The Negative Voice
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2001-09-21 - 2:21 a.m.

Know When To Quit

An entry or two ago I mentioned being a big fan of China Beach. Monday's episode reminded me why. (Caution: This entry is all about spoilers for the show. Of course, if you haven't seen it already, you probably don't care.)

We have to characters: KC, the hooker with a heart of somewhat tarnished copper (ie, good but certainly not gold) and Boonie, the super-sympathetic Marine in love with her. Boonie's doing that thing that all TV men in love with hookers do, trying to be there for her while pretending to himself that if she'd just quit her job, they could be a normal couple and all would be well. He's trying to save her. It's pathetic. I was having real trouble liking the guy up until...

There's a seen where she's upset about the way things are going. He's trying to console her. She's doing the supremely irritating "tell you to leave so I can be really sure you'll stay" thing women with low self-esteem do. Her tag line for this bit is, "You just don't know when to quit, do you?"

The first time she uses it, he bites, and it's all Serious Emotionally Charged Conversation. He's trying to build intimacy with this very damaged chick, see, and this is how he does it. But the second time she does it, he just says, "Watch and see." And walks out the door.

The way the series develops, this turns out not to be good for either of them. She continues to be a little out of control and he's perpetually acting broken-hearted and it ends badly in many ways. But every time I watch that scene, I give a great big "hell yeah!"

I've been in love with lots of chicks who've done that same stupid dance. The vast majority have been worth the effort. Still, many were the times I got sick of the constant testing. Retroactive vicarious revolt probably isn't the solution for the problem, but it sure scratched an itch.

In non-TV viewing news, I've been doing a lot of pager duty this week while getting back into computer gaming. Before that, I was house-cleaning like mad, getting ready for a visit from the ever-wonderful Shelley. When that fell through due to a slight case of terrorism in the skies, I dropped all pretense of cleaning and headed for the DVD collection and the computer. Yay me.

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