Rhona Mitra Syndrome

This pretty lady is Rhona Mitra. She's an actress - you might recognize her if you watched Boston Legal or Nip/Tuck. I think she's been in some movies, too. She is also the live model for the video game Lara Croft. Anyway, enough of that. the other day at lunch, Matlock told us that he has been watching Boston Legal, the first season, and that he really liked her. Ever helpful K then told us that one of the other associate's buddies dates her. This buddy is apparently short, a bit pudgy and not rich. He just had the guts to go up to Ms. Mitra in a bar and talk to her. And he has a "great personality."

Matlock was through the roof with joy, which I didn't understand, because suddenly it meant that he had a chance with her. He wouldn't shut up about it. On and on and on until finally when he said, "If I were with her, people would look at me and assume that I had a "great personality" because clearly there would be no other explanation for why she was with me," I responded with "Yeah. And they'd assume she had a really low self-esteem." I immediately felt bad - it was a mean joke.

But I think what got me going was the idea that when average guys (please note that when I say "average" I mean people who don't look like movie stars... and probably not your friends that you refer to as "my hot friend," cause everyone has one) hear about other average guys getting a hot chick, they assume they can do it too. Perhaps that's the attitude to take. But it suddenly seems like the average guy expects, ney, demands a hot chick.

Women don't think like this. First of all, we have no examples to follow. I tried to think of examples of very attractive Hollywood men dating average looking women. I came up with two. Matt Damon's wife was a bartender when he met her. But she's actually pretty cute. This isn't the greatest picture of her, but I've seen her looking downright pretty. And Tobey Maguire's fiancee, Jennifer Meyer is rather homely.... but she's also the daughter of the president of Universal. That was the best I could do. And when I hear about such things, I do think that said girl is lucky, but it never makes me think that I suddenly have a shot with a guy like that.

First off, average girls never think they could get a Brad Pitt. And even if average girl did get Brad Pitt, she would be wracked with neuroses the whole time about how out of her league he is and how all the beautiful women are making eyes at him. But not guys.

I told Kate the story of Rhona Mitra and she repeated it to her co-worker Matt. He said, "I like this story. It makes me think I have a shot with a beautiful woman." When I told Phil that an average looking guy would have no problem being with a woman like Rhona Mitra, Phil exclaimed "I'll be that guy!"

What is this confidence? If you got Rhona Mitra, do you really think you could keep her? I think the difference is that guys don't ponder such mysteries in advance. Guys think, "she's beautiful, I bet we'd have a lot of fun [wink, wink]." They don't consider the rest. Ah well, clearly it can work, and guys are the luckier for it - Rhona and her short, pudgy boyfriend live together now.