PAT'S PREP: LARGE'S ARK

"I hate blondes!" exclaims Julie at Don's Plum for a post-dance drink. the two are wearing their nonformal street clothes, she wears Mr. T, he wears Phylicia Rashad.

Julie: but you knew that already. i hate them! fucking hate them! the lot of em!

Pat: i did?

Julie: my song, hello? the one i gave you a mixtape cassette of under the bleachers. it's really gonna go global once i perform it at prom.

Pat: i don't want to think about prom, leave that pressure for another day. and for others.

Michael Weiss: you know if it wasn't for Michael Jordan Phylicia Rashad would not be married today. sorry for being the third wheel, but this bar is just too cool! it's swanky. gots that orange shag carpet on the walls. folding doors that look like button booths with the circular cut-in-half Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack ship's-portal ahoy window.

Pat: yeah you're right, this is the first time i've ever been to the bar section of Don's. and i couldn't ask for a prettier drinking buddy.

Julie: yeah i'll be your partner and Mike will be your sponsor when it's over.

Michael: shall i alert the barkeep we're underage? i'm undoing my tux tie my throat is on fire! barkeep, one cinnamon fireball......huh, counterboy's out cold...

Pat raises two glasses up to his chin.

Pat: what shall we toast to? wait, is this gin or water?

Julie: same thing. L.A. River, remember? but you can sure this sprig in it is the genuine article and not Hollywood-fake. plucked by my trespassing hand from a real palm tree lining Hollwood Boulevard...

Mike: one day Van Nuys Boulevard will have more gritty nostalgic charm than Hollywood Boulevard...

Pat: mmmm, minty. wait, these glasses. they're emptied Smuckers jelly jars!

Julie: that's so L.A., we killin' it.

Mike: it's rad and quaint but think about the jelly. won't somebody think of the jelly. you know? Phish needs a career, too.

Julie: i got it...…...to adventure. adventure lasts longer than love.

Gladyce and Doryce kiss in front of an essential worker.

Doryce: *blushes* so.

Gladyce: *blushes* so.

Doryce: i missed you.

Gladyce: me, too, dear. but that's what the Good Book says. to separate for a time so that we come back stronger. we can't get bored of each other, that would be the worst. don't worry about long vacations, we got all the time in the world.

Doryce: the Good Book being our grimoire. doubles as a cooking book.

Gladyce: how was your little solo mini-adventure?

Doryce: well it was weird. i went to the Beef House thinking this would be some salacious frat i could stick my tongue into and frisson my punana. but it was just a bunch of old ugly dudes who could barely speak. and a boy. only Tim is somewhat hot, Tim is the hunk of the group. plus he's a musician.

Gladyce: be nice, dear, not everyone has our way with spell words. you know this is the first time for me actually seeing Meadow Soprano act in something. HBO was too expensive back in the day...

Doryce: and so i left with a banana in my mouth. a banana i bought from The Store. how were Three Busy Debras?

Gladyce: *claps her hand* oh lovely! lovely ladies three! all of them supreme witch material! i did get annoyed at the all-white tho. reminded me of my goody-two-shoes cousin who lives in a Carlsbad bungalow in the desert, Glinda. i choked on her pooka shells one time. she only wears one flipflop, it's weird.

Doryce: you're just sore cos you thought you were going to Glendale...

Dirg: are the malls open yet?

Laertus: depends what you mean by "mall". smoke six feet apart. a strip mall does not house strippers.

Dirg: come on.

Laertus: oh god.

Dirg: you have to admit.

Eye Luggage: here we go.

Dirg: i mean i'm not one to make judgments. i know Biden is embarrassed by this. but it's no doubt it was him. he did it. i saw him do it. he did Sharknado...

Laertus: sigh. but welcome back, Bill Maher! welcome back to the team we missed ya! where'd you go? we thought you had defected to the other side, become one of those curmudgeons who as they get older and older age and age into an old white man finding it harder and harder not to be conservative. it's the nature of old men to conserve.

Dirg: yeah cos nobody likes an old hippie. they can't move. arthritis from dancing in drum circles.

Eye: OMG did you see Chris Cuomo's haircut! i KNEW it!!! i KNEW he was a Smiths fan! open up the circle, another Moz Army man is comin in!!!

Anderson Cooper's baby: what is your message to the country, sir.

President Bump: burp. PLAY BALL!!!

Takahashi: hey guys!!! lookie what i brought for tonight's discussion. the Taco Bell Do-It-Yourself Taco Bar!!!

Eye: oh rad! thank you, i always wanted to eat just a bowl of their beef...

Takahashi: and here for my driving partner, touring buddy, roaming Rome riding partner. not ride or die tho yet.

Laertus: how's he workin out for ya? wanna trade?

Dirg: equal. that's hard for me to say, when i look at your face, Taka.

Takahashi: here. the latest Rags comics magazine. controversial comic just the way you like it.

Dirg: i wish my father had been a cool rage comic. like Rickles.

Takahashi: anybody have any quarantine dreams or lucid nightmares?

Laertus kisses his laptop.

Laertus: open up baby, there you go, suck that power all off. i'm plugging into you. work your magic, magnetic baby, i need to cash in my dreams.

Dirg: working on a screenplay? or just a blog?

Takahashi: i was on my way to Albertine Books to pick up some French books when i saw it on their tiny black-and-white tv. the French LOVE their anime! but in the commercial, i mean take several seats, Chick-fil-A! slow yo roll, Christian. yo rolls ain't that good! it's one thing to want to help the helpers, but why you gotta shade my man McDonalds like that.

we don't just mangle our logo, we actually help people...

damn. how was your tattoo?

Dirg:

Dirg: hello. i'd like one tattoo please.

Ales: of what?

Dirg: i specifically stalked out a Czech artist. cos, you know. make it of a certain green cat-toy...

Ales: why the fuck would you want a permanent remembrance of the shitty time we're all having now!

Takahashi: i spent the rest of the afternoon waiting for this one to come back with our van steering wheel by watching the last two Fujiko films. brilliant stuff. but i mean that one pale dude who literally explodes not actually having intercourse with a naked Fujiko but just THINKING about fucking Fujiko.

Eye: the power of love. what were we talking about again?

Tyzik: the terraces in Louisiana. can a terrace be steel?

Dirg: it can if it's native son Steeler Terry Bradshaw.

Tyzik: trellises. trellisii?

Eye: veranda. veranda! THAT's what we need, Larry, a genuine Southern VERANDA for our Juliet + Romeo balconyplay.

Eye: Garden State and go.

Dirg: they don't make em like this no more. real movies. by which i mean you can't say retarded anymore. now when you call someone a tard it means they have tardive dyskinesia...

Eye: i wanna kiss those mouths. retarded quarterback. and i thought calling the quarterback a quarter pounder with cheese was bad...

Dirg: hey no making fun of my man Terry Bradshaw.

Laertus: Terry Bradshaw replacing Dylan McDermott in Steel Magnolias, that would have worked! i am very much inspired by this film. this film is me. this film is about Zach Braff's days in Hollywood before he made it big on Scrubs...

Eye: we need Zach Braff on the front lines now!!!

Dirg: i hear he's difficult.

Laertus: his twenties were his lost years, as are the lost years for all of us. he was lost, directionless, he had no idea what his life would be, he was adrift with no anchor but a pill bottle. i relate tremendously to that decade of loneliness...

Dirg: ...see? it's better for a man to be lonely, it says so right in the poem this film is named after. you fruits love your poetry, right? written by a marvelous man...

Eye ...before you met me. but i ain't no Natalie Portman Manic Pixie Dream Girl! i'm a real human with a real interior life.

Dirg: Dennis from AV Club is SO mad he didn't come up with that...

Laertus: Natalie Portman has nice teeth.

Takahashi: Pixi Stix for the masses!

Dirg: now Zach Braff is TOO Hollywood, do NOT mess with his car! stick to planes and cranes, hollywood boy.

Dirg: THIS IS THE FIRST-EVER CROWDFUNDED FILM!!! this movie is ours! i OWN this movie, it better be good!!!

Eye: pay attention to this opening scene in the rocking airplane, it will twin with the end later. if he hadn't made the right decision in the end he would have boarded a doomed crashing plane. hey! it's the sweet old man from The Sweet Hereafter! brilliant actor. i still can't get over that one scene from that film, it's uncomfortable for me...…...but not in the way you think...

Dirg: that Ian Holm guy should branch out and do some sci-fi and fantasy, holmes.

Dirg: this is why i don't take any drugs. cos i'm not depressed. zombies get killed first. don't inject me with anything but truth serum. is it true the Vietnamese don't eat bread? that's why they're winning the war on covid...

Eye: his father just should have told Zach,

here, son, take this and become Kurt Cobain...

Dirg: don't answer the phone, Zach, it's the government. let's not have a movie here...

Laertus: nice great Great Gatsby superhumansize fireplace. and Citizen Kane ivory swimming pool to match. oh god that leaves me in shambles, with the uncomfortableness of that accident. haunts me forever. very creative writing choice, the latch comes loose and the poor mother becomes paraplegic-paralyzed by falling back on the dishwasher door. that's the stuff of grimy household horrors. remind me, love, when we roleplay, i am always doing the dishes to save you from that horror.

Dirg: nice Batman motorbike scooter with sidecar. Natalie is wearing the same helmet Terry Bradshaw wore during his career.

Eye: i like the Natalie Portman character tho. i can relate to her, being a compulsive liar myself. where you lie even when you don't have to, i know what that's like, i can't stop myself. i don't know why i do it, i guess i'm terrified of being boring. i had my condition WAY before the President hit and came on the scene.

Laertus: just means you're a very creative person.

Dirg: Natalie would make the perfect lawyer. you do love Laertus, right Eye?

Laertus: Joisey. during The Sopranos time. i never watched The Sopranos, too expensive. hey they passed by Nice Guys High! okay this is writing gold, the Sally Struthers stuff, and peeing in the GameCube. screenplay gold. you coulda been a skater! but you were too short!

Dirg: before we start, i know you're alone with me in my room but we're not making out. typical dumb girl. and yes, OF COURSE this brooding dude SOMEHOW bumps into Natalie Portman at the doctor's office! not some rando girl but NATALIE PORTMAN!!! and yes, Zach just easily brushes her off and is content with never seeing her again after the appointment. just casually let Natalie Portman exit your life...

Eye: hey that's why we go to the movies, for the fantasy. her maintained childhood bedroom mirrors his lack of a childhood bed anymore. you know Zach and Natalie make a cute couple. they look good together, it's not just the Jewish thing. they fit well together.

Laertus: yikes. that pet cemetery. as in an actual pet cemetery not pet sematary. all those poor Hamtaros. being crushed by your own wheel, the wheel of life. there's a metaphor in there somewhere...

Eye: dead cat bounce, TERRIBLE name for that.

Dirg: ah 2004, where the only thing troubling twentysomethings was getting laid and acided in a basement. silent Velcro? omg it's McLovin!!!

