THE MEANING OF LIFE ON EARTH: IT'S NOT THE SEX, IT'S THE SUGGESTION

Priest-Principal: i'm a little worried about the upcoming prom.

me: nuh you're fine, we're combined, remember?

Priest-Principal: i don't want the thing to be an all-out sexfest. we are still an institute of religious learning.

Jen R: aren't all Catholics freaks?

Priest-Principal: it's catechism but it's crude, crass, cooing. it's lower learning, not HIGHER learning.

Jen: then get the gardener to make all the gardens cross-shaped and fill the yard with marijuana.

Priest-Principal: i want this to go off without a hitch, this prom is to be strictly '80s nostalgia. a theme of like Underwater Wonderland or some such. blue lighting, blue walls, blue streamers, blue everything. 

Jen: blue lava lamps and blue disco ball?

Priest-Principal: mermaids and shit. a nice song like Phil Collins "Sussudio" playing on the overhead speaker/spycam, no DJ. guppies everywhere strewn on the floor are Goldfish crackers.

janitor: thanks a lot, you idiot.

Priest-Principal: a big-ass octopus in the middle made of purple papier-mache. 

H.P. Lovecraft: that's what happened at MY prom...

Priest-Principal: pinhole lights in the bathrooms so God can monitor the students who are still students at night!!!

Jen: okay but why is there baby powder in your desk drawer?

Priest-Principal: no see i won't be the chaperone, i'll be in here during the prom, in my office.

me: did you get all this new furniture with the bakesale funds?

Priest-Principal: you like? club chairs. yeah. pool table next week.

Jen: at least it's not THAT priest pool.

Priest-Principal: i read a distressing announcement i had to broadcast to the school with my bulletin speakerphone mic. 

Jen: PA in Pennsylvania.

Priest-Principal: apparently we have a lot of COOL kids who go here!!! this is not good for prom prospects...

Jack Hughes: where do you go to get inspiration for your sad songs?

Billy Corgan: Disneyland. i was doing that before No Doubt. before Banksy. before Keanu Reeves was a gleam in Laurence Fishburne's weird eyes.

Keanu Reeves: i had fish for lunch...

Iranian hardliner: i dunno, the world is crazy now, a bomb erases religion, maybe the decadent isn't so bad, i've been checking out a few SNL sketches on YouTube...

coffee: meant to wake you. not be an egg. that's what the milk is for.

the year 1980: the beginning of the magic. Debralee Scott was single...

TetraNinja: i'm back, baby. my mental health is an iron screw. in my body. Zelda gets the Blood Moon right. especially predicting when the next Zelda game's coming out...

Japan: we're gonna make you wait forever. you're in love with Japan right now. the Blood Moon predicts the delay... 

Reza Aslan: we'll be discussing how opposition to C.S. Lewis created the Islamic State in Iran...

C.S. Lewis: it's a mystery only cops in a lab can solve...

Dan Souza in the ATK kitchen: the way i'm in-command roasting this broccoli and i'm freshly outta culinary college, you can tell i'm in the process of owning my own house in San Francisco...

Kelly Osbourne: whaddya mean, you so mean, i look COOL. i'm finally a true GOTH, i never wanted to be black metal!!!

D'arcy: i never watched Married... with Children, that raunch was spicy. 

Marcy D'Arcy: me too. that raunch was filthy.

D'arcy: i did audition for Kelly Bundy...

Marcy: hey so when are you guys gonna go back to the Gish sound?...

school nurse: do you mind turning off the fucking TV? thank you. FINALLY!!! my ears can breathe. 

Priest-Principal: push me back down on the changing table.

school nurse: time to take your temp.

Priest-Principal: stick it up my butt, the nuns never wanted to.

Animaniacs nurse: current time and temp, why does TV do that?

school nurse: YOUR blood pressure, Father, not MY blood pressure!!!

butter: it's like ice cream...

Phil Collins: Sussudio.

Ciara: the Sasuke chakra cage that looks like a Vaporwave devil? that's sus, old man.

Sasuke: my barriers are bogus.

Jen R: in the studio?

Lucio Rossi pulls up into the Palma parking lot in a Lucid car. the doors open OUT. i hug him sumptuously like i haven't seen him in, what, 40 years? 

me: hey man!!! my brother!!! wow you look COOL now!!!

Lucio Rossi: i shall not be a dork anymore. i refuse to be the butt of the homily. 

Jen: no more bubble butt, your ass is grass!!!

