Are you truly happy if you're single?
A few months ago, I was guest speaker on a panel discussion. It was our job to debate a number of issues. Of course, the topic of love was one of them.
I said that I didn't believe people are truly happy unless they're in pairdom.
I think, based on me, my friends, my family, and every single John Cusack movie I've seen, that people, all people, no matter race, age, gender or sexual orientation, want to have someone so that at night, they can put their heads on their loved one's shoulder and fall asleep, safe in the knowledge that they are not alone in this crazy, mixed up world.
One of the panel participants, a very witty, very smart, very kind comic from Montreal, took me on said he didn't believe it. People can be 100 per cent fulfilled when they're single, he said.
I've often thought about that discussion. All the great love stories - Romeo and Juliet, Danny and Sandy, Carrie and Mr. Big, Lady and the Tramp, the boys from Brokeback Mountain - exist because people need to be a twosome.
Which, in a strange transition, brings me to McDonald's.
The other night, I was watching TV when a Mickie Ds commercial came on the tube.
Now, I'm not one for big conspiracy theories but I did start to wonder if the fast-food chain is getting into the dating scene somehow - speed dating over McChickens perhaps? - or maybe McDonalds is part of a conglomerate that also owns a bunch of different online dating sites?
Anyways.
The commercial goes something like this:
Setup: Two men in their late 20s or early 30s are sitting in a car eating McDonalds.
Guy #1 is eating a single cheeseburger. He looks at his friend while munching the burger and says: "Do you think the burger is lonely?"
Guy #2 responds: "What do you mean?"
Guy #1 says: "Well, we're eating single cheeseburgers. They're alone. They're not double cheeseburgers. They're singles. Do you think they get lonely?"
Guy #2 scrunches up his face, looks at his friend like he's a freak and says: "Well, you're single. Aren't you lonely?"
Guy #1 looks at his cheeseburger with longing and sadly replies: "Yeah, I am."
And that is that.
Ronald McDonald doesn't pop up in the backseat and sing a happy song.
Hot blond girls don't appear at the car windows and offer to take the guys out for Egg McMuffins the next morning.
Grimace, that big purple thing, doesn't dance around and offer the boys hot fudge sundaes or McFlurrys to sweeten their day.
The commercial just ends with this guy being lonely with his burger.
So this is what I'd like. I'd like a marketing expert, a communications professor or Mr. Ronald McDonald himself, to explain to me how this sad commercial is supposed to make me want to go buy myself a McChicken Sandwich, fries and a Diet Coke, with barbecue sauce on the side to dip my fries into.
Because really, I think these two dudes should be out of their car, doing something fun to meet the chicks so they're not alone. The fact is, you can't meet the love of your life sitting in a car eating burgers.
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