It’s Not a Coincidence That I Named This Blog After a Movie

Certain members of my family (hello, brother-in-law) often compare me to Gracie Hart, Sandra Bullock’s character in Miss Congeniality and, while I would like to say that the comparison is made due to my stunning good looks, svelte figure and ability to use my superior intellect to capture dangerous criminals, I would be lying to you and to myself. The comparison is made because, much like Gracie Hart, I fall down... a lot; always for no apparent reason and always in front of an audience.

I am capable of tripping over my own feet; stairs are my ultimate undoing and, heels? God, don’t even get me started on wearing high heels, in fact; I once managed to catch the heel of a very cute pair of kitten pumps on a relatively minor snag in a piece of carpeting, sending me ass over tea kettle at a business luncheon.

To further fuel the comparison between myself and Gracie Hart, after such an incident, I generally pop right back up, declaring myself “OK!” and life goes on.

This weekend, I had a Gracie Hart moment that would have made my brother-in-law proud, were he around to witness it; I fell off the front of our boat, onto the dock with all the grace of a Mack truck hitting a squirrel. One moment I was casually leaping from the boat to tie us off and the next, I was somehow airborne, in slow motion, watching the dock come at my face like something out of a really bad horror movie.

Thanks to some awesome slow motion kung-fu moves, I managed to break my fall with my left thigh, shoulder and forearm which, now that I think about it, really didn’t serve any purpose other than to protect my face. Eh, I’ll take it.

As soon as I hit the deck (ha! Literally!), there was a moment of absolute silence as Hugh, the Man-Cub and about a million summer boating enthusiasts looked on; not wanting to worry any of them unduly, I leapt to my feet, declared myself “OK!” and went about the business of tying off the boat, all the while wanting to cry because my thigh was on fire with pain.

The result of my latest Miss Congeniality moment is a trail of very angry bruises from mid-thigh to hip as well as a sprinkling of bruises on my shoulder and arm. Now, I don’t recall Sandra Bullock sporting angry purple bruises in the film so, either the make-up people on that set lacked creativity or, I am even more dangerous to myself than Gracie Hart, the second choice being the most likely.

For the record, Hugh, who is a huge fan of Ms. Bullock’s, made the Miss Congeniality comparison again today and, despite his fondest wish, it had nothing whatsoever to do with me breathily crooning “You think I’m gorgeous, you want to kiiiiss me” in his ear (although, he does think I’m gorgeous and he does want to kiss me); instead, he compared the look on my face as I fell to that of Gracie Hart right before a slip. Of course, then he spotted the angry purple trail-o-bruises marching down my left side and he retracted his statement.

Smart man, because, one other actually very good point of comparison between me and Gracie Hart is that I also know the S.I.N.G Method of self defense.


Sadly for Hugh, I do not own the costume worn by Sandra Bullock in the movie because, despite my earlier statement, that might actually be Hugh's fondest wish, instead.