"Kidding. Please continue. I tried all that stuff and nothing happened."

There was a brief pause and the phone had that dead-air sound that made me think she'd put me on hold so she could laugh out loud at the hick in North Carolina who couldn't open the stupid compact.

Finally, she came back on the line, perky as ever.

"Ma'am, maybe you could ask someone who is stronger than you in the household to open it for you?"

WTF?????.

"I'm not some weakling," I sputtered. "Just because I don't have Ellen's guns and I really need that Olay regenerative serum doesn't mean anything."

"Of course you're not weak," the consultant said, clearly thinking that I was, too.

"Take it back."

"Excuse me?"

"Look, I really want to use this product today. I've got a meeting and I need to look sixteen years younger by two o'clock."

"OK," she said, brightly. I could just picture her making big circles in the air beside her temple while she talked to me. "Perhaps you could gently rap the compact on a countertop. Some people find that helpful."

"What if I just take a freakin' hammer to it?"

Suddenly, she sounded serious, not at all perky and more than a little frightened.

"Ma'am, we at CoverGirl most certainly do not advise that you do that."

Empowered, I decided to be an even bigger b.i.t.c.h.

"What if I put it in the driveway and roll over it repeatedly with my car?"

Silence.

"Fire all of my guns at once and explode into s.p.a.ce?"

"Ma'am, that's from Born to Be Wild."

I had underestimated my foe. She clearly had a grip on late '60s Steppenwolf, so how bad could she be? Maybe I did need a stronger member of the household to help me.

Just as quickly, she told me that she'd mail me a coupon for a new compact or the CoverGirl product of my choice (their waterproof mascara is the best ever). But now, she needed to go. I'm guessing there was a large-pore emergency brewing on the West Coast.

I think Susan Boyle had it right all along. I'm sick of trying to shave the years off with all these little pots of goo that clutter my vanity. Think of the very name of that piece of furniture: vanity. Why shouldn't it be something more evolved? Like my self-a.s.sured or my self-esteem? While Susan has gotten a tiny makeover, she's still her haggis-enjoying self and I could learn a lot from that.

It's doubtful Susan Boyle has even thought about her eyelash sitchy-ation. Long lashes are a big deal these days, at least to Latisse spokesmodel Brooke Shields.

I probably won't buy Latisse because it's prescription only and that just seems like a lot of trouble. Besides, the endless warnings of possible side effects that should include unrelenting hotness and maybe X-ray vision but really include discolored eyelids and itchiness make it less tempting.

Latisse, a pretty name that'll probably show up in kindergartens across this great land in about five years, is manufactured by the same company that gave us Botox. (Another product which Authentic Woman Susan Boyle knows nothing about.) Latisse started out as a glaucoma remedy but got renamed and repackaged ($120 for a month's worth) after its magical lash-lengthening properties were discovered by accident.

I repeat: When did we become so obsessed with our eyelashes? Maybelline has a new vibrating mascara. Is it a s.e.x toy or a lash lengthener? You be the judge.

Pulse Perfection mascara looks cool, but I'm plenty apprehensive about sticking a rod that vibrates at "7,000 times per stroke" that close to my eyeball. What if my hand slips during the application? Would it jackhammer my brain? I'd hate to lobotomize myself in the lame, insane pursuit of beauty. What would I do? Just sit at my self-esteem every day staring vacantly at the mirror and wondering why I sat there in the first place.

Let's stop the madness! Eyelashes are designed to keep crud out of your eyes (medical definition), or to be batted seductively at the object of one's affections (my definition), or to be pulled out one by one in an obsessive-compulsive manner (Sylvia Plath's definition).

I believe that clears everything up. Dawgs.

23.

Marriage in Three Acts

Act I

The front desk clerk warned us about the minibar in our room as soon as we checked into our Vegas hotel for the week.

"I have to tell you something," he said in a tone as serious as if Wayne Newton had just up and died in the Dale Chihuly-gla.s.s-flowered lobby of the Bellagio. "The minibar is hypersensitive and it will charge you sometimes if it detects even the slightest motion when you approach it."

Because duh-hubby and I share an irrational disdain for overpriced snack foods, we gave the desktop minibar a wide berth once we got in our gorgeous lake-view room. Yeah, we paid the extry $30 for the view because it was our twentieth anniversary, and we read in the hotel brochure that if you have a lake-view room, you can see the water fountains shoot up in time to music on your TV every twenty minutes. It is sooooo worth it.

