6 or 7 reasons Samantha wins at life, while Jeannie is just a sad, fake ponytail wearing, subservient wannabe

Which show was better, Bewitched or I Dream of Jeannie?

Oh, get out of your ivory tower and stop acting like you haven't had lengthy discussions about this very topic. Sure, you were probably stoned, but even so.

It's still relevant.

I fall into the "Samantha" camp, and here's why:

1. Samantha only had to discreetly twitch her nose and voila! Larry Tate was promoting Darrin and completely forgetting the fact that he had met William Shakespeare in the Stephen's living room that evening. Jeannie had to cross her arms, close her eyes and bob her head. Way too much work, especially if your arms are tired.

2. Between her nauseatingly pink harem costume (which still managed to cover her bellybutton at all times, in accordance with NBC censors requirements), her fake ponytail and the way she called Tony "Master", Jeannie was way too conspicuous. Therefore she was always homebound, and how much fun can you have in a house by yourself?

3. Samantha got to sleep in a bed. Know where Jeannie had to sleep? In a bottle. Every night. Also? Whenever company came over, Tony was all, get your ass in the bottle, bitch. And when she was "bad"? She got the bottle. It was like her timeout place or something. What self-respecting woman allows herself to be sent to timeout? Jeannie, that's who.

4. Yes, Darrin could be a bossy asshat at times, telling Samantha she couldn't use her magic, but I don't ever recall hearing Samantha calling her husband "Master". If I were a genie, I'd make it a rule that I could refuse to call any man master. The only exception to this would be if his last name was "Bates". Because that would never get old.

5. Samantha's quirky family was always dropping in unexpectedly. She had a smooth, urbane father and a snarky, bitchy mom (who preferred to say they had an "informal marriage". Now, how cool is that?). Also? Who could forget ditzy Aunt Clara, crazy cousin Serena, goofy Uncle Arthur, quirky Aunts Enchantra and Hagatha or Dr. Bombay? Samantha had a family, she had a history. Tony just picked Jeannie up on the beach, and brought her home. A one night stand gone horribly wrong.

6. Samantha had a wardrobe, for pete's sake. She had pajamas, dresses, capris and evening gowns. What did Jeannie have? The same tired harem costume. Day in. Day out. Oh, sure. Sometimes she got to dress in what I call "people clothes", but 98% of the time she was in her t&a outfit. Nothing like being objectified to make you feel like a piece-of-trash Jeannie that got picked up on a beach one night and has to call her owner "Master". No wonder she never went back to school for her MBA.  It's called self-esteem, Jeannie. Get some.

7. Eh. This post was originally called "10 reasons...." but I'm tired of this post so you only get 6. 7 if you count this one. Which you should cuz it's still awesome.

“All the other kids with the pumped up kicks you better run....

...better run, faster than my bullet."
- "Pumped Up Kicks"
by Foster The People

I seriously can't get this song out of my head. Tonight I made the kids sit in the car with me until it was done playing on the radio. TOTALLY. LOVE. THIS. SONG.

When I hear it, I think of Columbine. I think of Lyle and Erik Menendez. I think of the near-averted tragedy that would have probably taken place in New Orleans the day after tomorrow, if it weren't for the communication between school personnel and the Sheriff's department. And the kids who wanted to live badly enough to tell their parents, teachers, friends or probation officer about the plan afoot.

I dream of a day when songs like this are meaningless. Until then, I leave you with this:
http://youtu.be/bzP4mQ7Q-dQ

Yes, it's a link because Youtube is stupid tonight and won't let me embed the video into my post.

Ok, because you are SUCH loyal followers, here are the lyrics:

Robert's got a quick hand.
He'll look around the room, he won't tell you his plan.
He's got a rolled cigarette, hanging out his mouth he's a cowboy kid.
Yeah he found a six shooter gun.
In his dads closet hidden in a box of fun things, and I don't even know what.
But he's coming for you, yeah he's coming for you.

Chorus:
All the other kids with the pumped up kicks you'd better run, better run, outrun my gun.
All the other kids with the pumped up kicks you'd better run, better run, faster than my bullet.
All the other kids with the pumped up kicks you'd better run, better run, outrun my gun.
All the other kids with the pumped up kicks you'd better run, better run, faster than my bullet.

Daddy works a long day.
He be coming home late, yeah he's coming home late.
And he's bringing me a surprise.
'Cause dinner's in the kitchen and it's packed in ice.
I've waited for a long time.
Yeah the slight of my hand is now a quick pull trigger,
I reason with my cigarette,
And say your hair's on fire, you must have lost your wits, yeah.

