I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about politics or global warming or anything else remotely relevant to today’s world. Why get depressed over things I can’t do anything about? I prefer to spend hours, often days, pondering other things, things that are less stressful to think about although just as–if not more–provocative. For instance, lately I’ve been wondering why all the men I’ve ever known have preferred Mary Ann over Ginger when it comes to the Great Gilligan’s Island Popularity Contest.

I’m not sure why it surprises me since Mary Ann was just as pretty as Ginger, had just as good a figure and was obviously much lower maintenance but I always am a little shocked when a guy friend admits Mary Ann was the one who floated their boat while Ginger was much more of a meh. Ginger was pure glam, flirted with everyone and wore evening gowns or tight leopard printed sundresses, much sexier outfits than Mary Ann’s usual short shorts and gingham checked tops. So what gives with Mary Ann being the eternal Sweetheart of Sigma Chi fifty years after “Gilligan’s Island” was cancelled?

Which brings me to part two of my latest pondering: if most men like good girls better than bad girls, wouldn’t they be surprised to learn that most girls would rather BE bad girls instead of good? Furthermore, wouldn’t they be surprised if they knew that the reason why most girls don’t opt for the bad girl route is because they are completely chicken and every chicken in the world knows it’s easier to be good and boring and ultimately safe than bad and wild and end up having to take penicillin for long stretches of time?

But that doesn’t mean we good girls don’t envy the bad girls from time to time because we do. Ask any woman old enough to contemplate just where she falls into the quartet of “The Golden Girls” and the majority will automatically select Rose or Dorothy.

Deep down, however, we want to be Blanche. Blanche who never wears underwear and has had more boyfriends since becoming a widow than Dorothy, Rose and Sophia combined. Blanche doesn’t worry about what people think about her and she’s firmly convinced every man she meets is–or will be–in love with her before their first date is over and she’s almost always right.

There is a huge fly in the ointment of my good girl thesis and it comes in the form of the plot of “Grease.” “Grease” told the story of Bad Boy Danny who loved Good Girl Sandy but who really flipped over her when Sandy turned to the Wild Side and became a Bad Girl, complete with black leather pants and more flashy make-up than the entire cosmetics section of a local Woolworths. The movie ended with Danny and Sandy dancing and singing and obviously getting ready for a more exciting evening than even Blanche Devereaux could imagine.

Which tells me that the bottom line is that guys like good girls and good girls want to be bad girls and everyone goes through life wishing they’d been born into a sitcom instead of, say, New Jersey. No one ever said life was going to be fair. Or come with a built-in laugh track.