Sandra D

8:34am
B-Trip: Home

Sitting here thinking about this new reality show called "Grease: You're the One That I Want." It's a search for two people to play the lead roles in an upcoming Broadway revival of 'Grease'.

After casting a wide net, they've narrowed it down to fourteen people. All are very talented singers and dancers, though some are better than others. Each week the panel will lop off one guy and one girl.

The first two individual contestants recently got kicked off. A standard reality-show sendoff seems to be an exit interview in which the departing contestant waxes nostalgic about the quality time spent on the island or in the house.

But not on this show.

These sadists cut you and then immediately make you perform a gut-wrenching ballad from Grease. All the while, the surviving contestants sway behind you as your backup singers.

As the axed female contestant sang "Good-bye to Sandra Dee" -- tears streaming down her face, her competitors pretending to fix her hair for the big sendoff -- you couldn't help but feel you were watching a person's dreams die.

Now that's quality television.

8:11pm
B-Trip: Home

I brought the aforementioned 'How To Be A Gentleman' in with me and finished it up. I'm sorry to report the book offers little in the way of B-Trip etiquette, perhaps because a proper gentleman certainly would not discuss such a topic.

Here's the closest I came:

When there is a woman on the premises-or if there is any likelihood a woman will arrive soon-a gentleman always puts the toilet lid down.

Sound advice, but I've never really understood why girls struggle so mightily with the seat. Having grown up with two sisters, leaving the seat up has never been an option in my life. But if I ever do decide to leave it up, it's a certainty that Elle will fall right in. And she's not alone. All girls do that.

To me, it's one of life's great mysteries.

If a Gentlemen discovers, during a large business meeting, that he needs to use the bathroom, he leaves the room quietly. He does not need to announce where he is going or when he plans to return. When he must leave a small meeting, he excuses himself, saying: "I'll be back in a few minutes."

Punctuating his words, if necessary, with a modest fart.

A Gentleman Never Runs Out of Toilet Paper

Makes sense, but it would be entertaining to see just how a proper gentleman might deal with such a scenario. Something tells me even Tony Blair would cease any semblance of gentlemanliness under such circumstances.