The Scammers

Last fall, I found out that the Model and his girlfriend perpetrated a con that lasted for months, fooling literally millions of people. 

The Model stopped texting me not long after I finally confronted him about the fact that he never came to see me after he moved back to the Midwest, despite his promises that he would. I didn't try to contact him either. I had finally decided to wash my hands of him and his b.s. for good. However, a few weeks after we stopped talking, a tabloid headline caught my eye.

I have to admit that despite the fact that I am an English professor who reads and teaches writing and classic literature, I often read tabloids for the celebrity gossip and salacious stories. The British tabloids are particularly interesting because they often have the weirdest stories. I read one story about a woman who came home from the hospital after giving birth, only to find out that the father of her children had run off with her mother. Apparently, they'd been having an affair throughout her pregnancy, and both her boyfriend and her mother were unrepentant, insisting that they'd done nothing wrong because they'd fallen in love, as if that justified their betrayal. It's like, wow, these are the days of their lives.

Anyway, I was reading one of those tabloids when to my surprise, I found a picture of the Model, along with a separate picture of a female influencer. I can't give away too many details about who she is because then it will become clear who the Model is; I've always been careful not to reveal too many identifying details on my blog in order to protect my anonymity, and the Model is open about where he's from, which is College Town (the town I live in). But the article accompanying the pictures proclaimed that the Model and this influencer were in a relationship and were madly in love. 

I checked his Instagram page to see if it was true, and he had already proclaimed on his own page that he was in a relationship with her. Their posts were full of their adoration for each other. What was puzzling, however, is that the Model kept posting pictures of himself in his other girlfriend's apartment (the same girlfriend he'd been on-again, off-again with for years at that point) while he was professing his love for the influencer. I didn't understand. If he was madly in love with this influencer, why would his old girlfriend continue to let him stay at her apartment? He did mention that they'd been in an open relationship, but in the article I read, he stated that he was committed only to the influencer. 

So, I checked out his old girlfriend's Instagram page. They were still following each other on Instagram, but she'd deleted almost all the pictures of them together. She didn't delete all of them, just the ones where his face showed up in the first frame. The few pictures that remained were hidden behind a series of other pictures. Either they really had broken up, or she was hiding evidence of their relationship.

Some of that female influencer's followers accused the Model of using the influencer for her fame because she was more famous than he was; like me, they suspected that this "relationship" was fake. But the Model and the influencer kept defending their relationship, and he gave interviews insisting that he really did love her, even though they had not been "dating" very long. 

I couldn't figure out what was going on, but I also figured that it wasn't my business and set the tabloids aside. If I wasn't reading them, I wouldn't have to see any more articles about this "showmance."

But then a few weeks later, he was trending on social media because he was accused of cheating on the influencer by some anonymous woman who claimed to be a college student who had had a one-night stand with him. In another tabloid article, there was a picture of him in bed with the woman, except she'd hidden most of her face from the picture. But I was startled to realize that the woman was his old girlfriend (and she is not a college student). I recognized the headboard in the picture as hers; I knew it couldn't be his because his headboard was different from hers (and obviously, I've seen the headboard on his bed in person) and he'd photographed himself in her bed on more than one occasion. 

It made me realize that he and his girlfriend staged that picture, and then they leaked it to the media to stir up more drama in his "relationship" with the influencer and get his name back in the headlines. 

This is crazy, I thought. But I just kept reminding myself that it wasn't my business, and I tried to ignore the tabloids again. But I made the mistake of reading them a few months later because I was reading articles about Britney Spears (I've loved her music for more than twenty years, and I felt sorry for her when everyone made fun of her during her nervous breakdown, although now everyone is claiming that they feel sorry for her too. Yeah, right, because apparently they all forgot about all the times they viciously mocked her back in the 2000s.) And that's how I found more headlines about the Model.

Apparently, he and the influencer "broke up", and he moved on to another influencer, who was in talks for her own reality show. He told interviewers that he hoped to get on TV with her so he could show off their love. But when the plans for her show fell through, he quickly dumped her, and a week later, he posted a picture of his girlfriend at the beach without revealing her face (he photographed her from behind), referring to her as his girlfriend. She posted several pictures of yet another luxury resort he took her to, bragging about the umpteenth luxury vacation they had taken together, though she didn't mention his name or post any pictures of him.

That second influencer, however, reportedly had a nervous breakdown after the Model tossed her aside, and she disappeared from social media for a long time. I didn't know her, but I felt sorry for her, and I felt sorry for the first influencer too. 

It's possible that both of those influencers were in on the scam, and that maybe they were just trying to elevate their fame, though they didn't give any interviews to the tabloids, unlike him. But even so, that didn't make the Model or his girlfriend look any better. They took advantage of these women's loneliness so that they could profit from it. The Model did it for fifteen minutes of fame and the opportunity to get on TV, and his girlfriend did it to please him, and to get a fistful of cash and yet another luxury vacation that she did not have to pay for. 

I felt angry that they got away with scamming literally millions of people, including the media (especially the media!). His followers egged him on, praising him for being so "loving" to those women. I was so tempted to expose the lies of the Model and his partner in crime to everyone. I had thought of warning both of those influencers and sending them a DM that said, "He's using you. He has another girlfriend." I thought of contacting the tabloids and giving them a "tip" about what the Model and his girlfriend had done; I actually know a celebrity blogger through a friend, and I thought of messaging the blogger first. I actually sat down at my computer to send them all those messages to expose the truth.

But all of a sudden, I thought about Miss Havisham, a character from Charles Dickens' novel Great Expectations (if you haven't read the novel, there are spoilers ahead). She is notable because she is jilted on her wedding day, and she continues to wear her wedding dress every day for years. She refuses to throw out her uneaten wedding cake, so it collects dust and cobwebs over the years. She sets all of the clocks in her house so that they are literally stopped at the exact minute that she found out that her groom had jilted her. It's symbolic of how her life stopped after her heart was broken.

Miss Havisham is consumed with anger and a desire for revenge, so she raises her adoptive daughter Estella to be cold towards men. When Estella breaks the protagonist's heart, Miss Havisham is initially delighted; since she was unable to seek vengeance against her former groom, she used Pip as a substitute. But she eventually realizes that her vengeance does not succeed in making her feel better, especially because an innocent person (Pip) got hurt; furthermore, she is still as empty and lonely as she was before.

I told my literature students that Miss Havisham is a cautionary tale. Dickens demonstrated what happens when you not only suffer from unrequited love but refuse to move on with your life. 

