Up My Own Ass

… be sure to read Part 1.

As I pushed our belongings down the halls of St. Joseph’s Hospital, I inexplicably pretended I was in the film Splash, me being Tom Hanks or Eugene Levy trying to sneak Daryl Hannah out.

Mind you, this was when I was actually preparing for my wife Amy and I to bring our new li’l baby home. What is wrong with me? I thought. This was not 48 hours after I was shouting at an in-labor Amy, “You’re gonna be okay!” like Harvey Keitel does to Tim Roth in Reservoir Dogs after he was shot. I also couldn’t get a certain passage from Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life out of my head:

Hospital Administrator: And what are you doing this morning?
Obstetrician: It’s a birth.
Hospital Administrator: Ah. And what sort of thing is that?
Dr. Spenser: Well, that’s where we take a new baby out of a lady’s tummy.
Hospital Administrator: Wonderful what we can do nowadays.

But Amy and I had our baby boy and I continued to think of the girls I might have wedded and had children with if my life as a celebrity stalker had ever truly taken shape.

That said, here are numbers 10 through 6 on our countdown.

10. Dinah Manoff

Yes, at one time, when I was in high school, I was madly in love with the daughter of legendary actress Lee Grant and one of the stars of the hit situation comedy Empty Nest.

While many favored lesbian and nutjob Kristy McNichol, it was sweet Dinah for me. I actually had a bunch of episodes of this miserable sitcom on tape for a while to enjoy over and over again. Anyone know the theme song? No? Good.

Dinah made many other TV appearances, including starring with Nell Carter in the 1992 TV movie, “Maid for Each Other.”

Get it?

They were maids…

9. Christine McVie

In another instance of passionate love for a woman older than my mother, I was a huge Fleetwood Mac fan at one point. But to hell with Stevie Nicks. I had it bad for John McVie’s ex-wife.

As a young high school boy, I didn’t as much go for the 1970s Christine. Present-day, menopausal McVie was what I wanted, as she sang like an angel on hit songs like “Little Lies” and “Everywhere.” She can collect social security now. I’ll bet you thought this list was gonna be hot, huh?

8. Debra “Madusa” Miceli

In the late 80s a beautiful, yet kick ass, lady appeared on the pro wrestling scene. Her name was Madusa Miceli and when the American Wrestling Association couldn’t contain her, she went to Ted Turner‘s World Championship Wrestling, ’cause that’s what super bad ass Italian babes do.

In WCW she went only as Madusa and won a famous bikini contest against Missy Hyatt due to the “heel” judging of Jesse “the Body” Ventura. She jumped to the WWF in 1993, taking the name Alundra Blayze, then went back to WCW, even throwing the WWF Women’s Title in the trash on live television. Today, she’s one up on former wrestling valets Sensational Sherri and Miss Elizabeth in that Madusa is still alive.

7. Valerie Bertinelli

Former Mrs. Eddie Van Halen, now a shill for Jennie Craig, Valerie was the beautiful and non-drugged out daughter on One Day at a Time. I would follow her like a dog through her horrible late 80s sitcom Syndey, which also starred Daniel Baldwin and a young Matthew Perry, and the equally bad early 90s comedy Cafe American.

Picture The Mary Tyler Moore Show in France, only completely shitty and unwatchable. By far my favorite Valerie film was the 1981 Comedy/Drama The Princess and the Cabbie, about a young woman (Valerie) who works to overcome her dyslexia with the help of a good-hearted cab driver (Robert Desiderio). She was absolutely adorable in that silly-ass flick, which also featured a pre-Cheers Shelley Long. Wolfgang’s mom has got it goin’ on.

6. Audrey Hepburn

This Academy-award winning Anglo-Dutch actress overcame growing up under Nazi rule to become one of the greats in all of motion pictures. The star of such films as Roman Holiday, Sabrina, and Breakfast at Tiffany’s, in her later years she was a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador and still pretty darn hot (Hey, if I had it for 40-year-olds, why not 60?).

As a closing, I’d like to share with you an example of my infatuations with both Hepburn and our number 13 gal, Sylvia Plath. This is from a fictional Christmas piece I penned a while back:

…When we got Mom back in the house she broke down. Rebecca and I started crying too. She told everyone her marriage was over and that they should all just leave. No one wanted to go; they wanted to help her. But Mom was adamant and the family soon started exiting until a familiar face entered the house. It was my grandfather, who looked quite well, despite being dead for twelve years. Everyone was delighted especially to see that he had brought a date, as he simply glowed walking in arm-in-arm with Audrey Hepburn, and not the elderly, charitable Ms. Hepburn, but the elegant, early fifties Audrey. Grandpa always did like them young, from his parties with Roman Polanski to his kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby. This was his first date since Grandma Sylvia Plathed herself Easter Sunday twenty years before…

Until Part 3…