Laertus: yeah i mean why the silent velcro tho? the sound the velcro makes is the best part. a piece of metal determined and doomed Zach's entire life.

Eye: i know the feeling. i never played Spin The Bottle. but i have played with a bottle...

Laertus: the cop. i thought he was the guy from It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia. what would be that one thing for you, Dirg. that one thing you would do that would separate you from all other men who ever roamed the Earth?

Dirg: i told the truth. the actual truth. also i can lick my own asshole, i hope to show that to my wife someday.

Laertus: Peter Sarsgaard, perfect casting. sorry for the SARS reminder. Sarsgaard for the gard in Garden State. that is noice! Desert Storm trading cards, ha! where's Anderson Cooper's baby? will Kathy Griffin babysit? speaking of babyface, omg that's Jim Parsons! this man could pass for a 12-year-old boy, how old is this dude?

Dirg: scotchgard. for your nuts. this is the real reason i had to see this, i must watch all the Medieval Times films, this and The Cable Guy.

Laertus: and to brush up on your Klingon. class reunion, are you the guy who killed himself? and Zach answers no, ha!

Dirg: that Ace Hardware store employee comes off as a loser, but he ended up marrying Christina Hendricks's tits. i sold back my GameCube for store credit, i was disgusted at how a machine so cool-looking produced such rotten games!

Dirg: who here has just seen titties? raise your hand. there you go, stop complaining! ha! now THOSE are words to live by!

Laertus: Method Man was nervous about having to say that line in front of Natalie Portman. a true Method actor gentleman rapper.

Eye: okay we must pause here at the peepshow scene and talk about it.

Dirg: oh god. here we go. but you're right.

Laertus: i think all three of us here can agree: what is heaven? what is it to each of us? Heaven is sitting alone in a darkened theatre just you with Sasha Grey---in her own private theatre, just the two of you---watching Life of Brian. it just doesn't get any better than that on this Earth.

Eye: wait, how would that work? would Natalie Portman play Sasha Grey in the movie or Sasha Grey play Natalie Portman in the movie?

Laertus: the trinket the dead mother wears the brother---sorry, i always think Zach's best friend is his brother---unearths at his gravedigger job is one of those '80s small toys with the tiny glass case with the little little silver balls that you moved around in your palm and with wrist-action made the tiny balls fall in the tiny holes. i had one of those for dexterity. too bad i'm scared to drive.

Eye: beautiful love scene. love, not sex. when they're in the decadent caramel empty tub and Zach hugs Natalie---hug her forever, never let her go, life will never get better than the warmth you feel right now. that's it, Zach, cry, and let Natalie capture your tears in a cup and drink them, that's foreplay for me, that's 2 girls 1 cup as it should be!

Dirg: i loved that scene, too. especially the snot story. instead of going to the foodbank and losing my dignity i eat snot for breakfast lunch and dinner. okay i swear to you, when Zach tells the omega man keeper-of-the-flame illuminati who lives in the quarry with his subservient wife in the rain digging for bitcoin, "I hope you find the secrets of the universe here", i KNEW he would answer back, "you, too." i KNEW that line was coming!

Laertus: shoulda found a He-Man figure in the soil. okay so they DO in fact have sex. i was beginning to wonder as it was nearing the end. but it's implied, not graphic. nice choice, Zach, i agree with that choice, make the sex subtler, smoother...

Eye: okay thank GODDESS Zach makes the right choice in the end, i was throwing my Doc Martens at the screen! he ALMOST leaves that poor girl crying at the telephone booth. in an airport no less! Tony Robbins cannot save you now, boy!!! even if he's probably a licensed pilot, too. but he does the Hollywood ending in the end. hey, fantasy, remember? what are we gonna do next? no one knows, it's scary, but that's the excitement of life. remember that line for our next pillow talk, Laertus.

Dirg: your next plow talk. nah, you want her not to be stock character, right? the fuckboy leaves her, she cries at the telephone booth awhile, but then she picks herself up by her non-hooker bootstraps, puts on some Doc Martens, and gets to work being SuperWoman thank you very much.

Laertus: homesick for a home that doesn't exist...

Dirg: good, i don't have to pack my bags.

Eye: best film soundtrack of all time?

Dirg: most indie. too bad Dolores O'Riordan will never know...…...g'night, folks...

Madame Pons: how are you coping, dear.

Taki: bread. eating lots of bread.

Madame Pons: that's not good. you're gonna contract the Quarantine Thirty.

Taki: no my diet is amazing. i eat bread.....i only eat bread...

at Don's Plum Julie, Michael, and Pat all have their feet up on the counter. with their white ridged socks all pulled up to their knees.

Michael: i guess we have free reign here, nobody's here, nobody's coming for us. don't mind me as i remove my shirt slowly and lick my chest hairs and six gold chains.

Pat shoots an ice cube into Julie's mouth.

Julie: good. but that was your 24th try. no more tray. gotta practice more, this skill is invaluable.

Pat: don't shoot any ice cubes into Julie's mouth, we need to protect this precious cargo, this valley treasure.

Michael: okay then she shoots it in my mouth.

Julie: first come up with a name. i tell my girls all the time, this is a tough business, men will take credit for your writing work. truly be a screenplay sister. think of the name of a hypothetical actress, first name and last name, a name that hasn't been seen before. it's harder than it looks or sounds. i'll start: Julie Charles.

Pat: Nikita Henderson.

Mike: Olga Cage.

Julie: alright, you win. ready?

Julie is so good she shoots it right down Mike's throat, his vocal chords become a violin and the ice cube almost chokes Mike to death. Julie in time wraps her palms and hands around Michael's neck and no CPR is required, she kisses him on the lips and he is cured, the ice cube melts instantly.

TMIT: HUMP HUG

my priest taught me about the three kinds of hugs. as he was grabbing my ass one day.

much like the three kinds of love, the first hug is the handshake.

the second hug is the one where you touch the back. and the final hug, the third hug, the hug with the most power, in its final form, is the hump hug. where you're humping one another back and forth standing-up right in front of everyone in the church.

1. do you have a strong imagination? why do you think this?

yes. have to if you want to be a writer. why? because you can't just write something someone else has already written, you gotta be original. you gotta write your own unique experience as a human, something which comes plumb from the bottomless depth of your soul. so painful it punches you right in the plums.

i mean i remember this one time i went to a book signing. i was nervous as all get-out with flopsweat running down the sinkholes in my chin. cos it was Mario. he looked at me lasciviously, undressing me with his mustache. when it was my turn my penhand was shaking tremendously. Mario got up from his fold-in chair and kicked me in the balls. he then took out his wrench and placed it on his crotch, looking at me menacingly as if to say his girth was the length of the wrench and i didn't measure up.

2. are you confident?

no, but does it count if you're a good actor?...…...

3. do you consider yourself to be sensual?
a) you bet i am!
b) eek, no way
c) in the right moments i can be

nah i ain't no Popeye, when i see a mouse i run to the nearest stool. i get all my sensuousness from listening to Boy Harsher.

4. when was the last time you dressed provocatively to entice flirting?

first pic up top. i had always wanted to meet Dermot Morgan, i thought he was so cool. when i got there, he was dead.

5. how often do you think about sex?

trick question. you're not gonna make me do it. i'll NEVER give up my Air Jordans. i'll NEVER betray Mike! i've wanted to be him for so long. ever since my first hamburger.

yes i like adidas, too. i like A.D.I.D.A.S. All Day I Dream About Sex...

6, if someone called you sexy, what would you do? follow them on Instagram

7. are you comfortable with your body?

i've always been painfully skinny and shy and it's been a source of great shame for me through my life. i was so skinny, skinny as a rail, they said i would never be a conductor. but i showed them. i remixed Thomas the Train with Notorious B.I.G. and sent it to my would-be boss. he sent me a beautiful handwritten-with-calligraphy perfumed letter back explaining he danced to it and the reason he wanted to be a hobo ever since he was a kid was he wanted to save the planet by getting rid of all the coal in the world by huffing all the coal dust.

i mean the reason i always wanted to bulk up and i took all those stupid powders was i didn't want to get my button ass handed to me everyday. i didn't want to be thrown against my locker like a ragdoll and have to pee through a pump. back then i wanted to live. i wanted to grow up big and strong with muscles to protect myself from the world and LIVE MY DREAM!!! of becoming a gas-station attendant.

BONUS: are you good at getting what you want?

of course not, why do you think i'm a blogger?...

CLICK HERE FOR TMI TUESDAY

NED FLANDERS HAS AN EXTREMELY LARGE PENIS

notes:

* Phoenix the director: question, does the American standard change over time?...

* Phoenix: heads up cast and crew. hurricane season begins June 1 so we urge you to get your generator. direct from The Weather Channel. the hot Spanish hostess no longer works there, everything is owned by Telemundo now the way it should be. Mexico got that 5G first.

* man on ladder: i need that other infomercial that turns the gutter leaves into Malt O Meal. howdy, neighbor.
neighbor: hey. good to see you finally wearing gloves.
man: what's on your coffee mug there?
neighbor: i'm mad Metalocalypse got canceled. some salty language for a cup that usually nurses sweet coffee.
man: why are you staring at me like that?
neighbor: that ladder is made of chocolate chips...

* man: got that thing that blows the windows from 30 feet?
neighbor: you a peeper?
man: no, cleans the windows that are 3 stories high. nobody can reach that high not even She-Hulk. who's your favorite player?
neighbor: Rooney.
man: what do you like to diddle on?
neighbor: a fiddle.

* when you both get the groceries---that's happened to me so many times in my life!

* dad: did you get the eggs?
mom: why? it's not Easter. did you get my gossip rag?
dad: HELL NO. that company voted wrong.
mom: i know it's National Enquirer but this issue has Queen Meghan Markle on the cover, limited edition.

* daughter: why do i still have to go to school? no kid should have to do schoolwork on the same table she eats breakfast.
mom: the sun is out but it's still not summer, young lady!
daughter: my algebra teacher breathes funny. i tell him to turn off the zoom meeting but he always does five minutes late and the class sees him brushing his teeth...

* mom: well hello racoony!
raccoon: my name's Rigby.
Rigby: so...……?
mom: okay so Regular Show as it was originally supposed to be shown on adult swim as an adult show did NOT get greenlit, but JJ Villard's new show did, it's the closest you'll ever get.

CLICK HERE RIGHT HERE AT THIS LINK

happy weekend, my babies

TOMORROW: what i forgot last week! POPCORN CHICKEN!!! do your worst, Jack In The Box. i'll just pretend as i'm popping these in my mouth that i'm watching that black-and-white Woody Allen/Cuaron teamup film about bears in Texas...…...remember when there were black bears in Texas? and the theatre is packed...

PAT'S PREP: FORMAL FUCK

Julie drags Pat to the golf course. not the muni one mind you, the one relatively kept-up and nice by Van Nuys standards. no, the school one. which is mini and long and a squeezed 18 holes and slender and chain-linked and on the corner of the school no one goes to cos they think it doesn't exist. the corner that is. by the bathrooms and lunch trays.