When I was tempted to expose the lies that the Model and his girlfriend had told the whole world, I realized that if I did, I would be like Miss Havisham. I mean, what if those two female influencers were not in on the scam and truly believed that the Model really had cared for them? If I exposed the Model and his girlfriend, those women would only get hurt even more, and they would be publicly humiliated as being fooled by those two selfish, deceitful scammers. Also, despite his facade on Instagram as a good guy, the Model can be truly vicious and vindictive when he wants to be. He would strike back by telling everyone about how I was just a jealous ex who was trying to get back at him. And in a way, he'd be right. 

I did not want to be like Miss Havisham. I did not want to spend the rest of my life pining for someone who didn't give a damn about me. I did not want to go out of my way to hurt other people, even if they deserved it. 

For two years, I felt guilty about hooking up with the Model two weeks before he took his girlfriend on a romantic vacation (although I hadn't found out about her until after I spent the night with him) because I didn't know that they were in an open relationship at the time. When I found her Instagram page after becoming suspicious of him and doing some digging online, I thought that based on her pictures she seemed like a good person. But now I know that she is not a good person at all. A good person does not help her boyfriend lie to the whole world. A good person does not help her boyfriend scam other women into thinking that he cares about them. She knew all along that he didn't mean a word that he said about those women, but she didn't care if they got hurt. She didn't care that he was lying to the whole world because she was lying too. She was just as mean as he was.

If I exposed them, there was the danger of sinking to their level and ending up like them. I don't want to be like the Model or his girlfriend. I mean, if being with him means that I have to scam millions of people like she did, then it's just as well that I'm not with him.

If I exposed them, it would be proof that I was refusing to move on with my life. I did not want to suffer and stew in my misery for decades like Miss Havisham did. I wanted a life where I was free of my anger towards the Model and the pain he caused me. It made me think of a scene from a memoir written by the advice columnist Amy Dickinson, where she was sitting with her first husband. She loved him and wanted him to stay, but he was in love with someone else. She realized that by trying to hold on to him, she was only hurting herself in the process. Save yourself, she thought.

Her words echoed in my mind as I sat in front of my computer. I didn't expose the Model or his girlfriend. Instead, I closed my laptop, and I did something that would make members of Generation Z gasp and clutch their cell phones: I walked out the door without my cell phone so that I wouldn't be tempted to look at it, especially not the social media pages of the Model and his girlfriend. Leave them be, I thought. Save yourself. 

I took a walk in the local park. It was a beautiful day outside, and unseasonably warm. I looked around and thought, There is so much more to life than him. It was part of the mindset I'd developed since I was diagnosed with an incurable, life-threatening disease. Life is too short to waste on jerks who aren't worth my time. 

What about you? If someone you knew had conned people, would you expose them, even if there was a risk that they could strike back at you? 

How Cardi B Gave Me a Wake-up Call

I joined Instagram a couple months ago, and one of the people I follow is the rapper Cardi B. She posted a video on her Instagram page where she said something that struck a chord with me. This is an edited, censored version of what she said:

"Why do you go to the pages of people that you don't like? People don't post when they're doing bad. They ain't never gonna post their problems. So why would you want to see them do good? Why? So you can get more tight with them? Eff that! I'd rather just not see the b--h!"

For weeks after I found out that the Model had used me to cheat on his girlfriend, I kept looking at their Instagram pages, even though it pained me to do so each time. He never posted any pictures of her on his page, but in his Instagram Story (which is a series of pictures or short videos that people can post, which disappear 24 hours later), he posted a brief video clip of himself at a festival...with her. They were with friends, and he didn't identify her as his girlfriend. But anyone could tell that she was, from the way that she beamed at him, so happy and in love. He had a smirk on his face, and I hated him so much at that moment that I wanted to slap the smugness right off him.

She posted less frequently on her page, but when she did, she included more pictures of them together, such as the ones of them celebrating his birthday in Chicago, or the ones of them at a friend's wedding, where she included a caption that boasted about what a good-looking couple they were. It hurt more to look at her page than his because she represented everything I would never have: a life with him. Several of her friends commented on her posts, congratulating her on her relationship, and her responses made it clear that she was pretty smug too, basking in their admiration of how great her life and boyfriend were. It all made me hate her almost as much as I hated him.

But when I saw that video that Cardi B posted on her Instagram page, somehow her words woke me up and shook me out of the heartbroken stupor I'd been trapped in for far too long. What she said made sense: why should I keep looking at the pictures of two people I hated and see more evidence of how happy they were? It didn't do anything but make me feel more alone and unhappy, and I didn't want to keep wallowing in my anger and bitterness. Not to mention, as Cardi B pointed out, people typically only post the best parts of their lives on social media, not the problems. Obviously, the Model and his girlfriend's relationship isn't as perfect as the Girlfriend makes it out to be. If it was, he wouldn't have wanted to be with me that night, nor would he have made plans to meet up with me again when he came back to College Town. Cardi B helped me realize that I was never going to feel better about the whole situation if I kept looking at their Instagram pictures. It was time to move on with my life.

Since I know that he works out at my gym in the morning when he comes back to College Town, I've changed my routine so that I only work out at night; thus far, I've managed to avoid seeing him. But since College Town is not that much bigger than Small Town and I know that he occasionally comes back to see his family and friends, I'm still afraid that I might run into him, or worse, that I might run into him AND her. I'm afraid that if I see him again, I might a) punch him in the face, or b) tell him exactly what I think of him and THEN punch him in the face. If I confronted him, he would either get defensive and act like I was the one with the problem, or, narcissist that he is, he would feel a sense of satisfaction to know that he affected me this much. I'm afraid that if I saw her with him, I would blurt out the truth about what he had done to her and me.

It's gotten easier not to think about him or to dwell on how much he hurt me, but unfortunately, he still pops up in my mind every now and then. I don't like watching romantic comedies anymore because whenever I see two people kissing, it reminds me of how I felt when he kissed me and how soft his lips were. I was going through my closet one day, trying to decide what to wear to work, and I found an outfit that I'd worn once that he loved and said I looked beautiful in. (Needless to say, I didn't wear it that day, and I tucked it away so I wouldn't have to see it again.) A friend of mine posted pictures of herself on vacation with her new boyfriend, and it turns out that they went to the same resort in Mexico that the Model and his girlfriend went to. Even just the pictures of palm trees that are omnipresent in people's social media posts right now make me cringe because they remind me of the palm trees in the Girlfriend's pictures of the vacation she took with the Model to Mexico, just two weeks after he spent the night with me.

