WAITING IS A FORM OF LOVE: EARLY-MORNING POTATO SMELL

 

Jen R: waiting like when we're waiting for your coffee in the morning, see what i'm getting at?

we're waiting by my Keurig. i push the button.

me: here it is.

Xoxo: no that's the cup of coffee from YESTER morning. see it takes ONE WHOLE DAY for the coffee to brew to get the beans to taste just right. the Aztecs invented coffee you know.

me: shit i'm out of water. where's my water cup?

Jen: use this strange cup.

Xoxo: vieja, that's a tiny glass fishbowl.

me: as long as it works, right? even if my pet fish is swimming around in this cup...

Jen: whoa, check out your cats, they're calm around your fish now.

Xoxo: i have a calming effect on cats.

Leslie Sbrocco: omg you're HERE?!!!

Monica Pro: yeah. crouching like a motherfucker to put away these Teddy Grahams. did you get a good gander at my butt?

Leslie: i honestly thought i'd never see you again. i've been crying on the inside.

Monica: Safeway has a way of crushing your dreams.........that's it. Safeway has a habit of messing with your mind. btw.........don't try the Safeway meatloaf...

Leslie: i eat one sugar donut from Safeway a day, right? so why don't i gain weight? why don't i balloon out and explode?

Monica: because you walk, silly. if you walk TO Safeway you can eat a donut a day and not gain an ounce. empty calories are still calories.

Teen Titans: The Judas Contract.

plains: explains.

Starfire: if we move in together, one of the rooms MUST be a pizza parlor.

Jen R: yeah that's me, i'm always burning the lasagna, i'm always putting the lasagna in the oven at 500 degrees for 5 hours.

Nightwing: waitl let's not fight here, this is the pier from the Our Lady Peace "One Man Army" music video...

Dick Grayson: bulletproof vest? nah, manly chest. i mean my name is Dick Grayson, that's a porn star's name.

Blue Beetle: hey, only my father gets to call me ese!!!

Deathstroke: wait how many zeros?

Brother Blood: 20 bucks, right?

Terra: how COULD you?!!! i thought this was real love!!!

Deathstroke: sorry, kid, goth girls give me the creeps. nothing ratchets up the sexual tension quite like death. sex and death, isn't that what life is about? widow sex is where it's at.

Robin: no God will save you, Blood, because i'm an atheist.

Terra: Slade, you're about to experience the most fucked-up Legends of the Hidden Temple Temple Game ever!!!

Brother Blood: i beseech thee, 40 years in the planning only to end up Hot Nosferatu?...

Terra: i was gonna rock myself earlier but Deathstroke promised he'd get me a horse.

Kevin Smith: sucks about your girlfriend.........are we still on for the podcast?

puppy Sandy the black-Lab dog: ...

Beast Boy: not everyone has a road.

i stroll past the Fitzgeralds' place.

Jen R: i'm always in awe of their sprinkler system. i'm dazzled and drenched.

Jackie Fitzgerald: the sprinklers come on EXACTLY at 7:34 each morning to indicate Blond Rambo and i have finished fucking.

Jen: you scared the living daylights out of me, woman!!!

Blond Rambo: Jackie scares me unless i have my nightlight on. she only talks to me when all the lights are off.

me: the sprinklers make me feel inspired. i want to take a shower in your sprinkler water like as if I just had sex.

Jen: i keep telling him to bathe. to wash himself so he doesn't have to watch himself.

Jackie: yeah he needs it, he's a filthy motherfucker.

It's a Living.

agent: i'm taking you to the top.

Sonny the piano man: but i already work at Above the Top...

Shannon Sharpe at the NFL Hall of Fame ceremony: this Gold Jacket looks sharp on me.........this is not awkward in any way...

Tiafoe: like my END ICE ice? my END ICE necklace, i can only wear this in Toronto...

Gavin Rossdale: when Bush toured with Veruca Salt, we only had the one album, our first album. the concert was still an hour long but we had to play EACH AND EVERY ONE of our songs. you heard everything, man. everything we were about. from "Everything Zen" to "Alien." we played "Alien" at your prom...

