Why Not Me?

by Mindy Kaling

People love to say: “She just walked into the party, charming people with her effortless beauty.” I don’t understand that at all. What’s so wrong with effort, anyway? It means you care. What about the girl who “walked into the party, her determination to please apparent on her eager face”? Sure, she might seem a little crazy, and, yes, maybe everything she says sounds like conversation starters she found on a website, but at least she’s trying. Let’s give her a shot!

Like, I think it’s a federal crime parking meters won’t accept pennies. Yeah, government, we know pennies suck. But you made them! You have to accept them! Parking meters are literally one of the three things anyone uses coins for and you decide you don’t want to deal with them?

I... Agree?

As a bridesmaid, on the morning of the wedding you will be unfolding the rusty metal legs of a banquet table and in the distance you will see a useless groomsman playing Frisbee with a dog. To rub salt in the wound, he might lightly ask, “Is there anything I can do to help?” knowing full well no self-respecting bridesmaid will task him with any job because he will do it too slowly.

why are men exhibit 488458

Here is why: it’s not especially emotionally rewarding to know that I paid for three of five nights of a yurt rental in Big Sur. It’s so transactional.

Oh wow STRONG disagree

We will never come home to each other again and we will never again have each other’s undivided attention. That version of our friendship is over forever.

Wow this makes me never want to be famous or work THIS much

I believe the potluck tradition of entertaining is the equivalent of a teenage boy wanting to have sex with his girlfriend but who is too scared to go to CVS to buy condoms. If you can’t handle providing all the courses for your dinner party, you can’t handle the hosting duties of a dinner party.

Again, STRONG disagree.

MINDY: (slurry rant) Oh God, Pop Star! Say it ain’t so. Say you aren’t one of those crazy Hollywood people who doesn’t believe in vaccination. I glanced at Greta. Greta’s gaze was on the ground. Oh, no. POP STAR: (stone cold) Actually, I am.

Good for you, Mindy. Don't take that shit.

I wanted to be the judge, jury, and executive producer. (See what I did there?)

...stop.

I once witnessed him make a room full of actors burst into laughter during a scene by improvising the line: “All right, everybody in the conference room! I don’t care if you are gay or straight or a lesbian or overweight! Just get in here, right now!”

Ok but this..... isn't funny? It isn't necessarily offensive either, but it isn't funny. Maybe you had to be there.

Men! Psst, men! Are you still reading? Don’t worry, we’re past the chick-lit-girl-nerd stuff. Coming up next: competition, success, money, sex!

This is sad

He looked me in the eye, took my hand, and gently guided it to the front of his pants where I felt the unmistakable presence of an erection. My jaw dropped. He winked at me, said, “I think you’re doing just fine,” and dropped my hand. We never spoke of it again. It is, to this day, the sexiest thing that has ever happened to me.

Consent issues here....

Sometimes a story just needs an ending, and I used to not be a creative enough person to think of an ending to a romantic story that isn’t a wedding or a death. This story didn’t end in fireworks, because the truth is, fireworks are something from my twenties. I could have made fireworks, but I chose to make a nuanced memory of a person who is neither a hero nor a villain in my life. All I had to do now was move on. In the words of both Mariah Carey and Taylor Swift, I knew I could shake it off. How could it not be true if both songs have the same name?

This feels like a weirdly personal story to tell in a book and I hope Will is okay with it...

my friend Lena Dunham,

Ewwwww but also of course

It was my attempt to get in great shape, learn how to cook, and basically do a Julie & Julia, but with Gwyneth Paltrow so one day we could star in a movie about my experiences and eventually become best friends.

The fact that you *want* to be best friends with Gwenyth Paltrow...

54

5'4"?

But it’s not that I think I’m so great. I just don’t hate myself. I do idiotic things all the time and I say crazy stuff I regret, but I don’t let everything traumatize me. And the scary thing I have noticed is that some people really feel uncomfortable around women who don’t hate themselves. So that’s why you need to be a little bit brave.