BANKSY'S SECRETARY: REFRIGERATOR IN THE WILD

me on the phone: I WANNA HAVE YOUR BABIES!!!

Jen R on the powder-green telephone: i told you never to call me at work.

me: it's your first day?

Jen: maybe. i'm Banksy's secretary.

me: so your job doesn't officially exist.

Jen: exactly. let's keep it on the down low. well it used to be that way until he was outed...

Jen: okay i guess we can talk on the powder-green telephone now.

me: dusty-green.

Jen: it's not like it's being tapped, MI6 doesn't care about Banksy. speaking of work...

me: you're not gonna believe this but i have a job, too!!!

Liza: i'm showing him how to stock shelves at Safeway. i tell him it's just like stocking books at his old library job.

me stocking stacks. ah Berkeley, you made me cry. stocking zines is just like stocking fishsticks.

Jen: well a grocery store is a food library. hi Liza, i'm not jealous.

Liza: have you seen the Bank of America sign lately? there are crows on it!!! that's a bad sign...

LensCrafters in the back of the mall: we have SportsCenter...

Riding Bean: see it's Chicago but it's anime...

Vinicius Junior: i don't play for Brazil, i play for Ancient Rome...

Harvey Pekar: remember when the worst thing you could call someone was a shill for GE?

David Letterman: General Electric is now one bitcoin. let's go to the Obama Library together, Harvey. 

Joyce Brabner: your voice becomes clear when you're yelling, Harvey...

Melissa Maker: they say keep busy as a divorcee, keep doing that job where you tricked the world by getting paid for doing what you love. it's about passion, right? be prepared for when the next man comes. but how do you know there's gonna BE a next man around the corner? i'm Jewish, we don't fall for that life bullshit. most Jewish people end up atheist. i'm 40 but i still got the insane tits. these tits can still be a gift for someone new!!! old milk jugs don't clump. what if there's no one? can there be a someone special after 40?...

Henry Winkler: why did you start barfing when Happy Days switched to a live studio audience?

Ron Howard: craft service switched to shark sandwiches...

Joanie: i love Chachi? *vomit* 

a European in Costco: this store scares me...

Mitch Hedberg in soccer Norway gear: right? why does it have to be so cavernous of a warehouse? i got lost in a Costco once. i slept in the freezer aisle for 30 days, i didn't know Costco had beds. there is no such thing as a broken escalator because it turns into a Viking ship.

at the World Cup.

a soccer player kicks another soccer player in the nose with the soccer ball. 

soccer player: he was stealing my joy!!!

referee: i'll allow it. no yellow card.

Atom Egoyan: my work has been described as elliptical. that is the perfect revenge for all those math teachers in Canada who said i'd never amount to anything despite me with my glasses looking like a math nerd.

Atom Egoyan in Calendar: great, my first onscreen cameo and i'm giving off Woody Allen vibes...

Messi: Lionel Messi, not Little Messi...

Tom Hanks: in Cast Away when i finally reunite with Helen Hunt after being on an island with a beard and a talking volleyball for four years, i make this gesture, i just wasn't there, it's false, it's me, it's not Chuck Noland.

Helen Hunt: when you say to me "you make me want to be a better man" and then you give me the finger.

Wilson the volleyball: but when you CRIED when i "died," Mr. Hanks, those tears were REAL, man, they moved me.

Jack Nicholson: cast away, not castaway, get it?...

Jen: okay we can talk. i'm on the phone all day. there's nobody here.

me: are you at a secret location?

Jen: home is where the heart is. instead of visiting my mom i coulda bought a new refrigerator...

me: remember the refrigerator episode of Punky Brewster?

Jen: left me and all kids scarred for life. nightmares from childhood. poor Cherie Johnson, that refrigerator in the wild was ominous, growing like a weed in that junkyard.

our cats: we stay under your refrigerator because it's a WARM spot...

Jen: does your refrigerator make that SIGHING sound like it's a heavy-breather phone call from the '70s?

Punky Brewster: kids, don't go inside a refrigerator that's outside...
 

