What is funny?

Today I am forced to examine the concept of humor and what makes people laugh. This is offered up as an instructional guide for my readership (which stretches all the way to West Virigina now-hi everybody!). I don't intend for this to be seen as censorship or anything, but merely a guideline for those who make pathetic attempts at humor. This of course doesn't apply to me, because I crack myself up and that's all that matters since this is after all MY blog.

Here's the deal. I walk upstairs this morning and propped up in front of our computer monitor is a paperback book. The book is a dog-eared, well-read (as all our books are) copy of the tragic young adult story "Beat the Turtle Drum." (See Exhibit A, below)

Exhibit A

As you can see, the front cover of the book has been annotated or labeled by some deviant, who shall be known from this point forward by the pseudonym of "Erick". I'm thinking that this "Erick" miscreant must have come across this book (quite possibly while cleaning out the garage) and- he apparently finds it relevant to my life in some really indirect and inexplicable manner.

Let's examine this in detail, shall we? First of all, here's the amazon.com description of the book: "The heartwrenching story of how a young girl comes to terms with her sister's death."

So right off the bat, we have some problems. I don't have a sister, alive or dead. So labeling the sullen girl on the front as "Siobhan" is not accurate. Although I supposes you could argue the "sullen" part.

Then, we have the image of a horse frollicking in the background, helpfully labeled "Dempsey." I know "Erick" hates our cats, especially Dempsey, but there's no way a sane person would confuse a 10 pound tabby for a horse. AND if "Erick" had actually bothered to read a bit of "Beat the Turtle Drum", he would know that the innocuous looking little equine is basically a horsey of death.

Then there is the phrase "Tricky Tommy" artlessly inserted into the title after the word "Turtle." This practically defines the term "inside joke" as nobody outside of my very close friends and family know about Tricky Tommy Turtle. The attempt to somehow tie together the tragic loss of a young girl to the "tragic" loss of innocence suffered by a 25 year old who didn't figure out that it was her PARENTS who were demonically possessed, not her toy turtle...well, it simply doesn't work.

Finally, there's the most ridiculous part of the whole "joke" - a barnlike structure labeled "Johnson House." You would think that a man who actually made a documentary ABOUT the "Johnston House" might know how to spell the name of the building. You would be wrong.

So let's get this all straight-a sullen young girl who hangs out at a historic building, with a horse, representing me as a child puzzling over how the hell Tricky Tommy Turtle moves about the house at night, sans batteries, is supposed to be FUNNY?

You know what? It is, kinda. Good job, "Erick."

Weekly Address June 27, 2006

It's been quiet here at Big Sandy Bottom lately. Not much to report, other than I am knee-deep in OCD vacation planning for our August trip to Disneyworld, aka the "Big Sandy Bottom World Tour 2006." T-shirts to follow. My family is teasing me relentlessly but they will be forced (once again) to admit my greatness when my advance planning results in a relatively stress-free vacation. As relatively stree-free as one can be in Florida in August, amongst masses of sweaty, smelly tourists steeping in 100 degree plus weather and humidity, that is.

I received an early birthday gift from my mother. The gift itself is priceless, but I have to admit my very favorite part is the instructions. It contains what is quite possibly one of the greatest sentences ever written "The structure of a marshmallow makes it an unpredictable projectile." How great is that? Did you ever think you would read such a marvelous sentence? Me neither. And the gift itself-a marshmallow shooter! Who is the evil genius responsible for the existence of this item? It makes the whole "mini marshmallow hitting me in the forehead while brushing my teeth" incident seem a little less spooky, doesn't it? I guess there is almost always a reasonable explanation for these things, which is sad. I mean, I don't have any evidence that a member of my family possessed or used a marshmallow gun to impersonate a poltergeist, but it certainly doesn't seem to be out of the question. First my shower head ghost is revealed to be a talking "Three Stooges" bottle opener, (which is actually just about as weird as a shower head ghost now that I think about it.) Now I am faced with the possibility that my mini marshmallow-hurling poltergeist could have actually been a family member wielding a gun that shoots marshmallows, (which is ALSO pretty weird.)

