Man Auction Peeps

Here’s a little multiple-choice scenario: You’re a smart, successful, sexy woman with more than a little bit of cash to burn (oh, would that it were true). Do you {a} snap up that delicious pair of Jimmy Choos you’ve been drooling over; {b} invest the dough in your 401(k), the stock market, or some other fiscally responsible repository of which your accountant would wholeheartedly approve; or {c} purchase for yourself a man?

If you answered {c}, and weren’t at Coastal Woman’s Hot Summer Night Bachelor Auction last Friday, you missed out. But regardless of your answer, if you weren’t there, you absolutely missed out on witnessing the values-threatening spectacle of a lifetime. Yes, the proceeds went to benefit a great cause-Women’s Economic Ventures, a Santa Barbara nonprofit that helps women start their own businesses-of which I am firmly supportive; but, when all was said and done, the whole thing left me feeling like I needed to take a shower.

I mean, that sex can be bought is clearly not a new concept (they don’t call it the “world’s oldest profession” for nothing), but what about chemistry? What about sparks? No matter how quick on the draw you are with that paddle or how deep your pockets, can looking for love really be as simple as shopping for a pair of Louboutins on eBay-flipping through a list, making your choice, and crossing your fingers that you’ll emerge the highest bidder (and that the fit is right)?

Then again, all parties were consenting adults. The bachelors, advertised as the pick of S.B.’s litter, were looking dapper (in particular, KJEE’s Adam Lundquist, who copped to the fact that his morning show co-host Spencer “did my hair, buttoned my buttons : but did NOT shower with me!”) and were as friendly as could be. And the ladies did not give off the desperate, sugar mamma vibe one might expect. Au contraire; most claimed they were simply in it to meet a “nice person.”

To be honest, I admit that a certain part of me dug seeing the tables turned-the men parading about like the proverbial pieces of meat, the women holding the cards. Not to mention that the cash shelled out for designer dates with the Dudes on the Block was tax-deductible, so these ladies’ accountants shouldn’t have any beef with their choice to drop their hard-earned wads on beefcake, either. And so, really, neither should I.

But, ultimately, were it my checkbook being held accountable, I’d take the shoes.