ASKED AFTER: DUTCH UNCLE

 

Liza: your house is weird.

me: you made it normal.

Liza: it's just, there's no tablespace, there's no space on any table in this whole house where i can place the Sprite Pints!!! i also can't sit down anywhere, all the chairs are full of your dirty laundry.

me: you can sit on the bed but that's a technical foul.

Liza: why do you like me? i'm a grandmother, i'm too old for this wild shit.

me: next time don't be so friendly :)

Liza: all grandmothers are friendly because they can't believe they've lived this long!!! 

me: doesn't it get lonely at the sports bar?

Liza: grandmas shouldn't really be drinking beer, right?

Michael Weiss: don't add music to your Instagram post, people will just start humming the song and ignore the important words you wrote...

Bart Simpson: nothing ruins a summer more than a drop of new Simpsons episodes in July.

Marge Simpson: episode dump. like i'm doing right now, taking a dump in Bart's bathroom.

Bart: keep summer simple: a Don't Have A Cow, Man T-shirt that Mrs. Rossi disliked at Target.

Molly Qerim: omg imagine me as the First Lady. i'd be Melania but cool.

Atom Egoyan: look at us, we look like brothers.

Zalman King: Armenian brothers. we should do a film together, we explore the same themes.

Atom: Avo, a film about Avo Babian.

Avo Babian: no sex, just dentistry, but none of that Marathon Man stuff. 

Zalman: seeing it: LASIK in the back of a mall like A Clockwork Orange.

Atom: i need that. glasses are so '90s.

Harvey Pekar: there is no sweeter day in your entire miserable existence than when your errand for the afternoon is moving your girlfriend's stuff into your apartment...

Wikipedia: the place where everyone dies...

Charles Nelson Reilly: a terrycloth shirt is just the top half of a robe.

Kaye Stevens: can i call you Nelson?

Charles Nelson Reilly: call me Dude...

Barry Bonds: wait, the only hall of fame i can get into is the COLLEGE Baseball Hall of Fame? but everyone took the clear and the cream in college as practice for the big time!!!

Banksy: Banksying? do not be naming a toxic dating trend after me, my art is the ANTITHESIS of toxic, my art heals. art is not an Irish Goodbye, it's permanent. all you have to do is tell her where you're going!!!

match game: Joyce Bulifant's un-bra'd Mrs. Brady tits, not a soccer friendly between the U.S and Australia. everyone knows Cape Verde's winning the World Cup.

Willy Wonka: in Carmel the sidewalks are cobblestone...

Raul De Molina: when i was on safari and my little red car caught on fire, i took it as a sign from God, you know Dios, that he wanted me to lose weight. i was put in this world to run with the elephants...

Lili Estefan: mundial. but the Copa Mundial doesn't matter.

Liza: after we fucked, any food you get at Safeway will never taste the same.

me: why does fucking change the taste of food?

Liza: Chef Boyardee told me when i was a college girl that it had something to do with the nature of Italian love.

me: i can never go back to Safeway again.

Liza: i don't want you to starve. that's why we gotta go back to me just being your checker.

me: yes, please do a wellness check on me daily, you're nearby.

 

ASKED AFTER: COOKING LUNCH

Liza and i are in bed. my bed.

Liza: tell me your dreams.

me: the Knicks have won for the first time in 50 years. i'm celebrating along with everyone else at night across the Five Boroughs. but it's strange, as the mob creates a din of noise outside, inside Little Sal's Pizzeria all the Knicks players are gathered at one table DEADLY SILENT. their faces are quiet, no one makes a sound. not a peep, not a ref's whistle. Little Sal the local owner is a one-foot-tall man of Sicilian heritage with tiny hands kneading the pie dough.  

James Gandolfini: not Tony hands.

Liza: a lot of waiting to celebrate inside. symbolic. takes time to make the pizza just right. it's taking forever...

Warsaw: we're Hollywood East, that's what the Warsaw Pact really did. Hamnet was filmed in our woods. Atlanta scares us. 

