Pleasure and Guilt, Food and Poop, and (as always) Television

[witty intro]

...Hello. I’m here today to crankily type about a little something known as “guilty pleasures.” For the record, I do not have any issues with the term itself.  (The same cannot be said for terms like “make love,” “man-whore”— oh, the sexism— and “irregardless.”)

In fact, I love the idea of guilty pleasures. I’m even mother to quite a few. I think they’re a great way to get to know someone, because true-to-the-definition guilty pleasures are very similar to secrets. But so many (dare I say, majority?) of the guilty pleasures I hear of today are NOT true to the definition, and this is where the problem starts.

When magazines ask celebrities about guilty pleasures, or someone announces one in a public “place” (i.e. a locale in the real world or a status update online) I’ve learned to hold my breath and anticipate either a back-door brag or just a pleasure.

Sure, the pleasure might be a little nerdy, but if I had a nickel for every pair of Buddy Holly glasses I’ve watched ironically shuffle by me over the past year, I would spend the lump sum on a billboard reading,

“I get it: Cool = 'I’m nerdier/less-mainstream than you.' ”

Odd how no one ever seems to mistakenly label pleasure-less “guilts” as “guilty pleasures.” Maybe the conversion from adjective to noun tips them off that they’re missing something?

But enough ranting (at least in paragraph form). It's time to take this issue to the graphs. Let's start off with a celebrity example. 

"My best guilty pleasure is watching old sitcoms and eating grilled cheese and tomato soup in bed."-Padma Lakshmi

Padma, I think you're great. Love your show, yadda yadda yadda, but that's not a guilty pleasure. That's a Wednesday night.

You see, it's like this:

Need another comparison? 

Let me break it down using one of my favorite topics, television:  

dig?

...And yeah, that's pretty much all I've got right now. I might be back. 

Wow, today is not my day for segues. 

Bye?