My Love of American Girls Comes Back To Bite Me in The Ass on "Sabado Gigante"

We taped the show Wednesday and I got to meet Don Franciso (real name Mario Kreutzberger-Blumenfeld, a German Jew) who has been hosting the show for 45 years. He is about the equivalent of the Hispanic Regis Philbin, and has pretty much the same hair. Except Don’s is Orange. So we each do our dances and at the end Don asks us some questions. Tim was asked about his Cuban wife and said hello to his family back in El Salvador. Steve didn’t understand a goddamn word Don Francisco said but somehow managed to convey that he liked Latin girls better than Americans because of their asses. I, of course, was asked a little about the Marines and my time serving in the war zone known as Hialeah, and then was asked about my history of girlfriends. Hispancs, it’s always about the sex with them, isn’t it? Somehow, I could not bring myself to lie and I told him all my girlfriends had been American except for one. And what was she, asked Don Francisco? Asian. A collective groan came up form the audience. Needless to say, me and Alexa were the first couple eliminated from competition. It may have been because of my extremely sub-par dancing, but Steve is not exactly Fred Astaire either. However, thanks to my “parting gift” and a pre-arranged agreement with Steve, I still got $700.

Steve went on to the next round, which featured each couple in “pajamas” (I put this term in quotes because the outfits probably would not be allowed on any American channel not called Cinemax) popping balloons on each other. Like the guy sat in a chair and she sat on his lap either facing him or facing away from him and tried to pop a balloon. Or the guy bent over a chair and she tried to pop it on his ass (which led to a scene where Steve looked like a new inmate being violated by a skinny Mexican model) and finally the girl lying on top of the guy in bed trying to pop a balloon. It was described by the producer to me as “the most Hispanic thing you may ever do.” Sadly, I didn’t get to do it.

But Steve did and he won and actually went on to win another $5000 and a car in the bonus round. Of course, Steve speaks about as much Spanish as the average Canadian, so when they told him he had won he had no idea. He just sat there looking mildly amused until an announcer came on in English and told him he’d won in English. At which point he lost his shit. Way to perpetuate the “clueless gringo” stereotype, Steve. I’ll remember that the next time my mechanic tries to rip me off by speaking rapid-fire Espanol. Steve doesn’t work and lives off his savings, and now he can afford to bum around like me for the next few months, so at least I am happy about that.

We went out that night to celebrate, and sadly our models and their husbands could not join us. The driver for the girls came up to me during the taping and said “Hey, that girl you’re dancing with? She likes you. I heard her talking about it in the car. She’s here one night you need to ask her out.” I’m not sure if I believed him or not, but by the time me and Steve finished our celebration at the Doral Ale House Alexa had gone to bed as she had an early flight to Guadaljara the next day. Sad since she was the only one without a husband and that may have been my one chance to sleep with a Playboy model. But I’ll just tell myself it would never have worked out anyway. After all, I only like white girls, right? Maybe the good people at Sabado Gigante think I should reconsider.