I tried watching an episode of Criminal Minds while I worked out on the elliptical machine at the gym one night, and the sociopath in that episode had the same name as the Model. I came across an online article about a guy who reached out on social media to find a girl he'd met; all he knew was her name, and several women who shared her name responded. Her name was the same as the Model's girlfriend. I picked up an old manuscript of a story I hadn't worked on in years, and the name of the guy who my main character has unrequited feelings for has the same name as the Model.

It's easier not to think about him when I'm working. When I'm teaching, I'm not thinking about him or his girlfriend. I'm thinking things like, Why is that kid sleeping right now? If I can't take a nap during class, neither can he, darn it! or Why is that girl on Snapchat right now? Does she think I can't see her posing with cat ears? or They should really sell helmets that let you drink coffee while you're wearing the helmet, like they do with beer. I would totally wear one of those coffee helmets while I'm teaching. 

That's why I've found solace through my work, and that's why I've allowed my workaholic nature to control my life and my mindset once again. In addition to the time I spent in New York City, my work has provided me with something else to think about, and it has helped me free myself of my self-destructive addiction to the Model. And I will add that despite all the reminders of him, thinking about him now doesn't make me burst into tears the way it did last summer. My heart has hardened enough towards him that when I think of him now, I wonder how I could have been so foolish as to spend months pining for a narcissistic sociopath who treated me like dirt. I know the answer to that question, but that's for another post.

That same day I saw Cardi B's video, I stopped looking at the Model's Instagram page, as well as his girlfriend's. It's been a long time since I've looked at either one, and I've felt better ever since. Any time I feel tempted to peek at his page again, I watch Cardi B's video instead to remind myself why I shouldn't.

What about you? Do you ever feel tempted to look at the social media posts of people you dislike or who hurt you in the past? Do you think it's true that many people on social media only post the best versions of their lives and edit everything that detracts from that version?

P.S. Thank you, Cardi B, for bringing me to my senses, and thanks to all of you blogger friends for your supportive comments on my posts where I obsessed over the Model.

Fifty Shades of Meh

A year or so ago, I took a one-night writing class at StoryStudio, where the teacher distributed excerpts from the novel Fifty Shades of Grey, in order to show us how not to write. After reading the scene, I agreed with the teacher: the writing was clichéd and terrible.

I'm not really into erotica (though I have read a couple erotic novels, and I was all, "Seriously, ANOTHER sex scene?"), but I'm still curious to find out what all the fuss regarding Fifty Shades of Grey is about. So I still plan to buy the book. As I stated on Twitter, though, I have enough Catholic guilt drilled into me that I may have to go to Confession afterwards, in order to confess the sin of reading someone else's impure thoughts.

Last week I went to a movie for the first time since last June. I had a coupon for a free movie ticket. I decided to watch Fifty Shades of Grey, because as with the novel, I was curious to see what all the fuss was about.

Now that I've seen it, all I can say is this: meh.

Everyone kept fussing over the sex scenes, but they didn't really faze me. My favorite neighborhood in Chicago is Boystown, where a lot of the "adult" stores are located. Some of those stores have S&M window displays that are more shocking than the sex scenes I saw in 50 Shades of Grey. I've always been curious about those stores but have never had the courage to go in, partly because I'm afraid that one of my former students will be in there and they'll say, "Professor! What are you doing here?" And I'll just say, "Umm...you mean this isn't Garrett Popcorn?"

Also, if people played a drinking game and took a shot for every time Jamie Dornan took off his shirt in slow motion or every time Dakota Johnson bit her lip, they'd end up drunk and/or passed out before the movie was half over.

I was impressed by the acting of Dakota and Jamie, though their talent was wasted in a movie with a cliched storyline and even worse dialogue.  There were also several other great actors in that film, like Jennifer Ehle (whom I loved as Elizabeth in the BBC version of Pride and Prejudice) and Marcia Gay Harden (who's brilliant and transforms into a different person with every character she plays, rather than play the same character again and again), and they were totally underused in the film.

But all around me in the theater were other grown women, who kept sighing over the relationship between Anastasia and Christian, or maybe they were sighing over the times where Jamie Dornan took off his shirt in slow motion. I kept rolling my eyes and thinking, Seriously? THIS is what turns a former Twilight fan fiction writer into a best-selling novelist? I could write a better love story than THIS, especially because this story doesn't even seem to be about love at all! It seems more like it's a stalker-with-benefits relationship!

It also made me think that 50 Shades of Grey was a rip-off of the 1740 novel Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded, which was written by Samuel Richardson. The "love interest," Mr. B., pressures (and at one point tries to rape) the virtuous Pamela into becoming his mistress, and he even tries to "educate" her on the terms of their relationship by giving her reading material about what he wants. Mr. B. is also a very wealthy man, especially compared to Pamela, who is a servant. (Sound familiar?)

I hated that novel, because Pamela spends a significant portion of that story terrified of the "intimidating" Mr. B., and then when he finally lets her leave (after holding her captive for a significant period of time), she realizes that she loves him and marries him. Despite her earlier efforts to escape him, as his wife she submits to his control (hello, Stockholm Syndrome!). Mr. B. isn't into S&M, but the relation between him and Pamela was definitely about dominance and submission.

I might never get published, and I definitely don't think I'll ever achieve the kind of mainstream success that E.L. James has achieved. Even she admitted that she didn't think her book would turn into the success that it did, and that's a good attitude to have, because there are far too many aspiring writers who only want to write so they can become rich and famous, which makes it clear that they will not only not last long as writers but also that they know nothing about the writing life.

Once I finally finish my dissertation (and once I get it approved, fingers crossed), I'll revise the novels I've written. I'll keep writing and sending out my stories to literary magazines. I'll still keep trying to improve my writing, so that if and when I do get published someday, a writing teacher won't pass out excerpts of my story and tell the students, "This is how you shouldn't write."

What about you? Have you seen/read Fifty Shades of Grey? If you have, what'd you think of it? How do you feel when you read bad writing or watch it play out on movie/TV screens?

Prom Night

I didn't go to prom in high school. I was significantly overweight (which is why I go to the gym so often now), and most of the guys didn't talk to me that much unless they needed help with their homework or they were making fun of me.