Pat: i am so tired.

the course looks piping-hot at night, slathered in surreal. the line where the hills start to roll and your own eyeline starts to roll is the same. and it blends into holes. and it's black all over. magical. the dew on the sandtraps dance and twinkle and reflect the whiteness of the sweat and cum sprinkled on the greens.

Pat, bedraggled and beleaguered with a soppy mouth: we have a golf course? we fancy. never noticed before. never HAD to notice it before. before i was forced to play sports...

Julie: yeah most high schools don't have their own golf course. but we froufrou and ritzy and hollywood. and i'm doing my darndest to make this not a high school but a school for the performing arts.

this is scary for Pat. he's never stroked before. not like this. he takes out the club from the bag---actually he only has the one club and no bag---never been to a club---and takes a practice swing at the divot and tee. he looks out to where the ball should be so far...and sees only darkness. there's no way to gauge perception and perspective and precipitation and distance.

Pat: i only know miniature golf. where Par is always 2. but this is Par 2 but the holes are fucking far. i guess our varsity team is good. should we be here like this when it's closed?

Julie: the only time school is ever interesting is when it's supposed to be closed. when it's night. when the adults go home and the adulting can begin in earnest. don't worry, Natalie will mark your progress in her green golf minipad notebook.

Natalie Nourigat eats a pink mini-pencil while in front of the clique's astonished eyes.

Natalie: swing batta batta batta swing!

Pat: shut up, short stack. here i go...i'm swinging! god i hope to say that when i'm adult and it counts.

Pat: what happened? where'd it go?

Natalie: you forgot to place the ball on the tee. you swung air.

Natalie punches Pat in the balls. which means Pat is one of the gang.

Pat: oof. what are you sketching over there, shrimp.

Nat: none you bees. i'm a rebel. i hate my parents. my folks told me they named me after a famous actress who drowned. i found out later through microfiche they named me after a gnat. i DEMANDED for them to tell me what nougat was. to this day, the world's top scientists have no idea what nougat actually is.

Michael Weiss: i'll remember that on Halloween. oh it's so glorious how we all can get dressed up and roam around the neighborhood grey sidewalks at night on Halloween. with dusk as our curfew, with a chain at Denny's, not with a virus tickling your internal alarm clock. eat a flailing falling orange leaf and stick your cock into with a hole cut out of your white candy bag to feel for where the chocolate bar is. feel the chill of the stars on your cheek as you cum out the window of the old abandoned glassed haunted house buried underneath the graveyard...

Pat: it's memorable. take a picture of it all with your mind, it'll last longer. you'll need it later, trust me.

Julie: your mission is not complete, soldier. finish! you have to hit your target or we'll be here all night. all morning! no sleep for the worthy.

Pat hits a rainbow ball which ricochets all across the trees and hits Nat in the hand, her notebook drops to the grass which Michael immediately scoops up.

Nat: oh my nads.

Michael: yeah, bitch! OMG! what the fuck are you drawing, girl!!! these are, like, sly kinky naughty naked sketch figure arts on the side. body frames with no clothes on! aren't you talented enough to draw clothes?

Nat: GIVE IT BACK!!! i want to work for Disney someday, okay? i'm still shaky when i hold a pencil in my hand, like someone i know when they hold a club. witches are teaching me how to settle my lines.

Pat tries again and with a white ball hits an unexpected target that was hiding in the branch of one of the invisible grey tall pine trees. a red tin mailbox springs up and out and delivers its goods by opening its hatchet door. a note falls to the wet grass:

WILL YOU GO TO FORMAL WITH ME?

Pat blushes so hard the red line registers from space.

Pat: OMG! seriously? really? as i lay on this course of course my answer is of course!

Pat hugs Julie hard then lets go before he rumples her dress.

not looking Pat takes a swing behind his back. the ball travels into a hole-in-one. on the 18th green. Pat looks down and sees he has traveled to the 18th green, his barefoot feet were dancing on the spinning globe of the tiny divoted golf ball along its fiery path.

Pat: no wonder my toes feel ticklish. like a stepmom's pinprick on my hangnail. my answer is YES!!! a thousand times yes. and yes for next year, too! can you hear me from all the way over there? i cut myself on a blade of grass!

Julie: *shouting* want me to kiss it and make it better?

at Obec Hospital, a disturbed patient has just crashed through the swinging butcher doors. his pupils are dilated and he feels dilated. he is in the first phases of aphasia and has no idea what the fuck is going on since birth.

Dirg: hey. hey nurse, can i get the alternating wheels on this stretcher for my skateboard after all this is over?

nurse: you're bathing yourself. i can't touch you, remember?

Dirg: that's okay, i don't bathe. but why'd you have to wear the bodysuit? makes you look like we're in a bad sci-fi movie. with an alien babe who isn't green.

nurse: i'll alert the doctor you've been wheeled in.

doctor: son, may i hug you?

Dirg: no. am i required under penalty of federal law to wear a mask here? nobody has any idea which place you do and which place you don't. we're all in the dark here by the government, thanks government. just give it to me straight, doc, ALWAYS straight.

doctor: well i don't know how quite to put this. you have an easygoing pace to you which hides your malice. just what were you thinking, boy? i mean i know times are tough but no young man should EVER go out like that. especially one as you who has never experienced love.

Dirg: what. i drank bleach.

doctor: but you have so much to live for. suicide is like a temporary tattoo that never comes off. you put down on your insurance form that you have two best friends who fuck each other in a Burger King bathroom. you list their contact information as: CONTACT TRACING, THE FEDS ARE SCURRILOUS.

Dirg: yeah yeah yeah blah blah blah, doc, don't be elite, just tell me in simple plain Merican language. i'm cured of the covid, admit it.

the cast of Modern Family is crying.

Modern Family: NO ONE realized we ended!

Modern Family hugs Steven Universe and they both cry.

then Sean Hayes joins in the group hug. then Christopher Meloni kisses Sean Hayes...

Dirg: ...this is legal and allowed cos Meloni was in Fear & Loathing...

at The Treehouse Doryce is treated to a most magical sight!

Doryce: hey babe, come in here. what is this? the toilet paper by the toilet. it's all tied up in a beautiful knotty bow. quite quaint, like the cottage we used to go to and love in. and never leave.

Gladyce: oh how delightful! it's a reminder for you, dear, always honor the helpers. thank one on your way home to the bus because you never use your broom.

Doryce: okay okay i will, dear. but you see...…...i'm tryna take a shit and i can't get the bow loose!!!

Gladyce: *redfaced* my precious Katniss...

Yellow Ranger: ...so...

Dirg: okay okay i saw it. first of all, the best part was Steel in a dress. that made me feel warm inside. when the hell is Jason gonna show up already! it's been eons!

Laertus: oooohhhh! so close! but once again the draconian antediluvian Nickelodeon standards and censors for some reason don't allow a real kiss on the lips on their network. Fox did it but not Nick. not even for bots. tho they do allow butts. those two ALMOST kissed, until the inevitable hot water on her lap...

Eye Luggage: shame. i for one love that fetish on me, i love getting hot water down my jeans. washes my pussy good. Laertus and i role-play as you guys, Nate and the blonde chick uh yellow ranger, i end up in the glasses by the end of the night.

Eye: what were we talking about again?

Tyzik: can a gigolo make a good father?

Dirg: depends how early he comes. with the pizza. you know Elisabeth Shue should be brought up on charges to PETA court, you see how she had to win over the man racing horses on the beach and pushed her horse too far to win. dragging that horse to unnatural speeds. poor bit, poor horse bit, i'll make a call.

Eye: Steel Magnolias and go.

Dirg: okay FIRST OF ALL i better get SOMETHING for having to watch this. i mean really. like i better get a wife out of this.

Dirg: SECOND OF ALL, see? i told you the most important thing a woman has is her hair. a woman NEEDS to do her hair!!! it's a must!! good on Georgia for liberating all the hair salons...

Eye: ack. hair sure, paint it black. but the most important thing for a woman is NOT to go to prom! i hated my prom! i didn't go to my prom. you hear that, Pat?

Dirg: for Southern women it is. you know, real women. good old-fashioned Southern hospitality, real human love, caring, and compassion. hair and minor-league baseball. the smell of peanuts. fans in the stands.

Laertus: i gotta say, i remember the stirrings of this film as a young kid from my father's young stirrings, but at no time do i remember Dylan McDermott being a part of this!!! Dylan!!!? from Waterbury? Dylan McDermott, the The Practice guy? he's an odd choice for this. like, no, casting with the no. shoulda went with Matthew McConaughey or something as the country gentleman.

Dirg: i'll never forgive Dylan for what he did to those poor punk kids at that '80s club as that weird manager with the chest hair. those kids were monsters. party monsters. i'm jelaous of that chest hair. and velcro shirt. i'm sure his toothpaste smells of aftershave.

Eye: oh god! why must we go through this again! shooting birds off a tree ain't funny! NEVER will be!!! i'm covering my eyes now.

Laertus: mama. oh mama, mama i'm Julia Roberts and i look NOTHING like you, Sally Field! who is my daddy? my real daddy?

Laertus: okay, you see here? see Shirley MacLaine here!? she's kicking ass! she's schooling the other legendary broads. she's giving them a lesson in acting and life. those other belle dames don't know what hit em. her image is iconic dragging along the huge pitbull-vibe dog, the dog controls the leash, not the other way around. she wants to rip mustache's eyes out, that's real anger. why does Olympia Dukakis have that dopey grin on the whole film?

Dirg: thinking of painful political losses. you know what they say about people who are always smiling.

Eye: why wasn't Ouiser spelled like the band Weezer? ya herd? Air Jordans were JUST getting off the ground at the time.

Dirg: oh god that was messed up at the barber shop. all the ladies all gathered around in their gossip pink hot rollers and Julia just starts gagging. what the fuck is wrong! no one knows! at first i thought she was spastic.

Eye: the '80s, still the time when you could die from not regulating your blood sugar. all the '80s sitcoms had that one episode that dealt with hypoglycemic shock and the diabeetus. eating a cookie could literally save your life. C is for cookie, that's good enough for me.

Dirg: Truvy, groovy name. why is it that Dolly Parton is always saddled in these things with the dirtbag failed-country-singer husband? here and in 9 To 5.

Laertus: nah, Sam Shepard just needs space. he needs time. he just wants to live. in the country...the bigger country...and write his plays all day.

Eye: you know it's Nawlins Louisiana when you look at a two-storey building and see scaffolding on the balcony that is all many steel fleur-de-lis.

Dirg: WHOA! Daryl Hannah has never done anything for me---even tho Killing Hannah is my favorite band---but girl takes off the Hairspray glasses and TRANSFORMS like on Sally Jessy Raphael! now she's got religion! good girl! i was beginning to think the cherry-coke scene was gonna go the other way...

Laertus: HA! you see that scene? where Shirley MacLaine calls Olympia Dukakis ugly? that ain't acting! that's improv, bitch! MacLaine is hard. MacLaine is motherfucking hard.

