THE SCHOOL CAFETERIA THAT NEVER WAS: GRILLED CHEESE ON A GRILL

 

Jen R: it's better in high school.

me: that sentence has never been true.

Jen: all those grilled-cheese sandwiches your mom gave you in wax paper, that you never knew what to do with. now you can yourself put the grilled-cheese sandwich on an actual grill at lunch.

me: outside? on the grass? taking grass?

Jen: doesn't matter. haven't you found it odd that a grilled cheese sandwich is never actually grilled? it's put in a toaster oven if it's lucky.

me: huh, in high school the teachers really treat the students as adults. the responsibility of a sandwich.

Jen: well, peers. you need a lot of people for those peer reviews which bring in extra cash...

Grover: i mean why am i always paired with the blue man with the brown mustache, you know?

AI: but i let you SEE what you're manifesting...

Arthur C. Clarke: yes but i thought the internet bringing all of humanity to a point would multiply the COMPASSION of humanity exponentially...

Tostitos: our chips are like Bad Bunny's straw hat.

football: soon you will graduate college. soon you will become an old man. all old men like football whether or not they like football...

Norway ski-jumping: material in the crotch of the jumpsuit to go further. that material was a lime-green radioactive nugget.

Dr. Manhattan: ...

Michael Weiss: i HATE explaining my comments on Instagram. it's so draining. why can't people just get it?

me: so at night i can hear my next-door neighbors fucking.

Jen: Jackie and Walker? 

me: three hours of uninterrupted guttural MOANS from Jackie. and the climax is always Jackie shouting, "DO ME FROM BEHIND, BABY!!!" 

Jen: yelps of pleasure. she's teaching you not to nod off.

me: and the the next morning Jackie knocks on my door all bushytailed and smiling and signing me up for Meals On Wheels...

Jen: i mean you'd be happy and upbeat and cheerful and rosy-colored too if you just had a night like that!!! passion makes you believe in life again, believe in your mission again.

Jackie: once you fuck you can take on the world.

door-to-door vacuum salesman: i've decided i'm through with the vacuums and i'm gonna be a pro ball player. i've made this decision in a vacuum...

Roger Ebert: Jonathan Livingston Seagull, peaceful footage of a seagull flying over foamy oceans. meditative. i walked out on this because that first scene with all the seagulls sniping, jawing at each other, biting their beaks with their beaks, was too jarring for me.

Jonathan Livingston Seagull: you walked out because you WALKED out, you're jealous you can't fly.

Norway Olympic biathlete crying on live TV: i cheated on my girlfriend. she was the love of my life. she was my soulmate. 

Lindsey Vonn: he didn't cheat with me, okay?

Norway biathlete tears frozen on his face like Billy Corgan: the ironic thing is i cheated with a woman who later became the first American to medal in biathlon...

Jen: don't you remember how SUMPTUOUS the feeling was?

me: ah yes, at the high school and i'm asleep in algebra class. Mr. Diamond shoves my shoulder awake.

Mr. Diamond: son, there is more to life than numbers. high school is about expanding your IMAGINATION portals. the LANGUAGE of imagination...

i trust Mr. Diamond because he wears Coke-bottle glasses. so i fly with him to his English class.

along the way the janitor's broom closet is a makeshift laundromat. with purple Vaporwave walls. i use my last quarter i was saving for the arcade to clean my giant white COMFORTER downey blanket. i spread that puppy over my desk in class and SLEEP...

Jen: talk about a makeshift bed!!! schools should be about sleeping, they're about health, right?

me: and then Mr. Diamond wakes me up and tells me my homework is to write my own Red Shoe Diaries episode script...

THE SCHOOL CAFETERIA THAT NEVER WAS: THE 4:55 DREAM

 

Jen R: i need a hangover burger after all that. fried egg on top.

me: don't people call in sick the Monday after the Super Bowl?

Jen: not us, bucko, you have some inner work to do.

me: my wildest dreams occur from 4:55AM to 5AM when i have to get up for Match Game.

Jen: Gene Rayburn rests for no man.

me: in that five-minute span, i experience an eternal world...

