GINGER BREAD: PRINCESS LEIA IS MY COPILOT

Cotard: it's easy to rebel. grab one end of the rope and i'll grab the other.

a frightened shook Sinphony is uncertain from rote where to place her hands, but she nervously lowers her shaking hand as Codrus looks on at everything in bewildered knowing amusements and smiles heartily.

Codrus: *licking his lips* oh i love a good game. what are you cooking up in that little head of yours, brother? no no, don't tell me, there are no more surprises in my experience, i don't have fun anymore.

the rope dress unfolds its knots and falls limp into one slack snake writhing on the floor dead. as if its red color is the color of its blood holding all of its blood in.

a broken Velvetta lies prone on the dusty grey medieval stretcher death bed, blending her anorexic frame with the frame of the bed.

Velvetta: i don't have many breaths left. but i use them to form a smile on my lips. for i know that this is the day you have been saved. even if i don't get. we princesses have to watch out for each other. my body is so weak but that just means my spirit is that much strong.

Cotard quickly ties the rope around Velvetta's waist---which is easy to do---and holds her up limp by his one hand, which is usually not so easy to do for Cotard never works out or pumps weights in his monastery vineyard back home. Sinphony cuts the other end of the rope tied round the knob of the bed with her fingernails sharpened unusually-long previously used for other evil endeavors.

Codrus: *grinning* and I am the knob just waiting here watching. i love to watch. go ahead, i'll even remove the glass before you can crash into it all dramatic and bloody-sharded. i'll give the villagers onlookers a clear view of your daring escape and rescue.

the three bumble out of the Church on their scraped knees and bite a few stones along the way. they stumble away not being able to really run with their precious cargo and weight.

Cotard: go. go. run away as far as you can as fast as you can. pretend you're flying on brooms. i only have a bit more energy to shield you until my entire core will be tapped and sapped out for a good spell.

Codrus: i am laughing harder and more sincerely than i have since the black hole was on the other side, thank you for that, i needed that. go on, play your hide and seek, i already know where you hide, i see it cos i caused your mind to go there. i'll give you a head-start. like a week? i need to take a nap, i'm too old for all his excitement. o it's just no fun being me.

Eye Luggage: got a hot hot hot take for Red Circle Table this week.

Laertus: i mean, come on! at this time when we must do our utmost to illustrate and highlight and hold onto with bare fingers grasping at the slightest scrap of togetherness and tolerance, Foxhoven is a bonafide white 2Pac fan, and the dude gets fired for it!? it's like the company treated him black! this cannot stand!

Eye: i never liked the whole 2Pac transition, Tupac just looks more natural and tastes less corporate on the tongue.

Dirg: this would never have happened to Jeff Foxworthy. are we even sure Tupac is really dead?

Eye: he has to be, he would never have allowed the world to be what it is today.

Laertus: i for one am waiting for the real Resurrection of the Christ: Killuminati.

Simona Halep prances around the grass tennis court in a grass skirt and gumdrops in her mouth.

Simona: the headline on Wikipedia should have read

Simona Stuns Serena

Laertus: i'll get Takahashi right on that...

Simona: i'm just trying to halep. you know what's the deal with the drop shot? right? i'm trying out my Seinfeld impression cos i won Wimbledon, i can do anything now. i'm gonna join SNL! like, drop shots in tennis never work. 10% success rate. they mostly get flubbed or dribble over to your side of the net or it just leaves a sitter for your opponent to crush. it's like when the goalie leaves the net in college ice hockey...

Laertus: i'm afraid i can't address the matter, my mouth is filled with the cotton of sorrow. i am so depressed over the Federer loss. it's not just another loss, it's a dynasty-altering loss. it's a legacy loss. i'm so down i won't be able to enjoy the British Open this week like i thought i would.

Eye: it's my favorite golf tournament as well. cos it's always so dark and dreary and impossible to play, and damp and rainy and uncomfortable to navigate, and the bunkers are just large pools of brown water. amid brown bunkers the size of an American penny. and the haybarn hay, perfect for a hillbilly chew...you're not supposed to chew on the wheat stalk. and you're at the mercy of winds no doubt spellcast by my fellow sister witches.

