Curve ball

199 pounds

If you've never watched Modern Family, I highly recommend it.

It's an outstanding new sitcom that is both hysterical and progressive—with a family composed of sixty-something Jay (played by Ed O'Neill), his new hot Latina wife, Gloria, and her son, Manny. But the show also features the families of the patriarch's two kids: Claire who has three kids with her husband Phil and Mitchell who has just adopted an adorable Asian baby with his partner Cameron.

This show is notable for MANY reasons—because it shows an older man married to a much younger woman, because it shows relationships that cross ethnic lines, and most importantly because it shows a gay couple in a loving, monogamous relationship and that gay couple adopts a baby.

But another thing that makes the show more progressive than the average sitcom is the fact that the hottest women on the show is not Claire, the thin petite blonde, but rather

Gloria, the voluptuous Latina played by Sofía Vergara.

I never really thought about the fact that Gloria, not Claire, is depicted as the hottest woman on the show before, but during the recent season finale, something happened that turned me on this unexpected reality.

In the finale, the entire cast goes to Hawaii to celebrate Jay's birthday, and during one of the first scenes, Claire catches her husband, Phil, gawking at Gloria as she exits the pool . . . hair dripping, body glistening, and—wait for it—thighs jiggling.

Thighs jiggling?

Yes, I said thighs jiggling.

Because Gloria does not have a perfect, cellulite-free body. No, she has a very real body—with cellulite and enough curves to give Mad Men's Christina Hendricks a run for her money.

And when she stepped out of the pool—her lovely and immense thighs and hips reminding me of my own more than anyone else I've seen in a bathing suit on my television screen—I almost fell out of my chair. Gloria is, simply put, a real woman.

Clearly that's enough reason for all of us to watch.

*Modern Family is on hiatus during the summer, but you can catch re-runs Wednesday nights at 8:30 on ABC.