Sorry, Boyfriend: The Mark Ballas Edition

You know what takes the edge off being sexually harassed by students? Dancing with the Stars. There is something incredibly endearing about watching B-List celebrities or fallen A-List celebrities or sports stars try to do the rumba, and on Monday nights I park myself in front of the television and try to make it through the show without hyperventilating.

It never fails--there's always someone on Dancing with the Stars that I can lust after. Recall the Helio Castroneves incident? Well, that type of thing is happening again, except this season I have developed multiple crushes. For some reason, I find pretty much everyone on this current season to be as charming as all get out. Especially the professional dancers. Especially Mark Ballas. So, here we go:

Sorry, Boyfriend, but I am in love with Mark Ballas.

Mark Ballas is enough to make me want to enroll in acting classes just so that I can become some B-List star and land a gig on Dancing with the Stars, where I will be his one, his only, his partner for all those sexy Latin dances. I want him to murmur the phrase hip-action! to me until my brain leaks out my ear.

Last week when Amy was in town, we had the pleasure of watching the show together, and that meant we got eighteen different kinds of worked up about Mark Ballas whenever he appeared on screen. Then, after we had thoroughly discussed the reasons we thought he was just so hot, we got curious about him. We thought we should Google him. And we did. And we found out that Mark Ballas is a singer. A singer who plays the guitar. A singer who plays the guitar in a band he formed with another of the dancers from the show. Oh, it was too much!

Mark Ballas reminds me of a lot of people. Sometimes he reminds me of the old New Boy, what with the dark hair and tan skin, those curls. Sometimes he reminds me of a ton of the boys I had crushes on during college--preppy boys with cute hats, crisp shirts, clean sneakers. He reminds me of a boy who loves his mother a whole lot. I want to bake him cookies.

Oh, but I want to do more than bake cookies for him. I want to learn to dance for him. With him. Listen, I would be the world's worst dancer. That much is fact. I wouldn't be able to contort my body or wiggle my hips or do any of those things the judges of the show are always yapping about. After all, I am the girl who, when she was in the local pageant during her senior year and thus required to do a group dance--a swing dance--fouled it up but good almost every single time she did it. When our perky, blond-haired, recently-engaged-and-flaunting-her-ring-every-chance-she-got dance instructor ever sighed and called the number to a halt, it was usually on my behalf. My jazz hands? Not jazzy. My snaps and flips? Ugly. My timing? Sucky. Which is a shame because I really, really, really love to dance. Some of the moves I can throw down in my bedroom? Brilliant. And I would try so hard to get it together if just Mark Ballas would dance with me.

Of course, I'm not going to take him away from his current girlfriend. I wouldn't dream of it! After all, they have a lovely story. A classic story. It was all Disney-pop-sensation-and-hero-to-adolescent-girls-everywhere meets fine-assed-ballroom-champion. A few foxtrots, a few jives, a few waltzes and poof!

And who can blame them? They were stuck in a stuffy studio for weeks. They had only each other. They practiced for hours and hours on end. They were half-clothed and sweaty and they had to hold each other like they were lovers. So why not actually become lovers? Man, I wouldn't have been able to hold out very long at all. The first time that boy slanted his eyes at me in just the right kind of way, I would've had him up against the wall. And if that moment had occurred after hours of practice which left us both smelling like sour dishrags, so be it. I wouldn't have cared. I wouldn't have even insisted on going off and taking a shower before stepping back into the studio, suddenly smelling decidedly un-dishrag-y. I would've had him up against the wall even if I was dirty and sweaty and smelly, even if my hair was a frazzled nest on the top of my head, even if my muscles ached and ached and ached. And, coming from a girl who for years had to shower immediately after coming home from waitressing so she no longer would smell like the fryer, that's quite a big deal.

Oh just try to tell me you wouldn't feel the same way. Just you try.

Sorry, Boyfriend: The David Cook Edition

Sorry, Boyfriend, but I am in love with David Cook.

Also, another apology: I'm sorry, Chris Daughtry, for I have sinned. I have loved another American Idol rocker. I did not mean to do it. When this new season brought us two "rockers," I scoffed. I wanted to know just who they thought they were. Did they think they were you? Did they think they could somehow come out on stage and level a look at the camera that would make me flop on the floor and scream, Make out with me!!!! Did they really think that? Because that's what you used to do. But you know who's doing that this season? Jason Castro, yes, but someone else, too. And that someone else is David Cook.

David Cook is cute in this horrifically elfin kind of way. He's got all sorts of pointy angles. His hair is awful. His clothes are awful. But, man, do those makeup people know what to do with him. I've never seen a boy strut out on stage in prettier eyeshadow.

David Cook is no beauty. Sometimes I look at his face and think it looks a little tight--you know, in the way celebrities' faces look tight after they've gotten a lift and tuck. There are times I look at him and think, You sort of look like a girl. I don't think this would make David Cook happy, since he's trying to be badass. But I think he's badass. I do. I'd totally let him buy me leather, take me to cruddy little bars, and pump me full of cheap beer before we make out over near the amps his band is setting up.