Dirg: well you better buck up, buttercup. we rented this tent on the campgrounds of this year's British Open and i ain't wasting the price of a ticket, we're staying the four days! anyone got any pot? pot bunkers? the gales are howling so loudly i'm scared, hold me, Larry.

Eye: the wind blew my toupee away, that really sucks, i can't be a goth girl without my toupee. hey, cheer up, i need my partner back. in life. and maybe Rory will win this one, and highlight Northern Ireland. people and leprechauns will see that Northern Ireland is just Ireland. Rory's dating Jo, and we'll get the Brexit catastrophe stuff resolved again before the REAL dreary days of Halloween.

Eye: speaking of dark, anime roundup?

Laertus: i'll try, but my mouth is full of cobwebs. yep, dark and dark-shaded, i love the new Fujiko sereis The Woman Called Fujuko Mine.

Dirg: a little too gratuitous with the nudity if you ask me. my name is Dirg.

Eye: agreed. Fujiko's the kinda gal you want all to yourself. and a lot more dressed to leave something to the imagination. after all that, turns out she's German...

Dirg: yeah but the Nazis did things TO her.

Laertus: i LOVE how the characters are cell-shaded in this, their entire right side is all black lines, all the buildings and cars and roads are this way, too. it's the Batman: The Animated Series of anime!

Eye: no way would Zenigata fuck Fujiko. Fujiko, a hardened criminal. he'd never step over that line and stoop that low to disobey the law.

the three pause and reflect on Fujiko Mine…

Eye: okay, nevermind.

Laertus: the thing is, THIS series has overshadowed---pun intended---the current Lupin The Third Part 5 series going on now. compared to this, that series seems tame and watered-down. my enjoyment of it anyway. but i don't enjoy much nowadays.

Dirg: put me off owls forever. i mean, like, owls are no longer for me the Potter symbols of wisdom, they are the exact opposite, they're nightmare-fuel ravens. they're the rats and mice now. NOW their neck-cranes are weird.

Phil Mickelson wears a skinny Bart Simpson Eat My Shorts shirt and enters the conversation:

Phil: …

President Bump: no. nope. wrong, YOU can't win! you used to be someone who looked like one of my supporters: you were fat, white, and from Arizona. you trying to mock me? i can lose weight, too, buddy, i just choose not to, you Tiger wannabe!

Eye: you must tell us which diet you used! Jenny Craig?

Phil: Jenny Craig??? my MOM dated Jenny Craig! no i used this diet where i simply didn't eat or drink anything for a week, huge in Hollywood for not getting huge. i didn't even eat toothpaste. i got a little worried there that when i went to sleep in this state i would never wake up but everything worked out, i didn't have to work out and i woke up and am here.

Marianne Williamson is sailing the winds of Ponsonby.

Marianne: Baba, i'm not registering. i'm not reading on tv! even tho i'm a published author, i've written many awesomely New Age spiritual and Toy Story books for spiritual kids! advise me, spiritualist, i don't want to end up like Amanda Eller, poor girl has gone into hiding behind the large palm leaves. inside her own soul.

Baba Vanga: you read all the time! the no-SNL thing really killed your career! i know what i have to do. there's only one more thing i CAN do: i have to submit your name and your Top Five to heavy.com...

Ayanna Pressley: what the fuck are you doing, you dirty old man?

Bump: sorry.

Ayanna: does it say PRESS across my back? kick me? squeeze me? sexually-assault me? no it doesn't, it says PRESSLEY!

Bump: i won't say dog, hound or otherwise.

Rachel Maddow: i'm just an old potbellied lesbian who needs a little excitement in her life...

Megan Rapinoe: me, too. that's why i'm running...on the field to announce i'm running for office!

Rachel: i was gonna say that's why i watch soccer...

at The Breakfast Club:

Charlamagne Tha God: eat my shorts! our sponsors today are the Red Circle Table, which was originally us. typical. we're here with Cory Booker, who booked over here soon as he heard...

Cory Booker with a quizzical look on his face: i love this place. you know Charlamagne, you have the most beautiful eyes. i thought i had the most beautiful eyes---Rosario told me---but then i met you. your eyes are like twinkling turquoise Egyptian jewels.

