The Rise And Fall Of Fred And Ginger

It shouldn’t come as any surprise to readers who haven’t actually witnessed the horror to find out that I’m one hell of a bad dancer (I sincerely apologize to those who have seen it). So naturally, I felt fairly confident upon entering last night’s “Boise’s Worst Dancer” competition.

Of course, I wasn’t taking anything for granted. Overconfidence can be disastrous, and there appeared to be some extremely unskilled hoofers in the crowd. Just to be on the safe side, I thought that I’d perhaps gain an advantage by distinguishing myself from the other competitors … but how? To the drunken onlookers who were serving as judges, I might appear to be just one more rhythmically challenged doofus, dancing a waltz to a rhumba beat!

It occurred to me that the competition was for Boise’s Worst DancER, not DancERS, and that if I could somehow manage to find a partner, surely that would do the trick. The person with whom I was there has far too much grace and elegance to dance at my level of atrociousness, but, as fortune would have it, there was a woman at the next table practicing some truly awful material. I somehow, despite my usual oafishness, and likely due to some defect in her mental circuitry, managed to strike up a conversation employed my ever-smooth charms and general suave-osity to engage her in conversation, and soon, we were set to trip the light fantastic heavy tragic.

Our names were called fairly late in the evening, and we had seen some formidable non-talent, but we still felt strong going in. Sweet bounding Baryshnikov, what a spectacle we were! She was busting cheerleader moves and rocking The Elaine, I pulled out The Sprinkler, The Sailor, and The Swim … she blew the crowd away with The Grocery Shopper, I jazzed things up with a couple of tap moves … we threw in some attempted swing dancing, along with The Robot, and the routine ended with the Awkward Junior High Slow Dance. This was all done to “Hollaback Girl,” by Gwen Stefani. It was sublime.

Sadly, I had overestimated her lack of talent. It turns out that she really was a cheerleader in high school (not currently; back when she was in high school ... duh ...), and obviously, a good one, because we didn’t even place. I really shouldn’t blame her, of course ... I mean, I could have left my cycling shoes on (god, what was I thinking?). But we fell victim to one of the classic blunders ... the most famous is never get involved in a land war in Asia, but only slightly less well known is this: Never compete in a bad dance contest against fat guys with no shirts.

[UPDATE:] Word on the street is that there's video. Oh, sweet jeebus, no ...