Eye: called to the mat.

Dirg: MacLaine was unimpressed with all that bodacious baseball bare butt!!!

Laertus: men ruin women, you hear that, Dirg?

Dirg: who puts eggs in the trunk of a car? is that how The Store does it? you put eggs by your feet where you can watch them. why didn't this film open Easter weekend? it would have made a killing in the churches. millions from the '80s megachurches. i wish Julia Roberts and Lois Griffin had kept the short hair. Shirley MacLaine looks hot with white stuff dribbling out of her mouth.

Eye: moral dilemma here: do you let your daughter give birth for the experience of being a mother even for a short time? it's ironic that Julia is a nurse. it would have been too fried-corny to have her become a nurse only for her to discover her own cure.

Laertus: just call her Rosie the Remdesivir Riveter. i say yes, motherhood is a unique experience, motherhood is the glue which holds the universe together.

Dirg: i say no. think of the children! WON'T SOMEBODY THINK OF THE CHILDREN!!!

Laertus: oh god, that filled my marrow with shiver. when that towhead baby kid screams, that's a BLOODCURDLING SCREAM! when he cries for his mama, i tore out of my pajamas in empathetic solidarity and couldn't help but pain with him.

Dirg: when i first saw the slack telephone coiled wire cord i thought the worst. that something else had happened...

Dirg: that is a high-tech ventilator. i see ventilators like that today in hospitals. you know, i gotta say, this film got to me. i mean i had heard whispers and ghosts that this was a five-hanky maudlin classic, but i wasn't sure what and when. that whole death is scarring and shocking and like i experienced it for the first time. which i did. the finality of it, you know. i took a whole box of tissues in with me, all the tissues came back gooey. never knew i had that much nougat in my nostrils. this was The Fault in Our Stars before The Fault in Our Stars!

Eye: oh sensuous Ann Wedgeworth! with the faltering Southern hiccup of seduction in her voice. teasing tonsils. the way she shapes her hourglass figure with her hands. i knew i recognized her! making the Cookie Cats. was this during her seduction of Jack Tripper?

Dirg: she's from Joisey. why have a cake in the shape of a rat? was that a commentary on the growing Disneyfication of the civilized world?

Laertus: and Janine Turner! how bout that? ho ho howdy. well spit on me and call me an uncle's cob!

Dirg: what was with the whole cardtable scene? where they were ragging on him for all the aces. is that a gay thing?

Dirg: i was rooting for Sally Field. during her Oscar-winning performance of the dramatic scene at the outdoor funeral by the tombstones and trees. i was rooting for her to say this line:

Sally Field: after this i don't believe in God anymore. unless She's a woman.

Laertus: yeah-hea! see that? MacLaine don't respect Annelle till Annelle gives it back to her in sass! till she becomes a bitch like Shirley! and DO call her Shirley! game respec game. Clairee sounds like a type of tangerine. revivalists are scary anyway, the only revival i'm down wit is a tv-show revival.

Dirg: oh well. life goes on. cue Corky. oh wait that's next week...

Eye: aw, and Julia lives on in the upcoming baby being born right now. don't worry, folks, nobody's gonna forget Julia Roberts.

Dirg: let's see how that kid turns out, she's half-bunny. as in Easter Rabbit.

Dirg: folks, Julia Roberts is dead. but she's not a dead fish in her next movie, she just doesn't kiss on the mouth...

Laertus: Gretchen Whitmer?

Dirg: looking forward to when she does the Lifetime movie of Fargo. she's from Minnesota, right? this film is not to be confused with Balls of Steel. g'night, folks.

Taki: so...

Madame Pons: 1+1=

Taki: 3. wait. could be. three. i'm in a different plane than you, it works different here.

Madame Pons: nah. what are you going to do? you have to be a teacher now.

Taki: NO! i did not sign up for this! i'm an investigative reporter not a teacher!!! the only teachers i know have babies with their students.

Madame Pons: you have to transition, it's too tough on the front lines of this war. i don't want you to be a cold casualty. another soldier who takes her own life by her own hand. my girls are counting on you. i teach their soul, you teach their mind...

before, the clique decides to dine at Don's Plum:

Julie: so we can all be fat and happy and fed and satisfied to dance the night away. by the end of the night our tanks will be empty, it takes a lot of energy you know. mental energy.

Pat: yeah but i don't want to crap my pants while i'm dancing.

they see Tobey Maguire sitting alone under pale moodlight at the corner booth.

Julie: what up, Tobey. how's school?

Tobey: you know how hard the teachers grade. on a curve. i should be praised i'm flattening the curve!

Pat: so do the thing. we're all ready. climb the walls. stick to the ceiling.

Tobey can't. until Pat shakes Tobey's hand. then Tobey can hang on the spot where the chandelier used to be.

Tobey: DON'T EAT THE MEAT!!!

but it's too late. Pat has already digested the entire string of 15 joined links of sausage. he starts to convulse and goes into shock with his eyes open.

Tobey: YOU CAN'T EAT HERE IF YOU DON'T HAVE A GALL BLADDER!!!

quickly Julie sprints into action. she punches Pat's face but nothing. she Indian-burns his stomach area until a gall bladder forms and Pat spits out a pencil. she spits into her hand and fixes Pat's bowtie as she flexes her dimples.

Julie: you look so stirring in your tux! come on, let's go we're late!

at Formal, the dance is getting off to a slow start. then Marilyn Monroe walks in! oof. she lights the way, literally, the light emanating from under her pencil dress. everyone in the school has eyes glued to her except Pat, who is looking at a discouraged Julie. he hugs her slyly from the back, unintentionally undoing her bow in the back of her dress.

JUST THEN a huge black dog enters the basketball court and rips to shreds tons of dresses and tuxes and ice cubes. the students all away for their lives, all half-naked, all showing. but most survive. that ends Marilyn's night early.

Michael turns to Nat. and her notebook.

Michael: you better! let me see! what's in your notebook! you better have been drawing more naked humans!

Nat: what? i did what you said. i started drawing Disney animals.

TMIT: I CALL DAVID ATTENBOROUGH DADDY

The Utter Nonsense Edition, has that Monty Python ring.

1. so, what's your typical work uniform if you are working from home? orange bodysuit. with those reflective patches.

2. are you eating more ___ under coronavirus lockdown or self-quarantine?
a) prepared foods
b) fresh produce
c) frozen food (veggies/entrees/pizza...)
d) snack foods (cookies/cakes/ice cream/chips/crackers/candy...)
e) homemade soups, stews, casseroles
f) more of everything

of course everyone is eating Mint Pringles. but i'd like to turn your attention to a lesser-known Pringle...a Pringle that has ridges...some say once a Pringle has ridges it ceases to be a Pringle...

3. what are you planning to do? i don't make plans, it just gets me depressed

4. picked up any new hobbies lately? writing...

5. would you rather be compelled to high-five everyone you meet or be compelled to give wedgies to anyone in a green shirt?

this question hurts me. green is my color, i was named after a green saint---a saint who didn't have experience yet, not versed in the art of fucking, but vowed to be a man someday---now an orange shirt i can understand, orange shirts are ugly, who would ever wear an orange shirt!?…

i was so naïve as a kid, i thought when people offered to give me wedgies that was a geometry lesson.

the high-five was invented by volleyball players in the Valley in the '70s whilst they smoked substances in a van before regionals. they each had the same individual collective experience: they were touching the sun with their hand, and a new method of communication was born……...one that is snuffed out now by an invisible enemy...much like the sun's rays...

i swear, i went to all those college women's volleyball practices because i wanted to high-five...

BONUS: would you rather live in virtual reality where you are all-powerful or live in the real world and be able to go anywhere but not be able to interact with anyone or anything? a god in the machine or a ghost in the real world? CLICK HERE RIGHT HERE AT THIS LINK

CLICK HERE FOR TMI TUESDAY

WEARING NOTHING BUT MY STAN SMITHS

notes:

* yeah so there used to be this cool 3-minute commercial around about 2016 or so which had the adidas Stan Smiths and all the cool celebrities at the time---Black Eyed Peas and Neo and Elmo and that hip hop mogul who wears the Canadian mountie hat---back when he still worked with Muguruza developing fun sexy yet loose and airy tennis clothes. looking back, he should have just let Garbine wear his hat. with all manner of beatladen testimonials and purple and green neon lights in boxed rooms with hanging grabby gardens in Brazil and all the street folk amazed that their precious shoe came from some dusty Australian...it doesn't seem to be anywhere anymore...got deleted...oh well...

* Stan Smith: g'day my name is Stan Smith. i don't know how it happened but i'm a hip-hop icon and civil-rights leader. i've had this same mustache on my lip since i was a wee lad on the barbie. no, my mustache is not simply a big vegemite stain...

* rapper on stage: blood on the dancefloor! *crowd cheers* no for real!...…...oh that's just red crayon scratches on that dude's Stan Smiths.

* Stan Smith: they're Stan Smiths.
adidas: no, they're adidas...adidases...
Stan Smith: they're Stan Smiths, easier to say.

* big fat dude: am i on the list?
girl: we're a cool club, you have to have your name penciled on the heels of your Stan Smiths to get in.
dude: this sucks! the doctor says i can't wear shoes no more. and i was looking all fly with this pencil behind my ear, too.
Dr. Dre: bro i was joshin' you.

* kids in the parking lot: yes, EVERY single commercial has teenage kids pushing each other in an empty shopping cart in an empty parking lot, from Gucci perfume to Gap turtlenecks, that is THE symbol of teenage rebellion and freedom. the ultimate Skins script. but in this case, it's warranted, there is nobody in this parking lot. nobody buys food anymore.
Stan Smith: blimey. this can't be right. this is a tennis court! why isn't the parking lot full! tennis doesn't require fans!!!

* man drops his pizza on the toe of his Stan Smiths.
man: damn.
potential mate: they look fly with that red on the toe, keep em.
man: really?
potential mate: you're in Brooklyn and you're not eating a jumbo slice? the problem is that goofy shirt you have on, i was gonna get medicine from you, candy-striper.
wingman: remdesivir don't work. bra, you got played. you should have said you would donate your old pair of sneakers to the mill to impress her.

* Chuck E Cheese: which way to Sesame Street?

* Chuck: yeah i'm Chuck E Cheese, fuck Chuck D!!! all y'all shooting hoops with my basketballs in my arcade now, you AIN'T gonna make the NBA! you know late at night i stare at the tickets as they come out in that straight line...streaming like streamers or a hot comet...looks like a frozen rope shooting...

* it's okay, they're waterproof, you can take them to a backyard inflatable pool...just the rubber tips...

* look at the indoor overhang of my bedroom, remind you of something?
friend playing video games not looking: Skins.
you're a genius.
friend: you know how rappers do it? they push the buttons on their scratch records like if they're thumbs on a video-game controller...

* what field sport are we playing on the green grass? rugby? but the ball is flat...

* can i take my monthly bath here?...

* young Bob Marley...…...reincarnated Bob Marley...

