We watched Manor House on PBS last night. I love PBS� reality shows. It�s not about who gets voted out or who wins, it�s actually about the experience and learning more about how things were done in the period they are supposed to be emulating. There�s no money to be had, let alone a spouse in the end, and that�s what I want from a reality show. The show is simply a group of people who volunteer to surrender their modern lives for a set period of time simply so that they can learn. This time around it�s an English manor house set around 1905 in the Edwardian Era. There are servants and masters and the butler is every bit as much of a choad as one would expect.

I found myself struggling not to scream at the television on Saturday night. I get so sick of seeing commercials telling women that they are flawed, that cellulite is something to be feared. I want to put ad executives in a room where they are constantly bombarded with messages meant to belittle and see how they feel at the end. Your cellulite will not go away and you will not lose an inch off of your thighs by slathering them with cream for a month. Stop making women feel badly about themselves! We beat ourselves up enough.

I didn�t watch television for a full year back between 19 and 20 and it was amazing how much better I felt about myself in that time. Because I wasn�t hearing about how Special K can help me lose weight and Almay will remove my non-existent wrinkles, I wasn�t thinking about wrinkles and extra pounds. Instead, I learned to see myself realistically and, in the end, I found myself to be satisfying. As long as I find myself satisfying, I don�t need those shitty do-nothing products to improve my image. Yes, the placebo effect is shown to work in a lot of cases (ah, another tidbit learned watching PBS), but you shouldn�t need a remedy for how you look.

At this point, none of these bullshit ads make me feel bad, they simply make me angry because I know that there are other women out there who gauge their self-worth by the circumference and texture of their thighs and the depth of their smile lines. Why would I want to get rid of smile lines? They are proof that I have laughed and loved and had a happy life. It�s frown lines I would worry about, as that would prove I�ve had more anguish than joy. And who really gets worked up about your cellulite? If your boyfriend makes fun of you, he�s not worth dating. If anybody but you or he sees it, then you�ve got some serious fashion issues. No three inch long skirt is attractive, I don�t care how thin someone is. I don�t want to be the innocent bystander who happens to turn my head and see ass. Don�t get me started on Botox. You know how you�re not supposed to eat food in a bloated can? Well, that�s what�s in there and it can kill you. If it�s not good enough for my Dinty Moore, it�s never going to be good enough for me.