Gilmore Guys

Well folks, I reached a decision. I figured out who my favorite Gilmore Girls boyfriend is. And before you say, "Duh, Luke!", let me tell you that he was a given.

Because "Duh! He's Luke!"

But lately I've been catching spurts of the series posted on thewb.com, often in the form of episodes I haven't seen before. (I know, I shudder at the thought, too.)

In junior high, I lived for the Gilmore gals. Although my family did not have at home access to the WB at the time, my best friends supplied my addiction by taping each episode and delivering it to me at school the following day. It was like Hulu mixed with DVR, but before either of them existed.

So when Rory told Dean, "I love you, you idiot" next to his green pickup truck at Chilton, I was there.

When Tristan said his final goodbyes during the every-series-has-a-Romeo-and-Juliet-episode episode, I was there.

When Jess stole a kiss from Rory at the Independence Inn during Sookie's wedding, I was there.

And when Dean and Rory broke up at the 24-hour dance-a-thon, I was also there.

And when we got to take a nerdy trip to the University of Connecticut the summer after eighth grade, you bet your life we tried to buy cornstarch at a local market and played "1, 2, 3, He's Yours" with an actual person named Kirk in the vicinity and took pictures of the guy named Dean at Six Flags and held what I consider to be the first official Gilmore Girls fan convention.

I have to admit that I haven't seen many of the Logan episodes, and sure the guy is good looking and has that whole bad-boy-from-good-money thing going for him. And sure, he paid for Rory to spend Christmas in London with him. Yada, yada, yada. I'm telling you right now, Logan can never win this argument in my mind because I have no 13-year-old emotional connection to his character.

Which means it's basically a Celebrity Death Match between Dean and Jess. And you might be surprised who wins.

The first inkling came when I recently rewatched the "Bracebridge Dinner" episode, featuring everyone's favorite recurring character, Rune. (Not. Well, the episode does feature him, but no one likes him.) This episode features both Dean and Jess, but circumstances being what they are, Rory finds herself on a sleigh ride with not her then-boyfriend Dean but her hopefully-soon-to-be-boyfriend Jess. And that was the first moment when I realized that at 13, I was right to like Jess over Dean. Because Jess could read. And did so of his own volition. Unlike Dean who was spoon fed Anna Karenina.

And then there was the "Oasis" episode, a.k.a. the episode where Lorelei and Rory get a crazy neighbor who lives at the 21st century equivalent of a tiki bar mashed with one of those crazy game kiosks in the mall. Okay, so I think Dean and Jess actually get into a fight in this episode, but that doesn't lessen the fact that Jess comes running to turn off the water at Crazy Neighbor's house when she can't do it herself. And then turns it back on with a grin when Rory says Dean will be coming over to fix it any minute.

The final nail in the coffin? Today I watched a never-before-seen-by-me episode entitled "Luke Can See Her Face," wherein Luke buys himself a relationship self-help book ON TAPE and realizes Lorelai is his It Girl. Jess also makes an appearance because his mom is about to get married to the uber-weirdo T.J., and while in town he admits to Luke both that (1) last time he saw Rory he told her he loved her and (2) he didn't want to come because he might run into her.

So, there you have it. The three things I want in a guy.
1. He reads of his own volition.
2. He fixes (or unfixes) things when I need him to do so.
3. He can't get over me.

Hey, at least it's better than the list I had when I was actually in junior high. That one was totally shallow and mostly based on Tom Welling.
1. Must have blue and/or green eyes.
2. Must be taller than me.
3. Must not be a Yankees fan.

But here's the rub, kids. The basic problem of economics: scarcity. What if guys of the reading-fixing-liking me type already ran out? What then?