CLICK HERE RIGHT HERE AT THIS LINK

happy weekend, my babies

TOMORROW: i'm thinking Taco Bell. but not the one downtown. fitted into that row of small boutiques along the cobblestone sidewalk where the short cut-out parking lanes are LITERALLY the center road itself. no, see, there's no drivethru in that one. i remember i went there once and the power went out...just as the girl was about to deliver my Doritos Locos Taco. she was so sweet about it, she threw her hands up in the air---no more chandelier lights, pitch black---and was like, "okay. okay, everybody calm down, we'll get through this together.........i can still hear the hum of the frozen-smoothie machine..."

PAT'S PREP: '80s CHEESE

Julie: are you okay? i was worried sick!

Pat's tongue in the morning has been hung out to dry for hours and is hanging by his ankles. he is stuffed inside that locker so well his body is a pretzel pizza crust. he's a perfectly-shaped human cookie cutter. Julie and the rest of the clique pull him out by his ankles...

Julie: say something! are you alive?

Pat can't mouth words anymore, he is swallowing his own saliva. but he regains word thought and feeling when he sees Julie's butt in that silver dress.

Pat: it was horrible. it was an event which will define my life forever. my sense of self will be strained. i won't have real relationships. i'll never experience love.

Julie: oh you poor thing.

she hugs him and gives his tongue an Indian burn with her elbow. she then gets down on her knees, takes out her camera, and takes a Polaroid picture of Pat's belt area of his beige khaki shorts where his penis sleeps.

Julie: this one's going on the wall!!! just gotta flap it like a bird escaping school. will you join us for camera club later this afternoon?

Pat: sure. i got all the time in the world today. just have to go see the father and the mother to let them know why i'm not in school. hanging out by a lamppost at the 7-Eleven till you get let out at 3.

Julie: it's rad that you can tell your parents anything. it's awesome and cool that they are just around the corner. literally. as teachers at this school.

Pat: i tell them nothing. i'll make sure to give them some excuse like i needed my Gundam project to have the best glue possible. shipped direct from Japan. i'm leaving this one to myself. where it will bury into my soul psyche rot and ruin me from the inside till i decay and die.

Julie: next one, babe, next one, i promise...

Comey: believe me, NO ONE cares about me now, NO ONE is thinking about me now...

Avenatti: how'd you do it, boss!

Mueller: the old boy's got some skin in his bones yet. wings what flap. what will you do with your second chance?

Avenatti: i'm gonna bring back the Air Jordans!

Wolf: sir, what is your message to a dying nation?

President Bump: *smiles* time to make love, baby.

Wolf: and what of your daughter?

Bump: Ivanka? what happened now? is she pregnant by her mother again?

Ivanka: yes. i left. yes i broke the rules. people, i just don't care anymore. i am SO tired.

covid wolf: and what of all the lifetimes? the lifetimes and daguerreotypes, the brown photos which would have seen the light of day opened 50 years after the war from their green lockdowned chest in the attic, but you ate the key. the untold stories of buddies who never made it back, their striped letters shortened, who would have been better lovers than those who lived and made it.

Bump: just write all that down on a thank-you card and send it to me, thanks.

covid tiger: all that preventable old-timer death...

Bump: i took the vape away from them. old people die because they vape. there are only three flavors: bubblegum, gin, and shoeleather. i vaped all of it so they wouldn't have to. iodine, iodine is the gamechanger. hydroxy-iodine. silver, people are starting to 49er silver again. in the West Virginia mountains. you see what's coming out of my mouth? that would be mercury vapors, i got the vapors...

Tiger Woods: all that dying alone...

Federer: come on!

Genie Bouchard: no. no means no.

Federer: you have to do this with me!

Bouchard: NO! it's a stupid idea! combining the women's and men's tours. playing together. it's unnatural!!!

Dirg: ONE film i will wait to die to see is that film being made as we speak of Genie Bouchard's forced date with that random dude on twitter cos he won the bet and she's a girl of her word...

Yellow Ranger: so...

Dirg: oh NO!!! you played me! we were all expecting that episode where you and Nate are caught kissing on work hours! that's the ONLY thing which matters in your whole franchise!!! the rest of it is DIRT BORING!!!

Yellow: yeah sorry, it's next week. our last one before the LONG hiatus. what was supposed to be the Olympic hiatus...

Dirg: frankly the only thing which will salvage your show is an uncensored fuck session between you and the nerd. Nerd Nate. make it happen, Nickelodeon. only if I'M impressed. only MY blog matters.

Laertus: that was cruel. you had a Pan-American Games episode.

Eye Luggage: and i swore that last line was weird, the Red Ranger says karate finals but it sounded like coronavirus...

Doryce: what salad are you having now, dear?

Gladyce: warm salad. but it's weird. guac should never be hot.

Doryce: unless you're at a frat party. are you still cleaning?

Gladyce: yes. i tossed the brushes. i find it's easier to just rub your fingers on the dirty plate and clean it that way, the food comes off faster, just use your hand as a brush.

Dirg and Takahashi in the Onward van parked at the high-school parking-lot at night after their day-trip. Dirg is hogging all the Donut Friend donuts in his mouth:

Takahashi: well that was rewarding. it's always entertaining traveling with you. never a dull moment. but my sense of taste on my tongue has been dulled.

Dirg: we've been to so many drivethrus we might as well take over the Post Office before they bankrupt. Wales Millennium Centre looks like the Roman Colosseum Bronze Age on the back of a matchbook. my birthday is Earth Day.

Takahashi: that's birfday. and Erf Day. Mike Tyson's Punch Out made boxing palatable for me. you know you can't have the word hate anywhere in your Wikipedia username.

Dirg: the antibody test scares me. it looks like those horrible acupuncture Medieval bloodletting cutting out holes in your back tests.

Takahashi: that's the allergy test. got hay fever? smoke a pound of hay for 420.

Dirg: didn't feel 420 this year. too depressed. that we're not in a liberated state. nobody cleans their mask right, you're supposed to steam it afterward like steamed vegetables.

Takahashi: do you pronounce vegetable Veggie Table? when was the last time you ate a vegetable? that wasn't fried.

Dirg: these masks are ridiculous. you're supposed to sew your own? like that's gonna happen. like the governor is telling me to magically procure a mask. and then FIVE WEEKS LATER oh! great. they decided for everybody to get in a line in your van at the WalGreens parking lot and they'll pass out the masks to all the citizens. well THANK YOU. now is the time, i gotta do this for my own wellbeing, for my own sense of self. time is running out.

Takahashi: do not do anything for your own sense of sanity, the worst thing YOU can do is think about yourself and your situation. don't get into trouble.

Dirg opens the van door and takes a deep breath in the chilled cold night air. he takes a pace and dashes through the hedges across the street to the gym where you can also buy weights. he takes another deep breath and smells the musk on the handle of the glass door.

Dirg: *eyes closed* i've been mentally preparing for this moment, mates. Czechs, i'm ready to check you...…...i can't open the door...*his eyes remain closed*...what's happening?...

the gym is closed for covid. with the paper note on the inside of the glass this time.

Laertus: Basehor, Kansas??? come on!!!

Eye: i want Dex Parios in my bed.

Eye: ……...what were we talking about again?

Tyzik: Elisabeth Shue in Cocktail should have invented the eyelets of shoe laces.

Dirg: you could tell Elisabeth Shue HATED Cruise on set. when they do the play-fighting scene between two burgeoning lovers in the lagoon, and she's trying to sweep-kick him into the water, that ain't acting! she was going for blood! she would have punched his lights out if she could. poor Tom. that was a trick kiss to get him off his guard.

Laertus: can a bartender make a good father?

Dirg: depends what he drinks.

Eye: that is one of life's unanswerable questions. i can see it now: that poor kid. he's being bullied by his classmates---not the school bully---about what his father does for a living:

kid: HE'S A BARTENDER, OKAY!!!? MY DAD'S A GODDAMN BARTENDER, YOU HAPPY NOW!!!?

and the kid cries all the way home, running his little feet on highways racing with post-covid pent-up traffic, till he runs upstairs and dives into his Top Gun bed in the shape of a jet.

Eye: Loverboy and go.

Dirg: not the other 1989 film. Australian. they have weird laws over there. Patrick Dempsey looks weird here. like he's supposed to be the hot sexy boytoy but he's too gangly, too nerdy, too geeky with the friend's calculator, with that fro, it just doesn't read. he looks like a toy elf, not a toyboy.

Laertus: this is basically a porn. it's the same structure as a porn, has the pizza like a porn, except there's no nudity. it's amazing with this kind of movie that no sex is shown, it's all implied.

Dirg: again there's that one scene in the Chinese boudoir with the pink silky drapes where it's two body doubles flailing their legs and arms around on top of each other like they're wrestling on the bed while flapping around rose-colored lace sheets. was that how they did all sex in the '80s?

Laertus: the only person who is ever really scantily-clad is Kate Jackson!

Eye: OMG i LOVE Charlie's Angels!!! i'm not ashamed to admit Jaclyn Smith was the first celebrity i cummed to. Kate Jackson said her career was derailed by various forces.

Dirg: i like her. i'm gonna send her a pair of those 5-pound dumbbells everyone in the '80s had with their fuzzy headband and leg warmers. if Judge Reinhold is introducing your film, your film's got problems. Nancy Valen! she doesn't take valium! she later went on to do Baywatch. it was her idea for New Order to do the Baywatch version of "Regret". which they regretted.

Laertus: yeah but Carrie Fisher. see but Carrie Fisher is in this. so nothing matters. she INSTANTLY adds credibility to whatever project you're in. you got Princess Leia, that's it, this thing is destined to be a cult classic.

Laertus: pay attention, Dirg! the woman who does the animation of the opening titles is...a woman! and she worked for Sesame Street doing all their classics! you could learn a lot from her.

Dirg: i'd much rather daily EG Daily. yum yum yum. in her prime! the fact that she voices a cartoon baby makes it kinky. babyplay and such. but she had to get with a salmon. SHE wasn't a dead fish but HE was. she chirps like a chihuahua in this it's great!

Laertus: Barbara Carrera intrigues me. she's a mystery woman from the away-away islands. no one knows her origins, no one knows what her accent actually is, she speaks in seduction, the native language of all boys trying to be men. she had a nice career. many men, but no children.

Dirg: sounds good to me. the drug kingpin island girl with the lei for her floss bikini.

you're just a boy. i don't date boys, i date men.

pffft, what does that ginger know! you were all up salivating internally on him when you thought he had that mustache instead of it glued to his lip! those two were in the perfect place to sit down and watch Mannequin together to learn about love. by the way, Senor Pizza, not racist, a perfectly legitimate business. pizza was invented by the Aztecs.

Eye: but the extra anchovies thing? anchovies are disgusting. Madame Pons is begging me to try them but i can't get past the eyes. i think that's her test. if this movie was REALLY rad they should have been prescient and it should have been extra pineapple!

Eye: '80s gigolos are cute. i admit, the leaving the rose on her bed afterward is pretty adorable. and the dancing like Fred Astaire, see back then that WAS masculine. and the expected and anticipated tribute to the past of Old Hollywood by the '80s decade.