Lucio: i made my hair disheveled and curly. no more stolen Vidal Sassoon when the mafia invaded France.

Patrick Dempsey: i believe it's called beeswax in the hair.

John Travolta: are they Italian greasers or American greasers?...

Lucio: my Grinch socks have holes in them. at least those holes are smaller than the holes in my dirty white T-shirt.

Jen: 1+1?

Lucio: 2.

Jen: still a math nerd.

Lucio: this Vaporwave car of mine, Timothee Chalamet said it was okay, he inspired me to be a different person.

Timothee Chalamet: you're a rad person, Lucio, all i really did was tell you to follow your lucid dreams.

Jen: is that an open bottle of Perrier in your cupholder?

Lucio: in order to properly drink Perrier, you must be on your derriere: i'm putting that on a cardboard standee and making it the prom theme. after we each get our first kiss it's back to my place for Spy Hunter in the treehouse of my stucco Sherman Oaks house that looks like an Italian inn. we'll raid my mom's purse for Domino's money while she sleeps. if you hurt me back then with party promises, i forgive you now. i've trained my whole life for this prom. 

 

THE MEANING OF LIFE ON EARTH: ZEN SLAP

 

Priest-Principal: it just came to me!!!

the Priest-Principal is making an important announcement.

Priest-Principal: henceforth Palma High School i decree shall be coed.

me: great. my entire life would have been different if this announcement had been made, oh, some 20 years ago instead. what's with the sudden enlightenment?

Priest-Principal: the whims of time...

Alice: it's called being LIBERATED. shoulda done this in the '70s...

Priest-Principal: i'm really excited about this, the nice girls will wear the same uniform as the guys, that ugly blue plaid checkerboard thing. Notre Dame High School will close down of course, shut, it will all just be called Palma from now on. a blessed blended salad of integrated religious learning.

black Jesus: "diverse" just means "human."

Jonathan Livingston Seagull: love is fun.

Irish lad on Instagram: Shan and i have been together for 30 years. we're both 28 years old. we've been together all 50 years of Instagram's existence. we have no plans to marry, only to be boyfriend and girlfriend...

gambling: it's fun. if you have a beard.

soccer ref: i'm giving a yellow card to the ENTIRE organization of Sunderland, okay?

Arizona: Hell on Earth.

CVS: we're the only place you can get cash now...

Jake Lloyd: yeah i won't be at that Star Wars convention in Phoenix...

Trent Reznor singing "Kinda I Want To" in a purple club in the '80s: what's a boy to do, time for my 4PM poo, I WANT TO!!!

Elisabeth Hasselbeck: i won't return to The View if Jon Hamm's gonna be on!!!

Jon Hamm: what, i was just gonna talk about my college initiative.........inside my old frat house...

1930s: women didn't say titties in the '30s.

Jean Harlow: yes they did.

Hallmark movie: women are not allowed to wear baggy jeans...

Tokyo Revengers: blond: you're a successful, quirky, and different Japanese man. black hair: you've lost everything...

Mr. Kotter: bring back those blouses and hotpants 1970s Iranian women wore!!! open up the colleges again, let's learn about pop culture!!!

Connor Storrie: oh you want me to be a clown again? i just became the Joker...

Meals on Wheels: M on W, men on women, Monday to Wednesday, no weekends, people don't get hungry on weekends, people go to restaurants on weekends... 

Saturday Night Live: the reason we have such large casts is we need to do a lot of office-party sketches...

Premier League: it's surprising how SMALL the goal is...

Reza Aslan: i'm a gray-haired professor who's still handsome. i'm a freethinking Iranian man who teaches at the university. Riverside where Archie and Jughead live and play pranks. i am SWIMMIN' in women.

Iranian student: getting my first-ever copy of a shrink-wrapped 1970s Macmillan science textbook...

Brooke Trantor: am i the only one who still likes Los Angeles?

David Lynch: you, me, and my empty swimming pool, baby.

Jen R: have we landed on a name for our zine?

me: Read.

Jen: i was thinking State of Emergency like the Bjork song.

Bjork: come on, woman, i'm not political, i like to have FUN.

me: i'll email you the new story i write one a week.

Jen: so you're never gonna stop talking to me?

me: we don't have to talk about work. we can talk about the weather, sleeping, what's for dinner...

 

MARY ANN'S TENNIS TOWER: THAT'S THE WAY THE FUZZY GREEN BALL BOUNCES

 

Mary Ann: come on, we always end the practice with a set. you've never been able to take even a game off me when we play a real match of tennis.

me: if i did you wouldn't be much of a coach now would you.