Chorus:
All the other kids with the pumped up kicks you'd better run, better run, outrun my gun.
All the other kids with the pumped up kicks you'd better run, better run, faster than my bullet.
All the other kids with the pumped up kicks you'd better run, better run, outrun my gun.
All the other kids with the pumped up kicks you'd better run, better run, faster than my bullet.

[Whistling]
[Chorus x3:]
All the other kids with the pumped up kicks you'd better run, better run, outrun my gun.
All the other kids with the pumped up kicks you'd better run, better run, faster than my bullet.
All the other kids with the pumped up kicks you'd better run, better run, outrun my gun.
All the other kids with the pumped up kicks you'd better run, better run, faster than my bullet.

Did I ever tell you about that one time...

One time, about 8 years ago, we needed to get our house painted. This was not a voluntary decision on our part, oh no. The city wrote us a nicely worded letter citation and gave us, like, 2 weeks to git 'er done. Because who DOESN'T have $8,000 laying around in an envelope that reads only to be spent on getting the house painted, f*ck the plumbing. So I, of course, flipped out. Shut up. I was either pregnant or post-partum AND I GET VERY TEARY WHEN MY HORMONES ARE OUT OF WHACK.

My husband-at-the-time and I discussed this predicament in a calm, rational manner freaked the shit out, using all sorts of grown-up words such as troublesome, unexpected really bad swears like f*ck! and sh*t! and a**hole! Only we replaced the asterisks with actual letters. We were that upset. 

So I did what any mature, self-supporting and adult woman would do. No, that's a lie. I actually started crying and then I called my parents. SOBBING. HYSTERICALLY. AND LOUDLY.

Now, before I take you any further into this story, I need to tell you something about my dad. My dad has worked hard for everything he has, and he expects the same of others. He also isn't one to judge others based on the gigantic shit sandwich that life has handed them (i.e. if you're poor, or homeless, or live in a van by the river, he'll help you out. A little.)

So when my dad told me he would buy the paint, I thanked him profusely. When he told me he had a guy lined up to paint the house, I was ecstatic. When he told me the man's name was Stinky, I was curious. When he told me Stinky lived in a van down by the river, I felt bad. When he told me that Stinky was the only name this man answered to, I was quietly accepting.

Because hello??! Free paint job!

After two weeks of waiting, because it was too humid to paint, Stinky showed up on my doorstep one fine Thursday morning.

Allow me to paint a mental picture for you. Old, gray, potbellied, unshaven, smelly (hence the name), torn and dirty undershirt, bloodshot eyes, greasy work pants and monosyllabic.

Oh. You say you have problems visualizing the written word? Let me help you:

First, Stinky told us we would need to buy 18 gallons of plain white paint. We were painting the house gray, with blue trim. Fortunately, my husband was good at math and quickly deduced that the amount of paint Stinky was requesting would cover the White House three times over. So we bought 5 gallons.

The second day that Stinky was on the job, he painted on the second story. My daughter, who was 5 at the time, ran screaming into my room. MAMA!!!! There's a gross, dirty old man on a ladder looking into my room! We need to call the police!

Do you know how hard it is to convince a 5 year old that the gross old man outside her window is there at her parents request?

It's really freakin' hard.

Secondly, Stinky did what I would consider a "half-assed job". By this, I mean that he spent hours scraping the paint off the house, but he then used a sprayer (that my dad had probably supplied), to haphazardly paint the rest of the house gray. Even the parts that weren't supposed to be gray. Like our antique cherry-wood porch ceiling.

Thirdly, he took like, 6 weeks to paint the freakin' house. Seriously. He'd show up at 10am, paint a bit, stop, smoke a cigarette (grinding out what was left on the sole of his shoe and carefully placing it back in the pack), eat some cold beans out of a can and wander around checking out our neighbor's garbage cans to see if there was anything worth taking, before finally coming back to take a shit behind the garage and calling it a day.

After 6 weeks, Stinky was done painting our house. He insisted on showing me the entire house, but he glossed over the attic windows that he'd neglected to paint. Plus, he mumbled, so I was never completely sure of what he was actually saying. So when he mumbled, "Clfif yodokfk hvkdls yrksr clitshsk?" I said, "Sure!"

Apparently he was asking me if he could have the retractable clothes line that went between the back of our house and the garage. So he took it.

And that's how we got our house painted and lost our retractible clothes line, all in the same month.