Charlamagne: she's next week. my eyez are so sparkly i break mirrors. don't call me pretty. it's weird that it's Rosario and not Rosaria, you know? i must say, it's a puzzle, a quiz, why you're not doing better.

Cory: i know, i was supposed to be Cory In The House. i was supposed to be the Black Obama!

Charlamagne: i mean your backstory couldn't be better! it's riveting! it's on the silver screen! it's straight out of a comic book. it IS a comic book. you literally don the cape...

Cory: not the white cape...

Charlamagne: ...and you go out in the community and you PERSONALLY knock on people's doors---in a friendly warm hot non-ice way---to break up domestic disputes, you stop drug deals on the street from happening with your hand, and you rescue cats from trees. no more need for police. it's like you had no staff when you were mayor, you did all these acts yourself.

Cory: i didn't even have a live van.

Charlamagne: look, man, whatever happens, you're MY hero.

Alex Jacob stalks around the betting tables upturning the frayed green felt with his filthy fingernails as he anxiously skulks around for his winnings. he wears honey around his ears and bothers the girl card-dealer.

Alex Jacob: yes i'm Trebek, where are my winnings! i won the World Series of Poker. at least give me a bracelet, i can hawk it on the black market! i NEED this or no more Taco Bell for me! i'm not twitching, i watch birds. not women. let me make a call, the phone in the lobby is always free.

Alex: hello? Ken Lemmings? where's my money? i got some heaping for ya!

Ken Jennings: Alex? oh. what? who the hell are you?

Alex: i'm him. i'm The Man.

Ken: the one that guy who was supposedly versed in Vegas cos he was a local couldn't find? oh come on! you missed the plot! and the whole story! much like God, you're late...

a table down, Hossein Ensan does win the WSOP and the bracelet.

Bump: oh NO! no no no. you don't win, you're not a real American. plus you're a frat guy, i HATE frat guys! what's your sign? what are you playing at?

Hossein: poker.

Bump: don't think you can trick a casino owner! what are you signaling? virtue signaling? are you an Ensign on the new Picard show? infiltrating our armies! did Barack send you? hey gimme that bracelet! my wife is ready for her photoshoot wearing nothing but this bracelet in her shag carpet...on the '70s shag carpet i mean, it's a European mag thing.

Doryce: are you feeling better, dear?

Gladyce: quite, thank you, love.

Doryce: no more of that evil coffee. i bought two boxes this two-weeks: one pure organic and bad-tasting, and the other a nice MILD sunshine blend. here's the thing: do you go for the new box and try to finish that up? or start with the used box from last week and finish those old cups first? what is the most effective method of drinking all the coffee?

Gladyce: use it all up. doesn't matter which cup you drink first, it all eventually gets drunk, especially you.

Doryce: i love our kitties. they have a sixth sense of where the light falls in our house in summer, the angles, the launch velocities, the cheat angles, they follow it instinctively, without math. sometimes the rays take weird jagged turns and hit one stair but not the other. they don't even care that a slug is right there in the middle of the stair, they go where the light is and lie down in front of that shellless snail. to sunbathe.

Gladyce: our cats are true humanists. they have a seventh sense, a sense we don't know about.

Dirg: something happened to me on Instagram this week that was truly scary. i mean, i always railed against this sort of thing, warned we were heading down this path, but like for the first time i EXPERIENCED 1984! so i'm commenting on my own picture post, writing my story, adding some salty language, describing a pornographic scene in vivid detail with heavy words, i hit SEND and the Machine chimes back at me:

are you sure you want to post this?

i mean i literally jumped out of my chair. it was the beginnings of thoughtcrime. the origins of the list of words Carlin warned us about, you know? when you start to question your own self about what words you should and shouldn't write, we're all in trouble.

Llywarch: *sigh* hello, Dirg.

Dirg: hello, goatboy.

Doryce: we could go to Apothecaries Hall. especially once all the owls there have become owlmen. we could order in: Mario's Kitchen---Primo Pizza.

Dirg: nah, too ethnic, too Italian, you know? makes me think of Chris Cuomo and i start to barf.

Doryce: how about some Country Subway?

Cotard: we need a country subway in our village, would help urbanize the population, give us modes of travel to escape this place and explore other cultures, make us less Dark-Ages-y. a railway, the only tricky part is how the train navigates through the trees without a bridge.