Tula from The Pirates of Dark Water: you played it at my prom. you don't remember but i do. "Alien" has since become a prom song. "Alien" was the last song at my prom...

Gene Rayburn: i am FASCINATED with what color a woman's hair roots REALLY are...

Morgan Spurlock: so McMigraine doesn't work. remember, i died early...

Raul De Molina: piscina. you know? the only thing that matters in life is my swimming pool.

Zverev: you can read my serve. look at the toss, it's like a goaltender trying to read the penalty kick...

Wednesday Addams at Wendy's: purple sauce? that's just not appetizing. even if you call it Vaporwave Sauce. even if you call it '80s Sauce...

Richard Dawson: i can seduce any woman. no i'm being serious. my success rate is 100%. except that one time i was Moses in a tuxedo parting the Red Sea.

Eric Clapton guitar solo: i play during the breaks of every Late Night with David Letterman episode...

Cecily Strong: when do i play Tara Palmeri on SNL?...

Tom Edwards: i have a rich resonant voice like Sanka coffee. i made Char Aznable sexy, he wasn't before. i'm Canadian so i know Melissa Maker. i'm a funnyman so i do a magic trick in my pants. i was that councilman in that one episode of Da Vinci's Inquest...

Tom Brady: no more smelling salts? but that's how i get through the day now that Gisele has taken up with her yoga man. i tried yoga once but i broke my nose...

blue whales: we're silent to show a moment of silence for poor Pinocchio...

Xoxo: cheese on pizza like a giraffe's fur.

me: so Xoxo, you have unique colors on you.

Xoxo: they're not painted-on, they're natural.

Jen R: the colors of Ancient Mexico?

Xoxo: the colors of the United States Southwest, the colors of Arizona...

Jen: that is depressing. aren't you a harbinger of the underworld?

me: that dark passageway no one wants to take?

Xoxo: yes but it's not a scary thing. death is natural, the problem is you can't explain it...

WAITING IS A FORM OF LOVE: '80s USC DAD COFFEE

 

Jen and i are waiting in line at the Sherman Oaks Magic Castle for pizza.

Jen R: on line. i'm from Baltimore.

me: we've been waiting here for 3 hours. the arcade cabinets are getting cold.

Jen: but the pizza is made from dough made from '80s nostalgia. so it IS worth it. see what i'm getting at here?

after three hours i bite into the crust with my non-braced teeth. my family couldn't afford to get me braces when i was a kid.

me: there's something about the cheese that evokes the '80s.

Jen: the cheese is BURNED. right? the cheese has that BURNING flavor to it. i'm surprised that's not a black pizza what with all the burnt cheese.

me: didn't Domino's do a neon balck-licorice pizza once? to celebrate the '80s?

Jen: the secret is to eat a triangle of cheese pizza all by itself, no seasonings, no salt, no pepper, no hot sauce, no cheese. so you only taste the cheese. and tomato. and bread.

Monica Pro: don't worry, i'm not getting shipped out to Carmel Valley. i left you a surprise at the donut case this morning.

Leslie Sbrocco: i enter Safeway at breakfast and make a motherfucking beeline for the donut case. i think to myself, "let's see here, which donut is calling my name." i study the donuts a good while examining which donut has just the right amount of misshapen roundness. topped with just a bit too much sugar to be a healthy daily intake of sugar...

Monica: i left the last sugar donut ON TOP of the glazed donuts.

Leslie: oh yeah i saw that!!! SEE?!!! you DO care about me!!!

Monica: yes. but i'm also bored.

Teen Titans: The Judas Contract.

Judas: not a Christian movie.

Nightwing: i'm not Darkwing Duck.

Robin: team, i have some bad news. we're rescuing this alien girl who's ugly. she's gonna be living in Titans Tower with us for three years. this will test the very foundation of the Teen Titans, what we stand for.

Superman: you're really trying my patience with this shit. there are 253 DC animated movies? DC characters do not need to be ninjas...

Nightwing, blushing: i made a key for you. i want you to live with me.

Starfire: okay but you live with your mom.

Raven: i'm Wednesday Addams but i can fly. oh damn i got HIPS in this movie!!!

