Lisa: Oh my God. Look at that! Mom, I should’ve brought the coral shoes. You said I was taking too much.

Marjorie: Well, sweetheart, you brought ten pairs.

Lisa: But the coral shoes matched that dress.

Baby: This is not a tragedy. A tragedy is three men trapped in a mine or police dogs used in Birmingham, monks burning themselves in protest.

Lisa: Butt out, Baby.

This is the scene in Dirty Dancing that I think of every time I watch the news lately.

I hate the news because of the emotional puppet strings they try to pull every single night, but there’s something oddly comforting about it that always brings me back in.

It’s not just Lester Holt’s sweet, “I look like I’m smiling even when I’m telling you something horrific” face, or the manipulative, “Come back for more tomorrow even though we tried to scare the shit out of you for the past 1/2 hour”, sappy story in the last 2 minutes. It’s because growing up, that’s what adults did, they watched the news after a long day. So for me, it’s the ritual that reminds me of home and family.

Whenever I’d go to my grandparent’s house at night Poppa would be watching Channel 11 WPIX, waiting for Yolanda Vega to call the winning lottery numbers. You’d hear my entire extended family echo Yolanda as she’d say, “I’m Yolaaaaannndddaaaa Veeeggggaaaa!!!” Awesome.

Anyway, this is why I watch the idiot news.

The reason I think of Baby Houseman telling her sister to get a grip while watching lately is because they’ve been really trying to ramp up the fear level in people regarding shortages of holiday presents and toilet paper. Two things that matter just as much as Lisa Houseman’s coral shoes on vacation.

Some of you are thinking, “Ok, this dummy might be able to argue that my shitty kid doesn’t absolutely need the latest and greatest toy for Christmas, but toilet paper? We NEED toilet paper!!”

No you don’t.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying I don’t buy the most expensive TP on the market for my precious bum, but I don’t panic at the thought of not having it.

There are people in America right now who voluntarily reuse cloths instead of toilet paper in an effort to save the environment.

More so, in the same news program trying to scare us over toilet paper, they just informed us of a REAL tragedy like an earthquake or a tsunami in another country. A REAL tragedy that decimated the little that these poor people had to begin with. Do you think their main concern is toilet paper or getting that special gift in time?

Please keep this in mind the next time you’re watching the news and they start getting you all freaked out about your Christmas lists or TP for your bunghole (shout out to Beavis & Butthead 🙌 )

Sure it may be disappointing and inconvenient, but little Billy not getting the latest iPhone or you having to wipe your ass with a washcloth is not monks burning themselves in protest. Get over it.