The Gross

...even though it's like pouring warm water on a frostbitten foot, i continue to listen to "Fresh Air" whose host i've taken to referring to as The Gross...i think i'm biased against her, in part, because of her shoddy interview with barry hannah, where it's clear barry is humoring her...but something that also bothers me is her corny laugh...she sounds like the long-lost sister to beavis or butthead...

...there's a resemblance here, right? i can't be the only idiot who thinks so...

...you'd think that after years of interviewing celebrities, politicians, and other important people, she'd grow out of that schoolgirl giggling and just do a damned good interview...is it too much to ask that she be barbara walters?

...still, i listen...and i cringe...and every so often i'll write down a phrase, word, or sentence uttered by The Gross that actually makes me embarrassed...so much so i feel an overwhelming need to crawl under my desk, and begin moaning and rocking until the  prickles of her voice on those words is eradicated from my brain...i wish there was a way to open the top of my skull and bleach some of these away...

...i thought purging them might help to keep them from spinning in my brain during the wee hours of the morning when i can't sleep...

"So, when you come out of rehab, and you're, like, off drugs..." say huh? what does it mean, exactly, to be "like, off drugs"?

"So I'm having a lot of trouble wrapping my mind around the concept of parallel universes..." thank you for this keen, insightful, and interview-worthy comment...

"What about throwing up blood? Did you consult a magician for that too?" this is from her notorious interview with Gene Simmons...really, that whole interview made me cringe, but for some reason when she said this phrase i lost it...i thought, no, The Gross, he consulted a doctor who said, "Sure, Gene, puke blood"...

"I think, like, the human voice is an amazing instrument. Like the more you understand it, the more amazing it becomes." (an interview with Tom Waits)...was this some sort of backhand insult about Waits' voice?...this is a woman who TALKS for a LIVING, and this was her profound wisdom about voices...

"How much sadism is, like, enough?"

"Yes, your manhood is kind of, like, italicized."

 "Well, I'm going to say it and I hope it gives you pleasure."

...these phrases came from three different interviews, if you can believe it...

...The Gross has a series of words she tends to rush through, slur, or almost lick onto the microphone so as to distort her voice and make the listener wonder, What the hell did she just say?...words like "sex" and "meth dealer" and "bra" and "yearning"...when she says these things, my brain summons a giddy schoolboy who has stolen the mic from the principal during an assembly, is running around the auditorium pursued by wild-eyed teachers, and is muttering into the too-close foam ball of said microphone all of the curse words he can before getting caught...i'll never be able to hear someone say "hard drive" again without thinking of The Gross and suddenly feeling like i need a sterilizing shower...

...perhaps my masochistic relationship with The Gross has to do with her use of "like" during her interviews...it's a word that, like, used to, like, make it's way into, like, every conversation i had when i was, like, a
teenager in california...it reminds me of talking to my sisters--who live far away from me and i hardly ever see--because when we, like, talk on the phone, we, like, totally throw back to, like, the eighties...though her show is taped in philly, her overuse of "like" reminds me of those wayward years when i could talk to someone and wasn't expected to follow the rules of standard american english grammar...