Sweaty Cookies

As if I’m not vain enough already, I’ve long worried about the attractiveness of my armpits.

I blame Madonna for this. Once, I read in a Vogue article that Madonna had “the worlds’ most beautiful armpits” according to Karl Lagerfeld or someone. What does that even mean? I don’t know either, but for about twenty years I’ve obsessed about the relative beauty or lack thereof of my armpits. Are they smooth enough? Are they discolored? Do they (gulp) SMELL?

To that end I’ve tried waxing, shaving, sugaring, even tweezing each deep seated, painful little sprout all (of course) to little avail. My armpits, like my ass, have staged a long running rebellion. Every morning as I shave them, I find at least one errant hair of an obscene and unexplainably long length. As if to taunt me this single hair sticks out all wiry and French like from the folds of my oxter. Shave as I might, it will dodge all attempts at its removal; until, in frustration, I yank it out with a pair of tweezers. I feel victorious, if only momentarily over my wanton follicles.

This victory is shallow though because, for some reason (the chemicals in deodorant, perhaps?) my armpits are ever so slightly a different shade than the rest of my underarms. Blast! I will never be able to dance with my arms above my head, for fear that the world is looking at my hairy, discolored pits. Oh, the shame!

So I resort to wearing sleeved shirts. Ha! Take that, seedy armpit of discontent! Which of course brings me to the most obsessive part of my, well, obsession. Sweat.

I believe I’ve mentioned (if I haven’t I’ll be shocked) my abhorrence to sweat; the wetness, the smell, the self consciousness checking for the “ring”. Oh, the stress! To that end I’ve tried nearly every brand of deodorant, only to find that after a time, even the most effective cease to work. Nothing like raising your arm to fix your ponytail and getting a waft of BO to make you want to go home and shower!! So I switch back and forth between brands, varying the scent to keep myself appeased in my vanity, a situation which resulted yesterday in the following conversation;

Office Mate – “What’s that smell?”
Me – “What smell?”
OM – “It smells sweet.”
Me – “Sweet like cotton candy or sweet like a baby’s head?”
OM – “Sweet like cookies”
Me – “There’s cookies? Where?” (after looking around, no cookies)
OM – “I only smell it in here, are you sure you don’t have any cookies?”
Me - “Oh my god, it’s my armpits. My armpits smell like cookies. Smell them!”
OM – “Holy Crap! They do smell like cookies! Lili! Come here and smell her armpits! They smell like cookies!”
Lili – “That’s so freaky! How many cookies have you eaten?!?!”
Me – “Dude, it’s my deodorant!”
Om – “Get out!”
Me – “No seriously! It’s secret Vanilla Sparkle Deodorant I guess when I sweat, I smell like baking cookies. Cool. Wait, bad. Now I want cookies. Damn you deodorant!”

Do you see what I’m going through here? I can’t win! Either stink or smell like cookies, which makes me want cookies, which makes me eat cookies, which contributes to the great Ass Wobble Rebellion, which would mean more exercise, which would mean I would smell like sweaty cookies.

Damn you Madonna! Damn you and your beautiful armpits and Skeletor face! As if I didn’t have enough to worry about, your stupid, perfect armpits are taking away from the time I could be obsessing about things like Paris Hiltons harpy claws, or whether Julia will have the baby on Nip/Tuck or if I could ever learn to catch marshmallows like those Blue Man dudes and get on Letterman and then translate that into a visit to Oprah where we could instantly bond and then become best friends and she would invite me to help her pick her favorite things for the “Favorite Things” show and everyone would say it was the best show ever and I would be famous and have a fabulous career buying gifts for celebrities and even get to keep some for myself. But no, Madonna, you’ve ruined all of that for me. You bitch.

It’s all too much. I think I better go lie down.

With some cookies.