Jillian Clare: all of this makes me sad.

Gene Shalit: i was the unlikeliest of Titans, the Titan that flew under the radar. i made it to 100 years not because of my magic handlebar mustache that came from an '80s woodshop, but because i invented old-timey boxing...

Neale Donald Walsch: think of an angel's halo as a ring light...

Trent Reznor: look at me, if i didn't form a band i'd be your freshman roommate at NYU with the long black hair, the music major in the pigeon-blue NYU sweatshirt.

Liza: fill my holes with soul.

me: you're the only woman who's elongated my penis like this, that thing is STRETCHED AND BALLOONED.

a mountain of cum sits on Liza's face.

Liza: this has seasoned the both of us.

Jesus: never jealous.

Peso Pluma: i'm better than Michael Jackson, and that's no bait.

Luffy: my straw hat is the official hat of Spain...

Pele: why doesn't the United States soccer team have a nickname?

Jacques Pepin naked in the stands: because they're stupid. eat a mince pie i made with butter, you fucking Yanks.

Alexi Lalas: just call us The Gauchos and let's move on. why does everything American revert back to the cowboy hat?

Pele: the beautiful game is most certainly NOT ice hockey...

Emma Raducanu: boyfriend? naw, he's just a friend...

Emma: yeah that's my central-park yogi who looks like Mickey Rooney...

Mbappe: do you play the Legend of Zelda ocarina like me?...

Atom Egoyan: video-rental stores and hotels...

Fannie Flagg: i hate sex.

Gene Rayburn: that is a jarring concept considering your tits.

Fannie: the whole no-bra thing isn't a '70s thing, it's a Southern thing...

Fannie Flagg: i hate sex.

Brett Somers: how come?

Fannie: that's just it, i don't cum.

me: i was just about to make a sandwich, would you like one?

Liza: where have i heard that before?...

Liza: i'm gonna cook lunch. Spaghetti-Os.

me: meatballs?

Liza: no the ones with the chunk of hot dog for the nose...

   

 

ASKED AFTER: TOTEM WEED

 

i couldn't deny my attraction to Liza from Safeway. i saw her every day as i made my morning walk and got my 4 items that never amounted to over $20. she was always my check girl, the old man on the bus bench from Ghost World, reliable, there. sure she was friendly to me but she was friendly to everybody. i had to make my move, the lust was overwhelming bubbling in my innards. there were ants in my spirit.

me: are you attracted to me?

Liza: no.  

me: before you say no...you're fast.

Liza: i'm old enough to be your mother.

me: i like mommies. you think someone like me could hang with some 18-year-old airhead?

Liza: i had my stout baseball son then stopped dating. got in a groove of being alone. watching The Sandlot alone. i dunno, don't want to upset the balance. but you are kind of a cool someone to watch soccer with at a bar, nothing more.

Liza: let's see if we're compatible. what is the greatest injustice in the world?

me: that they made Travolta evil in Carrie. Travolta should always be cuddly, huggable, derpy Barbarino with the kind smile.

Liza: poverty.

Liza: okay, what makes you cry?

me: the intro song to Deep Space Nine.

Liza: flowers. you're strangely derpy for being so intelligent.

Steve Buscemi in Ghost World: i should have been the bus guy. bus-cemi, huh? huh? perfect casting. me playing a strange suicide spirit? no, just an old man waiting for the death bus. not all old men are weird. i'm that guy who gets excited when he puts spicy mayonnaise on his chicken sandwich.

Jaleel White: Flip Side is an impossible game show. not only does it bring in-laws together, it brings EX-in-laws together!!!

Melissa Maker: ...

Flip Side crew: there's a lot of moving questions. we move a lot, a lot of movers at our various houses...

Enid in Ghost World: have you ever been born. and then once you were born, you just wanted to die?...

Borders bookstore: THIS was a warehouse store, not Costco.

the Australian nurse: g'day from Canberra. i will help you with your mom the way Lucy Lawless's sunny disposition is in My Life Is Murder...

Max Rose, smiling: i'm not running for office again, i'm just a New Yorker.