Codrus: bad idea, brother. just make the bridge out of the waterfall. urbanize? you mean gentrify.

Doryce: no, what I mean is a Subway sandwich shop in the country...

Eye: poor Stephanie Niznik. she was my one whom i loved more empathically and emphatically than my own mother, you know? she was my tv mother, my mountain mother, i always felt safe in her skinny arms.

Laertus: you're MY emphatic empathic. i am praying to goddess it's not what i think it is. i fear. i never want to be Dirg-dark, but i'd much rather have another Cameron Boyce. there's no mention of her on Takahashi's wiki having had any sort of relationship or children, i just hope she was happy. let's not have another Assumpta Fitzgerald situation, please!

Dirg: for the love of the Catholic god. come on, she had to, she was at least one of Limp Bizkit's groupies in the '90s, had to be. ah, Everwood. where did all the good CW shows go? and the cowboys. i believe this is the first teen show ever with an actual series finale. this is what we need to get back to, fuck the cities, drive back to the rugged countryside, that's where the true values are.

Eye: you're not real until you're freezing your ass off. like the ice in my heart.

Laertus: i had forgotten how triumphant and majestic that score is in the intro music. leaves a lump in my throat, which just adds to all the things in my mouth right now.

Dirg: very heraldic battlefield march, 1776, with the valorous whistles and Olympic panpipes and little drums you hold like purses. you know how the actors peel away from their own oil paintings of themselves in that intro? nobody knew what to call it at the time, but this is the very first instance of deepfake.

Goody Paul: there was so much excitement and hubbub this week everyone forgot about the hurricane. it's the first time we at the Weather Channel just said fuck it to naming a hurricane, so we just didn't name it, not worth it to us.

Maria LaRosa: this is why i left The Weather Channel.

Goody: you know i'm sick of all these internet weathermen who forecast from their blogs. they're worse than the stormchasers. I am the meteorologist, okay?, I got the degree, a wet degree cos i went into the field. i am the real deal, look at my shiny black skin! i am the genuine article, i fucked Titan Maria LaRosa, it wasn't a metaphor for the rising Right, it just felt right. no more bloody social-medialogists!!!

Eye: When Harry Met Sally, go.

Dirg: so this is part of a trifecta, right? triptych? this, Sleepless In Seattle, You Got Mail, and Forrest Gump. and Mrs. Doubtfire and Jumpin' Jack Flash i mean Sister Act.

Eye: Nora Ephron is my hero.

Laertus: so right from the start i think the keenest writing goes to the college scene. right? it's not the Love Story college scene, it's this idea that Meg Ryan's college roommate is her very best bestie friend, this person whom she's tighter with than her mother. DURING college. but after a decade or so at an airport, Meg realizes she doesn't even remember this person's NAME!!! that was very well done, that is so true to life, people you think you'll be with forever...one move and...well...

Dirg: and why are you looking at me? why didn't you look at her?

Laertus: look, i'll just say this now, everyone's thinking it: Carrie Fisher and Bruno Kirby were the more interesting dynamic couple, we wanted the movie to be about THAT couple.

Dirg: save it for the sequel.

Laertus: and hey, not EVERYTHING can be translated to the Broadway stage, you know? jus' sayin'.

Dirg: i'm discovering that Bruno Kirby was, like, HUGE in the '80s. see what i did there? as a cuddly teddy bear before he went off a cliff doing all that gangster shit and ending up the ethnic server at Mario's Pizza.

Eye: agree, Laertus. on everything you said. did Carrie really start Sex and the City?

Laertus: of course. Carrie Fisher was a beautiful soul inside and out. she's just gotta realize he's not leaving his wife for her. you know, it's actually pretty hard to break up a marriage. i mean once there's kids, how bout you scroll your Instagram elsewhere.

Dirg: mission impossible, i've tried.

Eye: she was the ultimate wingman. who could ever be a better matchmaker for you than your best friend? she knows all your foibles and secrets. folks, online dating is not the answer, get back to getting a best friend! and she was so nice and gentle, the way she talked, she was so measured and kind. like her best line in the film:

she's pretty, thin, big tits. in short, she's a nightmare.

that line was delivered in the sweetest, softest, innocentest, most non-vitriolic way possible.

