5 Weird Crushes I Had As A Kid

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Much like my taste for food, fashion and alcohol, my taste in women has evolved over the years. As a child, I hated red onions. Now, I love red onions. I thought bucket hats were the coolest thing anyone could wear and the Charlotte Hornets had the greatest uniforms in the history of sports. In high school, Natural Ice (yeah, Natty Ice, I went that hard) was my drink of choice because it never filled you up and always went down smooth, or so I thought. Now, I’m pretty sure my kidneys would implode on themselves if I took just one sip from the black can of death.

Now comes the time where I present my taste in women, which was as flawed, confused and undeveloped as everything listed above. Of course, I was ridiculously attracted to the mainstays of the ’90s, your Carmen Electras, Pam Andersons and Tyra Bankses of the world, but at the same time, there were some crushes of mine that flat out don’t make any sense.

Laura Hall: The piano player from “Whose Line Is It Anyway?”

When Wayne Brady, Colin Mochrie and Ryan Stiles weren’t making me piss my pants with improvisation (*shakes head in shame*), I was fixated on Laura Hall. The way her hands moved across the keys and the way she started off the Hoedown to end the show ignited something inside me: a fire, deep within my loins. She wasn’t traditionally “hot” by ‘90s MILF standards, but she was still a good looking enough lady to induce NRBs.

Renée O’Connor AKA Gabrielle: Xena’s sidekick

I never understood all the Xena hype. I mean, Lucy Lawless is still a total fox, but Gabrielle was my afternoon TV goddess. The Battling Bard of Potidaea held my attention while most guys my age were drooling over Xena or watching Baywatch over on UPN.

Chyna

This is where we go from weird, to just plain embarrassing. I was a gigantic wrestling fan in the late ’90s, just like any other person who loved seeing rich people get doused in beer by a pissed off redneck or see 80-year-old women get power bombed into a pile of tables. Of course, Sable and Lita held most of my attention, but at the same time, I always found myself entranced with the Eighth Wonder of the World. In the end, I just chalked it up to being jealous of her getting to hang out with DX all the time.

Wendy Makkena, AKA Sister Mary Robert from “Sister Act”

Man, when those nuns sang “Salve Regina” at the end of Sister Act, I just about leapt up out of my chair to dance in the aisles. Those gals could really belt it, putting a Motown spin on Latin Christian hymns and vice versa. It was one of my favorite childhood movies, mainly because I had a huge crush on Sister Mary Robert. Hey, I went to Catholic grade school and the concept of hot nuns was a foreign, yet also extremely taboo one, so I didn’t exactly know how to feel about that. In the end, she wasn’t a nun in real life, so I feel vindicated and a little less ashamed.

Sporty Spice

Yeah, you can keep Posh, Ginger, Baby and Scary. I was all about Sporty Spice. Looking back, I’m not sure why. I really don’t have an explanation for it. Maybe I wanted to be different. Keep in mind, this was back when “Girl Power” was sweeping the world and Brandi Chastain was empowering women by ripping off her soccer uniform, so maybe I thought I could get in good with the opposite sex by being unique in having a crush on Mel C. Zig-a-zig, ah.

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Brian McGannon

What do I love? I love happy hour, a good golf tan, and getting moderately drunk during dinner.

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