My mom and I were listening to Augusten Burroughs' "Possible Side Effects" on our drive from LA to Moss Beach. While he is not as "lol" as David Sedaris, he is still pretty funny sometimes. We especially enjoyed the "Druggy Debbie" segment, which revealed the previously unthought of (by me anyway) existence of a stealth weapon that every woman possesses, at least for about a week every month. It's hard to imagine an incident where I might need to "pull out" this weapon, but I have to admit that the idea is strangely compelling. But maybe I'm just sick that way...

That's it for this week! Watch "Veronica Mars". I command you.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DOUG

What is this man thinking?

Eric loves his new CPAP machine. He says that at night he likes to

"pretend I'm John Glen, breaking the sound barrier."

Weekly Address - June 2, 2006 (Live Nude Ivy!)

(okay mother, flattery will get you everywhere with me, so here ya go! And I don't care if the Weekly Address tends to come out on a monthly basis, I'm still calling it a Weekly Address! So There! And I still don't wear a sweater when it's cold out and you can't make me...)

I really wish I went to college. In addition to all the obvious benefits (better paying jobs, opportunities, STD's, yada yada), I think I missed out on a very important aspect of college life-attending college drama productions. Or rather, attending college drama productions and being young enough to 1. Understand what the hell is going on in these shows, and 2. Take them seriously.

Take the two shows I saw last weekend at UCSC. Please. *insert drum roll here*

Only one of the shows starred someone related to me, but as Ivy's show was sort of "bundled" with another production I was forced to sit through that one first. The non-Ivy appearing production was the earnest and ironic story (it is a UCSC requirement that ALL shows must be earnest and ironic) of a young vegan who is apparently so stupid that he drives his car to the middle of the desert and decides to take a long walk to "find himself." Personally, I think the kid was weak and disoriented from lack of protein but then again I really love steak so that might possibly have affected my take on the situation.

I bet you know what happens next, right? The vegan gets lost in the desert, of course. You saw that one coming. What I bet you DIDN'T see coming was that in his delirium the vegan begs to God (over and over and over again) to help him and God decides to assist by sending the vegan a cow. Yup, that's right-a Holy Cow. Get it?

The next fifteen minutes of the show are dedicated to the Holy Cow dancing about the stage (swearing like a character in a Quentin Tarantino movie) thrusting her udders about taunting the vegan with her milk. The vegan stays true to his principles, although I'm not sure why he had to eat his shoes. But whatever...

(Oh! I just remembered-the vegan wears a shirt that reads "udder annihilation.")

In a twist ending, the cow is revealed to actually be death or possibly Satan, I wasn't quite sure. Anyway, the satanic or grim reaping cow pulls out several large machetes and forks (this part distracted me quite a bit, because I couldn't figure out where exactly the cow kept the utensils. I mean, it didn't have pockets or anything) and chops up the vegan and eats him.

Pretty subtle, hunh? A vegan who won't even drink milk to save his life is butchered and eaten by a cow.

This special kind of subtlety seems to be a trademark of UCSC drama productions. In the almost two years that Ivy has been there, she has:

• Appeared on stage as a woman wearing a burka and a dog collar in a show called "Iran Man". This character was sold by her own father for drugs.
• Played one of only two smart and sane people in a town controlled by an evil corporation and populated by citizens forced by said organization to have lots of plastic surgery. This one was actually kind of clever. Titled "Invasion of the Body Surgeons", the show was funny and held your attention for the right reasons (unlike the show we saw right before it, which you can read all about in a previous post entitled "I Can Save You From Unoriginal Dumb-Dumbs")
• Narrated a production that was about...well, honestly I really don't know what it was about, because it was in Farsi. Do I speak Farsi? No. Did anyone in the audience speak Farsi? Not that I could tell, because the rest of the audience seemed to be as puzzled as I was. At least Ivy's character spoke English but it wasn't enough to fill in the blanks. Luckily Ivy has stage presence to spare so it was enough to make the show enjoyable for me.
• And then, finally, we have:

Live, Nude Ivy. More specifically, live, nude, lesbian Ivy. I believe the actual title was "Face Me." but I prefer the more colloquial title of "The Topless Lesbian Show."

