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.

 

MARY ANN'S TENNIS TOWER: THE GREY DUPLEX

 

Mary Ann Caliento is my tennis teacher. she has ragged large-curly dirty-blonde hair that's always wet even when dry, a STUBBY core, fat face with freckles, zigzag tube socks and pink vinyl short shorts out on court.

Mary Ann Caliento: i'm Madonna with her natural club hair. i live in a grey duplex overlooking the Encino Hills. the apartment complex is sprawling, i have to make nice with all the new tenants who move into the building because there's only ONE COURT out back.

Jen R in a green visor and puce shorts: this is a COOL tennis court!!! it's grey like those muni courts at the park. 

me in my Bonobo T-shirt: i feel naked. is this the court?

Mary Ann: i feel bad, being a tennis instructor and all, i take up all the time on this court, i really don't let anybody else have it. i hit my landlord in the head with a whizzing 100mph serve.

Jen: tennis ball or pebble?

Mary Ann: at a woman's 100, it makes no difference...

me wearing jeans on court: bald legs. i feel nervous. i don't want to fuck this up.

Mary Ann feeling nauseous: you have what it takes to turn pro.

me: i'm just in high school.

Mary Ann: about that.........i'm 30. drills consist of running in the park and jogging around this duplex as i watch you from my Juliet window on the second story. hit that Kix cereal box on the other side of the net with this purple tennis ball and glowing racquet.

me: this is too strange for me!!!

Catherine O'Hara: a text is MAGICAL, you've really made contact with the person, you know?...

UK: The Andrew Formerly Known As Prince.

Prince: is Andrew going to that prison you guys have over there that looks like Willy Wonka's candy castle? do prisons have elevators?...

Zalman King: okay check out the Red Shoe Diaries episode i wrote "As She Wishes," i came up with the premise for Lost!!! i really was more of a genius than Hollywood who shunned me gave me credit for.

Gladyce: eventually, all food tastes the same.

Red Shoe Diaries: desperation is a lived-in human emotion.

John Singleton: the sex scene in Boyz n the Hood is realistic, you will be fucking while overhead and through your windows LAPD helicopters flying over your roof are flashing their highbeam floodlights on your bed.

get your Game Day snacks!!! at Safeway!!!.........we're assuming the Olympics are your Game Day?... 

Burger King: now how is a hamburger supposed to be melty?...

Isabeau Levito: i'm just here for the skating gala, the REAL competition. i'm wearing my honey Belle ballroom gown on the ice. gonna get me a nice boyfriend with a yacht. ice soccer, think about it...   

Pando: a Tolkien tree in real life...

Pokemon: we have a monster wearing a hockey mask on ice skates, right?

Mike Eruzione: The Miracle on Ice, brought to you by Pokemon!!!

bike polo: it's cool because there's no goalie...

Washed Out: i get it, the grey-green muni Manhattan court. but the bike polo championship match should be played in Portland...

Freud: i'm more of a Jung person.

Jung: and i'm more of a hung person...

Eileen Gu: time to hate me more because on the cover of Hong Kong Vogue i look like Audrey Hepburn...

Sarah Schleper: schlepper, i should have been a cross-country skier.

Alysa Liu: Dorothy Hamill bob my ass. i'm a real one. I'm a real person who has a job stocking shelves when i'm not skating. i'm from Oaktown, man, my hair is a tapioca-mocha parfait pudding cup.

Johannesburg: The Olympics in Africa!!! it could work. put the swimming and track in District 9...

Blake Griffin: i'm not down with NBA "experts."

Stephen A. Smith: ...

Blake: but i like you. because you're a good actor. i learn from you how to do my Red Lobster commercials, act like you're having a head seizure...

LeBron James: is it weird to eat chocolate chip cookies with wine?

Caitlin Clark: no weirder than pizza with wine. i've never had cheese...

