Physical pain: I mean, check the bullwhips at the door... but I get an insane pleasure out of chewing on a hangnail or papercutting myself in the finger. I think it's the Irish in me... I want to cause pain as well. I only wish there were English around to fling potatoes at. You walk aLONE, English!!!!

10. Playing strange music at work: I love some Bollywood and some Greek music, people. So, now, apparently, I'm a terrorist and I play terrorist music. Or so they tell me.

That's really the tiniest drop in the great big sloshy bucket of things that disturb me about... me, but I've wasted enough company time on blogs and theonion.com, and I really should get back to making stacks of paper into other stacks of paper. Hee!