Jaime Reyes's father: blue Beetle? but the boy still can't drive. i want my son back. where's my heart medication?

Blue Beetle: pop, i promise to go to college when i'm 45.

Brother Blood: cemeteries are the last quiet places in the city.

Deathstroke: i'm Deadpool without the personality. without the Ryan Reynolds Canadian quips. i suck.

Starfire: Nightwing, why can't you cum for me when we're in your mother's bed?

Nightwing: Batman said real men don't cum.

Beast Boy: am i seducing you with my snake? i mean me AS a snake. The Jungle Book was my favorite Disney movie as a kid, it spoke to me so much.

Terra: my favorite movie is Kids...

Madame Pons: hey Deathstroke, the Lazarus Pit ain't got nothing on LUSH bath bombs. not the bombs you're used to, you brute.

Jaime: sorry, the cockroach inside me acts up whenever there's a hot poor girl serving soup to strangers.

Makeup Department: okay no makeup on Terra EVER.

Nightwing, moving: why do you have 300 brown cardboard boxes of stuff?

Starfire: those are your dirty magazines. it's just my Sailor Moon wand and Jem hair gel.

Beast Boy: mama, did you think Ginyu from Dragon Ball Z was cute?

Terra: i'm more of an Uncle Wiggily woman.

Beast Boy: unhealthy online presence?

Terra: Twitter's not gonna last. before we kiss, i must warn you, i'm into older men...

Jason Mewes: i'm only "Other Guy" because i can't talk because i'm chewing gum.

Robin: i mean the team STILL hasn't searched for me, it's been a week...

Starfire: dick in a box?

Lucille Ball in the SNL dressing room: powder your nose, dear, save the nose powder for John Belushi.

John Belushi: my nose is shiny.

vj: a blowjob from an Early '80s MTV VJ.........preferably Cyndi Lauper...

Blond Rambo: walk the dog, then hog (motorcycle).

Jackie Fitzgerald: why aren't you part of a motorcycle gang? it's just you out there on the highway at 7 AM chasing the sunrise. 

Blond Rambo: i'm a loner, baby. it's the hog credo, to truly experience the freedom of being in a motorcycle gang, you must ride alone...

It's a Living.

Granville Van Dusen: you are related to someone who made it with Susan Sullivan, the first milf who ever lived.

Susan Sullivan: what a hunk. i had the most perfect bean-shaped butt.

Granville: someone who traveled the stars both as a Klingon AND as Jonny Quest...

Jen R, laughing: It's a Living, the ENDLESS SALAD!!!

me: i have a dream where i'm eating at Above the Top restaurant in that silver tower, for dinner i order only a salad.

Jen: it's a skyscraper spinning-restaurant that doesn't spin.

Larry on It's a Living: ladies, given up on dating? too many jerks? Larry will be a stable supporter, a pious provider, and a faithful father. and i'll only sell you a GTO...

It's a Living: we did the whole naked-priest thing first...

Comcast: we deliver high-speed internet to gas stations...

Vieve the bag girl at Safeway: i saw flies coming out of the Lucky donut case. 

Leslie Sbrocco: not all donut double-doors are the same.

Monica Pro: you know when it's early August and you REALLY need a summer shower to happen in the sky?...

Tour de France Femmes: but it's on Peacock...

'80s TV: the women were good-looking but not TOO good-looking...

new boyfriend: i'm not just a sudden replacement for the long love you had for your beloved Alaskan Malamute dog for 17 years?

Jillian Clare: my therapist says i'm making gains. meet him now.

Freud: see people latch onto pets because they can't handle scary uncertain complicated human relationships. Jillian is making progress, her relationships are not short and fickle...

universe: wait that's a stupid way for me to operate, i should help someone in need, not reflect their misery...

Hayao Miyazaki: hiya.

One Life to Live: a soap opera about Buddhists...

Patrick Swayze: are you laughing at my naked body?

director: is this because of your nose?

Jennifer Grey: no i'm giggling because nobody dances like this anymore. do i need to send this dance back to the Ministry of Silly Walks? 

Michael Jackson: this dance is silly. that's a silly dance.

