The Call of the Cattiness

Want to see 15 beauty queens throw a hissy fit? (Myself included in that blanket label.) If America's Next Top Model is any indication, a number of things will probably do it. But try this one: after they've spent all morning volunteering for you and are super hungry, stick them outside on a random street corner on the first cold day of the year. Leave them there for nearly an hour and tell them to wait for the bus. Then once you've done that, put the nail in the coffin by nearly forgetting to send the bus because you're too busy eating pizza. That ought to do it.

Okay, clearly my hissy fit isn't over yet. But apart from that little incident, I actually enjoyed volunteering at the parade this past weekend. (I don't particularly like big crowds and I'm terrified of mascots. Since I managed to avoid both, I rate it as a success.) But rehearsal was another story--this weekend the claws finally came out.

I'll admit that it's kind of fun to watch the slow decline of facades that were so carefully built. I've seen it many times before in all-female situations. (Anyone remember the mayhem that ensued while working on little publication called the Ryerson Review of Journalism?) But for some reason it's so much funnier in a pageant context. I suddenly understand why it makes for great reality television fodder--although I really don't want to know what would happen if we had a "confession" room.

On the plus side, I'm finally making friends. Since everyone else's disguises are wearing away, I'm no longer guarding my tongue so carefully. I am, however, trying valiantly not to get sucked in by the Call of Cattiness, which is kind of like the Call of the Wild, but with more giggling. Basically, I'm fine with being annoyed about particular girls and their complete lack of professionalism. (This is not pageant specific. All people in life who lack professionalism annoy me.) However, I draw the line at making fun of what someone's wearing. But sometimes that's very, very hard.

So on that note, here are some amazing conversations I thought I'd never legitimately hear in my life:

-A girl greeting another girl by acknowledging they had met one another at The Lakeshore auditions.

-Two girls discussing just how short Pauly D. is in person. (He's short, apparently. Neither girl was particularly impressed, from what I could gather.)

-A girl with something noticeably fake claiming that she is "all real".

-A dude at the parade checking out one of my pageant-mates who was wearing four-inch heels. "Man, I really love those shoes," he told his buddy. "But they look so expensive." (The funniest part was he was being quite literal. The implication was completely unintentional.)

(And yes, the act of writing this on my blog may just be catty behaviour. But it's just too funny not to share.)

In closing, I seriously just had to Google image search "g-string" to figure out what exactly a "g-string wax" might look like. As a first-timer, I think I'm sticking with the bikini wax.