Mary Ann: if you get one POINT off me i'll show you my hamper.

i shank the serve. i still have never hit a slice serve, cleanly at least, but this one somehow dribbles over the net hitting the very SLICED edge of the in-box spinning dead for the point.

Jen R: well; we're here at your hamper, what's the big whoop?

Mary Ann takes a Prince racquet out of her hamper.

me: is that a Prince racquet?

Mary Ann: no it's a princess vibrator...

i'm in Mary Ann's bed with the light-green sheets. with Mary Ann's Egyptian cat Sphinx looking at us from the inside ledge of the bedroom window above, we're going at each other in a perfect volley, our bodies hitting this way then that way. she rides me like the perfect straight line she always teaches to form with the body in order to hit the perfect slice serve...

Mary Ann with a shaky voice: look up to the sun, both meanings. these are your glory days!!! 

Jen: don't cum early like Connors.

me: i'm trying but it's hard, both meanings.

Meryl Streep: cry on my bosom, Marty. there there, i'm here. i'll always be here. i'll be with you forever...

Martin Short: some days all you can do is wear the Three Amigos sombrero and smile through the pain.

Katherine Short: everyone thought i was Kathryn Short from Goosebumps. nobody got to know ME.

Meals on Wheels: we don't do breakfast...

Meals on Wheels: we sleep in. we're latesleepers...

Miralax: an '80s synth band.

E.T.: i stopped Soviet nuclear war vs. the United States. does Matthew Broderick wear a red hoodie?...

Connor Hellebuyck: it was awkward because i'm actually a raging AOC guy...

Collider: we're now a YMCA...

hot guy with one earring: only in the '90s.

Daniel Day-Lewis: the unbearable wetness of bedding.

Amanda Seyfried, Dwight Howard, and Stan Van Gundy on The View.

Amanda Seyfried: so my prosthetic butthole...

Joy Behar: hey did you guys watch Bob's Burgers last night? it was so good. better than the soccer episode!!!

Dwight Howard: my President's long speech...

Joy: you know Bob Belcher looks a lot like you, Stan.

Stan Van Gundy: Dwight Howard farted during my halftime speeches. that's why the Orlando Magic never won anything. 

Amanda: Dwight Howard needs the prosthetic butthole!!!

badminton: tennis on a cloud. your body is AIRY as you play it.

croquet: the balls are striped skateboards!!!

Ralph Bakshi: The Shire was just Smurf Village. Bilbo Baggins was Paul McCartney as a hobbit...

Nina Garbiras: what could have been...

David Duchovny: the hardest character i ever had to play on TV was Jake from Red Shoe Diaries. i had so much inner turmoil from the movie i wanted to EMOTE but the show never gave me enough time with those short intros!!!

Cook's Country ginger: i laugh when people put olive oil in spaghetti, the sauce won't stick to the spaghetti that way!!! these are the types of droll jokes i laugh at at dinner parties.

blonde: do you put ginger in spaghetti?

ginger: no i'm a redheaded woman...

me: run away with me. so i don't get ruined. go on tour with me. as my coach-wife.

Mary Ann: i might as well break your heart in Encino than when we get to China, it'll be too late then.

Jen: there's no letting down easy in tennis, tennis is hardcore.

Mary Ann: i'm a lesbian.

me: but how?

Mary Ann: i'm not a lesbian but i'm a lesbian. if you play professional tennis and are a woman, you're a lesbian, that's just the way it is.

MARY ANN'S TENNIS TOWER: CAN THE SMELL OF PIZZA BE TOO MUCH?

 

dad is having a serious conversation with Mary Ann out back on the court.

Mary Ann: Mr. Me i really think your son has what it takes to go pro. i've seen Andre Agassi change in the Wimbledon dressing room, he's a weeny.

dad: it's just, i think the kid has a lot going for him, you know?

Mary Ann: yeah that's the thing, he'd have to give up college.

dad: not that he was gonna get into Princeton four-years-free because he was my son, Princeton conveniently dropped doing legacy hires after Ryan O'Neal got too big after Love Story...

me: i have no shame, i want a free ride, book or ball.

Sidney Crosby waking up to a glacial hospital bed: our Miracle on Ice was when Canada upset Antarctica...

Boyz n the Hood: but why was the decision made to let the boy live in the hood?

pops: a boy doesn't need to be a man, a boy needs his mother. 