Jennifer Grey: come on, man, it's the '80s, we breakdance.

Michael Jackson: strangely, i've never breakdanced. i have brokedanced tho...

a Xoloitzcuintli Colima-dog ceramic ocarina from Mexico comes out of the coin slot of the tabletop Donkey Kong arcade cabinet no one ever plays.

Xoxo: hola, calling me a cunt means something different in Mexico. also i'm hairless which is not very manly in Mexico.

me: where did you come from? Jen, it's genuine magic!!!

Jen R: i thought i was your magic. let me guess: from a Legends of the Hidden Temple temple.

Xoxo: close but no Mexican cigar. i come from a famous film.

Jen: can i blow you? like a Zelda pipe?

Xoxo: as tempting an offer as that is, vieja, my holes are just for show.

Jen: did he just call me an old lady? or ugly?

me: your name is Jojo?

Xoxo: it's pronounced Zozo...

MY MATTRESS: THE ONLY TIME I WAS AN ADULT

 

Georgia Kernell: so who were the other women?

me: what?

Georgia: when you think how Junior Year at Berkeley was your best year as an alive person, who were the freedoms you enjoyed?

me: oh you mean THAT woman. yeah, she was a Persian princess, had that Garine Babian look, beautiful in that exotic way only the Middle East affords. she let me tag along as she returned her graduation gown. looking back, she was rubbing it in my face that i was a doomed student. that shade of deep blue was so beautiful tho, i wish i would have worn that gown at least once.

Garine Babian: the shade was beautiful.

me: and then of course there was THAT woman. the one who looked like Ally Sheedy. 

Ally Sheedy: if Molly Ringwald turned goth.

me: when i told her Tori Amos makes love to the piano i was talking about sex but she thought i meant Tori Amos was a good piano-player.

Tori Amos: like i actually really make love to my piano. i fuck the piano, the physical object of the piano, in real time. i don't just splay out spreadeagle on the piano's lid like Michelle Pfeiffer in The Fabulous Baker Boys, i'm thrusting, i'm thrusting against the set of keys.

Georgia: see? note how i'm not jealous listening to you reminiscing on your other women, THAT is what it means to be a free adult...

Palm Springs: shoulda been called Palm Fronds.

me: i can get by with holes in my socks.

Jen R: as long as the hole isn't the big toe. a hole in the heel is fine.

Rage Against the Machine "Renegades of Funk": the official Oprah 2028 campaign song.

Katy Perry: does Canada have a Secret Service?

Justin Trudeau: yes, we use Wheels from Degrassi.

Beastie Boys: we're brothers.

Tony Hawk: AND i'm neighbors with Trent Reznor.

Leslie Sbrocco: THE STRIKE WAS SUCCESSFUL!!! we did it!!!

Monica Pro wearing cute black Smiths glasses without the lenses, just the black frames: yeah that just means i have to go back to work at a grocery store.

Leslie: come here, give me a hug, fall into my arms. i was on strike with you guys, too. i suffered along with you. i REFUSED to eat a sugar donut from Lucky, Safeway sugar donuts only. i was on a DONUT STRIKE!!!

Head of the Class "Mission to Moscow": not so much a TV-movie as as series of 99 short clips.

Robin Williams: you're on borrowed time.

me: can we switch? i was never one to be patient enough to be a teacher.

me: Match Game '74 is over before my morning alarm-clock sounds.

Jen R: my alarm clock is the Match Game '74 porno thinking music.

Olmec: on the island Match Game '74 comes on at 4PM. the show is my 5-Hour Energy. my joints are fucked, i can't get out to exercise...

Monica Pro: garbagemen need donut breaks, too.

Super Mario: yes, ma'am. i park my BIG-ASS green recycle truck in the middle of the Safeway parking lot and get a sugar donut. nobody else in the cab. we're like the trash cops.

Jillian Clare: i'm dating someone who is you as a black man.

me: you have no idea how painfully ironic that is for me...

NoizeBoy: so i guess i was gay.

Jillian Clare: yeah man, i mean these are DOOL tits to drool over!!! and to root for.