I could have gone to prom with one of my guy friends, which is what I did for a few of the other school dances. But I always thought that if I did go to prom, it should be with someone I really liked and who felt the same way about me. There was something romantic about prom (maybe it was because of all the cheesy prom scenes from high school movies that I'd watched), and it didn't feel right to me to go with someone that I didn't have romantic feelings for. I'm not criticizing anyone who did attend prom with a friend, though, because I'm sure that can be fun too.

On prom night, I went to Dairy Queen and watched movies at home. I didn't tell my friends how much it bothered me to have to look at all their prom pictures when we were back in school; they were oblivious to how much it hurt me.

I've been thinking about it lately because even though the school year is now over, I still remember all the articles I've read about high school students who invited celebrities to their proms.

I don't know if anyone else has heard of it, but I guarantee you that the next time there's a homecoming dance or a prom, there will be more news articles about even more teenagers who want movie stars, musicians, and athletes to escort them. It reminds me of when I was in high school and I had a crush on Lance Bass, who was in the boy band N'Sync; he later turned out to be gay. I also had a crush on Ricky Martin, who also turned out to be gay. (My gaydar wasn't very good back then.)

Those articles bother me. I can understand the appeal of going with a celebrity to prom. Everyone has had a crush on a celebrity at some point. They often seem larger than life, and many of us (myself included) tend to create this imaginary image of them that often contrasts with who they really are.

But I think that many of those teenagers invite celebrities not just because they have crushes on them but because they want to be the center of attention. They want news articles to be written about them; they want to be on TV; they want all eyes to be on them on prom night.

I think it is nice when famous people accept those students' invitations. Contrary to many of those students' hopes, none of those invitations resulted in romantic relationships. But it is nice of those celebrities to take the time for their fans. I don't think it's nice when teenagers promote their invitations on Twitter, Facebook, and Youtube and go "viral", which makes the celebrities feel pressured to say yes.

I think it'd be even nicer if those teenagers invited "the shy kid" or "the class nerd" to prom instead. I remember what it was like to be a nerd in high school, and I know how much it would have meant to me if I had been invited to go to prom.

But instead these teenagers make it clear that their expectations are set very high, as if they feel entitled to go out with Grammy winners or Olympic medalists. And I don't think that's right. I'm not saying that celebrities are better than regular people; they're not. But I don't think they should be pressured to go out with these kids, especially since it seems like those kids want celebrity dates not necessarily because of the celebrities themselves but because of what they get out of them.

What do you think of this new trend? If you could have gone out with a celebrity, who would it be? If you did go to prom, what was it like?

The Thing about Plagiarism

Recently, the actor Shia LaBeouf got into trouble over allegations of plagiarism. Apparently, he made a short film that was too similar (too similar, that is, to be coincidental) to one of Daniel Clowes' graphic novels, Justin M. Damiano. He then made several public "apologies", including an apology in skywriting that said, "I am sorry Daniel Clowes." He also wrote several Tweets that alternately apologized and defended his actions.

Here are a few examples of how he apologized:

In my excitement and naiveté as an amateur filmmaker, I got lost in the creative process and neglected to follow proper accreditation.

Copying isn’t particularly creative work. Being inspired by someone else’s idea to produce something new and different IS creative work.

The thing is, that second statement about copying was later alleged to be plagiarized from something that someone named Lili wrote on Yahoo answers. Here's Lili's statement (which I read about on Buzzfeed.com): Merely copying isn’t particularly creative work, though it’s useful as training and practice. Being inspired by someone else’s idea to produce something new and different IS creative work, and it may even revolutionalize [sic] the ‘stolen’ concept.

So basically, after plagiarizing Daniel Clowes' work for his film, he plagiarized someone else for his apology!

(Excuse me while I go bang my head against the wall.)

Daniel Clowes expressed shock over what happened, and I'm not sure if he's going to sue LaBeouf or not. I'm a little familiar with Clowes' work; I read his graphic novel Ghost World, which I really liked and thought was very well-written. If I was him, I'd be enraged that someone stole my work and then didn't really apologize for it. I think one reason that actor is in so much trouble right now isn't just because he plagiarized; it's because he's trying to rationalize his actions.

I teach writing, so I know that sometimes people forget to credit their sources. But if they lift entire passages or even brief excerpts from other people's work and claim it as their own, that's still plagiarism. And I think that LaBeouf's claim that he was "inspired by someone else's idea to produce something new and different" doesn't really apply to his film.

Clueless is a 90s teen movie version of Jane Austen's Emma. The movie 10 Things I Hate about You is a 90s teen movie version of The Taming of the Shrew. Why didn't those filmmakers get in trouble? Because for one thing, they took the premise from those stories and really did create something new, so that the filmmakers' story, though based on those earlier works, really did become the filmmakers' own stories.

A lot of people do that. I mean, consider how often the Cinderella story has been retold and revised. The same thing goes for books like Jane Eyre and plays like Romeo and Juliet. On the other hand, I've read books that took actual characters from previously published stories by other authors and "gave them a different spin" or interpretation, which would be good if it wasn't for the fact that some (though not all) of those authors try too hard to sound exactly like the authors of those previously published stories. (One notable exception would be Jean Rhys, who "wrote a life" for the mad wife locked up in the attic in Jane Eyre; that book was excellent and Rhys didn't try to sound like Charlotte Bronte at all.)

I've never been published. But that doesn't mean I've never been plagiarized. A few times, I've seen lines that I wrote for this blog and my Twitter page show up in other people's blogs and Twitter pages (side note: I'm not talking about retweets, since at least with those they give me credit for the Tweets I wrote. And I LOVE retweets, and I often return the favor.). To say that I was angry would be an understatement. I considered confronting them and demanding that they either take down the posts where they stole my lines or give me credit. I also considered finding out where they lived and egging their cars or spray-painting the word THIEF on their houses, or perhaps finding a way to force them to watch marathons of Dance Moms AND Here Comes Honey Boo Boo! But what I really did was nothing. What could I do, when it was only a line here or there? But if someone plagiarizes me to the extent that LaBeouf plagiarized Clowes (though I must admit I haven't seen LaBeouf's film, partly because I think he took it down after the allegations surfaced), I'd fight back like one of the Dance Moms does when one of their daughters gets passed over for a solo. My writing, while far from perfect, is nevertheless something that's MINE, and I think that any writer would be upset to know that someone stole the words right out of their work.

What do you think? Have you ever been plagiarized? Even if you haven't, what would you do if someone plagiarized you?