Laertus: and what's with Robert Picardo ALWAYS playing doctors! he always plays a doctor! whether in space or on Earth!

Dirg: he's got his two feet on the ground. Kirstie Alley. Kirstie Alley was riding high in this time, she would never have it as good in her life as her Cheers years ever again. the glass balls scene, like THAT wasn't symbolic.

Laertus:

I have fantasy.

gotta love Kim Miyori.

Dirg: as long as this fantasy involves pizza savers up my butt. i'll do it for my country.

Laertus: and Vic Tayback, you know that is EXACTLY how i pictured Mel's home life being!!!

Dirg: revenge of the jilted husbands. The Three Amigos! hey i did like how they gave the blond buff WWF champion-belt muscle monster a heart, he cried. see?, we're sensitive, too! it's okay, buddy, you still have American Gladiators.

Laertus: ah the good old days, when it was the WWF, and steroids was still untraceable. needed contact tracing back then. boots on the ground, no tech.

Dirg: i feel sorry for my other blond brother Ray Girardin. you know he thought he'd be the next big thing. he'd be Bill from Bill & Ted. sometimes you just gotta ride another wave, brother. oh and Dylan Walsh. THAT's Dylan Walsh!!? he looks WEIRD in this, he doesn't read at all. Dylan Walsh as the mullet bully. tho he is in the right spot---Beverly Hills---to start his plastic surgery practice later.

Laertus: real doctors. in space. a lot of '80s movies were about Beverly Hills. made it easier to film.

Dirg: Patrick even had to endure talking to a...how shall i put it...a business woman. two shots of golden wine! yeah see you never challenge an Italian on a scooter, be prepared for a street race with your car all over the Los Angeles congested highway system. we know this way back from Roman Holiday. and suddenly this becomes the set of Legends of the Hidden Temple. the good one, the Nickelodeon one, the original one! not the godawful movie PLEASE tell me we never have to review that!

Dirg: Pat and Dylan, here we go, the inevitable showdown. between Luke and Darth. for Princess Leia's hand. not chopped hand.

Laertus: Carrie's line:

FUCK FIBER

haha, love it! that was funny. that should be the name of a brand of cereal. right on the front of the box. and that photoshoot reads back to her Postcards From The Edge experience.

Dirg: right on the front of the box of any toys NOT from the original trilogy. it makes you go poo. look, here me out: maybe they should have had the son fuck his own mom. it would have been an important psychological study. NOW the two really have to talk to each other. she questions him on what he gets out of empty loveless sex with random women, he asks her pointedly what's wrong with dad that she had to stray from her marriage. a nice heart-to-heart pillow talk after the act.

Eye: i feel sorry for pianos. they are so beautiful and graceful. they elicit sounds only a goth could admire and secretly love under her tearstained pillow. but do they have to be so big!? they are dangerous weapons when used improperly.

Eye: ha, joke's on you, dad! you thought your son was the worst '80s disease there is---being gay---so you bought him a baseball bat......which he used as a balance stick to do Fred Astaire dances!!!

Laertus: and also, the dad looks like a porn star with that mustache. he would have fit right in to his son's work. at the pizza place.

Dirg: why the girl mad tho. he was doing it for her. so he could please her better. escort? yucky. paid escort? now her college is paid and she didn't have to take the stage. as anything but an actress.

Laertus: i sure hope Pat doesn't have this hard a time getting through college.

Dirg: yeah so this was an extended episode of Three's Company. but why oh why wasn't the ending the way it should have been. the last line writes itself, it was perfect, it was all set up:

Italian Tony comes into the pizzeria and says to Patrick:

I fucked your mom.

g'night, folks.

Madame Pons: *on the phone* babe? Taki? you want to take the walk from The Treehouse to the pizza place AGAIN!? i only wanted to show you what i walk every Tuesday when i don't go grocery shopping at The Store.

Taki: i want to do it tomorrow. at least four times a week. it's good exercise for me during these times!

Madame Pons: i only do this walk once every two weeks! how do you manage to walk so much? why are you walking all the time? where are you? you're never around.

Taki: i have my ways. i like planes. oh i love the primrose path when you skirt through all the rosebuds littering the Obec Outdoor Mall! nobody's around so you can eat the buds. how do all those flowers get watered now?

Madame Pons: automatic sprinklers. essential workers operate them. still gotta have love.

Taki: yeah so you could say i skip to my heart's content! i glide, i float when i walk...

Pat is all better now that he got 8 hours of Julie's arms. he and the rest of the clique are quietly causing a ruckus with all their snaps around town. a girl with a purple bow in her ribboned hair tugs at Pat's vest shirt.

girl: excuse me, mister, want to take a picture?

Pat: you're a member of Camera Club? aren't you a little young to be going to our school?

girl: i'm her sister. not by blood. no, i'm a genius, they say i could attend college already if i wanted. i'm 35 years old. i'm just short.

Pat: sorry. you have the newest expensive Polaroid camera, i can't afford that. instead i take pictures with my mind. i find those images last longer. they remain forever in my frontal lobe. lobe love. i will be able to recall them decades later when i'm feeling low.

and Pat does just that, he looks around all 360 degrees of the corner he's on, he takes in all the sites and sights, cos he knows he'll need them for later:

the skateboard shop Skate Rabbit with the huge bay windows, the Pic Mart with the outer windows all covered in long scrolls of white butcher paper with today's specials in red ink: 5 cents for a cut of fajita, 14 cents for crabs, the Greek place on the other side of the wide road which was Pat's first pronunciation of the word gyro, dripping in street grease, Don's Plum where Pat first learned what a bar was. and what a newspaper was. and that narrow green alleyway with the chainlink fence and dark-green tree which obscured the view of the black dog barking slobbering on his tiny cheek tied to a forgiving chain planted in an aisle cut of out the center of the building, another hall of mirrors which tricked sound as well as wheels.

it's been a watery day for Pat, he sits down exhausted on the curb and dusts up his sockless feet. he gets used to the road. somebody something comes out of the jangling bushes and whacks him on his head with a golf club. but the silver stick feels good. maybe cos it's night. and Julie's face is staring at his with her moonlit eyes and her neon lips. Pat takes the club and does a practice swing, cutting the chilled night air with a hot knife.

Pat: which way's the golf course?

Julie: school.

TMIT: MARGARET CHO IS THE OG MC!!!

1. do you like pain? only the Naruto character

2. would you say you have a high or low tolerance for pain?

i like it rough, so physically, yes. the emotional side of it is more tricky. when she berates me in front of my father in the room with us, belittles me, tells me i will never amount to anything, when i cum off that it's a bit embarrassing, the parrot looks at me funny.

3. true or false: i like to receive pain during sex:

false. i like to receive the phone bill.

4. finish this sentence: i like inflicting pain during sex because...

it makes me think of the phone again, i mean just take a step back and think of the song "Regret" by New Order. just think about New Order: imagine instead of New Order Ian had lived and it had been Joy Division creating all those records through the years and decades the '80s and the '90s till now in the present, 2020.

like imagine "Regret" being performed by Joy Division. how would that sound like? how would that look like? Joy Division as a millennial band. picture Kurt Cobain for that matter, what kind of song would Kurt Cobain make today? in 2020. what would that song sound like?

5. what's your preference?
a) wearing nipple clamps for 8 hours
b) receiving 20 minutes of spanking session using hands and paddle
c) getting your cock & balls smacked...only for those who have testicles...
d) heavy flogging

the paddle cos i'm training for the ping-pong team for the Olympics. in Tokyo 202---ONE. i wouldn't have made the team if they were held this year. now i have an extra year to practice. dusting off my Wii. i like to play in the attic where it's quiet, the Wii collects dust there. i tried to get into Flogging Molly but i just couldn't...

BONUS: what is the best thing that a woman can do to you in bed? wear nine-inch heels

CLICK HERE FOR TMI TUESDAY

BOWIE SIGHTING

notes:

* i don't get it. where are the Bowie sightings? they should be occurring frequently now. where are all the Cobain sightings for that matter!?

* first mistake: should have recycled, not trashed

* Biden supporter: slice of quiche. Trump supporter: square that's been cut. hikkikomori: Triforce, wet Princess Zelda doll. me: slice of pizza.

* that was not the first time a banana brushed against my face...

* Space Man: greetings. i'm the Space Man. don't think from my design that i'm a square, i like to have fun. i have too many fingers when i get bored...
man: oh i get it, little green men, your green pajamas.

* first time you hear the British accent. he had boots on...made of real cheap leather. and a handle on the back of his neck for when he became a tea kettle...

* man: here's your problem: somebody took a bite of your ipad mini...
Space Man: you're a genius!!!
man: no, i'm an Apple Genius.

* man: Global Warming Button, can you please not push that red button...…...except for the penguins that turn into pingpong racquets, we need those for next year...
Space Man: not push the button...genius! how novel. sorry for using that word. i never thought to not push it.
man: yeah, read Thomas Friedman's latest, this coronavirus was just the glitch, the dress rehearsal for the real big show the planet must confront: global warming.

* it was just like any other day: holding my two umbrellas, my bike tires were those electricity balls you see in science museums, chased by a dog...Cerberus i mean.

* Space Man: i can't believe what i'm witnessing!
man: yeah the X-Games got canceled, that was the one which really got to me.
Space Man: no, is that a man or woman? why do men have long hair, it's confusing. can you teach me? i want to run over my sunglasses.
man: take off your boots...
Space Man: you know how to win life? never grow old.
man: if i teach you to wheelie, i live forever.
Space Man: and then i blow it. your penis goes in a circle, right? no i mean blow the tire. with air.
man: this is so much fun, i feel like Elliott from E.T.
Space Man: i'm trying to see how my father felt...my alien father...you can only be one with the universe if you're a bird...
man: i know, i have to be more sympathetic to women's needs. oh no, wait! now i get it. forever young, always be a fan of the film E.T..

* the next thing i knew, i woke up in the mental ward. and my face was a computer screen. for all the pricks in my elbow pit, i felt no liquid cocaine...

* true story: i REALLY DID escape from my mental ward, waited under a grey sky by the maple tree an hour and a half for a small empty public muni bus to come and bus me home.

* Space Man: i have seen senseless wars. why do you paint faces on your tanks? what are you doing, let the horse win, they were here first. i have seen people hungry in the streets.
man: yeah there are millions of McDonalds on every corner but nobody wants to eat there.

* Space Man: that cloud looks exactly like Princess Diana!
man: buddy, i need to tell you something...

* Space Man: all of my chocolate bars are gone.
man: that's why i can see your face clearly.
Space Man: Graham...
man: that's Grey Ham.
Space Man: another man who looks like you lives with us?
man: classic sitcom plot: either evil twin, clone, or country cousin.

* man: we're identical twins. but more importantly, we're friends.
twin man: where's your elbow?
Space Man smiles.
twin man: no that's your foreskin.

