As I’m sure you all noticed, I didn’t post a column last month.  Don’t worry, I’m fine.  I was just, well, otherwise engaged.  This brings me to the good news and bad news of the month.  The good news: I have a new girlfriend, Martha.  The bad news: I’m completely off the market ladies and gents.  Oh, and Martha is loaded.  When she was a toddler, a police cruiser backed into Martha’s big wheel and gave her financial security for the rest of her life.  She has a part-time job at the whole-foods market—which gives her plenty of time to focus on supporting my art.  Given only those two responsibilities, she has lots of time on her own, which she spends watching reality TV.  I know I’m supposed to be curing people, trying to make people better themselves, but for this months column, I’m going to prove to you why “America’s Next Top Model” is the pinnacle of high culture entertainment.

1) Tyra Banks.

2) It tackles some of the big questions like, can one apply couture make-up in 45 seconds? (It’s a metaphor).

3) Tyra Banks teaching/facial expressions/dime-store psychology is priceless and will heal the nation.

4) “Meet the Press” only comes on TV once a week.  “America’s Next Top Model” is on twenty-four hours a day.  And honestly, who knows better? Television execs or James Carville.

5) There’s always that one special girl who hates herself no matter what.  It’s Shakespearean.

6) Art, by definition, is a celebration of beauty. How better to celebrate beauty than through catfights, crying, alcoholism mixed with bulimia, face eating bacteria, and shoving fourteen naked 90 lbs girls into a phone booth.  It’s poetry really.