Choco Taco: long enough?...

It's a Living: the Salad UFO is lifting off.

Patti Deutsch: i was the Alien Queen...

E.T.: the Deutsch Voice. Patti Deutsch's voice emits a LOW frequency only my species of plant people can hear.

Marian Mercer: i play Ms. Krause in the Lifetime Movie.

Kansas: carry on my wayward son

don't you come back home

Molly Qerim: why do you walk that way?

Stephen A. Smith: i STRUT like George Jefferson. i was conceived during the first episode of The Jeffersons. that's gonna be the Presidential Strut one day.

George Jefferson: i went up the hill before that crazy British white chick Kate Bush and before Michael Jackson in The Fisher King.

Michael Jackson: i'm colorless.

Jen R: so i'm at the Hallmark Channel Experience in Calgary workshopping some ideas for movies. i got one: a divorced father who hires a plumber named Mario to be the babysitter. the movie can NOT star Sydney Sweeney.........she's too big for Hallmark Channel...

Mary Blair: i made Disney Disney.

Walt Disney: turns out i'm just another of the bungled and the botched.

Billy Corgan: Smashing Pumpkins "That's the Way My Love Is" is my poppy version of Depeche Mode "Strangelove."

Fletch from Depeche Mode: "Strangelove" is about that Kubrick movie.

Match Game '74 lower tier: it sucked for us. we were always craning our necks to talk to the celebrities on the upper tier, we needed permanent neckbraces after we retired.

In-N-Out Burger: you're gonna need a car to eat me...

Melissa Maker: it's time to take this marriage to the next level.

me: what do you mean?

Melissa: it's time for US to go to Towson Hot Bagels!!! i've never been to Baltimore. remember, if you're having a bad life, pickle chips. Pickle Doritos go with any sandwich.

me: but how do you know?

Melissa: i trust the Red String of Fate. there was a red string stuck to my dryer ball this morning.

MY MATTRESS: COTTON-CANDY GRAPES

 

Georgia Kernell: your bed saved me from those godawful frat beds. this mattress was my mattress sanctuary from that oily mattress at the far-end corner of the last frat on the block!!! i know when i'm not welcome at a place, i can sense it. the wine over there didn't smell right.

me: was it any better than, say, a Palm Springs bungalow? the Marilyn Monroe bungalow? the Marilyn bungalow at Palm Springs?!!!

Georgia: you'd think but the wine in Palm Springs never smells right either.

me: omg i mailed a letter for the first time as an adult. you know? from my apartment i took an envelope, licked the Cat Stevens stamp myself, and put it in the blue mailbox next to the Berkeley suburban 7-Eleven, i felt so alive!!! i felt like a man who pays bills!!!

Majin Buu: i'm Curly from The Three Stooges...

Curly: i love bubblegum, too. i eat it, i don't chew it. during The Depression gum only came in pink...

The Fisher King.

Ethel Merman: think of me as Ethel Mermaid...

Amanda Plummer: what a gyp. i can say that because i'm half-gypsy. it's like when you can't find Cinnamon Coke at BevMo...

Jen R: everyone had that white ceramic casserole dish.

mom: ...bot not the one with the grapes.

Amanda: $40? okay, i'll begrudgingly sell my beret.

Robin Williams: i'm the first man in history to do a mudmask.

Jen R: see? I'M HEXED, TOO!!! next time i'll just be a lesbian in a past life...

Muriel: it's the Chinese restaurant from Muriel's Wedding...

Martin Yan: this was the very FIRST dim sum...

Robin: i drink breakfast coffee.

Robin: i have a hard-on for you the size of Florida.

Amanda: we're going to Disney World!!!

doctor: i hang around catatonic patients all day, you'll excuse me if i snort the occasional snuff.

Q: Home Free, a show about three wacky wise homeless guys who love being free, starring Ben Stiller, Robin Williams, and Robert De Niro, Thursday nights on UPN.

Robin: let Yanni without the mustache take over as conductor.

Jack: i realize i love you. and i hate this earring.

Robin Williams: i was a Ronin roaming the streets.........a Robin Ronin. 

