oprah winfrey scares me. did i ever tell you that? no, it’s not in the ‘intimidated by a powerful african american woman’ way you might think, which would be politically incorrect, but at least sort of grounded in reality. oprah’s her own special case. i fear her control over the massive audiences of daytime tv-watching women that tune in religiously to her feel-good, you-go-girl piece of crap tv show for warm feelings and celebrity gossip. they’ll read her book club picks (as a sidenote, i was especially delighted when i heard about the jonathan franzen drama when he expressed honor at being picked but also ambivalence, accusing her of picking some good books but also “enough schmaltzy, one-dimensional ones that I cringe, myself…” way to strike back!). they’ll probably try out whatever bath oils or other crap her on-air experts recommend or place in their gift bags. they’ll probably buy compact discs by whatever crappy singer comes on and seems so nice when oprah asks them about their family. all in all, the woman has an unhealthy influence on the minds of the average american female, and that just plain freaks me out.

but why do i share this now, you ask? well, because far from being satisfied with the puppet strings that extend to every housewife’s television set each afternoon, i’m beginning to fear that oprah is now set on taking over hollywood as well. not only the institution and factory for american film, but the city itself, which i call home. before, she was just a boring tv personality who aired at 11am or something, when i am safely far away from my television. but now, i am constantly assaulted by her propaganda while driving across my own fair city! on my daily commute, i pass TWO enormous oprah faces on full-sized billboards, her monstrous coif humorously extending above the board on a wooden cutout, and a large blue box updated daily (yes, daily!) with the subject of the episode to air the next day at 3pm. i should not know what time oprah winfrey airs, or that today’s episode is about ashton kutcher’s party mishaps, people. this i find truly unfair.

and in addition to those, which i am sure are in more than those two places i drive past each morning trying not to recoil, i also pass no less than five assorted billboards, bus shelters, bench ads, and other signs advertising ‘oprah winfrey presents their eyes were watching god‘. sure, it’s halle berry’s beautiful face, but her name isn’t anywhere on the billboard, curiously enough. with the new long hair, i didn’t even realize it was her until about the third week. so when you add that omnipresent power play to the fact that for some reason last week’s oscars included more shots of oprah winfrey’s reactions than clint eastwood, who only, you know, directed the best picture of the year — yes, i will admit that i am getting a bit of a shiver at the thought of what comes next.

please oprah, please… you can have a slice of the cheesy hollywood blockbuster pie, fine. i’m not a huge fan anyway. just promise me — promise! — you won’t keep assimilating until we have nothing left untainted by the sugar coated glaze of soccer mom sappiness. i was hoping to exit this life under more graceful circumstances than a violent plot to unseat the queen of daytime.