By:
The Dude on the Right
First off let me start this by saying part of me doesn’t like Oprah Winfrey,
probably mostly out of jealousy, but there is nothing but admiration for the
empire she has built, an empire I can (that’s correct, I wrote "can") fathom in
my mind, wonder if it is an empire that can ever be built again, and will give
credit where credit is due because as much as there are things I don’t like
about her, the good things she tries to do are huge and deserve commendation.
But, as a dude, today’s episode of
The Oprah Winfrey Show is one
of the most bizarre, yet entertaining, pieces of television of the year.
Yup, today was the usually annual
"Oprah’s Favorite Things" episode (some of those Oprah fans who got gypped
last year when she tried the "Pay It Forward" experiment are probably still a
little, deep-down, pissed), and if you ever want to see a group of women, and a
couple of dudes, go completely out of their minds, this is the show to watch.
Oprah secretly took her team to Macon, Georgia, to celebrate the folks who, at
4PM if they are watching TV, 45% of them are watching Oprah. This
statistic, in itself, should raise a ton of red flags about Macon, and maybe
this is why I could never be in the league of Oprah because rather than
embracing them I would be saying "What is wrong with you people? What do
you do for a life?", yet there some of them were, in an auditorium in Macon,
going nuts, when Oprah announced they were in attendance for her "Oprah’s
Favorite Things" show.
Oprah, of course, made the people in the audience
happy, giving away things like a cool camcorder (it retails at $799, and we know
that because part of "Oprah’s Favorite Things" show is Oprah detailing exactly
who makes it, how you can get it, and how much it will cost you), boots,
cleaning products, DVD’s, a boatload of other stuff, and as Oprah put it, the
most expensive gift in the history of her "Favorite Things," which turned out to
be a refrigerator retailing at $3,799, which, I can probably guess, most
husbands of those in attendance are saying "Our fridge keeps my beer cold just
fine. Do you realize what kind of plasma TV we could have gotten for that
amount of money?"
As I did my quick tally it looks like those in Macon who
ended up at the show were given nearly $7,500 worth of stuff, which, from the
reactions of most of them, was stuff that was going to change their world in
ways they couldn’t even imagine yet. Those gifts also will change their
lives in another way they didn’t image yet, with the tax bill that accompanies
getting prizes, or at least so says my accountant, Fruitcake, from the firm
Dewey, Cheatum, & Howe, LLC. But you know what, I’m still jealous I wasn’t
there because yes, I would have probably been jumping up and down like a little
schoolgirl like the rest of them, but then wondering what that signed copy of
"O’s Guide to Life" and "The Pillars of Earth" would get on eBay, and if I could
really pull off wearing those "Ugg Australia Classic Crochet Tall Boots"
because, well, I got them from Oprah.
That’s it for this one!
I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!