Reeling in a Catfish

Right now a lot of people are talking about the Notre Dame football player, Manti Te'o, who was apparently the victim of a hoax. According to the story, he had a "girlfriend" that he was involved with for more than two or three years. But then he found out that she died, and he shared his story with the press; everyone felt sorry for him, and he got a lot of publicity.

But then it came out that the girlfriend never existed. What's more, he never met her. Apparently some guy tricked Te'o into thinking that he was e-mailing and talking on the telephone to a beautiful woman that he'd never seen in person.

At first I was skeptical. I wondered whether the football player just made up this whole story to get attention for himself (if he really wanted publicity, he should have just auditioned to be the next Bachelor or dated one of the Kardashians. Then everyone would be talking about him, though not in a good way.). Not to mention that Te'o now admits that he made up stories about how he did meet her in person, though he never did. But now I can't help wondering if he really was the victim of a hoax.

I also couldn't help wondering how anyone could communicate with someone for that long without meeting her in person. There's actually a show on MTV called Catfish, that originated from a film about a guy who was also fooled into thinking that the online friend he'd communicated with didn't exist. According to Wikipedia (which as everyone knows is a totally reliable source), a "catfish" is a person who creates fake profiles in order to get attention (and in some cases, "love") from other people. I think that people who deceive others like that must be very lonely...and also very manipulative and selfish.

I've been writing to several of you fellow bloggers ever since I started blogging, even though I've never met any of you. And I do feel like bloggers can make good connections with each other in that way. But it's one thing to develop an online friendship; I think it's something else altogether to develop an online romantic relationship. My question is this: is it possible to have a romantic relationship with someone you've never met?

I'd have to say no. Like I said in my last post, I believe that the best way to find out if you truly have chemistry with someone is to meet him in person. When I did the online dating thing, most of the guys that I met arranged to meet in person after the third or fourth e-mail.

There was one guy who I did spend several months communicating with. He always had an excuse for why we couldn't meet in person. Finally we set up a date, but he didn't show up (he had another lame excuse for that). Was I mad? Let's just say I reacted in the same way that I would if Starbucks suddenly shut down, or if I found out that the Kardashians had moved into my building. (Oh, dear God! The horror!) Maybe I shouldn't have given him another chance, but I did. When we did meet in person, he turned out to be about ten years older and thirty pounds heavier than he looked in his profile pictures. I hoped that his personality would make up for it. It didn't. The date was so bad that when we took a walk by the lake, I contemplated jumping into it and swimming away from him. (I thought if I just ran away he might catch up with me.)

There was another guy that I've mentioned before. He sent me ten or twelve e-mails over the course of a month. Every time I brought up the idea of meeting in person, he came up with another excuse for why he couldn't. After a while, he stopped e-mailing me, and he didn't respond to my e-mail. It made me wonder why he pulled a disappearing act. Was he not who he said he was? Was he in a relationship with someone else? Was he one of those self-centered guys who enjoy getting attention from women on online dating sites and leading them on, but chicken out (or change their minds, when really in all likelihood they may have just been "browsing") when it's time to meet them in person? Was there any way that I could find out where he lived, so that I could order fifty boxes of tampons and have them sent to him, or perhaps send a messenger over there to throw his laptop out the window?

I don't think that you can fall in love with someone you've never met. It's like obsessive fans who claim to be in love with Ryan Gosling or Robert Pattinson (though I do think Ryan is cute). They have this idea in their heads of what that person is like (and an idea that the movie star will fall in love with them at first sight), an idea which may not match up at all with reality. Not to mention you can present yourself as being a completely different person online. (Side note: Don't worry, I haven't done that. I really am a neurotic workaholic, and I really do obsess over everything. I also believe that going on vacation would freak me out even more than I would freak out if Starbucks shut down.)

I think it's important to meet the person you're interested in. When you communicate with other people online, you can figure out what you want to say beforehand. You can go back and revise what you've written. But offline, there is no delete button. You could still pretend to be someone you're not when you meet in person, but even body language can be very revealing.

So if Te'o really is the victim of a hoax, then I feel a little sorry for him. But I also think that he should have insisted on meeting the girl in person sooner, rather than carry on a "relationship" for years. He claims he tried to meet her, but the "girl" made up excuses or kept canceling the dates. Those excuses and cancellations should have been red flags to him, and it shouldn't have taken him so long to find out the truth. (I admit that it took me a while to figure out that those two guys weren't necessarily who they said they were, but it didn't take me years to figure it out. I also didn't consider myself as being in a relationship with them just because we'd been communicating online.)

What do you think? Do you think that it's possible to fall in love with someone you've never met? What do you think of people who spend months and months communicating with someone online and over the phone without ever meeting them in person? I've heard them say that it's still a relationship, and that they are in love and have a deep connection with each other. Do you think it's possible to have a relationship that way? (Side note: It's not the same thing as couples who have long-distance relationships, because at least they have already met and spent time together in person.)

What I've Learned from the Jersey Shore

If your underwear is showing, then your dress is too short.

If you insist on wearing a short dress, then make sure that you wear underwear.

Fighting strangers in public just because they threw a drink at you/pulled your weave/looked at you in the wrong way does not make you look like a man (or a woman). It makes you look violent and stupid.

Orange is not a good look for anyone. It's also a sign that you've spent too much time in the tanning booth.

If you wear your hair so high that you start to resemble Frankenstein's monster or the monster's bride (Pauly and Snooki, I'm talking to you), then the villagers just might come after you with flaming torches and pitchforks.

Referring to yourself in the third person does not make you sound smarter (and who gives himself a lame nickname like "The Situation", anyway?).

It's okay to swim in the ocean. It's not actually full of whale sperm.

When your boyfriend/girlfriend screams at you on a regular basis, destroys your belongings, freaks out if you talk to someone of the opposite sex, and/or shoves you around, it's time to break up and cut that person out of your life for good. It doesn't mean you should take that person back again and again just because he/she is so "awesome".

Even if you pull the blanket over your heads, everyone still knows what you and your date are doing.

If you are lucky enough to get a free trip to Italy, don't spend the whole trip partying with tourists. Looking at art, eating Italian food, interacting with the locals, exploring the different cities, and experiencing all the other things that Italy has to offer should not be an afterthought that is saved for the last couple days of your trip. 

It's good to exercise and lift weights on a regular basis. It's also good to lift a book and actually read it every now and then.

Spraying your hair with a bunch of hairspray is not the same as shampooing it. And spraying yourself from head to toe with cologne (which is so strong it makes other people hold their breath and back away quickly from you) is not the same thing as taking a shower.

