"I'd Feel More Comfortable with an Ugly Woman."

"I'd feel more comfortable with an ugly woman." That's what my friend "Frank" told me in the Philippines.

At the time I hadn't seen his wife, but when I did I thought, "What the %$#!? Are you crazy?"

Of course, it's true that when you go to the Philippines a difficult change to make is to accept the caliber of woman you can get. After a lifetime of begging for women's attention and affection, of groveling, of paying for everything, it comes as a shock when you see the sort of woman that's available to the average guy.

But Frank has a problem much bigger than his wife's spending: He plans on taking her with him to Australia. This is like taking an alcoholic on a tour of the Budweiser factory in Milwaukee. Don't be surprised if he swan dives off a second story balcony when he sees a 25,000 gallon vat filled with beer, gulping all the way down.

Do a little thought experiment with me here. Let's say Joe is a retiree from Sacramento, California, who goes to a small, remote island in the Philippines. Everyone on the island is a fisherman, so the place is poor. With his $1200 a month pension, Joe becomes the richest man on the island when he goes there.

Now things get juicy. On this island is the most beautiful girl anyone has ever seen. In fact, even the oldest people on the island cannot remember ever seeing a woman as beautiful as she is. Joe knows from the magazines that he's seen, the TV, and the movies that this girl is model material. Surprisingly to Joe, but not to anyone who knows human nature, this beautiful girl falls for Joe and they get married.

But Joe becomes bored on the small island and decides to take his new bride with him back to Sacramento. Can you see what's coming?

Now Joe's $1200 a month, which was enough of a fortune to buy sardines for the whole neighborhood, can hardly pay the rent. Surgeons, bankers, and even --God forbid--school teachers make more than Joe, and his wife senses she is "in the market." She sees all kinds of men, and becomes aware of the existence of hundreds of thousands of them, who are younger than he is, who don't wear polyester sansbelt slacks, and who don't get their clothes mail order out of a J.C. Penny catalog.

Two years from now Joe returns to the island, alone. Looking at his face, it seems like much more than two years has passed. With alimony, the child support payments, losing the house and selling the car, he is now making $700 a month, which still makes him the richest man on the island.

He falls in love with the woman who is now the prettiest woman on the island since his ex-wife left. He marries her, because he realizes he married "the wrong one." In time he becomes bored, and decides to take his new bride to Sacramento...