* twin man: why don't you ever gain weight?
Space Man: i eat with my eye.

* twin man: hey don't wear that red hat, you are no Doctor Who.
Space Man: are you a pilgrim, housemate?
twin man: yes.
Space Man: you're going to Hell for what you did to the Indians. SUDOKU! can i help you with your puzzle?
twin man: if we don't figure it out the snail becomes angry.
Space Man: the snail is a drawing, it's a picture. oh, i get it, you like anime.

* Space Man: can a sunset be racist?
twin man: that's a very existential question.
Space Man: you can't ignore me, Richurd! you don't have herd immunity! I was the snail all along!!!

* Grey Ham: DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH THAT FIGURINE COST!!! I CAN NEVER SHOW MY FACE AT COMIC-CON AGAIN, YOU DUMB LITTLE BITCH.
Space Man: but why would you want to play with figurines when you could go outside and experience nature?

* Space Man: i'll give this woodchuck to Graham as an apology.
woodchuck bites Space Man.
woodchuck: i'm from the Geico commercial.

* and suddenly this becomes the 4th season of My Hero Academia...

* this is the Superman story except here the parents HATED their son cos he was so annoying...

* Grey Ham: WAIT! i don't want eternal life! eternal life renders life meaningless!!!!!!!!!!

go to the adult swim youtube page and watch all the Space Man segments loaded this week, i wish it were all in one cluster like the movie was...


happy weekend, my babies

TOMORROW: i wanted to go to the teacup-pepperoni pizza place. but it's closed. i wanted to go to Subway but what's the point. so it's Burger King. the drivethru, i can't go to the bathroom there, that's where i have sex. should i get the frozen coke or make it myself at home with coke and a blender and some ice chips?

PAT'S PREP: STEFFI GRAF ON THE BEACH

Pat: i'm nervous.

Julie Brown: you're always nervous.

Pat: it's Homecoming. just the name of it. the concept of it. it's too gargantuan for my skinny body. it's always an underwater theme and i can't swim.

Julie gives Pat an Indian burn on each of his two knees, right on the bone. it hurts so bad Pat has to go to the bathroom twice.

in the dark brown stucco bathroom Pat sees rolls and rolls of brown paper and one flower faucet in the middle of the trough sink where all the boys pee like cows. Pat reaches to turn on a petal but the faucet reads:

FAUCI FAUCET. DO NOT ADJUST EVER AGAIN.

Julie: see? you can't feel your legs anymore, right? just like my strong merman. Aquaman will always be a dud.

Pat: i need to take a seat here on this pizza saver. i'm sitting down and it's comfortable despite the three prongs up my ass.

Julie: the inventor of the pizza saver was a genius woman, you know she also accidentally created the dollhouse...

Michael Weiss in the hallways: do you have a stucco wall as one of your bedroom walls?

Julie: sure. all girls do. boys i don't know. the ones with all the little beads and baubles. girls make sure to cover that ENTIRE wall with polaroid pictures. you can't see the white of the wall after a girl finishes with it. it's their first foray into interior decorating.

Michael: yep. this is our Instagram before Instagram.

clique: Instagram?

Julie: what do you cover yours with?

Michael: well i can't speak for the rest of the clique but my walls are caked with my cum. i'll never need white paint again.

Julie gets up on stage and introduces her very special guest. the anticipation is so vibrant in the arena---which is a basketball court---even the nerds' heads explode into Kool-Aid powder.

Gladyce: that Snow Day Kool Aid. it's red like Cherry but is it the same flavor as cherry?

Doryce: stains our dishwasher ever the same.

the sophomores squeal first but soon the entire student body orgasms.

Julie: here she is, folks! Vitamin C!

Vitamin C is sporting a new look. she's the first girl ever to wear a trucker hat and glow-in-the-dark tire pants. Vitamin C drones on about raves and other things nobody has ever heard of before, transfixing the gazes of the audience with each of her words like the tip of an icing gun.

Vitamin C: eat your vegetables, kids, they contain minerals. so yeah, i'm gonna film the video for my hit song "Graduation".

Dirg: think about that song. back then all students had to worry about was who they were gonna ask to the prom. no seriously. that was it. that was all that concerned them. this was BEFORE 9/11!!!

Vitamin C: we're gonna film it right here at your beloved public high school! *principal elbumps* how cool is that?! my song? don't worry, it WILL be a hit! it will blow up so fast you'll hate it and hate my guts till Fiona Apple comes out. you'll be hearing this song at EVERY graduation: high school, college, dogcatcher school. the only thing which will stop my record weeks at #1 will be the Garbage Pail Kids. it will be played at your wedding, too. for some strange reason. all around the world. even by your Iranian cousin, even tho you're Scottish...

Julie: so Vi is gonna be filming during our dance tonight. but don't mind her, continue on twerking like you don't see her. don't pay attention to her crew, and don't look directly into Vitamin C's eyes: she has creepy orange irises.

Larry David at home: FINALLY! i get a respite. i catch a break! Bernie's out...i can take a nap on this couch chair full of small stucco balls...

Vitamin C: so Intern Fauci, who do you want to play you in the movie?

Fauci: *redfaced*

Larry David: fuck.

Bill Maher: sorry, i'm just really pissed the baseball season won't start on time.

President Bump: what more do you want from me! what more do you want me to do! i took all the vape away from the kids. wiped from the ends of the earth. their little stubby sooty pink-bubblegum fingers were weeping to their hot mothers.

Pence: and where did you store all the vape, sir?

Bump: in the National Stockpile. which means my Lincoln Bedroom. i've smoked six vapes a day everyday since this crisis began under my tie for lunch. that's why i look so slim. who's on the phone?

Pence: Gretchen Whitmer.

Bump: hang up. i can't stand women. in control. how can a woman named Gretchen be hot? Gretchen's a grandma name.

Yellow Ranger: women in power have done more for their countries. they're smarter leaders. look at New Zealand. she's the best, she's awesome, she's a little powderkeg of professionalism.

Bump: has that blank-stare smile. her teeth are too white, i don't trust her. *looking at a paper for the first time* NORTH KOREA HAS ZERO CASES!!!? no fucking way. i'm blowin' up Kim's beeper.

Bump: come on, dude. more propaganda?

Kim: no we do! it's possible! we're completely walled off! we're the fucking hermit kingdom, lardass. look into us sometime. you interrupted my jelly donut...

fat guy from Power Rangers: a jelly donut is not a donut. it's a pastry. i should know.

Doryce: what are you eating, dear?

Gladyce: why it's my saladless salad! it's simply an orange bowl of Arizona mesa with bacon bits in it, those tricolor tortilla strips, sunflower seeds, crouton bits, a smelp which is a hybrid of artichoke and radish. all topped with a drizzle of your finest House Russian dressing. cos Putin is locked in the prison of his own country. it's a way of eating salad without actually eating salad. you're just eating the salad toppings.

Doryce: brilliant. and now you're washing like we should all do.

Gladyce: yes but it's tricky. washing brushes. i wash the blue brush with the green brush, but now the green brush is dirty, so i wash it with the now-clean blue brush. and the blue brush is dirty, this cycle of domestic violence never ends. which was the original brush? which was the first brush? the blue or the green?

Cecily Strong is on Instagram Live with Megan Rapinoe:

Megan: how are you dealing with everything?

Cecily: i hear there's a flu bug going around. New Yorkers are already used to isolation, we all live in one apartment. one for each of us. yeah i mean i'd go to a professional but...all my psychiatrists want to fuck me...they all start scratching below their belt when they say they're writing on their little notepads. i find listening to prominent celebrities calms me, it beats listening to gruff doctors anyday, that's how i am guided in life. no priests.

Megan: i hear you. you want me to host sometime? i'll be free...well, there's gonna be a glut of sports on Thanksgiving...

Cecily: yeah, whatever. i missed my only chance to reconnect and be with my friends till October cos i missed my flight. can you believe it! there was too much traffic. in these times. i could have had an empty plane! Megan...you know if i could i would be with you...i was born the wrong way...i've talked with Gaga about this...damn it all but i'm still attracted to skinny men...

Megan: okay well. you know just keep kicking the ball into the goal. you'll be good enough soon. for a tryout or something...

Dirg: John Callahan would have made the best Tiger King. you know it's weird...why isn't this van moving to someplace exotic?

Takahashi: we're out of gas. and because of the trade war there won't be gas for a VERY long time...

Dirg: as i was saying. yeah like all the governors were too indecisive. i was getting ready to ON MY OWN start staying six feet away from people. and wear a mask to my bank. i heard all this stuff on tv but nothing was happening in our area! finally the states got around to listening to the CDC---which is the CIA---like two months later. i was like, what is the suggestion? i was already thinking i would try this out for a week to see if i liked it. it was weird crossing the street and for some strange reason the roads were full. now they're saying it could be two years. well THANK YOU for finally telling us! you need to be a man, California. a man like me, a take-charge man! how's work?

Takahashi: from home. it's actually harder to hack Wikipedia from home...

Dirg: fanless WWE looks like blackbox theatre. there's always an Entertainment Tonight person creepily monitoring John Mayer's livestream to see if Jennifer Aniston left a comment.

Governor Cuomo: Christopher? Christopher? you up? what was Sandra Lee doing at your basement there last night? i saw the whole thing on your livestream.

Chris Cuomo: what? oh she was just giving me her goods. baked goods. i mean that literally, jelly donuts and stuff. we're all family, right? she knew i was ill and wanted to cheer me up. again, literally.

Governor: i still want to fuck her later so watch yourself, boy.

Eye Luggage: what were we talking about again?

Tyzik: oh how. oh yeah, i love in Children of a Lesser God when the background music stops, no more swell, and the stagecraft is all set up: Marlee is on her proper mark on the set, Will is on his spot, and the thing is allowed to take a breath, a silent beat for Marlee to react to the next line or for her to say her next line as if it were a sound line.

Dirg: and we all know all of her lines were sound.

Tyzik: oh, and the Marsalis patriarch may he rest. so sad. if only that quarantine family house in Eve's Bayou was big enough for him to stay there, too.

Eye: Cocktail and go.

Dirg: based on a true story. if you want to make it as a bartender, it only counts if you bartend in New York City. the big city. the mecca. NYC invading my nightmares once more.

Laertus: yeah, where you have to flair the bottles or it doesn't count. can't just pour, gotta make a waterfall and dance of it.

Dirg: i was waiting for the famous Tom Cruise dance, sliding across the waxed floor of the living room. in a pink shirt and tighty-whities. but i guess that's the wrong movie, Risky Business or something, all those '80s Cruise movies start to crowd the brain.

Laertus: the book of this is a great read, a dark accounting, a parable about lost dreams and the greed of money in the '80s leading to early deaths. when is it too late to actually start to live life? the way you always wanted. the way in your dreams. but Disney got a hold of this. yes, Disney, for some reason. before Disney was the Disney Of Now. but even back then they knew what they were doing, they took a LARGE CHUNK of the dark stuff out of this and replaced it with more Tom Cruise shaking his hips and wiggling his midsection as he threw bottles over his head. tons of footage of Tom side-to-siding and moving and twerkin' dat ass.