When your fifteen minutes of fame are up, at least you'll have a career to fall back on selling T-shirts in the Shore Store.

When I first started watching Jersey Shore, I did it because I was bored and nothing else was on. I hadn't even really watched reality TV (except for the occasional episode of Millionaire Matchmaker) since I stopped watching The Real World almost a decade ago. I'd gotten irritated with that show because it had gone way downhill since the show first aired. Now every show centered on drunken catfights, hot tub orgies, and pretty, spoiled brats whining about how hard life was for them even though they didn't have to work and got to live rent-free in fancy penthouses.

And yet, I later found myself tuning in to watch Jersey Shore, which is full of drunken catfights and hot tub orgies, except the cast of this show is a lot more orange and have turned partying into a career. I could never live or act the way that they do (nor would I ever want to), and yet I couldn't help watching them. (On the other hand, I haven't been watching the show as often as I used to, because the episodes started getting repetitive three seasons ago. For example, it gets boring to watch Snooki and the Situation get thrown out of clubs again and again.)

One reason I watched the show was because they're so stupid it's funny. They say and do the stupidest things sometimes, and they don't even realize how stupid they look. I guess it's bad for me to say this, but I actually feel better about myself when I watch them. I think, Well, at least I've never done anything THAT dumb. 

I know I'm not the only one who indulges in reality television. Millions of people take pleasure in being voyeurs to other people's lives; they say it's "reality", but it's anything but. The episodes are edited by the show's "writers" and producers, and certain events and emotions are magnified to make them seem much more dramatic than they actually are. Some of the people on these shows are so greedy for fame and money that they let the shows bring out the worst in them without considering the long-term consequences. We watch people get engaged to people they've only known for a few weeks, only to break up a few months later. We watch women who see nothing wrong with marrying for money so that they can have luxurious lifestyles, and we watch men treat women like sex objects.

We also watch teen moms who spend more time obsessing over their abusive boyfriends than their own babies. That's one reason I'm seriously considering not watching Teen Mom anymore, because the show has become so disturbing. What kind of mother would rather scream at her mother and drive off to smoke weed than stay home with her son? What kind of mother would slap her emotionally abusive boyfriend around in front of her child? What kind of mother prevents her ex-boyfriend from spending any time with their son just to punish him? Several of the girls on Teen Mom, that's who. Yes, there are older women who act like this too, but the behavior of some of the girls on this show in particular makes me worry about the example that several (though not all) of the girls on that show are setting for other teenagers.

We watch teenagers and twentysomethings on other reality shows get drunk, take their clothes off, and do the kinds of wild things that make us wonder how they'll ever get hired for real jobs when they finally come to their senses, because employers who are not Joe Francis (of the Girls Gone Wild notoriety) will probably not want to hire young adults who do those things on national television. (That might explain why some of them continue doing reality TV well into their thirties and forties.)

And even though we may be frustrated, repulsed, or horrified by their behavior, we continue to watch because it's "entertainment". It's also very easy for us to judge these people, seeing as how we only get the edited version of their lives. I've read the online message boards for some of these shows, and many of the people post extremely hateful, nasty, and ignorant  comments on those boards that bash the people on those shows.

But on the other hand, I think that we can actually learn something from reality television. For one thing, we can learn about how we shouldn't act, and we can learn that all that fame and money can't really make up for the fact that the people on those shows have no privacy and have made themselves vulnerable to millions of viewers' criticism. Reality TV also teaches us that loving, lasting, and genuine relationships are nothing like the ones that we see on TV.

What about you? Do you watch reality TV? If not, why not? If you do, which shows do you watch and why?

A Salesgirl's Requests

Recently, there was a big fuss over a list of "diva demands" that the singer Katy Perry made. When she performed in a concert at Australia, she had very specific instructions for her dressing room: "a dressing room draped in cream or soft pink, with two comfortable egg chairs, a 'perspex modern style' coffee table and two 'french ornate style floor lamps." She also had a very specific driver's policy: "chauffeurs must not start a conversation with Katy, stare at her through the rear view mirror, or ask for autographs or pictures, especially while driving."

I've heard of other "diva demands" that celebrities make. For example, I read an article that said that Van Halen demands "a bowl of M&Ms with the brown ones removed" and Cher demands "a separate room for her wigs". Whenever I hear these types of stories about celebrities,  I'm more amused than anything else. They're famous, they're rich, and they let their "power" go to their heads a little (or a lot).

But it made me think of what it would be like if "ordinary" workers like me could make demands of their employers. For example, I recently started a new part-time job selling overpriced souvenirs at the Tourist Trap. It made me reflect on all the retail jobs that I've had over the past several years. I wouldn't dare to actually present my retail employers with a list of demands, because I would definitely get in trouble and possibly lose my job. (Either that or I'd be given a list of b.s. reasons why the employers can't or won't fulfill those demands.) But I thought of a few "requests" that I wish I could make.

1. Give me a uniform that actually fits. All the retail jobs that I've had set up very strict dress codes for their employees: no tattoos, no dyed hair, no "inappropriate piercings", no T-shirts that say "This store SUCKS and everyone who shops here is a SUCKER." Dress codes don't bother me, especially because I wore a uniform for twelve years of Catholic school.

But if you're going to make me wear a uniform with the store's logo printed all over it, do you think you could give me a uniform that isn't two or three sizes too big? And also? If you're going to schedule me to work three days in a row, do you think you could give me more than one uniform? That way I won't have to hand wash my uniform every night (I'm not getting paid enough to use the coin-operated laundry machine more than once a week) or make the choice to not wash my uniform and then worry about customers backing away from me and wrinkling their noses, saying, "What's that smell?"

2. Ease up on the pressure about the "add-ons". When you go shopping, do you ever feel slightly annoyed because the cashier or the salesperson tries to get you to "add on" to the purchase by suggesting additional items that you could buy? Or does the cashier ever try to pressure you to sign up for the store credit card?

It used to annoy me too, until I had to do the same thing at all my retail jobs. FYI, most salespeople don't really want to pressure you to buy something that you don't really need. We also don't like reciting the same sales pitch a hundred (or more) times a day. But we also have supervisors and managers breathing down our necks (this is literally true; sometimes they'll stand there and watch us interact with customers, and then when the customers leave the managers will tell us everything we did wrong) to make sure that we get customers to "add on" to their purchases.

