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.

ANDY WARHOL'S PUBLICIST: BBQ BRUSH

 

me: the hospital?

Basquiat: Andy was at that big outdoor open-air neighborhood block party being thrown by Salman Rushdie. 

Jen R: how long does he have?

Basquiat, crying: something about food poisoning.

me: i guess i'll go visit him in the hospital. but after i go to Burger King and get some grilled burgers, i'm starved.

Andy Warhol at the hospital: this thing i'm wearing that opens in the back, can i add it to my permanent wardrobe?

Andy hocks a loogie on the 3rd Floor vinyl floor.

surgeon: you gonna pick that up? i hate party animals. do you know how lucky you were to survive that, you white-haired freak?

Andy: thanks doc. from now on when it comes to summer soirees i'll take a dip in that one swimming pool that leaves me with an unknown sumptuous vibe. i'll stick to hot dogs like i usually do...

Michael Weiss: the worst is when someone's "got you figured out" on Instagram, they don't need to see your pics anymore, they know what you look like, they don't need to read your posts anymore, they know what you're gonna write. occasionally they'll send you by DM a strange meme that relates to your causes...

Karen Carpenter: i was the original drummer for Led Zeppelin. but John Bonham left me at the vanstop in Miami. there i went on that talk show with that Catholic priest who looks like a male model. i had a voice like a whale back then...

hot priest: your voice caused me to live on air defrock in front of my studio audience and everyone out there in TV land. i wanted to marry you, slim chica.

Karen: but i wasn't into Catholics, i needed to be free, baby!!!

chocolate prime: the chocolate you eat for breakfast...

Tim Allen: i want to do a Home Improvement continuation but the kid actors have personality problems now. the boys are either in jail or one quit acting to go to Harvard, can you believe it?!!! Harvard is a dangerous place. nothing involving a porch, okay?

Tom Hanks: wow you really are a caveman. you just want to squeeze those boys for as much money for you as you can, you see how successful Fuller House is...

Tim: come on it'll be a fun summer party for them. what else am i gonna do? nobody believes in Santa Claus anymore.

Tom: you want me to wring your neck with this toolbelt?

Atom Egoyan: i wanted the brother and sister in Next of Kin to REALLY kiss, but Toronto said that old wave was dry...

luter: the end credits of Next of Kin are like a Storybook International local-theatre production.

Elon Musk: i'm now wealthier than most countries. i'm the Earth's first trillionaire. this is not good for the world. i blame you. if my mom had let me play with her Monopoly board game as a kid i'd be an actor now...

Andy Warhol is wrapped in wet sheets in his hospital bed.

Andy Warhol: well i'm glad you finally made an appearance, you honeysuckle half-virgin!!!

me: sorry, Andy, i was walking the streets of Brooklyn at night thinking about things.

Andy: understandable. 

surgeon: do you know how lucky your friend was? the President removed Secret Service protection from this room when he learned it was Andy Warhol.

Jen R: doesn't the man have a hole in his stomach? 

Andy: i look cool now, i look hard, single-bullet theory, the one bullet cross-stitched my whole body, leaving me with stitches all over, my chest is a darning tuffet. 

surgeon: no, what caused the hole in your stomach was you unknowingly ate one bristle off a barbecue brush that cleans the dirty grill grate before cooking the next batch of meat. 

Andy: i gotta stop tripping balls with JFK.

surgeon: you swallowed a hair and almost expired.

Andy: i had to have that rib roast, it makes me feel like a caveman.

surgeon: you almost died from eating barbecue, do you know how fucked up that is? 

ANDY WARHOL'S PUBLICIST: THE CONCERTS WE MISSED

 

Andy Warhol: i'm thinking back to that one summer.

Jen R: 69?

Andy: lewd. okay well maybe it was 1969, that was my fertile period. what's your one concert?

Leslie Sbrocco: Vanilla Ice, his first non-Florida event in Mississippi, those were the days. that exciting mix of dance, putting your hands behind your head, shaking your dick, rapping without a mic, and improv lyrics about my mother.

Mackenzie Phillips: for me it was personal. i was a coke fiend and i really needed help. the Wilson Phillips song "Hold On" to this day has saved countless lives, at least 30,000 would-be suicides. by the dulcet tones of my relatives' voices, rhythms, and harmonies. 

the fat one: mostly the lyrics.

