Dangerous, Dirty, and Unfun

Dangerous, Dirty, and Unfun knows which side its bread is buttered on. You’re not here for the trenchant political commentary. You’re not here for the feeble displays of passive aggression. You’re here for Gossip Girl.

Regular readers of DD&U know that Gossip Girl is my favorite show on TV right now. It’s not even a contest. It’s the reason I’m able to make it through my weeks in the fall and winter. And considering how fortuitous the circumstances that led to me watching the show were, I thank my lucky stars that I have Gossip Girl in my life in the first place.

See, I knew that Gossip Girl was coming. I knew that it was from the creator of the OC. I knew there was an OC-shaped hole in my heart, but I had no idea if Gossip Girl would be able to fill it. I didn’t really have feelings about the show one way or the other.

My friend Meg and I were already fans of America’s Next Top Model, which was on Wednesdays on the CW. Even though I was committed to the show, I was sort of put off by Cycle 8, which saw Jaslene, who I thought looked like a garment bag filled with bones, win the contest. But like I said, I was committed, and when I commit to a show, I commit. I watched Cavemen, people. Every episode.

Cycle 9 premiered on September 19, 2007. I should have known the night was going my way, because I was introduced to my precious love, Heather, the prettiest girl to ever appear on ANTM, whose eventual ouster from that show led me to initiate a lifelong boycott. Because it might be true that when I watch a show, I commit to that show. But don’t ever cross me, or else I’ll move on to a show that rewards my loyalty more.

So that season premiere of ANTM ends, and we start seeing promos for this new show, Gossip Girl. I was at Meg’s place, and we were both a half a bottle of Chuck deep at that point, as was our weekly tradition. We decided, what the hell, let’s check this out.

The rest is history.

I wasn’t the only one watching Gossip Girl. The show immediately captivated Jessica Pressler and Chris Rovzar, writers for New York magazine’s Daily Intelligencer blog. Pressler and Rovzar are famous for their weekly Gossip Girl reality index, but I’d like to direct your attention to a New York mag cover story they wrote called “The Genius of Gossip Girl.” Read it, and you’ll begin to understand why I love this show so damn much. (I also stole the “Greatest Show of Our Time” moniker from them. It’s an homage!)

I’m a regular reader of the Daily Intel GG reality indices, in which the authors go through every episode, adding and subtracting points from based on how authentically “New York” it is. A clever gimmick! I wish I had the cleverness or the capability to go through with something like that myself. But alas, I had to steal a bit from Bill Simmons (who stole it from, I dunno, Norm Chad?), and do the whole running diary thing. I think this is the first one, although I forget if I did one on the old .mac site. Irregardless, it’s become one of my favorite parts of DD&U. Forces me to watch the show more critically, come up with the wittiest (one-way) repartee I can. I’ll be honest with you, precious readers: the diaries aren’t a service to you. They’re a service to Gossip Girl watchers. If my dear readers and Gossip Girl watchers are one and the same, then great! If not, they should be! Just start watching, and you can stop skipping the weekly diaries.

For those of you interested in a little inside baseball w/r/t your favorite blog, Gossip Girl is responsible for the most random hits to Dangerous, Dirty, and Unfun. Since July 15, 2009, when I started tracking statistics using Google Analytics, a search for “omgbse”, or some iteration thereof, has been responsible for at least 186 unique visits to dangerousdirtyunfun.com. (I’m not counting the sundry versions of a search for “dangerous dirty unfun,” because those are, obviously, obvious.) “Omgbse,” of course, is something one of Blair’s minions uttered in a Season 3 episode, which is translated “Oh my god, best sleepover ever.” (You’ll also recall the clarifying update post I wrote.) Thing is, it’s the middle of June, and the top search term sending people to Dangerous, Dirty, and Unfun is STILL “omgbse.” So either there are a ton of people still watching old Gossip Girl eps and wondering what the hell is going on, or there are a ton of vegans who are just shocked at the idea of bovine spongiform encephalopathy. Either way, if you’re shopping for your favorite blogger, this wouldn’t be a bad choice.

Tags: Gossip Girl, omgbse, rank self-indulgence, The Greatest Show of Our Time, Youth's the Most Unfaithful Mistress

This entry was posted on Monday, June 14th, 2010 at 11:51 pm and is filed under Culture. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.