Who's The Foxiest Rock Critic?

Sara's unintentional Lloyd Cole quote: "cheekbones like geometry" mirrors the "Perfect Skin" line of "She's got cheekbones like geometry and eyes like sin / and she's sexually enlightened by 'Cosmopolitan' / she's got perfect skin..."

Love that song.

In my experience at art school (which I suppose is a slightly different thing than the music crit world), I would see girls that I thought were either plain or not particularly attractive date fantastically good looking men all of the time, but I can think of very very very few examples from my own anecdotal experience of very attractive girls dating unattractive men (unless I count the handful of relationships I've ever been in.)

Ugly guys with beautiful girls
You always know what the story is.
Beautiful girls with ugly guys
What do they take us for anyway?
What do they take us for anyway?

Ugly guys with beautiful girls
Ugly guys with beautiful girls

As they walk down the street arm in arm, I see
them and once again feel the need to ask
myself the question, the question that has
weighed heavily on me of late. How is it
possible that a guy and a girl so dissimilar
in physical appearance, there being such a
disparity in how attractive each is, be nonetheless
in what would appear to be some sort of relationship?

It ain't done with smoke and mirrors.
It ain't done with smoke and mirrors.
It ain't done with smoke and mirrors.

Ugly guys with beautiful girls
Ugly guys with beautiful girls
Ugly guys with beautiful girls

How do we explain this? An attraction of
opposites? No, that theory has been refuted
by many experts in the fields of human psychology.
A much greater attraction seems to come from
one more similar to oneself. Personality, perhaps?
Without intending to sound judgmental, I would
say that he doesn't look like what was once called
a "live wire" or "the life of the party." He appears
rather expressionless. His movements are stiff
and even awkward. Perhaps he is a person of
some intellect-an expert in science, the arts, political
theory. No , I think not. See how well tailored his
clothes are, how well cut his hair is.

It ain't done with smoke and mirrors.
It ain't done with smoke and mirrors.
It ain't done with smoke and mirrors.

Ugly guys with beautiful girls
Ugly guys with beautiful girls
Ugly guys with beautiful girls
(Ugly Guys With Beautiful Girls con't.)

I must confess to you, my listeners, that I have been
a little less than honest in pretending I had no answers
to my previous questions. You see, I lost someone
very dear to me, someone very beautiful, to someone
much like him.

Ah, you ask, surely there must have been other areas
where you were deficient and he was not. No, I don't
believe so. My shortcomings were of an economic nature.
He was rich. I was not.

You see, I underestimated the appeal to her of things---
imported things on wheels, large things with manicured
lawns and Olympic swimming pools, things to wear around
her neck that would glisten in the night light. Things. Still,
I am not bitter. Rather, I am an observer who saw first
hand how life may not be fair. Would things have turned
out differently between me and her had I moved up the
corporate ladder quicker, been born of more noble stock,
or done better on one of our journeys to Las Vegas?
Perhaps. In fact, I'm certain of it. Things would have turned
out differently between me and her. I know this now. It ain't
done with smoke and mirrors.

Ugly guys with beautiful girls.
You always know what the story is.

The "cheekbones like geometry" line was something I saw on a Friendster profile of an incredibly gorgeous girlfriend of a semi-attractive (at least to me) rock critic. And it's not the case of a very flattering thumbnail. I've seen her in person. And it just made me think, "Why do I bother trying to be smart, funny, endearing, having great hair and wearing cool dresses from 1966?" Another former male friend of mine used to lecture me on how cheekbones aren't important to men, but since then, has dated a succession of tall skinny size zeros with all lines and no curves.

The thing is, for all the men I've met who say they'd pick Jeanine Garofolo over Uma Thurman in The Truth About Cats and Dogs, when given the choice in real life, they pick Uma Thurman. And me? I prefer Buddy Holly to Elvis, Topher Grace to Ashton Kutcher, Roger Taylor to John Taylor, John Cusack to Tom Cruise. So this has been my dilemma for all of my dating life. I can't date or even be friends with the guys that I have the most in common with. Hence, me and the hotel concierge working that whole opposites attract thing, plus my posse of cool girlfriends and gay boyfriends.

Sara, have heart. Not all men are like that, and you're better off not dating the ones overly hung up on body type, especially if you don't meet their ridiculous standards.

And you're totally right about Topher Grace. You'd better watch out for those John Cusacks though, cos those seem like exactly the type of men to watch out for.

Yeah, word on the street in Chicago here is that Cusack is supposedly sleeeezy IRL.

My geekiest moment ever: I was at the Fangoria Weekend of Horrors one year, talking to Tom Savini and having him autograph my copy of his makeup how-to book. Afterward, my dad mentioned that I'd been standing next to Elvira the whole time, and hadn't even noticed.

Just so you all know, all the women I have dated have been phenomenally attractive too.

I'm with Sara, as I'm attracted to the cute, neurotic types and they always seem to be dating tall, boney blondes. Perhaps I'm too much like them, like a sister or something. I do know more than a few cute, smart femme academic/critic types. Many of would them agree with me (um, if I may speak for them). We talk about it a lot.

Aha! So according to this law of the universe, as a not-bony blonde I am therefore repulsive to the sort of guy I want to attract. *ponders what color to dye hair*