The Black List: Cho Time!
Can reality TV stomach Margaret Cho’s raunchy realism? The notorious all-American girl lets it all out on "The Cho Show," debuting this month on VH1. Below, a prim list of the top ten things she hates.

By BlackBook

July 23, 2008

1 Static electricity. I hate it. I just fucking hate it -- especially when I’m taking my computer out of the X-ray machine at airport security. I wish I had oven mitts because it always gives me a big shock. Sparks come off and shit. I can’t even express in words how much I hate it.

2 Halitosis. I hate my own as well as everyone else’s. It’s bad when you have it because you can almost taste it, but it’s worse if you don’t even know you have it and someone tells you. That is mortifying. It is also bad when other people have it and they insist on talking to you in close quarters. I have a keen sense of smell, so I can always tell what it is from. Most of the time, it is either poor oral hygiene or some kind of fruit juice ingested approximately two hours before.

3 Cystic acne. I hate all acne, but I am prone to cystic acne, which, in my opinion, is the worst. It is bulbous and hard, and hurts from deep within. And you can’t pop it! When one of these starts to emerge from my skin, I totally freak out because, no matter what I do, I’m going to have to live with that thing for at least a month. Even after the swelling and the redness have gone away, there is always a scar—no matter what.

4 Vomit in the street. I especially hate when it isn’t an isolated case. This tends to happen a lot in Scotland. One time, I was in Edinburgh early on a Sunday morning, and there were countless pools of vomit all over the street. The grossest part about it was the proximity of the vomit to late-night restaurants, because I could tell what each place’s specialty was.

5 Jell-O with milk in it. It is some kind of trashy, covered-plate dish that you see every once in a while at a fundraiser or church social. Straight-up nasty.

6 Dry foot skin. I have beautiful feet with high arches and perfectly-shaped toes. But I also have the driest foot skin, which gets white and flaky. I shave big sheets of skin off of them from time to time. It looks just like parmesan cheese. I swear I could put the shavings on a Caesar salad and no one would ever know the difference.

7 Organ meats. I wish I could be more adventurous in my food preferences, but I really cannot deal with organ meats. They taste so full of blood or urea or bile or other weird substances. They just remind me too much of the fact that what I am eating is dead.

8 Stepped-on dog shit. Not just dog shit. The logs don’t bother me when they are whole and intact. After it has been stepped in, though, it’s a whole new ballgame. I get so grossed out that I can’t even deal. Of course, this doesn’t include my own beloved dogs’ shit. Everything that comes out of them is solid gold.

9 Hangnails. I should always have a nail clipper handy because I am prone to hangnails. And I know I shouldn’t pull them, but usually I just can’t wait. And then I do and I pull a strip of skin the length of my entire finger.

10 B.O. Mine has a weird smell, like rotting limes. There is a fruity citrus element in there that is downright disgusting. But other people’s B.O. bugs me too. If you combine halitosis with B.O., you have someone who must overcome impossible obstacles in order to be my friend.