Miss America-That's not a talent

I found myself sitting in front of the big screen last night and somehow, in the sea of channels on my satellite TV, I fell on the Miss America Beauty Pageant. Before I could escape, the women in the room yelled at me to step away from the remote. It has been years since I have actually watched the competition and there have been some significant changes-like the swim suit portion, the host, etc. BUT-the one thing that still remains a touchy subject with me is the talent competition.

Come on.

Now, I should say they did make a change or two to this portion as well. All the competitors, ten at this point, come out and sit on a bench. You got your singers, piano players, dancers-who actually aren't sitting but you can see stretching just off camera, on stage watching and waiting to be called up.

They only call eight out to compete. So here you are, all warmed up and ready to do your interpretive dance of the flamingos and they don't call you up. You and one other loser get to walk off stage trying to smile. That's pretty cool. But lets talk talent for a minute.

Sure, you can sing Puccini or be some white blond gal trying to be Tina Turner, but anyone with a voice coach can do that. Here are some real talents-new talents that I think we need to write letters to the pageant and have them at least try. Let me know what you think.

• Recharging the freon on a 1976 Admiral refrigerator in under two minutes (the actual length of the talent portion)


• field strip a military grade M-4 rifle while blindfolded.


• Eight second bull ride (the other minute and fifty-two seconds could be filler video of the competitor being loaded on the bull-clock starts when her butt hits the bull's back)


• roofing a small shed.


• changing the flange adapter on a Hudson 280 smoke suppressor


• performing a live appendectomy (it can be done in under two minutes of the volunteer/patient is already anaesthetised)


• Fix a table leg on someones patio table


• Digging ten feet of trench for a sprinkler system


• repairing a sprinkler head on said system


• changing a washer on a kitchen/bathroom faucet


• starting a fire in a fireplace

I am sure we, as a collective, could come up with more. What I am happy to see is none of them are baton twirling. Now, if the baton was lit or had razor sharp ends to it-huh, maybe.