Jack: name one person who survived a suicide attempt then went on to be Bill Gates...

Robin Williams: you were given 30 years of bonus time, enjoy it.

Steve Irwin: i was a helper on Legends of the Hidden Temple...

The Big Amish: baseball distracted me from the nervous jitters of Amish prom sex in the back of a covered wagon.

It's a Living.

Earl Boen: i'm Larry from The Three Stooges in your favorite '80s sitcom...

Louise Lasser: it's strange me being on this show, you know? in the tits-out sky-high waitress uniform. i smoke too many cigarettes to be a waitress. 

Z Sword: i mean it's just a regular Zelda white sword...

death in the '80s: a kindly old man with a cigar...

Sonic the Hedgehog speedrun: get it?

beanbag chair: if Shel Silverstein was a chair.

Janis Joplin: i'm in the audience in every Match Game '74 episode...

Friday: Happy New Week!!!

ngon ngon: not that hot dog...

tetrazzini: eating chicken whilst playing Tetris.

Leigh Ann Caldwell: if Joyce Bulifant was a reporter...

Justin Trudeau: but i already look like a Tolkien elf.

Katy Perry: let's go away for the weekend to Orlando, Florida.

Justin: do we have to fuck?

Katy: no, but maple-bacon room service the next morning is a must. 

mom: Deion Sanders and i shop Costco together in the WIDE-ass aisles for 2 green boxes of Depends.

Liam Neeson: Pamela Anderson, i'm dating you because you said you'd help me get Natasha Richardson back...

Los Angeles Clippers: we're the oldest team in NBA history.........we started in 1809...

Frog & Toad: we're an old married couple, now THAT's friends...

Doctor Who dies: it's about bloody time...

Sparky Anderson: when you switched from lion to tiger as your favorite animal, Age 8.

Olmec: dance to the '90s Legends of the Hidden Temple theme song by shaking yo hips then shaking yo ass like that bassist in the Flock of Seagulls "Space Age Love Song" music video...

President Trump: i can never make up my mind because i was a bad actor...

Michael Weiss: approach each day on Instagram as if it were a new day, a brand new day, meet your followers for the first time...

Charles Nelson Reilly: bra.

Richard Dawson: you know what that is?

cheeseboard: chessboard.

Allyn Ann McLerie: i'm the mother of Laverne & Shirley...

Monica Pro: wanna go to San Diego Comic-Con with me? seeing as we suddenly have a lot of free time now with the strike. an indefinite amount of free time...

Leslie Sbrocco: don't have to ask me twice.

Monica: i'm dressing as Android 18. you should dress as Android 18, too.

Leslie: i see it now!!! 

i take Georgia to Star Wars at the Berkeley theater on the corner near the shoebox apartment. matinee showing, there's no one in the crowd, a scant audience.

me: i might as well show you my world. you showed me yours.

Georgia: this is weird. there's no one here. where are all the college students?!!! the point of going to college is to finally watch Star Wars alone!!! well it is the modern flat watered-down turn-of-the-century Star Wars movies that are here just to be cash-grabs, right? here's how you know i'm comfortable in your presence: i'm eating a plate of spaghetti in front of you in a darkened theater.

me: what's that smell?

Georgia: AH!!! THAT's the smell!!! the burning of wine!!! it's my Cabernet Marinara sauce!!!

me: let's get drunk off sauce. yeah i'm with you, that sauce over Four Cheese spaghetti sauce, that stuff is too much cheese, spaghetti already comes with Parmesan cheese, it's too much cheese.

Georgia: i'd swirl some orange vodka spaghetti sauce into my pasta before i'd use Four Cheese.

me: what's the classic use of eggs sauce?

Georgia: sauce on eggs? salt, no pepper.

me: salt AND pepper in the '80s.

Georgia: Tabasco sauce came in the '90s.

me: don't mind me, continue studying this Star Wars film we're watching, i'm just opening my mail from my desk this morning. 

Georgia: don't make noise opening mail, people are trying to concentrate on this Star Wars.

me: that's not fair, the envelope was caught INBETWEEN the middle of the grocery-store coupon-flyer magazine everyone tosses.