Jen: tell me your darkest fear.

me: well you see i've never experienced a school cafeteria my whole life. never ate at one of those proper public junior-high cafeterias that, say, the Belcher kids eat at.

Louise Belcher: it really brings a sense of normalcy to one's life. 

Tina Belcher: New York City non-religion really is the way to go.

Gene Belcher: and don't go forgetting Hot Lunch Wednesday!!!

the five of us are at a school cafeteria completely foreign to me, with the slatted overhead drop-door and the fly buzzing around the lunch lady in a shower cap's one tooth.

Gene: here the pizza is always ham, which is neutral.

Louise: the hot dogs are always grilled on a grill INSIDE the school so there will always be enough black smoke for a fire alarm which is an impromptu recess and gathering of school souls outdoors to build trust.

Tina: and the Hot Italian Sandwiches are just rubbery cheese in the middle.

Olympics Opening Ceremony: that part of the program that sounds like Star Tours...

Sartre: yeah Sartre Night Live, it all makes sense now, i solved God, SNL was the only show that was funny because it was free.

God: Sartre was absurd, that's why i loved him.

Shelley Duvall: instead of a NO SMOKING sign, a SMOKING ALLOWED sign that's me in silhouette holding my TALL cigarette ash in The Shining...

Jen and i are at the Winter Olympics. 

me: i'm in a TIGHT speed-skating suit.

Jen R: revealing all the muscles you don't have.

me: the tip of my skate blade catches a patch of ice and i go fucking FLYING into those welcoming spongy boards.

Jen: you're on your butt but you STILL make two revolutions around the oval!!! i don't know, i'd rather be the Italian Wuthering Heights poet...

me: an email from you each day, gets me through the day.

Jen: my name in black on your email board.

Jennifer Dodds: i'm that babe from the second season of Survivor...

Rainbow Harvest: i'm Winona Ryder if she had stayed in the Rainbow community...

Quad God: look at my outfit and think of the movie Solarbabies...

Peter Griffin: would you be more receptive to a British hostage negotiator?

Brian: yes, that accent, he would exude excellence and professionalism and competency. a voice like Michael Caine.

Peter: but not Jeremy Irons from Lolita, that would be weird.

Rainbow Harvest: it's always good to have that one rich friend...

Alyssa Milano: everyone had that '80s experience where a girl from school you don't know well is in your room rifling through your diary pages, messing up your stuff, hugging the teddy bears on your bed.

Old Enough (1984): THIS is the American Degrassi!!!

Madison Chock: it's just weird ice-skating at 11PM at night...

Bates: chalk us in, bet chalk, we're always the best, we're always gonna win.

Zalman King: yeah so Red Shoe Diaries "Cowboy, Cowboy," i had to do that one, the network was pressuring me to write a Republican episode or Middle America would boycott the show. i inadvertently ended up creating Yellowstone, man!!! it's me, it's still me, your urban cityboy Zalman, it doesn't get as cynical as Trenton, New Jersey.

The Toxic Avenger: tell me about it...

Zalman: at least the end of the episode looks like Pretty In Pink...

the Super Bowl: played outside?...

turtleneck: sunburnt nape?

me: i'm the Beerus the destroyer god of Instagram...

Lindsey Vonn: i did it for my mom. i'll be okay, just get me one of those little sandwiches from Vons. i'm Sigourney Weaver in Working Girl...

Bad Bunny at The Super Bowl: i mean you were gonna eat chips and guac anyway, right? i'm gonna slip some Spanish insults to Trump in my song he won't understand...

Jen R: how do you like your hangover-burger egg cooked?

me: hardboiled.

Jen: just not the same. a hardboiled egg tastes like french fries. 

FRIZZY HAIRCUT: THE WELL-COIFFED BUM

 

Kurt spots a person strange and familiar skulking the corner pew.

Kurt Cobain: hello madam, come to cleanse your sins?

Kody Cobain: the gig is up.

Kurt: oh my god!!! you look EXACTLY like me!!! except female!!!

Kody: how can you tell? you already look like a beautiful blonde woman, i'm more of a homely man with short hair and Gloria Steinem glasses.

Kurt: no you're beautiful, because i never knew i had a soulmate.

