January 14, 2006

• Unbridled Machismo
  The Author, 2006

  During the second half of our California vacation, Shaun and I had the pleasure of really getting to know our favorite friends Beth and Allyson’s significant others, Jay and Jessie, since we all stayed in Ally and Jessie’s apartment just outside of LA. I couldn’t be happier for our friends, because the older we get, the better their taste in significant others becomes.

  
  

  Like Shaun (and all of our friends, really), Jessie is an accommodating listener, asking questions and seeming genuinely interested in whatever lame story you might be telling, and piggybacking with funny stories of his own. While getting to know Jessie is as easy as pie, a first encounter with Jay is a bit more involved: he is a writer who upon first introduction is bristling with opinions and shows of fire-speed linguistic dexterity, but once a bit of time passes, he quickly settles into a naturally curious, genuinely nice and funny guy before this bubbly energy has a chance to get on your nerves. Jay is the kind of person that made me thankful for having patience, because once I got to know him, it became obvious to me that he is a hilarious, perfect match for our group of friends, plus he seems to be really good to Beth. Everyone involved gets two thumbs way up.

  While we spent most of our time together in LA being stuck in traffic,
  museum going, frequenting used record stores, discovering delicious ice cream parlors , eating heavenly Thai food, and playing endless hours of games (see random tangent for details), we also spent a few minutes everyday laughing at Ally and Jessie’s cat, Dean, who was wildly in heat. A spading is on the horizon for the female cat inexplicably named Dean, but the present sex-crazed reality of the kitty’s life causes her to be especially emotional and walk with her butt out and low—ready for action. As sad as it was to see an animal so helplessly preoccupied with its vagina, the freakishness of the scene was pretty entertaining. When Dean the cat came around, Jay would get low to its neck, and with his voice thick and rich and emanating from his chest, he would seethe, “Deeeean. Deeeaner.” The cat would go wild purring and arching her back with all this growly, raw machismo reverberating on her spine. Writing it makes this sound really crewel, but I have to say, we were all busting a gut over it.

  

  As you may have read, this past Monday, January 9 was my and Shaun’s 8-year anniversary. To celebrate, we used a $50 coupon we had to dine at a fancy restaurant, Opera. Serving luscious Pan-Asian cuisine, Opera is by far one of the most dramatic dining experiences I have ever had. Walking into the bold, extravagantly decorated, open space makes you feel both special and stupid for wearing your big, clunky winter ski jacket accessorized by a lunch bag containing bright red Tupperware reeking of beet couscous from the day’s lunch-hour meal that you have in tow because you are meeting your date for dinner promptly after work. Once you suck it up, put on a brilliant smile, and get over your own personal lack of polish, the experience becomes marvelous again. Absolutely maaahvolous.

  Tucked away from the rest of the diners are little, curtained dining coves in the exposed brick walls that are reserved for romantic couples or people who are wearing unsightly ski jackets accessorized by Tupperware. Seated in this intimate space is claustrophobic, but fun, like the whole family being cramped in the basement during a tornado watch. The funniest thing about these little dining coves is that the diners have no idea when a waiter is approaching and it is startling to have a waiter, no matter how ridiculously suave, pop his body through the curtain, like a little sprite, and take your order or bring you food and drinks. I was startled every time.

  I can’t speak for the entire wait staff at Opera, but if you have a big paycheck coming up (or a coupon), I would recommend dining there just to have a hearty laugh at the waiter we had. Imagine a man too debonair for his own good. His hair is a permanent slick: coiffed and impenetrable. His eyelids hover halfway between open and closed at all times. His lips are glossed and puckered and curled up at the edges. His voice is thick and rich and emanating from his chest in the exact same tone as Jay used to seduce Dean the cat with unyielding hormones. The waiter is lavish. He is ready. He wants to roll naked in steaming piles of duck sauce.

