Britters.

Both these authors have new novels out: The Marriage Plot and A Sense of an Ending, respectively.

Even though Eugenides is American and Barnes is English, both stories use the old fashioned love triangle to explore the damage individuals wreak on others, even (especially!) the people they love.

Most crucially though both novels feature scenes where a main male character wanks off into a sink.

Annoying people like to say things like “Britain and America are two countries separated by a common language.”  That may well be, but we’re certainly united in spunk.

ps. Is this something I need to be concerned about?  Should I just assume every sink I use is a cum dumpster?  Of course, I’m not talking about Starbucks bathrooms here, which we all know are covered in semen.  I’m referring to sinks in dudes’ apartments.  Does any sink work?  If, say, I’m in the bathroom and you’re desperate to come, are you just going to blow your load in the kitchen sink?  Does it help if the sink looks like this?

Came to the epic conclusion that what I really, truly want more than anything in the world would be to find a nice man for once and settle down somewhere sensible like Connecticut and have a girl and a boy each and a golden retriever named Buddy and then just slowly murder each of us like Madame Bovary.

One can dream!

On Sunday, I had the pleasure of hitting a surprise birthday brunch and was seated at the end of the table with a hilarious couple.  We mirrored one another’s humor and hangovers. While we were trying to slide our faces on front-wise through the application of copious mimosas, two attractive women next to us engaged in a gravely serious conversation about sharks, as in:

Lady A says, “I love sharks.”

Lady B: “Oh, do you?”

A: “Yes, I love them.”  

B: “Do you like Shark Week?”

A: “No, not at all, not at all. I find it degrading. Shark Week demonizes a beautiful animal unnecessarily for entertainment purposes.”

I overhear this and whisper to the couple, “These women are talking about sharks.”

The guy sort of squints at me and says, “What? ….”  

“They’re talking about sharks.”  

“… what?… oh… Huh, really?”  

“Yeah, like really seriously, super earnestly.”

Then he looks at his girlfriend who shrugs, then back at me and widens his eyes with clarity. Finally, he says, “Ohhhhh, SHARKS!”

“Yeah, that’s what I said.”  

“God, I thought you said they were seriously discussing SHARTS.”

I burst out laughing and said, “You somehow managed to find a completely different topic that is a BILLION times more hilarious than seriously discussing sharks. God, how I wish they were talking about sharts.”

So, this got me thinking: what if there were a Shart Week on TLC?  The programming would be brilliant:

— Extreme Sharting

— I Didn’t Know I Was Sharting

— Shart Boss

— Shitney

— Wipe Out