Courtney Love: *heavy sigh before divorce*

Kurt: so what brings you here?.........you know, to this scorched-earth church?

Kody: you.

Kurt: my own twin sister, this will completely change my music.

Kody: so i watched that Red Shoe Diaries episode. what i got from it was thus: it's weird seeing a man in the Navy in his Donald Duck uniform riding a skateboard...

The Toxic Avenger: i'm Frankenstein with a smooth voice.

Richard Scarry: apple cars, not Apple cars...

Victoria Justice: i'm not jealous of Leon Thomas III. i just never thought to combine rock with jazz, that's all.

Leon Thomas III: the Mutt Mix. turns out i was a musical genius, not some son on a silly show. everyone says they're "gonna do music now," few achieve it. i'm Snoop Doggy Dogg before he went crazy. my music has that Boogiepop Phantom vibe...

Jen R: it's been two weeks and the snow STILL hasn't melted in Baltimore!!! worry not, with global warming as all-encompassing as it is now we'll get ONE 100-degree day and that'll melt the whole area...

Darko Milicic: i'm from Serbia and even i didn't want to bathe in the Orlando Magic showers. thank God for the courage of Chauncey Billups.

Chauncey Billups wearing bunny ears: i showed Darko how to shower and now i'm just waiting on Darko to bail me out here...

mom: hey babe, Gin Blossoms next, trust me.

The Charismatic Voice: ...

Lorelai Gilmore: most high-school valedictorians don't do well in life.

Rory Gilmore: thanks mom?

Seth MacFarlane: that's why i didn't apply myself, i was terrified of becoming Scott Adams...

Mr. Pibb: Dr. Pepper without the headache.

Desiguales: we can talk shit about all these desperate single no-life bedhopping fools in the Big Brother house because we're all happily married with kids!!!

cozy mystery: i mean is murder ever really COZY?

atmospheric river: why is Central California always the target for atmospheric rivers? pointed right at the hub. why is Salinas and Seaside always on the bullseye? can't the Pineapple Express change course one time for something different?

Match Game: wife, boobs, Howard Cosell...

mudroom: there's never any mud in this room. don't track mud into the mudroom...

Colonel Sanders: one of my mysterious 11 herbs and spices gotta be garlic, right?

Mrs. Dash: how the fuck is this seasoning so flavorful with NO SALT?!!!

Kelly Song: Cook's Country? i should be Mulan!!!

Saturday Night Live: we are the TRUE BEACON of American freedom. this is what freedom of speech looks like!!!

i take a deep sigh and enter the confessional booth.

Brother Peewit: how many Hail Marys have you said in your entire life?

me: i'm growing out my hair and i'm scared.

Peewit: they told you to wait a year? who do they think you are, a monk?

me: what should i do?

Peewit: you come to me for life advice instead of going to a Korean soap opera?

Peewit drinking Pepto in the booth: it's fine, look at your hair. it's a fro, you'll never grow more head hair.

me: i can FINALLY be Bob Ross for real!!!

Peewit: your hair covers the jaw of your mouth.........that's it. you will never have the FLOW of a long beard.

Jen: back to the monk thing.

Peewit: my friend, you have FRIZZY HAIR. your hair will never grow again!!!

FRIZZY HAIRCUT: SHAVER SAVIOR SURFER

 

Jen R: what is the purpose of a friend?

me: a friend?

Jen: a friend is someone you tell your troubles to.

this was wisdom on the beach.

Jen: let's go surfing. 

me: i'll stick with the sticky sand in my toes.

Jen: well we'll have a gladiatorial movie between us then. 

my eyes bug out. i IMMEDIATELY run into the ocean!!!

Jen: oh shit it's the big one.

i dive deep underwater, i'm possessed, in a trance, but Nine Inch Nails "The Great Below" is NOT playing in my head. i spot what i think is an electric jellyfish.........it's an electric razor.

i fish the clunky razor out from between two kelps before it has a chance to sink out of reach...

Jen: you're a hero. do you know the DAMAGE an electric razor can cause to the ocean bottom?!!! 

me: it's a sign. from where i know not of. free the floor!!! 