Michael Weiss: the Lord will provide us with the next meme...

we have a lesson-mate who lines up with us, a ginger boy with biceps in his tennis shoes and a Morrissey emo curl in his hair called Evans. Evans is only interested in making me do weird wrestling moves.

Jen R: it's not PRO wrestling, dude!!!

Evans: hey look do this: roll your fist into a ball, shoot up to the sky then down to the ground, the Tarzan March, like you're working a stairmaster in La Canada. that's the signature entrance of The Monkey Wrench Boys, i watch WWF on Saturday mornings as i swallow pickles for breakfast.

me: Evans, you are frightening me. being near the hot breath of your face is making me break out in hives. 

Jen: his skin is rashy.

me: i wanna go up to your apartment after practice. 

Jen: don't worry, he doesn't sweat when he plays tennis, he won't need a shower. 

Evans: he's not a hard worker.

Mary Ann: okay but not to my bedroom, only to my Pee-wee's Playhouse black-and-white-racing-flag kitchen countertop for milk and cookies. some peanut-butter-and-mustard sandwiches to fatten your legs. there are things in my hamper i don't want boys seeing.

ON A BRAKE: YOU DON'T HAVE TO EAT ALL OF IT

 

Walker makes a pit stop to The Treehouse for some eating advice. Gladyce has always been a surrogate grandmother to him.

Gladyce: why the fuck are you so giant?!!!

Walker: must have been something i ate.

Gladyce: see that's the thing, you don't have to eat it all. when you're trying something new, different, foreign to your palate, take a SAMPLE of it, one bite, that's it, throw the rest in the trash. 

Walker: i've been called white garbage.

Gladyce: you don't have to eat the entire TUB of mashed potatoes with chives and sour cream. just the corner. you don't have to finish the entire bottle of that malky Ensure Very Vanilla nauseous milk. just taste the tip.

Jamie Lee Curtis: story of my life.

Jen R: in our dream we're at the corner booth of Burger King.

Gladyce: corner, promising so far.

Billy Corgan: we aren't connected. either get another dream, another Siamese, another wrist tat, or i'm gonna have to drop you from my friends list.

me: am i wearing the Burger King paper crown?

Jen: no you have hair, remember? when we get served our two burgers each in the wrapper it's not the savory stacked gourmet char joy of a grilled Burger King hamburger but the NASTY fried mcburgers of McDonald's. our mouths agape AGHAST in disgust.

Gladyce: see? eating leads to disappointment.

Leslie Sbrocco: stick with one peanut-butter-and-sour-cream sandwich each night for dinner.

Ronald McDonald: i mean how can a hamburger be juicy?...

Scrubs: you see how easy it is to just bring back a show for another season? that's what we all want!!! now let's do the same with ER, Seinfeld, Star Trek: The Next Generation, and the Robert Stack Unsolved Mysteries...

Spock, Bones, and Kirk camping in Yosemite at the end of Star Trek V: The Final Frontier: we killed God *group laugh*.

Jimmy Fallon shaking the bottle: these pills will cure your cognition and aches. i'm gonna need you to vote for Bill Clinton again...

Rollie Wesen: see it's the same concept.

Gladyce: yeah.

Rollie: this garlic-bread loaf i'm swinging like a lightsaber.

Jen: you do that very well.

me: i don't get it.

Rollie: you're only gonna eat a piece of this loaf once.

Gladyce: then the remaining 7/8 of the loaf will sit on tip of your refrigerator forever...

Dutch Bros: the official coffee of Doesburg...

Amy Poehler on her podcast: cuz we need HELP to live, child.

Charles Nelson Reilly swathed in white Cannon towels: time for me to give Brett Somers her bath.

Brett Somers: my breakfast bath. it's an oatmeal bath that i sometimes eat. have you ever bathed in milk?

Charles Nelson Reilly: it's weird, trust me, honey. those ascots Fred from Scooby-Doo wears are MINE!!! GIVE EM BACK!!! just give them to the nurse, my bedpan's full of soup.