If you ever want to have your beliefs and prejudices explored, I highly recommend that you see a show in which your daughter appears as a topless butch lesbian. I consider myself a liberal person but after this experience, I have to face facts: I may in fact be plenty liberal, where OTHER people's children are concerned. Not my own.

The topless lesbian show had some redeeming qualities. Most of the cast was very good, and the show was interesting, other than the constant swearing (again with the swearing! What's up with the youth of today? Use some imagination, people! I have nothing against a good, appropriately placed swear word. I'm not a prude and was raised by possibly the foulest-mouthed parents ever, but I take offense when the "f" word is used as a noun, verb, adjective AND expletive all in the same sentence. I say there should be law against using any swear word more than once in the same sentence. For instance, if a character says "I have had enough of those f'ing Lauber girls" that's okay, and I certainly support the sentiment. However, if a character says "I have f'ing had enough of those f'ing Lauber girls, f''face" that is not acceptable and the punishment should be death. Okay, sorry bout that little rant there.)

The other problem with the show, in my opinion, is that once again the subtlety was completely missing. The main character was a recluse lesbian artist who was frustrated by the lack of images in the media world she could identify with, and who also felt alienated by real people judging her. She spent her time at home on the couch, endlessly sketching people sans faces. Hence the title, "Face Me." Get it? In case you didn't, then you might catch on when I tell you that at the end of the show, this character decides to leave her apartment and ends up finally sketching a person WITH a face.

As for Ivy's topless scene, I have to say that I found it gratuitous. It did absolutely nothing to advance the plot, occurring near the end when the main character decided it was time for her to venture out into the real world. (An aside here-I used to laugh at actors who talked about doing nudity only if it was "essential to the plot". Seemed like a ludicrous statement, but I understand it better now. In this play, it certainly wasn't essential and actually made no sense at all. I mean, the main character had difficulty sketching faces, not breasts.)

I have to salute Ivy's bravery in this show though. It was a very small theatre and there was no attempt to light her in a fashion that would partially obscure her nakedness. There she was, at the edge of the stage with literally a spot light on her for all the world to see. I have always admired Ivy's willingness to push herself to try things that are outside of her comfort zone.

Okay, so what else is up here at Big Sandy Bottom? After years of nagging Eric to go to a doctor about his snoring and his unsettling habit of ceasing to breathe for 30-45 seconds at a time, he finally had a sleep study. Guess what? He has severe sleep apnea! Big surprise there...now he sleeps with a CPAP machine (or a "snore catcher", as Doug called them) and for the last two nights I haven't had to sleep with ear plugs. Which makes me happy because between being blind as a bat and unable to hear anything with the ear plugs I feel pretty vulnerable at night. No more jumping up in alarm when one of the girls finally has to shake my arm to get my attention! And of course there's the added benefit of dramatically lowering Eric's chances of dying in his sleep. So it's all good.

Olivia is done with her sophomore year, yeay! She also had her first job in about a year, a photo shoot for Jansport. I wasn't there for the shoot, but they were on the streets of San Francisco in a very sketchy part of town. Apparently the homeless in the neighborhood really enjoyed the event and had a great time mocking the models. In what I consider one of the funniest lines I never thought I'd hear one of my children say, Olivia lost her patience and yelled "Okay, so we're professional backpack models! You got a problem with that?"

As for me? Same old same old. I've been busy planning our August vacation, and also preparing for next weekend's trip to Napa with Olivia and her pal Hannah. I'm sad to report that if only I hadn't done a little more research, we would've have been staying at a "gay-friendly", clothing-optional resort. Think of the comic material in that situation. Anyway, I waited too long to look for a place to stay and was having no luck until I came across this one resort that looked quite lovely. The rates were reasonable, and miracle upon miracle the place actually had vacancies. Unfortunately, after I sent in the reservation request I started to peruse the website for information...LOTS of really muscular and well-groomed men hanging around the pool and playing volleyball (shot from the waist up, of course.) When I got to the page that said "guests must be over 18 due to safety and indecency laws" I finally got it that probably wasn't the place for us. Sigh. So now we're staying at a Marriott which in comparison sounds really boring, doesn't it?