Doing these things helps the store make money. The salespeople are given sales quotas to fulfill each day, and if we don't make our quotas, then one of several things could happen: 1) one of the managers will take us aside and counsel us on how to do our jobs more effectively; 2) we won't get as many shifts as the people who do make their quotas; 3) we won't get chosen as Employee of the Month, and then we won't get the extra few bucks added to our paychecks or the gift card to a restaurant that we couldn't afford to get into otherwise on our paltry wages.

3. If you're not going to let me earn a commission, at least let me keep the tips that customers try to give me. Occasionally a nice customer will have a few cents in change but will tell me to keep it. What the customer doesn't know, however, is that I'm not allowed to keep it. Baristas at coffeehouses are allowed to get tips, but cashiers at retailers are not.

Don't get me wrong. Since I work in retail and not food service, I don't expect tips. It's not like I'm going to set out a "Tips" cup by the cash register. But if a customer offers me a tip, I'd like to keep it, especially since it usually only adds up to a dollar or two a day. And seeing as how the store makes more money in one day than I do in a year, would it really be losing any money if I were to keep those tips? I don't keep them, but it'd be nice if I could. It's not like I'm taking money out of the register, and I would never do that either.

4. Positive reinforcement doesn't mean as much as a salary that I could actually live on. At one of my retail jobs, we were given stickers if we made our sales quota for the day. Getting stickers for good work made me happy when I was ten. But now that I'm thirty and I have expenses that don't include bubble gum and Sweet Valley Twins books, a sticker isn't going to mean much to me. Or my landlord.

I admit that it is nice when my employers praise me for a job well done. But you know what else would be nice? Not having to worry about how I'm going to pay my rent when the store cuts my hours because it's providing paid training to a new group of employees or because it's not making enough money.

5. Please stop micro-managing me. The thing about working in retail is that there are always at least half a dozen supervisors and managers who are watching my every move. I can understand why they want to make sure that every employee is doing his or her job, because one of their main concerns is the bottom line. It is a business after all, and they need to make sure that the store is making money.

But please don't make me refold a whole stack of sweaters that I've been folding for the past ten minutes just because all the size stickers don't perfectly line up, especially since the next group of customers is going to undo the whole stack in five seconds. Please don't reprimand me because I didn't greet that one customer because I was busy refolding those sweaters. Please don't remind me six times in one shift to get as many customers to "add on" to their purchases as possible. Please don't lecture the staff about communication issues if I can't get a straight answer from you about why I didn't get a significant raise (or any raise at all) after working for the store for one year or more. It can be really frustrating to have half a dozen people telling me what to do, and it can be even more frustrating when they keep telling me the same thing over and over and over again, especially if I'm not even making any mistakes. (It's like they're the Energizer Bunnies of retail.)

6. Give me a more reasonable amount of time for breaks. It's not unusual to only get one ten minute break in a five hour shift, or to only get one half-hour lunch break in a six hour shift. On my last shift, I got to sit down for exactly five minutes. That's because it took me more than twenty minutes to navigate the crowd of tourists at the food court, get the free soda that all the employees were raving about as one of our "perks" for working at the store, and find my way back to the breakroom. From now on, I'm just going to bring my lunch, but it's hard to figure out what to bring because there's no refrigerator where I can store it.

I did say that I am grateful to have part-time jobs that can help me pay the bills while I am in graduate school. When I took this job at Tourist Trap, I thought about holding on to it even after the summer ended. It would mean extra money that I could definitely use. But I already have my hands full during the school year with my dissertation, teaching, and my website job; I'm not sure if I could take on another job. I don't think I want to, especially because after my last shift, I came home so tired that I immediately went to bed and slept for four hours. I woke up at ten P.M. and was too tired to eat dinner, so I went back to sleep again and slept through the night. I haven't been that exhausted since I was an adjunct with three jobs, working seven days a week. So it's in situations like these that I don't feel grateful so much as just worn out, angry, and bitter because I can't do anything to change the way retail employees are treated. And I feel even more worn out when I think about how I can't just quit, because I need this job.

Now that I think about it, it does bother me when divas like Katy Perry (though I do love her music) make outrageous demands, especially since "commoners" like me aren't in a position to make demands of our employers. If I were to present any of my retail employers with these requests, I'm fairly certain that there would be at least a dozen people waiting to take my job if I were to "act out" too much.

If you could present your employer with a list of "demands", what would they be? (I'm not suggesting you actually do this.) But if you could do it, what kinds of things would you ask for?

I'd Like to Thank All the Little People

Theresa Milstein, who writes the blog The Substitute Teacher's Saga, is hosting an awesome contest titled "Four Hundred Follower Fiesta on February Fourth". You should definitely visit (and follow!) her blog and check it out.

The grand prize is a query critique by Nicole Zoltack, whose publisher is Desert Breeze Publishing. You could also win several great books, including The Red Garden, by Alice Hoffman and The Dating Game, by fellow blogger Talli Roland. In order to participate in the contest, all you have to do is be a current (or new) follower of Theresa's blog. Also leave a comment on her blog post (the link to the post promoting the contest is above) that indicates which of the prizes you'd like to win.

Theresa also let me know that I got a free book, titled Smart Words: Vocabulary for the Erudite, since I was one of the first two commenters on that blog post. How cool is that?

When I was in high school, I used to watch several of the awards shows. I even taped some of them, including the MTV Video Music Awards and the Grammys, if my favorite musicians were performing. I thought it was nice that musicians and actors were honored for their hard work.

I still think that it's good for them to get awards. They do work hard after all, and I suppose it is nice for them to be recognized and praised for what they do. But I have to admit that sometimes I get a little tired of all the awards shows. Not to mention all the gossip on the red carpet gets old, because how many times do we really need to see a bunch of celebrities parade around in expensive clothes while everyone else compliments them?

I probably sound like I'm jealous. I am, a little bit. It would be thrilling to be the center of attention like that. I think it would be fun to live that life for one day.

But I wouldn't want to live that life 24/7. Can you imagine living under a microscope, with everyone watching and judging everything that you do? Can you imagine spending hours getting ready for one of those red carpet events, only to end up on some worst-dressed list while people like Joan Rivers laugh at you and say, "I can't BELIEVE they even nominated someone who dresses like that! If they had put on a burlap sack or a clown outfit they would have looked better!" (I should add that I've never liked Joan Rivers very much.)

I also think that there are too many awards shows as it is. Although hosts like Conan O'Brien do provide entertaining commentary, at the same time the acceptance speeches seem to be the same every year.