Brushing by the minibar to play with the electronically controlled drapes because I am, at heart, a Clampett, Duh fairly screamed at me.

"You're getting too close to the mini bar! Didn't you hear what the desk clerk said? Do you want to spend nine bucks for a pack of peanut M&Ms? DO YOU????"

Hmmm. Maybe renewing our vows wasn't such a good idea after all.

Duh was so paranoid about the minibar that, watching him dart by it, I was reminded of Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible when he did back flips and even caught his own sweat droplets to keep from setting off the laser alarms. But seriously? Army-crawling on the carpet just to avoid setting off insanely overpriced Fiji Water? This was not the romantic scene I envisioned when I made the reservations.

Our first trip to Vegas was an eye-opener, and not just because of those wicked cool electric drapes. For starters, it's in the middle of nowhere. There's desolate mountains, hundreds of miles of cactus-studded desert and then-bam!it's GIRLS! GIRLS! GIRLS! and ALL-U-CAN-EAT CRAB LEGS!

Cruising across town in our complimentary white stretch limo enroute to the Graceland Wedding Chapel to renew our vows before Elvis, we were momentarily delayed as a heatstroke victim was loaded into an ambulance. A walleyed tourist drinking rum punch from a life-size plastic guitar with a straw attached stopped to take pictures. Second weirdest sight: an attractive woman limping into a casino wearing a full leg cast and high heels.

It was early May but already the temperature hovered around a hundred by the time we got to the Graceland chapel, where a sign out front announced "WHERE JON BON JOVI AND BILLY RAY CYRUS GOT MARRIED," although, it should be noted, not to each other. I don't think. In the early-afternoon heat, we were wilting faster than our $7 airplane salads, so we scurried inside.

Fortunately, inside Graceland the air-conditioning was cranked up good. We had to wait for a minute while the young woman at the reception desk finished hot-gluing some silk flowers onto a rental veil. We were getting remarried at 2:30 P.M., to duplicate exactly our wedding twenty years ago. What can I tell y'all? I'm romantic as s.h.i.t.

I was getting a little nervous that Elvis was going to be late but, at 2:20 exactly, he walked in, looking very much alive, and mumbled some Elvis-style pleasantries.

He led us into the chapel and, never once breaking character, grabbed a microphone and sang Can't Help Falling in Love With You. Then he threw the mic down and sprinted from his pulpit to walk me down the aisle. He then tossed me off to Duh and jumped back in the pulpit. I was blown away: Elvis was wedding singer, preacherman, and father of the bride, all in one.

Elvis read the vows, which included several wonderfully cheesy song references. Duh vowed to Love Me Tender and I promised to never send him to Heartbreak Hotel.

After it was over, Elvis presented us with our marriage certificate and a replica of his and Priscilla's, which I thought was a little egotistical but it didn't cost any more so it was OK. We posed for pictures, me, Duh, and Elvis, as though the three of us had just been married. I clutched my complimentary three-rose bouquet and Duh wore a red rose boutonniere that also came with our "Viva Las Vegas" package.

Before he could leave the building, I just had to tell Elvis that I truly loved his black, sparkly jumpsuit.

"Had to smash up a Trans Am or two to make this one, darlin'," he said. I knew right away that he said that about eighty times a day, but it didn't matter. Elvis's sidekick and photographer collected the money. Elvis is too cla.s.sy to take it himself and merely ducked out a side door when I tried to tip him, which I thought was just so very Elvis.

The limo took us back to the Bellagio where we got gussied up for Cirque du Soleil's Love show. For those of you who don't speak French, Cirque du Soleil is French for "Buford, you're 'bout to see some weird s.h.i.t!"

Our twentieth anniversary evening ended exactly as it had twenty years before, with me watching SportsCenter while Duh dozed peacefully, and me waking him up to show him basketball highlights.

"Which is why we work," he has said on more than one occasion.

Amen to that, and to twenty more ... .

Act II

We also work because Duh is nothing like Richard Batista. Who he, you ask?

Dr. Batista is the doctor you may have read about who must have skipped bioethics cla.s.s the week they discussed whether or not it was cool to donate a kidney to your dying wife and then try to take it back when she dumped you.