Laertus: yeah. which is in contrast when we start looking at the scripts she penned herself. even the ones she script-doctored for, you could tell her signature. Postcards From The Edge is a biting caustic account. sure it's deeply personal, but Carrie's words are absolutely insightful and no-holds-barred and leap from the page. she is speaking from raw experience and the script doesn't just read that way, it sings that way! an extremely talented writer. she uses the heavy words, you know?

Dirg: Debbie Reynolds will do that to a person.

Dirg: you know i don't get why Billy Crystal was cast. i mean isn't Rob Reiner a big loudmouth heavy guy? they should have cast Gandolfini in the part. Billy Crystal, that sounds like a male porn star. explains his massive...porn collection. it's like he drinks Crystal Pepsi all the time or something.

Laertus: BILLY wrote the famous "i'll have what she's having" line.

Dirg: Corgan? can you imagine if a woman orgasmed like that in a 2019 deli? i mean just take a step back and think about the reaction online that would generate.

Eye: maybe people would start livestreaming again.

Dirg: would put the Woman's Movement back a decade. well more decade than before now.

Laertus: Billy made the script funnier, made the character funnier. that weird Greek Balki accent thing, that is all Billy you can tell. i imagine what the character was before the change to funny, like he was this dour Ingmar Bergmanian spectre floating across Central Park, hitting his own head with his baseball bat.

Dirg: halcyon days, when real men could still sing Oklahoma and sleep with a bunch of random women and leave the next day kicking down her apartment door skipping breakfast removing the sock from the knob without much worry. just toss them out like tissue paper when they were through.

Laertus: i mean this was way back when Oklahoma was their Hamilton. all '80s movies referenced past movie history. the Laurel & Hardy bobbleheads in the window on New Year's.

Laertus: the end scene. you know they wanted to make Meg and Billy REALLY old like the other couples, but the audiences probably wouldn't have recognized them then! *laughs* oh Billy, your poor Knicks, you actually thought you were close back then...

Dirg: had that Makeup Oscar right in their hands, but no...

Eye: so, can women and men just be friends? ANSWER: you Dirg, NEVER. you Laertus, LET'S TRY IT to see how long the theory lasts until it breaks for us.

Laertus: i'm sure it's an elastic theory...…...are you talking about a condom?

Dirg: are the Somalians still hungry? see, if you could still make jokes like that now we wouldn't have Bump. the Somalians can have my leftover Burger King Taco, that was disgusting. Mallomars? graham cracker in a cracker? disgusting! the Somalians can have my mallomars as well.

Cotard: we're safe, girls. thank goddess. i'm on my last knee. i got you out of your robes...

Sinphony: ...we were both naked...

Cotard: out of those evil red robes and put you in these two blue robes. much fluffier, right? full-bodied, thick threads, i used Snuggle the laundry teddy-bear mascot in my washing and drying today. your robes were blinking red. as you can see, the red rope is turning brown. i'm trying to turn a negative into a positive...

Sinphony: hey, it's half the size!

Cotard: tell me about it. look more closely, smell it, taste it. it's one half of a pretzel now.

Sinphony: my nose is an instant salt detector.

Velvetta gets up from off her knees on the other side.

Velvetta: sorry, girl, i had to take a chunk and eat it. sorry if i plunked you. i'm regaining my strength from it. i told you. this was all your doing, you cooked it up in that nightmare Church and fed it to me when Codrus wasn't looking. it's your recipe. you will save the town. i was seconds away from being used up and thrown into that witch's boil in that horrid smudgy kettle in the fireplace. that's no way for witches to be represented! i can still smell the acidity of those rancid popping crackling bubbles!

Sinphony: i wasn't even trying, i was just fooling around.

Cotard: imagine what you can accomplish once you're cleared. and your mind is clear. you two girls are our saviors. you two are Princess Leia. it's up to you, only you, i can't help. now assume the stance. not the cat stance. you Sinphony over there holding one end of the dough, you Velvetta on the other holding the other. like you're about to double-dutch jumprope. you'll figure it out i know, it's hard, this is the first pretzel. the very first pretzel. now if you'll excuse me, i have to lie down...