I love David Cook because he usually saves the night on Idol. Say what you will about this season being one of the most talented ever--there are an awful lot of bright-eyed hippies on it, and they like to sing songs about peace and love and holding hands and becoming one. Yuck. A girl can only take so much of that (I'm talking to you, Archuleta. I'm talking to you, White. I'm talking to you, Castro. And I actually like all of you. But grit it up, okay? Seriously.) But after all the kumbaya is done for the night, there's David Cook and his guitar and post-sex hairdo and razor blade of a voice. And everyone breathes a sigh of relief because--whew!--no more songs about all the planet's people being brothers and sisters forever and ever, amen! Suddenly there's a man onstage, and he's singing about stalking and sex and disillusionment and other titillating things. Bless you, David Cook. Bless you. Now come on over to my house and sing me that slow version of Lionel Ritchie's Hello. It freaks me out and excites me all at the same time. I couldn't ask for more.

David Cook has suddenly become the show's dark horse darling, and that makes me happy. That means he'll stick around for a while, and I'll get to keep watching him grab that microphone like a lover and put his mouth so close to it I feel like I'm inside his voice when he sings. I want to kiss his tightly-stretched mouth and pull on his stupid, stupid hair and tell him he's a beautiful badass elf-boy. And I hope he would take that as a compliment.

Sorry, Boyfriend: The Rami Kashou Edition

Sorry, Boyfriend, but I'm in love with Rami Kashou.

Boyfriend, you will not know who Rami Kashou is for several reasons. The first is that you don't have cable TV. The second is that even if you did, you wouldn't use it to watch shows like Project Runway. After all, Project Runway has nothing to do with football, hockey, cars, hunting, or things that explode. And if a TV show has nothing to do with those things, you don't see any reason to waste your time on it. And I'm okay with that. Because I know that when you and I finally get it together and share an apartment, we are going to have two rooms with televisions in them. One of those rooms will be forever-tuned to ESPN, and the other will broadcast a steady stream of What Not to Wear, America's Next Top Model, and Project Runway. That room will be mine. And in that room I will worship Rami Kashou.

I have been a Rami fan from week one on Project Runway. Week one. The things I love about him are many, but one of my favorites is his voice. I mean, my God that is one soothing man. I would like to have him around on those days when everything--and I mean everything--goes wrong. I'd like to turn to him and say, "Rami? Say some words for me, would you?" And then he would let me curl up on his lap and he would pet my hair and speak the names of fabulous fabrics he's thinking of using in his next collection. And then I would fall asleep and drool on his abs, but he'd be okay with it because he has realized he is in love with me.

You know, just like he's in love with Jillian.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Rami's "gay." He likes guys. Uh-huh. But have you ever seen the show? Have you ever seen how Rami and Jillian can't keep their hands off of each other? They're always standing next to, batting eyelashes at, and whispering to each other. There is something going on there. You can so totally tell. And if it's true that Rami has, in the past, wanted nothing romantic in nature with girls, it might just be that Jillian is making him rethink all that. I can't even tell you how much money I would pay to see the two of them make out. Their making out would make my day.

I'm not really blowing any of this out of proportion. I didn't think anything of the two of them at first, but a few weeks into the show, I caught myself thinking, Just what the hell is going on here? And it's not just me thinking and wondering about these things.

Of course, even if they aren't in love--oh, but they are--they still please me. I bet they have slumber parties. I bet they get drunk on expensive wine and watch Casablanca. In the morning, I bet they get bagels and watch many hours of E! and say catty things about, say, Lindsay Lohan and her sad leggings.

Oh, what I wouldn't give to have that kind of sleepover with Rami. Or the other kind of sleepover. Either way, I want to spend many hours considering Rami's jaw, his stubble, his fantastic eyes. I want to lay my head down on his arm. I want him to tell me it's all going to be okay, that we can sleep in late and then, after breakfast, he'll make me a nice spring dress.

You know what else I really like about Rami? Just looking at him, you can tell he would look good wet, that there is no one else in the world who would look as spectacular coming out of the shower. I'm fairly sure he would glisten.

And I hope his glistening self wins Project Runway, and that's saying something because I love every last one of those final four contestants. I want to be Christian's roommate. I want to be Jillian's sister. I want to be Chris's date to every New York drag show. But Rami? I want to be Rami's go-to girl, his muse, his love. I want to spend many days watching him work, watching him cut the next most beautiful dress I've ever seen in my life.

It would be a pretty spectacular life.

Sorry, Boyfriend: The Lee Pace Edition

Sorry, Boyfriend, but the facts are these: I love Lee Pace.

And it's hard for me to love Lee Pace because I am not sure if he's going to be around for all that long. After NBC ripped my heart out of my chest last fall when they pulled my beloved Studio Sixty on the Sunset Strip and then the equally-delicious Black Donnellys--the show that replaced Studio Sixty--I swore I wouldn't get too invested in good shows again because I know what happens to them. They get canned. The networks' lack of devotion to good, funny, well-written shows makes me sad. And let's not lie--I'm still smarting from My So-Called Life being canceled in 1995.