Reva: you cute, Furious. 

Laurence Fishburne: that's the reason i did Ike Turner to your Tina.

Angela Bassett: cafe au lait with moms in my 100-story Downtown L.A. Red Shoe Diaries bank skyscraper...

Gene Rayburn crying frustrated tears: shoulda called Match Game The Loony Bin.

Jen R: okay we're in your kitchen, what's the big whoop?

Mary Ann: notice anything about the food?

Jen: Meals on Wheels paper beige trays: moussaka, bran cream, Fish Veracruz...

Mary Ann: see? you don't have to eat it all.

me: Fish Veracruz is tasty but looks disgusting. i wanna go to Tijuana for a book...

Jen: it's not moussaka unless the eggplant has lamb. got any eggplant sandwiches?

Mary Ann: this is my, uh, roommate.

Gladyce: see what i did with the chip bags in the cupboard? i put a chip clip on the bag even when it's not opened yet. 

Jen: saves time. always put a blue clip on the Cool Ranch Doritos.

Mary Ann: don't eat ALL of this sand-colored ice cream sandwich that's a huge fish. nip at it, nibble at it like a fish.

Jen: red bean paste? how can red beans taste like raspberry jelly?

Andre Agassi: i stole Pete Sampras's koi fish. i was mad that no one was respecting Las Vegas.

Pete Sampras: and then a year later there were fish as one of the slot symbols.

Major Lazer: see what we're doing here at the Olympics? we can do this at the UN, too!!!

Jack Hughes: i'm Billy Corgan with no teeth.

Billy Corgan: and hair as i played "Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness" on my junkyard piano...

Mike Eruzione: yeah i'm that guy from Monsters, Inc....

Ranger Rick in Alaska: Triscuit is short for electric biscuit. Electric Biscuit was a '70s children's show...

SuperBeets: you would not use the word arterial in natural conversation...

Lizzie McGuire: i had the best dad. he was kind, calm, and goofy because his brother sexually asphyxiated himself.

Hallie Todd: silent smirks between us as husband and wife because we knew.

Keith Carradine: not a Carradine Curse. rather, Carradines caring too much...

David Carradine holding a green hourglass bottle of soy sauce at sunrise: the spirit of kung fu heals all mental wounds. if you look, i actually was the best SNL host, i danced like a shinobi on that stage...

Meals on Wheels: imagine an ETERNAL RECESS of half-pints and half-pints and half-pints of green Clover milk that never ends.

Jen R: but you need a milk card. i got a hole punch in my pocket...

luggage carousel at an airport: it's infinity-shaped, think about it...

Tom Hanks: ...

Kelly Osbourne: i don't look like a dead body, i look like my mother. everyone had a crush on me when i was fat!!!

Mike Tyson: Mayweather-Pacquiao rematch in 2026?!!! what the fuck is the point of that?!!! it should be ILLEGAL to box if you're over the age of 35...

the '90s: life was smaller back then, more intimate.

ankh: discovered by Madonna in the '80s...

Salesforce: what if you were a cute woman with THOUSANDS of freckles on your face? agentic? 

freckles: it would have to be an Argentinian woman...

Felix da Housecat: Tom & Jerry in house form.

Jonathan Livingston Seagull: it was tough flying through that X-ray section...

Evans joins us as we make the perilous cross from Mary Ann's shade place with ferns on the outside to the corner-mall Little Caesars for our mid-practice lunch.

a Mazda almost runs us all over.

Mazda: zoom zoom, you motherfucking kids.

Evans: pizza is worth it tho. the pepperoni reminds me of my hair. 

Jen: but no hair in the pizza, right?

Evans: no, The Noid wears bunny ears as his hairnet. the pizza comes like a leg in a cool sleeve. like how i wear long-sleeved plaid grunge shirts on court.

The Noid in a Little Caesars toga and green visor serves us at the counter. 

The Noid: you've come on a lucky day!!! we have Tavern Pizza!!! this pizza will make you think you're in Medieval times.........when the portions were SMALL.

Evans: i'm sorry my good man but we pass. we came here on a mission.

Jen: yeah we gotta honor our tennis teacher.

The Noid: right, Mary Ann Caliento, who vomited all over this counter after eating one bite of our ham pizza.

Evans and Jen: one ham pizza please.

me: do i have to? i can't turn away Medieval food!!!

the three of us eat the WHOLE ham pizza and vomit all over the Little Caesars countertop in tribute to our beloved Mary Ann.