  After bringing us our appetizers, the waiter sashays into our dining cove.
  “How are the flavors?” He coos.
  I can barely keep a straight face. Shaun’s back is to him, so he can silently laugh all he wants.
  A while later, the waiter tweaks his nipple, drooling and asks, “Is it finished?”
  The odd use of the word “it” instead of the more standard, “are you finished?” causes me to imagine Shaun and I feeding a monster under the table. I suppress violent laughter and manage, “yes.” With his back to the waiter, Shaun is rolling.
  Upon reserving our table, Shaun must have let it slip that we were celebrating our anniversary. When it was time for us to enjoy some decedent basil ice cream for desert, the waiter, desire oozing from every pore, burst into the cove with two dinky birthday candles a-glow on the desert plate. “I wanted to bring you some candles for your anniversary,” he said, his voice husky and low, “I wanted this to be special.”
  Instead of crawling around on all fours with our butts arched ala Dean the cat, Shaun and I laughed until our sides hurt. It was a splendid evening.

  ________________________________________________________________________
  Have you had any laughable encounters with unbridled machismo?

  ::Random Tangent::
  While I hope you are all familiar with Pictionary and make the game more interesting when you play by writing funny suggestions like “Poops Ma Gee” and “Vagina Salsa,” you may not be aware of three very fun games called The Name Game, 8-Headed Doctor, and Drawing in the Dark. I promise you will love them all. Here’s how to play:

  The Name Game
  Everyone at the party writes ten names on slips of paper and they put them in a hat. The names that you write can be anyone from celebrities, characters on TV or from plays, authors, mythical characters, Bible peeps, dead people, Tommy the boy who peed his pants on the big slide in your kindergarten class, your Aunt Sheryl—anybody, whether the others in the group know of them or not. Have the party break off in teams of two. It makes the game harder if you are paired with the person in the room you know the least. Pairing off in couples makes the game easier. Now it is the first team’s turn. One person draws a name. They may know who the person is whose name they drew, or they may not. But they have a minute to try to explain as many names as they can to their partner without using “rhymes with” or charades.

  Once I had to explain a name that turned out to be Shaun’s sister’s 5th grade boyfriend. But at the time of drawing it, neither Shaun nor I had a clue as to who Michael David was. So how did we do it?

  Truly: What is the name of our favorite character on the show Arrested Development?
  Shaun: George Michael.
  Truly: Good. Now say just his last name.
  Shaun: Michael.
  Truly: Now, the second part. What is the name of my favorite director?
  Shaun: David Lynch.
  Truly: What’s his first name?
  Shaun: David. Michael David?
  Truly: Good job! Next one…

  See how having teams of couples makes everything easier? However you break off, it is a lot of fun and you learn lots of fun stuff about people and laugh really hard.

  8-Headed Doctor
  You can play this improvisation game anytime, as long as you have two or more players. If it is New Years Eve, it can also be a drinking game. Shaun and I also play it while we are taking long walks.

  The object of this game is to tell a story, with each person of the group adding one word at a time.

  Truly: Rancid
  Shaun: cats
  Jessie: hate
  Allyson: to
  Beth: wear
  Jay: tutu’s.
  Truly: The
  Shaun: story
  Jessie: begins…

  See? Fun. If you add a word that results in incorrect sentence structure, or take too long to say a word (it should be a seamless flow after your practice run), the group makes the noise of a game show buzzer at you and you are responsible for starting a whole new story. If you choose to make this a drinking game, you also have to take a swig of something.

  Drawing in the Dark
  In this game, each participant is given a pencil and a piece of paper. All the people at the party put their names in a hat. Everyone draws a name and keeps it secret. Then the host turns off all the lights and each participant has a minute to draw a picture of the name they drew without being able to see the paper. Then the lights are turned back on and everyone displays their artwork and laughs at how retarded it looks. If the party can guess who you drew, then you are very cool and a winner indeed.

  • 1:14 pm
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