Jen: that electric razor was still ON!!! 

me: i think i might have thrown my buzzing electric razor in the sea as a sign that i was letting my hair grow out and my beard get unruly.........it's okay, i just made amends for that right now.

Jen: join me in celebration as we sing just the two of us "Joy To The World."

me: Christmas, sadly, is over.

Jen: no the cool folk-rock version.

fishes in the deep blue sea: our joy is expressed by our third milky eye that doesn't blink...

fishes in the deep blue sea: we're embarrassed to tell anybody this but our eyes get watery when we're out there swimming...

blanket: not for cold, for protection...

Toto: hold the line, love isn't always on time, whoa whoa whoa. unless you're making love on a train. hold the line, love doesn't always choose sides, whoa whoa whoa. unless it's divorce court, whoa whoa whoa.

The Charismatic Voice: i was going through a bad breakup. so i hopped up on anti-depression meds and took my mom to Disneyland.

mom: smell the flowers, sad sack.

The Charismatic Voice: there are flowers in Disneyland?

mom: it ain't over till the fat lady sings.

The Charismatic Voice: i understood that only because i'm an opera singer.

mom: well, luckily for you all your fat is in your tits, from that you'll attract another man, marry Ryan Gosling, and start a billion-dollar YouTube singing-science enterprise. 

The Charismatic Voice: mouth science, mother.

mom: when audiences rain flowers down on your head after your aria, don't sniff them, the pollen will damage your vocal chords, look out for that, missy. other than that, yeah, i mean you're a real redhead!!!

ProZD: an Asian online like me shouldn't be this successful in life...

wife: ZD?

ProZD: Zero Dick.

wheelchair: the skateboard of the bike. skate culture.

Father Navin in a car touching the radio: don't mess with my priest presets!!!

Band Aid: ironically, the name fit, ALL the money from that concert was at best a band-aid over the systemic problems of poverty in Africa.

Bob Geldof: Band Aid every year. my name sounds like a wizard.

Walker: i'm one big walking tan in faded jeans.

tennis: we're always spoken about in REVERENT terms on sports shows, never as the daily scandal. that says something about our beautiful sport.

Jennifer Lopez: i'm the soccer mom of The Weather Channel...

Broly: Yu-Gi-Oh on the anabolics.

Entenmann's: EXTREMELY difficult word to spell. spelling-bee word. those tiny little chocolate donuts you forget about five minutes after eating them. we invented the see-through donut box!!!

the Stussy S: seahorse.

Roger Ebert: do you blame me for walking out on Mediterraneo? the concept offends the senses. by the way, islands aren't that great.

Carnival Cruise ships: have fun again in 2026. don't iPhone ANY of the fun you're having on our boats!!!

Shaq and Monty Python: also known as a pleasure vessel.

Stella: i should have been the couple's dog in a Red Shoe Diaries story...

Jen R: i don't know about you, but after a long hard day of surfing, i need to relax with a Super Bowl.

me: the sweat pouring down your chin onto your board?

Jen: your girlfriend works at Safeway, let's eat for free!!!

me: i wish Liza was my girlfriend. she drives by my house each morning!!! she knows where i live!!!

Liza: and what are you two lovebirds munching and sipping on this afternoon?

Jen: don't start. with him. excited for the Super Bowl?

Liza: yes. but as you can see, i'm working on a Sunday...

Jen: idea: have a 2000-INCH television screen in the middle of the grocery store!!! rotating for all the shoppers to gaze at the screen as the Super Bowl game is going on.

me: that's an aisle hazard. people would slip on their celery not watching the road as they drove their carts.

Liza: would you mind writing that IN PENCIL on a suggestion card?

Jen: these beige cards remind me of library cards.

Liza: i was deep into Ramona.

Jen: no the Dewey Decimal System library cards...

Liza: the party's almost here, would you mind getting the case of V8 Bloody Marys out of the back of my van?

as i lug the 50-pound case of silver-bullet cans of spicy vegetable juice on my scoliosis brace-fixed back i have just enough strength to turn my sweaty red open face to where Jen the painter is pointing my attention.

Jen: check this out, Liza has a bumper sticker that's Smokey the Bear with RESIST under him. Liza's so cool.