Dirg: MORE TOM JUMPING ON THE COUCH!!!

Laertus: Tom later admitted anecdotally that this was not one of his better efforts. but i disagree, this had SO much potential. Bryan Brown's character is magnifique! Bryan is SO good in this. the wizened philosopher with the Aussie accent. we all know this person. we all want to BE this person! the man who lives by his own code after having tried, drained like socks, and scoffed at society and its rules and every other man's code. a man who is truly free cos he is not bound by a code. wisdom that can be gained only on streets, not school. sorry, Princeton. sorry, Nice Guys High.

Dirg: Bryan Brown on the set of The Thorn Birds took young ingenue Rachel Ward's hand, looked at her lines, and took her fortune. he said that she would have three children...

Eye: she later bore HIM the three children. THAT IS THE GREATEST PICK-UP LINE OF ALL TIME!!!

Laertus: see? he is SO smooth. in all his parts. that's why it is ever SO depressing when he kills himself. a man of such genius and wit and southern feeling should NEVER go out like that! leaves a bad taste in the air. a smoke wafting off a fire drink made wrong. he does it by cutting himself with his own bottle. he says in his suicide note he was full of shit the whole time, the whole life, it was all an act, a sham, a see-through sham. NO! your wisdom turned around Tom! helped him become the man he is today!

Dirg: Tom would have joined the Army instead of Scientology were it not for Bryan...

Laertus: that seemed to be a staple of '80s movies along with the FUCK. suicide. suicide was treated in such a ho-hum manner in the '80s. like, yeah, that's just what happens when people reach a crossroads. when they reach the end of their boat. when they can't cross any more waves. it's as ordinary as an eye infection. that's what life is worth. oh well.

Dirg: of course Bryan was jealous of Tom. he knew for all the time he served behind the bar gaining insight he would never BE Tom. never be Tom's effortless Casanova with the ladies. he had a midlife crisis that only Tom coming to work for him jolted him out of.

Laertus: interesting. Bryan thought he would live in his rut forever. pouring drinks for different colored panties. who smoked in his bar but never went behind it. then he had a crisis right in front of young Tom simply because Tom showed him, reminded him that he COULD live life to the fullest again.

Eye: awww, for all his sagacity he was shy, i like that. Tom had the benefit of unthinking youthful exuberance. it is so surreal. so we all watched the music video of Ollie Wride's song "Don't Wanna Change Your Mind" before we saw this film. all those scenes from the film underlaid with Ollie's great music. and then i see that one scene with the girl in the Lennon sunglasses who admonishes Tom for Tom doing Elisabeth Shue dirty like that. no words spoken, cos the music. and i swear to goddess, this girl looks like STEFFI GRAF! and she mouths her line so elegantly, so grandly, like she's making a poobah pronouncement of the highest order. with such authority. i imagine her saying it in Steffi's authoritative grand voice. but when we come to that scene in the film, it's Elisabeth's drunkass comatose friend in her squeaky voice and it just ruins it, all of it, throws my whole sense of balance and equilibrium off.

Dirg: for the longest i didn't put two and two together, i had no idea that girl was the same girl who passed out on the beach. or the same girl who bumps into Elisabeth Shue when Lis goes to Tom's Jamaica bar after the same girl recovers.

Laertus: champagne: perfume going in...

Dirg: ...Calvin Klein going out.

Eye: none of the '80s songs in the actual film---tho good---can compare to Ollie's song! hey Pat. what are we eating?

Pat: i thought Pop Tarts. there's something about sinking your teeth into a Pop Tart, transports you back to the '80s. to the gooey warm center of a makeshift breakfast cos both your parents worked. flaky crust, NOW in pretzel!

Dirg: my man Tom is the first person who will EVER win the Oscar and the Raspberry in the same year! President Bump mention!!! he was the example back then on how to be rich!

Eye: ugh. you want to be the Mickey Bump of cookies? yeah no thanks, that lady should have kicked that ratty professor in the balls and said she would be getting her cookies from Sandra Lee.

Laertus: i love all teachers but he was greasy. yeah, that was the driving force back then in ALL '80s movies, that's all anyone cared about: how to become rich, fast. Wall Street. make money, make millions, be happy.

Dirg: the guy who made those tiny tiki umbrellas in drinks: millionaire. the guy who made the eyelets of shoe laces: millionaire...

Eye: loved Elisabeth's nonsense word. better than dinglehopper. Elisabeth Shue should have portayed the lady who made the pizza saver! miss millionaire!

Laertus: i just want to experience one date, ONE, where i'm riding horses with my girl along the coast of a beach as we look out onto the ocean waves. sunset together. with the horses singing "Kokomo". isn't Blind Date coming back? *Eye twitches her eye*

Dirg: it's so wild seeing Gina Gershon before she was '90s Gina Gershon! haha, she was saving herself for young Flanagan this whole time. you tell 'im, Bryan! notice how they don't have sex, it's just the two of them flapping their arms and legs together underneath large white sheets for a full ten-minute montage.

Laertus: i love how he calls him Young Flanagan. that accent is Gold Coast gold.

Eye: Tom's Uncle Pat was right: life. it just happens to you. before you can look down, you have a wife and two kids and you're like how did they get here?. *Laertus twitches his eye*

Dirg: the scene where Elisabeth strips down completely nude in the waterfall showing huge sidetit was the same waterfall from the Jungle Cruise ride, Disney had a fit. Icehouse Club? isn't that an Australian band?

Laertus: i'm sure modeled after a real New York ice club. like the one Penguin owns. Australia gets all the breaks: that band and sensible gun laws. sigh, let me return to the days where at a trendy nightclub the people clamor for poetry. yes, POETRY!!! you know what all those bizarre names for cocktail drinks are really, right? the name of your porn dog: the street your dog lives on and...

Dirg: ...his bitch. the yuppie poet was right, you need money to overthrow the government, that's why parties don't matter, only money does. that yuppie poet was an actor, right?

Laertus: it would have been more interesting if Bryan interfered with Tom's relationship with Elisabeth in Jamaica. instead of that harebrained cockamamie scheme story where he just gets a random rich heiress to fall in love with him cos he's so charming and marriages him up into wealth. finally the lifelong bachelor succumbs. THEN you would have seen continued conflict and a flaw emerging, the Gina thing wasn't a one-off.

Eye: yeah, let's have Elisabeth and Bryan fuck. for the drama of it! and just cos it's hot.

Dirg: for the majority of the film i had no idea Elisabeth was named Jordan, only named her late. okay, when Tom gets in with the rich older woman, that was a cool pick-up line, when he throws the match to her face like that to light her. cigarette. i mean i'm sorry but THERE IS NOTHING BETTER than seeing Tom Cruise as a kept boy. nothing. it's so perfect cos he's short so he fits the bill perfectly. those scenes were HIGH-LARIOUS. when he punches the Antonio Banderas sculptor into his own sculpture at the night art show next to Broadway cos Tom is experiencing small kept-boy rage.

Laertus: I WANNA BE A KEPT BOY!!! i just want to experience that once. see how it feels. i love strong women. i want to be dominated by strong women. *Eye twitches her eye*

Eye: the dialogue starts to creak here as the film moves along. oh, she's a painter! yeah this '80s mentality again of it's just assumed that no man would ever want to be a dad and would always shirk his responsibility if an unplanned pregnancy happened. so girls, just don't tell him or get an abortion under cover of night. and don't tell your father. it's a little too convenient and on-the-nose that Elisabeth ends up being the wealthy girl all along. should have been poor after all, then it would have really been love.

Dirg: oh man, the diner scene is ridiculous. pouring the oatmeal---not the cocktail---over his head and suddenly this is Seinfeld. are you spooked yet? and the meeting with the father is like a bad episode of Family Ties. whoa, Ricky Schroder just left the diner! to be a cop! that elevator fight scene is hilarious! don't mess with Tom, he'll Mission Impossible your ass! that poor bellboy. dude, the bellboy is a bald man who has to wear a monkey hat for a living, he did not sign up to get stuffed in an elevator and get cake down his penis.

John Hughes: this whole time i thought this film took place in Chicago...

Laertus: i mean come on. Tom is kissing his best friend's wife. for a second i think she cuts off a lock of his hair with her penknife or something, that was a strange sound. Tom after three or four kisses with this woman THEN realizes that yeah, probably not a good idea to fuck his best friend's wife, things could get messy, that could lead to problems. the only friend who ever believed in him. the only person who looked out for him in the cold scary world. golddiggers or revenge depending on a better script.

Eye: he was just scared. back then, the only worry was crabs. crabs on the beach. the ending. turns out she's having twins, that's why she's been fat for so long. if it's a boy, Tom smiles that Tom Cruise Smile. if it's a girl, forget it. g'night, folks. oh, and i made amends, i turned my Pernod Fils into...a Cape Codder!!!

Madame Pons on the phone: it floats! we can't take any chances right now. both crones Doryce and Gladyce are staying with me at The Treehouse so i can keep an eye on them.

Taki: thank you for helping out with the loan, being a signatory, now it's extended for ten more years, you'll pay it off by then, that black-and-white photocopy of your Social Security card was crucial. i don't have to worry about The Treehouse going into foreclosure. being bought by the bank or the cops or the feds. you don't have to worry about me no more...

Madame Pons hears the click of a gun on the other line.

Taki: don't worry, it's my x-ray gun...

that night, as the revelers and ravers get ready for their nightcap---the dance---Pat is suddenly lifted and stuffed into a locker by a bully and his crew. the bully wears an earring in his brain.

bully: no crossdressers at my school! there's no such thing as a spectrum. i can feel your fear, your ankles are in your mouth. lipstick is for bacon.

Pat struggles and fidgets with the lock chain and key but it's on the other side. he's stuck in there for eternity, he sees no light, no stars, he brays like a banshee, he wails and cries his heart out for eight straight hours, the duration of the dance, he misses everything! he starts to suck his toes for nourishment, his polished black dress shoes starting to stink, his whole body covered in sweat and tears, he drowns from himself.

bully: this will be the greatest lesson you learn here. you better learn a sport in a hurry or you won't survive this place. you won't last.

Pat: do tennis and golf count?

the bully laughs. which in turn makes the crew laugh. and they off. it's the morning after and Pat's tongue feels like a stucco wall.

there are no air slots in this locker, just pure darkness. Pat's mind wanders all throughout the dance, he can hear everything but can't see anything. he imagines Julie in her shimmering silver dress with a worried look on her face. he can't breathe but never passed out like he wanted to. he remembers that one moment when the music stopped. and the stage stopped and the punch bowl stopped. and the vibrations of the dancers and the vibrations of the lights stopped and there was just that one beat of silence...before...something extraordinary happened. the whole school goes nuts! it blew the roof off! but what was it!?

Pat: *trailing*...wait! what happened at the dance! did Vitamin C get naked!!?

bully: *trailing*...nah. she just debuted her carrot-colored hair for the first time...