I never thought it could happen:  a TV show that taught me how to handle the crises with which I find myself continually struggling.  NCIS is the best show on the boob tube, supplanting classics from the past such as THE $64,000 QUESTION, MR. ED, CANNON, ALF, BEVERLY HILLS 90210, and ACCORDING TO JIM.  What have I gleaned from watching the best show on TV (in case you haven't had your morning or evening coffee and are having a difficult time following, that would be NCIS)?

1)  Tats are cool.  Now, I haven't gone so far as to ink any part of my body yet, but it's apparent that the well-adjusted Abby the Forensic Guru owes her good mental health to tattoos.  More than any other character, she embodies hip yet compassionate sass, brains combined with an undeniable sexiness, and intuition beyond compare.  The only thing I see setting her apart from her fellow NCISers is that she has multiple, expansive tats.  I gotta get me some.

zz)  Head slapping can be an effective behavior modification tool.  Tony is smarmy and full of himself (but he's good looking, and though I'm straight, I think I might do him).  Sorry but I need  a brief aside here.  Remember that movie with Robert Redford, Demi Moore, and Woody Harrelson where RR offered Demi $1M to sleep with him?  Well, duh, back in the day I would have done Redford for a million, hell, probably a couple of hundred grand, even.  Back on topic, Tony often finds himself in the middle of some smart-ass comment or two or ten only tangentially connected to the case at hand--he loves to make movie allusions or affect a notable accent, such as Sean Connery's James Bond.  What brings him back in line?  A head slap delivered by the father figure and team leader, Jethro Gibbs.

So, I've been wondering if perhaps I shouldn't use that for my kids, both real and imagined.  "Hey, Dad, that isn't the cereal I want to--"  WHACK!  Eat what ya got.  I wouldn't have to take the positive reinforcement approach to parenting, "Now, now, dear, let's examine the contents of the cereals we can choose from.  Don't you see that the one I wish for you to eat has much less sugar and more nutrients?"  Nope, just a whack on the back of the head.  Works for Gibbs; should work for me.  One danger I do see, however, is that any real or imagined child might wind up growing up with beaver teeth after repeated knocks in the block.  I can live with that.

b.5.ii)  Don't mess with women.  Now, this might seem obvious to most, but I'm a slow learner.  First, we had Kate who was a professional investigator, and a woman few wanted to cross, lest she land a right cross.  She could put Tony in his place with a mere glance or word.  She could shoot, and she was brave.  Alas, she was too slow to get out of the way of an assassins bullet, and left us after season two.  In came Ziva, and she is more like Kate on steroids.  You do not, DO NOT piss off Ziva.  She will beat you senseless as Mossad has thoroughly trained her.  Gibbs almost has to beg her not to kill the bad guys sometimes.  Yet, she is vulnerably sensuous and hot in her own right, especially as she seems to carry a torch for the near-clueless Tony.

Now, is that not the best paradigm for a woman we could have?  Smart?  Check.  Independent?  Check.  Professional?  Check.  Sexy?  Check.  Kick asser?  Double check.  She even has an endearing quality where she misuses colloquial English phrases such as, "let's put our toes to the grindstone."  Are you paying attention, Paris Hilton?

1969)  Being nerdy is good.  The true computer geek on the show is McGee, or McGeek, or Probie, or any one of a dozen names Tony happens to call him from time to time.  McGee graduated from MIT with a laundry list of high-end degrees, so when it comes time to track down a suspect with the latest gadgetry or to infiltrate a super-protected computer, he's the man.  But, here's the best part.  Not only is he geeky, he is also a best-selling author who uses a pseudonym to write mysteries whose characters are only thinly-veiled versions of his co-workers.  Not only does make the dough, but he and Abby have a real yin/yang relationship going on, meaning he also gets the girl.  Wow.

En fis)  Listen to Papa.  Gibbs.  The boss.  Tony, Ziva, Abby, and McGee even call him "Boss."  He's a man of few words (gotta love that!), but a man of definitive action.  When he speaks, everyone listens.  He zeroes in on the pith of a matter quickly, and on the rare occasions he's wrong or has been fooled, when the correct course of action is uncovered, no one moves more quickly and with more command than Gibbs.  He is the unquestioned authority figure, even more so than his superior, the director of NCIS.  Gibbs says more with his eyes than I manage to do with a full page of blog (see all the crap above). 

I simply must learn to assimilate that mien of his into my every day life.  No more flagging down servers in a restaurant and explaining that I want the steak cooked medium rare, the sides warmed, and the wine at true room-temperature-for-a-red.  Nope.  One mere gaze upon my countenance and the meal comes to me perfect in every way.  In the grocery store in line behind the slowest shopper on the face of the planet:  Look.  At.  Me.  "Oh, I'm sorry, sir, I won't use coupons or write a check or forget how to use the debit card or forget my security code. . .I, I, I'll just use cash!"  Damn straight you will, I glare.  Yeah, I need me some Gibbs mojo.

Now that I've got the world figured out, I have a plan to insert these newfound lessons into my daily routine.  When I struggle with a weighty issue or confounding moral dilemma, I'll merely ask, "What would Tony/Ziva/McGee/Abby/Gibbs do?"  So, don't be surprised the next time you see me if I'm wearing a zodiac tat, giving you a head slap, then showing you the "glare."  You've been warned.