Kurt Cobain on Unplugged: tell me how did you sleep last night...

Jen: very well, thank you. had some wild extensive deep-sleep dreams. that i forgot.

Jen R: do you know how i know i'm your soulmate?

me: how?

Jen: i spell the word remembrance right.

Proust: ...

Miss Piggy: no matter what you're doing in life, you're ALWAYS in pursuit of meeting a handsome man...

the only cool cowboy: the cowboy that points his guitar down like it's a bow-and-arrow...

Red Shoe Diaries: believe in the miracle.

Gladyce: here.

Jackie: thank you for bringing him back. dropping him off like he was in nursery school. i don't know what to do with myself when he's not around. life is boring you see. he's back to regular size, good. truth was we weren't talking when he was a giant.

Gladyce: not communicating?

Jackie: no we weren't seeing eye to eye, he couldn't hear what i was saying...

 

ON A BRAKE: WALKER'S LINE

 

Walker: i love living right next to the highway. it's so convenient. at the first threat of atmospheric river, i'm biking my way down GONE. don't worry, my motorcycle lubes itself on the rainwater. 

Jackie: not even me flicking crunchy edamame off my tits can keep you here with me?

Walker: the giant snowman who lives in the clouds waits for no man. even a giant man like me. sorry babe, fights must be fought or there's no fucking.

Jackie: no fucking after? then a thunderstorm's not romantic anymore...

mixed skeleton: SHE'S SCRAPING LIKE A FATHERFUCKER!!!

Nika Prevc: it's like Vitamin C. Sunny D. i look like Princess Allura's mouse if she were a human girl. the '80s Voltron is the only cartoon they show in Slovenia...

Death: *scythe sigh*

Jung: my dream dictionary is more nuanced than yours.

Freud: ...

Katniss: but i've been accused of cattiness when it was courage...

crumbs: that's the best part!!!

Walker: I NEED BOOTS!!!

Hillary Clinton: Aunt Cork with real power.

Zrek: umbrellas are useless. an umbrella just gives up a hand. unless you're holding the umbrella with JUST your long E.T. finger...

atmospheric river: i arrive right after 7:30AM to RUIN your morning commute...

Fire Horse: don't douse me with the fire hose...

twobob: two-man bobsled.

Sally Jessy Raphael: i had the better glasses. i could find them at Greyhound depots because they were red.

Martina Navratilova: but have you analyzed your dreams where you take yourself out of it?

Walker retreats from the sky battle back to St. Cyril's long blond hair disheveled, still hasn't shorn his stubble, and literally licking his wounds.

Walker: i'm using my long tongue to lick my belly wound. a battle in the clouds goes unseen... 

Father Navin: and why have you found yourself today with me here in this tiny sardine-tin confessional booth? at this church made of stone. why are you kneeling in front of me looking through cheesecloth at my rain-soaked eyes and lips stained from cotton candy. 

Walker: i tried to fight a giant snowman in the sky and lost.

Father Navin: i see.........i knew this day would come, my mother warned me not to believe in things. that's why i purchased a red spongy psychiatrist couch. unfortunately this shit hovel is so small the couch can't fit so no one's getting healed in this space. 

Father Navin: do you know you're tearing the environment to shreds?

Walker: what environment?

Father Navin: you're a giant and hence have a giant motorcycle. the fossil fuels needed to motor that thing alone is a totem smokestack unto itself making the ozone hole bigger than the moon!!! 

Walker: but not the Death Star.

Father Navin: you have SINNED, son. you look like a motorcycle punk, young man. don't be a faggot, say your Hail Marys. how many Hail Marys have you said in your life?

Walker: is that the roller-derby queen?

Father Navin: what are you doing here, man? your lady misses you, she's called me using my private phone number to tell me as much. go to her. you Kurt Cobain wannabe. she wants to give you a sloppy blowjob instead of a kiss.