Anyway, I'm afraid for Pushing Daisies, which features Lee Pace as a witty pie baker with the ability to bring people (and things) back from the dead. It's ridiculously well-written, sharp, and clever. On top of that, the show's sets and costumes are brilliant. They are little opulent feasts for the eyes.

And so is Lee Pace, and I'll tell you why: it's his torso and his eyebrows.

I have a weakness for tall men, and Lee Pace is tall. Most of that height comes from his torso, which is the longest part of him, and the show's stylist is always putting him in tight black shirts that do nothing but highlight that fact, and this makes me want to gnaw my arm off because I know if he took his shirt off he would have fantastic hipbones. I never once thought I'd spend time wishing Wednesday would hurry up and get here because there is guaranteed to be several moments of time where Lee Pace will be on screen wearing an apron--another thing that highlights his lanky, lanky torso. It's stunning how often I think to myself, Oh my God. A man in an apron is so freaking hot.

He also has some pretty badass eyebrows. It's hard to explain why I find them to be alluring, but I do. I think it has something to do with the angle it brings to his face--it's a sort of hardness that makes him look both a little angry and sad. The second is appropriate for the show, since he's in love with his childhood sweetheart he brought back from the dead. They can never touch again because if they do, she dies again. For good. Oh, it kills me--all those long, sad, aching glances! I can't make it through the show without ingesting some kind of chocolate product to compensate for the fact that they can't kiss, hold hands, hug. If I had the love of the pie baker, I would soothe him. I would fix his broken heart. And then I would pepper his lanky body with kisses fast enough to make your head spin. Oh, you better believe I would.

There are other things that make Lee Pace pretty fantastic, too, and those things are his hair (it's got a cute swoopy wildness about it) and his delivery of the show's cheeky lines (subtle, hysterical), and this is why, come Wednesday night, I am always sitting in front of the television with a brownie or a cookie or a candy bar clenched in my fist so I can make it to the first commercial break without passing out because I think he is just that beautiful.

And you better believe I have my fingers and toes crossed so that the writer's strike doesn't somehow lead to the cancellation of the show, which has easily become my favorite of the new season (although I have to admit I would be pretty upset if Chuck got canceled because, well, just look at Zachary Levi). I can't handle having my heart ripped out again. I've been trying to fill the post-West Wing hole in my heart for a long time now, and I'm ready to give that spot out to Pushing Daisies. It just better stick around.

Sorry, Boyfriend: The Helio Castroneves Edition

Sorry, Boyfriend, but I am in love with Helio Castroneves.



In the past, I've had a love/hate relationship with Dancing with the Stars, mainly because when it first came out I thought it was stupid. Really, really stupid. Then I moved back to New York after graduate school, and that fall I was in what I'd loosely call a "funk." A funk which involved watching entirely too much network television. After a long day of teaching of three or four sections of composition in a row, sans lunch break, all I wanted to do was come home and sit on the couch with my father and help him make snarky comments about whatever shows the networks were presenting to us.

And that's when my hate for the stupid, stupid show turned to love because it wasn't stupid; it was brilliant. First of all, that was the season that featured Joey Lawrence and Mario Lopez--two boys I had minor crushes on in the 80's--and those boys seriously knew how to dance. Also, Mario was totally nailing his professional dancer, and if that's not incentive to tune in and watch I don't know what is.

Anyway, this season of Dancing brought with it a stack of impressively skilled stars. And Helio was one of those stars. I hadn't even heard of him before the new season began, and I probably wouldn't have even cared about him had he not been so freaking badass in week two of the competition. On that night I sat up straight in bed and yelled to my empty apartment, "I AM IN LOVE WITH THIS MAN!"



The best part of this has to do with Helio's day job. He is, in fact, a racecar driver. That's right. A Latin racecar driver with dimples and a smile I want to eat for breakfast.



We all know how I feel about racing and racecar drivers. Not only did I cut my thirteen year old teeth on crushes I held for drivers at my hometown asphalt oval, but throughout the years I also sustained a pretty active fantasy life that involved an alternate life in some NASCAR-soaked world, where I was a sassy sports journalista who would somehow meet and snag Jeff Gordon. As a young girl, I wrote many a story about that, and those stories were printed out on an ancient dot matrix contraption and then circulated among my friends during chorus.

The fact that Helio is a racer, albeit an Indy Car racer, increases his allure. The fact that he somehow reminds me of a Brazilian and more deeply dimpled version of Jeff Gordon gets him even more points. And--it must be said--he's cuter than Jeff Gordon will ever be (even though here Jeff is pictured with his brand new baby in a picture that seems so cute and awkwardly tender it makes me want to implode). I think it's the accent that seals the deal with Helio. I mean, Jeff is from Indiana. When he first began making television appearances he had this weird bordering-on-Southern accent that the Hendricks PR team finally beat out of him, but no one better even attempt to beat Helio's silky accent out of him because I will kill that person.

I want to make a nest in his dimples. I want to take up residence in his ears. I want to wake up every morning to the sunshine that breaks across his shining teeth. And I don't even care that he's a whole inch shorter than me. It would be worth a life without high heels if I could just nuzzle against his neck during a foxtrot, if I could put my hands on his gyrating hips during a samba.