Trent Reznor: we have nails so we can type on a computer. push buttons on an electronica machine. although it would be cool if your fingers were just these squishy sticks like hot dogs, very cartoony.

Ms. Swan: no beauty shops if no nails.

Billy Howerdel: my bald head is shinier than Billy Corgan's. nails are for protection.

Trent: but my nails, however long, never protected me from my feelings...

YouTube: it's just the latest toy. it's the 2020 version of the Nintendo Greybox. parents are getting their kids ring lights like they did new grey Nintendo railroad-track game cartridges back in the 1980s that cost $89 a pop.

Michael Weiss: on Instagram the women aren't just eerily beautiful, they're HORNY.

Brooke Trantor: ...

Michael Weiss: he doesn't need to look at her Instagram anymore, he knows what her art is gonna be!!!

Eggo: this waffle will only brown golden after ONE toast if you LAUGH with a loved one while it toasts.

Zalman King: think back to a slow Saturday morning. you take a soothing shower in the middle of watching the dreamlike Red Shoe Diaries episode "Weightless." soothed and weightless you pee in the drainhole. the soft waterfall hitting your open eyes midstream you have the thought you have to finish rushedly to answer the doorbell for the Meals on Wheels guy.........but you don't, it's Saturday...

Morrissey: i had the velvet voice but i wanted to rock out like Johnny Marr. have my flower garland be my guitar strap. i'm jealous of songwriters, they go on my shit list. i'm the spokesman for Malefactor Vitamins.

Scarlett Johansson: i am really FADED with my performance in Ghost World. that was either what the character called for, i didn't want to be there, or i was too young to be acting serious stuff...

Atom Egoyan: there is no more sensuous feeling than eating rice with your fingers.

Arsinee Khanjian: more sensuous than nutty sex.

Frank Oz: i played Robert Crumb in the '80s for a local NYC theatre production of Fritz the Cat with my fiend Jim Henson.

Jim Henson: i made all the Fritz the Cat Muppets, i was trying to get back in the good graces of SNL doing the hardcore stuff again...

Enid and Steve Buscemi are clothed on Steve's bed in Ghost World.

Enid: don't you like me?

Enid and Steve Buscemi are naked in Steve's bed.

Steve Buscemi: we do make a cute couple. two lost souls who like weird art. let me just see here, half my age plus seven...

we walk back to my house.

me: obviously i'm a loser who has no car.

Liza: you see that Bank of America sign up ahead? i think about you walking past it each day. that's a total fucking blind turn!!! the wild speeding cars of our parking lot just turn around that corner and could ram into you without them even knowing!!! they'd still be listening to their godawful talk radio. Bank of America sucks.

me: Bank of America used to be cool when i was a toddler playing on their LONG green carpet under a TALL 3-story window while my folks were trying to get a loan. 

Liza: Chase sucks, too.

me: you see my backyard?

Liza: the lawn is so pristine and level.

me: used to be full of sharp-angled crabgrass. there were weeds shooting up like bamboo totems which is the type of plant i would be if i were a plant: a weed totem. but my gardener Super Mario cut them all down to prepare for summer.

Liza: that's too bad, all that symbolism gone. and i look like Barbara Walters :) 

Liza: i brought two Sprite Pints for the occasion.

me: Mexican Sprite?

Liza: i work at Safeway, not Erewhon. we only make $38,000 a day.

we sit by the TV in the living room. it's Inside the NBA after the Knicks win.

Liza, smiling: i haven't had sex in 50 years!!!

me, smiling: me neither. 

Kenny the Jet Smith dropkicks Shaquille O'Neal out of the studio across the Five Boroughs.

Ernie: what the fuck was that, Kenny? i've never seen you like this before.

Kenny: i don't know what came over me.

Charles Barkley: i blame the street meat. New York fans are annoying but the street meat is worse. jeezus, remind me never to get on your bad side.

Kenny: i don't get mad at anything. i'm always joking around. i wanted to see what it felt like to get kicked off a show for paying a hooker.