Although I can sympathize with the whole man-spurned angle (wifey reportedly took up with her karate instructor after getting all healthy and whole again), it's tacky beyond words to ask the mother of your children to please return the kidney you gave her like it's your favorite piece of Corning-ware and your so-called best friend is just bound and determined to keep "forgetting" to return it even though she's had it since her aunt died last August and you really need it back to make a proper funeral tetrazzini. Oh, sorry. Where was I?

Yes, Dr. Batista. Well, I do sympathize with him because it's a wretched thought that your very own kidney, that which hath filtered countless kegs of beer through undergrad and medical school, now enables your ex to toss back Mai Tais with her new boyfriend after a few hours of breaking bricks with their foreheads or whatever.

Here's the thing, though, Doc. Sure, you've got a nasty scar to remind you of what you used to have, but trust me, getting that kidney back won't make you feel any better. I mean not for more than a week or two, anyway. Those two weeks, you'd probably be on top of the world, but seriously, no longer than that.

Lawyers got involved and the doc decided he didn't want the kidney back so much as he wanted its value, which he decided was $1.5 million. Which kinda makes those home parties where you get a few twenties for your old gold necklaces look like chump change, right?

The real problem with this is that it turns out, you can't put a price tag on a vital organ. Which is why they call it organ donation not organ selling. When you go to renew your driver's license and they ask you if you're an organ donor, they don't mean there's a guy out back with a couple of reasonably clean knives who can give you some serious cash if you want to get rid of an organ today. ("What's it gonna take to get you to give up that pancreas to-day, lil lady?") Donating body parts is at the tippy-top of things to do to get into heaven. I don't care what else you've done wrong; you give somebody a kidney, those pearly gates will swing wide. (Which is why Tiger Woods might want to think about letting go of a lung or something before too long.) Dr. Batista's wife is lucky she doesn't have my kidney 'cause I'd camp outside that karate studio going, "Karate? Are you kidding me? I don't think our kidney can take that. And lay off those sugary sodas, would you?"

Act III

In the third act of our marriage play, allow me to vent just a moment about a couple that may love each other a little too much.

Please tell me that I'm not the only person who thinks Pat and Gina Neely, the nauseatingly in love stars of Food Network's Down Home with the Neelys, need to get a room. With a velvet swing, mirrors, and plenty of oils that aren't Crisco.

Pat and Gina Neely host a cooking show but they baby talk, kiss, and cuddle so much that it's a wonder anything gets cooked.

And, yes, I could turn it off but then I'd miss the only soft p.o.r.n I get all week-plus I'm incapable of turning off a show that promises a recipe for macaroni and cheese topped with strips of bacon and crushed potato chips. In-cape-uh-bull.

So the food is fabulously, decadently Southern, but the banter? Well, this is only a slight exaggeration: Pat: "Today, Gina and I are gonna make some barbecued ribs that'll set your mouth on fire!"

Gina: "You set my mouth on fire, baby, oooh, ooooooh."

Pat: "Oh, girl, when you talk like that, I can't remember whether I put the vanilla extract in the sweet potatoes or not."

Gina: "Baby, I'm the only sweet you need. Come over here and gimme some sugar!"

(Camera nervously lingers on a pan of mashed rutabagas languishing by the sink while sounds of "Mmmmm, oooh, baby" come from somewhere near the Mixmaster stand.) Pat: "We're back! And it's time to stuff that duck!"

Gina: "You the only duck I wanna stuff!"

Pat: "Baby, I don't even know what that means but it sounds like it might be hot!"

Gina: "Mmmmm, Pat, come over here and watch me lick this spoon."

Pat: "Girl, I wish I was that spoon."

Gina (to camera): "My husband is so baaaaaad, isn't he ladies? You know I like to keep my man happy and one way I do that is with my creme brulee."

Pat: "Was that French? Cause, baby, you know I like French. French toast. French fries. French kisses! Mmmm, put that turkey dressing pan down, girl, and get over here!"

Gina: "Down, boy! We have to keep our minds on what's cooking."

Pat: "I'd hit that."

Gina: "What?"

Pat: "Oh, sorry. I was just daydreaming 'bout the time I first saw you back in middle school and you were so fine and my best friend, Rodney, asked me what I thought of you ... ."

Gina: "Pat! That's enough sessy talk for one day. This b.u.t.ternut squash isn't going to saute itself, now is it?"

Pat: "I'd like you to b.u.t.ter my nuts ... ."

(Hasty commercial break) Gina (visibly disheveled): "And we're back and, whoa! Who's that at the door? Why it's Pat's noseyb.u.t.t mama. Again."