Who is Beyonce?
Beyonce is an introverted Houstonian known best for being allergic to seats — like, literally every seat she’s ever seen makes her sneeze — and for inventing “surfborting.”
Surfborting?
Yes. Surtborting. She’s the world’s first — and probably the world’s only — professional surfborter.
Is she known for anything else?
Well, for approximately 171 million Americans and 1.4 billion people worldwide, Beyonce is everything. Not a “person.” Or a “woman.” Or “just a very successful and popular entertainer.” Or even “a surfborting maven.” But every single thing. There is nothing she is not.
Let me put it this way: Do you remember season one of Game of Thrones, when Khaleesi and Khal Drogo would refer to each other as “sun and stars” and “moon of my life”? The show’s writers got their inspiration for those lines by retweeting Beyonce fans.
Ok, I get it. They love them some Beyonce. Why was she in the news last week?
News broke that Beyonce spoke during an interview with Beat magazine.
Wait, that’s it? She spoke?
She answered some questions too, including one about Halloween and another one about jalapenos.
I don’t think you’re understanding my question. so I’ll rephrase. There were no deep insights or secrets revealed, right?
Nope.
Any news about what she’s planning next?
Not really.
Any words about the made up rumors of her and Jay-Z having some Rihanna-related marriage trouble?
Nope.
Anything about, I don’t know, subprime lending? Or gravitational time dilation? So the only news was that she…spoke words?
Well, you have to understand, she doesn’t often grant interviews. Shit, she was on the cover of Vogue a couple months ago, and basically just gave them the equivalent of a scroll-by Facebook like. The biggest fashion magazine on Earth, and Beyonce gave them the same treatment you give to night school graduation announcements from second cousins you've never actually met. In the last 24 months, only 37 people have actually heard her speak. She’s basically a creole version of Pai Mei from Kill Bill.
So the news was that she actually spoke words in an interview, an entity specifically invented to get people to speak actual words?
In so many words, yes.
How was the reaction to this interview?
The usual. Bedlam.
Bedlam?
Yes. Bedlam. When Beyonce talks, or sings, or dances, or releases an album, or releases a song, or releases a fart, or invents a sexual position, or invents a word for the sexual position she just invented, or stands, or makes a face while standing, or says things like “frittata” and “nevermind” and “extra large,” or grants interviews and says nothing during the interview, it often causes a reaction called Beyonce Derangement Hyperbole Syndrome.
Beyonce Derangement Hyperbole Syndrome? What’s that?
It's a medical condition I wrote about last year. When Beyonce does things people get crazy. They go to church in house coats, they praise dance at Popeye’s, they say things like “yaaaaaaaaaaas” and they drink entire bottles of cranberry juice. So crazy, in fact, that it also makes them exaggerate. She is not just a singer. Her “voice lapdances on Jesus.” She is not just an entertainer. Her concerts make people “lose their religion and get it back before intermission.” She does not perform. She “snatches wigs and edges and wayward teeth.” She is not just pretty. She is “so fucking flawless it makes me want to leap inside my own mouth in shame.” She is not just a wife and a mother. She is “the reason I started believing in Black love again.”
Naturally, when she granted an interview and actually decided to bless us with answers, time momentarily stopped while we read it.
Time stopped? You’re not serious, right?
Oh, yes I am. You know how with Daylight Savings Time, we lose an hour? Well, when Beyonce spoke last week, we literally lost 16 minutes. Whatever time it is now, it’s actually supposed to be 16 minutes later. But, time had to stop for us to savor, assess, appreciate, and deconstruct answers such as “Destiny's Child 'Survivor' era with the army fatigues — or maybe 'Bootylicious' with the gold tooth and pink tips in my hair.” And, in my estimation, losing that time forever was worth it.
Oh, you suffer from Beyonce Derangement Hyperbole Syndrome too?
Not really. Well, maybe. I mean, I’m writing this while googling curtain sizes, because I want to give my Dodge Charger a partition.
So yes?
No comment.