Often you'll see a celebrity go up there all teary-eyed and happy, saying, "I didn't even prepare a speech because I didn't think I'd win! I just want to thank all the people who weren't as talented as I am, so that I could win this award instead of them." Or sometimes the person accepting the award will act like he or she doesn't care, and they'll go up there all cool and indifferent. They'll say something like, "Yeah, thanks, I guess. I have to go and let people fawn over me now before I go clubbing with other people who are also too cool to care."

And then you have the people who were nominated and didn't win, and they'll say something gracious like, "Really, it's an honor just to be nominated." But what they're really thinking is, "I should be up there! Am I the only one who recognizes my greatness?"

It seems like every other week I turn on the TV and there's another awards show being promoted. I do have to wonder if they're going to create even more awards just so they can have more excuses to roll out the card carpet. Here are some examples of awards that they could come up with:

"I'm So Beautiful It Only Takes Me Six Hours Every Day and a Styling Team to Look This Way" Award

"Most Popular Reality Show That Is about Nothing But Cat Fights and Hot Tub Hookups" Award

"Biggest Scandal Involving a Porn Star/Public Rant/Celebrity Breakup" Award

"Most Popular Socialite with the Highest Number of Famous Boyfriends/Girlfriends" Award

"15 Minutes of Fame" Award

"15 Minutes of Fame That Should Have Ended Last Year and Yet He/She Won't Go Away" Award

I'm not sure if they'll ever make awards like these, especially since the titles are too long to put on those trophies. But I can think of more than one celebrity who should be nominated for one or all of these awards.

Gossip, Breakup Songs, and Tiaras

One of my guilty pleasures is People.com. I often read the news about celebrities to find out who broke up with whom this week, and who thinks that being famous means you don't have to pay taxes. I say it's a "guilty" pleasure since most of the articles are mainly just gossip; did you ever notice how most of the articles about celebrities don't actually include quotes from the celebrities themselves? Instead the articles include information from people who are supposedly "sources close to the star", which could mean anyone from the star's best friend to his or her hair stylist to some guy who stood fifty feet away from the celebrity once.

Ever since Prince William got engaged to Kate Middleton, their relationship has been all over the news. Every day there's a different headline on People.com and other gossip websites and magazines about their engagement and their upcoming wedding, because apparently William and Kate are the first couple EVER to get married. And I just have one question to ask:

                                   WHY DO WE CARE?

I must admit that I did have a crush on Prince William when I was sixteen. But then again I also thought that Skittles should be counted as one of the four food groups, and I thought that The Real World actually was real, and I wanted to be just like one of the cast members when I grew up. Now I kind of just want to challenge them to a duel and then when they show up to fight me I'll use a magic wand to zap them onto the Jerry Springer show and have one of the guests fight them and then I'll laugh maniacally as chairs are thrown and...

Wait. What was I talking about?

Anyway, I also admit that I am a little envious of Kate Middleton. Not because of William, because I'm not a starry-eyed sixteen year old girl with a crush anymore, obviously. I'm envious because the money that will be spent on her wedding dress would probably be enough to pay for a lifetime supply of Frappuccinos, or possibly enough to buy my own personal Starbucks, complete with a full staff of baristas ready to keep me caffeinated all the time. And that would rock.

I do have to wonder why Americans care so much about the Royal Family. No offense against the Royal Family, and definitely no offense against anyone reading this who lives in England. But seriously, why do we care? It's not like the prince's wedding impacts us in any way. It's not like we're going to be invited to the wedding. It's not like we will EVER meet the happy couple. We don't even have royalty in this country, despite the fact that certain politicians walk around as if they should be wearing tiaras and we should all be bowing down to them in adoration. So why should we care?

Maybe it's because Kate and William's story is like a fairy tale with paparazzi. And people like fairy tales and want to believe that they could actually come true.

I read the celebrity magazines not because I actually care about the celebrities, but because the magazines themselves are an escape. People magazine, for example, is the exact opposite of the "scholarly" books I have to read every day, as well as the students' papers that I have to grade. I don't have to analyze the articles I'm reading; I can just read them for fun.

I'd like to say that I'm mature and that I never judge the celebrities for their mistakes. But I do have to roll my eyes and shake my head when I hear about another famous person getting arrested while in the company of a porn star, or a musician getting married for the tenth time, or a young starlet flashing a late night talk show host. And besides, I judge EVERYONE.

Do you notice that the magazines rarely include articles about "real" people? When they do, the articles are about people who have committed crimes. What's also interesting is that I rarely find any articles about writers on People.com.

But sometimes the articles, particularly the headlines, get to me, because they often don't reveal anything about the famous people that I didn't already know. (And, sadly, I already know too much.) Here are just a few examples: (And these are actual headlines, and by actual, I mean I just made them up. But you just might see them in the next issue of People.)

Kate Chooses Nail Polish Color for Wedding: Tie-dye Is In!

Donald Trump Gets Cavity, Fires Dentist

Ashton Kutcher: How Twitter Saved My Marriage

"It's My Turn!": Prince Harry Announces Engagement to Snooki

Poll: What Kind of Wedding Cake Should William and Kate Get?

Jessica Simpson Shows off New Mohawk

The Top 10 Reasons Why Brangelina WILL NEVER GO AWAY

Contest or Conspiracy? Bristol Palin and Dancing with the Stars

Gwyneth Paltrow Uses Dictionary to Find Baby Names

I do feel sorry for celebrities, because they can't go anywhere without being photographed. Every move they make is overanalyzed and criticized by people who know nothing about what their lives are really like. People complain about the aggressiveness of the paparrazi, but the paparazzi wouldn't even exist if people weren't reading their magazines or checking out the latest photo of Britney Spears buying lunch. But then again, I don't feel THAT sorry for them, because they're good looking and so rich that their personal assistants have assistants. (Again, I must ask, WHY?)

I think that as William and Kate's wedding draws nearer, every third article will be about it. I guess the simplest solution would be to just stop reading People.com. And I will. As soon as I finish the latest article about Jake Gyllenhaal and Taylor Swift. They just had coffee together, which obviously means they'll get engaged and then break up; Taylor will write a song about Jake titled "You Done Me Wrong", and then they'll reconcile, move in together and adopt dogs that they will name after their costars. And it will all probably happen within the next week. Maybe I should use my magic wand...

What do you think of the celebrity magazines? Do you read them? Why do you think people are so fascinated by famous people?