Mackenzie: BUT that song didn't work on me because i was related to the singers. how stupid is that? so i dove headfirst into the street sugar in Indianapolis.

me, crying: my dad used to call me Alien. so i'd like to see Victor Wembanyama play live at Madison Square Garden at least once... 

Beyonce: what's the best concert you ever went to?

Andy: Solange Knowles. period.

Beyonce: *smirking* oh behave.

Mordecai and Rigby: if you're losing hope, if you think the only thing the country cares about anymore is how masculine you are, picture us getting a box of boba at Costco, THIS is the world you want to inhabit...

Jacques Pepin: if i knew swordfish was to be my last-ever dish, i'd've given that swordfish nose to Gene Rayburn to play with instead of that stupid little silly thin microphone.

Gene Rayburn: the nose of a swordfish is called the bill. can i call you Pepper? i was light on my toes, i coulda been an Olympic fencer...

Arsinee Khanjian: i am to Atom Egoyan what Isabella Rossellini was to David Lynch...

Mr. Kotter: if the Knicks win rename them the Kotter Knicks. i'm wearing my urban gritty mean-streets Walt Frazier fedora from Bonnie and Clyde as i play blacktop basketball at Rucker Park.

Boom Boom Washington: you'd look better with a headband, dude, white with red herringbone...

Charles Barkley: as part of the Knicks pregame i went out into the mean streets and sampled some of New York City's finest world-famous street meats.

Ranger Rick: that's raccoon. but a little white rice, a little white sauce, and it tastes like chicken.

Charles Nelson Reilly: in 1973 i was a serious actor doing SeaWorld specials with porpoises and cute summer-job girls in wetsuits. the girls like the wetsuits were slick. i was a man who didn't joke on Match Game...

Trading Places: in the '80s rich people's stuff looked like Fisher-Price toys: the car phones, the jacuzzi tub, those cute little flowers in suction vases sticking to the Rolls Royce's windows...

if you're a dude: you have a beard. that's it.

Match Game: the BLANK is always a cock.

Charles Nelson Reilly: do you know why i wear no socks? i do commercials for Macy's...

Brett Somers: do you know why you have no cock? because you wear no socks.

Charles, crying: and do you know why i visit you in the sanitarium? because i'm lonely.

Brett: because the nurse won't give you dinner in your room.  

Charles: i have to eat with the others, what a crock!!!

Danke Schoen: a German Foot Locker.

Andy Warhol: i don't know, man. i am so tired. i'm trying to do art that matters again, that haters hate again, but it's not happening. my art sucks, i suck, and my life sucks.

Jen R: but you're not gonna kill yourself, right? that is so cliche.

Andy: no, but. can you believe i'm never gonna fuck Michael Jackson? i need to get away...

an hour later Basquiat calls from the street below, he shouts at us as we're all leaning out the high-rise Factory window.

Basquiat: Andy's in the hospital.

ANDY WARHOL'S PUBLICIST: WHEN THE ART TURNS TO PRODUCT

 

me: i'm nervous. i have a job interview. 

Jen R: you? for the first time ever?

me: does this suit make me look professional?

Jen: who you tryna kid, you've never owned a suit!!!

me: i know but i can't go naked.

Jen: well it is Greenwich Village. i'm wearing my pastel pasties with flower-pattern sarong and high-heeled flip-flops.

when i get up to the Factory door, i trip on the street.

Jen: two knocks for Andy Warhol, one knock for death.

Andy Warhol: see? you must be assertive, young man. three knocks for Knicks. come in, young turk.

me: why do you have 88 paintings of Peter Pan hung throughout the studio?

Andy: never you mind all that, you chump. eat my easel. you here for the opening? not my butthole, you naughty boy.

me: i'm here to be your publicist.

Andy: which means you're not gonna do any work.

me: right.

Andy: hired. 

Roger Federer: i go to Business Insider for my tennis news.

John C. Reilly: don't do Titanic, do Boogie Nights, everyone knows the boat sinks!!! trust me, i'm a doctor.

Leonardo DiCaprio: doctor?

John: Dr. Steve Brule. 

Leonardo: i don't know what that is. should i have done What's Eating Gilbert Grape? 

John: your acting in that was messed up. it was wacky, weird, and it made me uncomfortable. your lip was like a slimy caterpillar. no, everyone knows grapes just get turned into wine.

Evil-Lyn: i have a complicated relationship with Skeletor. i think he's funny but i've seen him smile at his own jokes, how is that possible if his face is a skull?

Skeletor: where did we meet?

Evil-Lyn: Jack in the Box. you ordered the California fries.

Pink Floyd lyric: once in a Keith Moon...

Keith Moon: this is why i left the band.

Link: Bro.

Princess Zelda: nice try, i know you like me...

Link: but isn't your name...?

Princess Zelda: Bro Bragason...

Basquiat: my name is NOT a corruption of the word basket case...

Basquiat's mother at that nice shady lawn-lined nuthouse along a NYC street: but it could be like the word basehead...

there's a knock knock at the door.

Andy: Madonna?

Leslie Sbrocco: no it's me, Leslie Sbrocco.

Andy: you got tits like that hoochie-mama. i just came back from that Madonna's little bedtime cuddle puddle.

Leslie: this place is COOL, Andy!!! we should do a Check Please here at the Factory.

Andy: but i don't eat food.

Leslie: do you know what it's like to be touched by a handsy old man for 30 minutes? who gave everyone on set leis. leis we had to wear the whole show. he was supposed to be some legendary surfer from Hawaii who was big in the 1950s, but he turned out to be a white-haired drunk legendary for drinking Hawaii's first pina colada.

Rita Wilson: my second act.........oh i'm sorry, that was quite insensitive of me, i realize most people don't get a first act...

Anthony Head: this whole time you thought i was married to Alyson Hannigan!!!

Alyson Hannigan: right? we made this strange quirky cute couple. 

me: you two as a couple will always be my personal Mandela Effect...

Janis Joplin: i was the 1960s Bjork.

Bjork: when i was dating Tricky i had that hair that looked like a blowfish...

Julia Child: i was alive AFTER Kurt Cobain, think about it...

Kurt Cobain: that just sunk in like your bread pudding.

Julia: my bread pudding is as stodgy as my pussy, young man.

Kurt: your bread pussy is what i savor in the afterlife.

Dr. Robbins: if you have problems, don't come to me, buy a stripper for an hour, it's more fun...

Stephen King: usually guys who look like Graham Platner run for Republican office. once again the fate of the country relies on Maine. maybe he can say like how those aren't really swastikas in Tokyo Revengers?...

Banksy: i don't mind my art being on a T-shirt, i give the money to a good cause: an art school that can produce another JG Quintel. i want to see another Mordecai the bluejay!!!

Big Bird: it's no fun being blue.........as in an actual blue-colored Big Bird...

Melissa Maker: Trump takes the Montreal Cognitive Assessment to prove the United States won't crumble. ironically if it does crumble everyone's moving to Montreal...

Susanna Hoffs: The Bangles "Manic Monday," the lyrics will ALWAYS be true...

the Eiffel Tower: it's the Effitall Tower during summer!!!...

Carey Means: i have no more means, i'm homeless. my wife doesn't like it. when i did Waiting for Godot at the shoebox theater in Harlem, my motivation wasn't finding God, it was going back in time and changing my answer from lump sum to royalties. i chose wrong...

Shake: nah, i get a royalty cheque for $19 a month which i use to see a movie by myself...

Andy Warhol: i don't know, man, my stuff is all starting to look the same.

Banksy on a red couch: you shouldn't have named this house the Factory, your art is on an assembly line.

Andy: that's my home you're talking about, bigshot. my art doesn't mean anything anymore. your stuff means something.

Banksy: my art comes from the heart.

Andy: man that's a sucky line. what do i do?

Banksy: one word: wheatpaste. you'll need a pushbroom to apply it. like try putting your Marilyn Monroe stencils on a brick wall outside in the street, it'll mean more.

Andy: the funny thing is i hate soup. and Marilyn Monroe was a bitch to me.

Banksy: have Marilyn biting down on the can of Campbell's Soup, her perfect teeth the can opener, her alluring smile that drew men to their deaths the model magnet of change. you'd show Marilyn now has black holes in her mouth where her teeth used to be, that would be political.