When Good Manners Go Bad

I’m on the phone with a Customer Service Representative and I’m trying to be as polite and friendly as possible in order to work out a mutual mistake (that quite clearly does not involve me giving my credit card number and subsequent $2,782.43 to PervOrProgrammer.com).

Unfortunately, I’m in a “Pat” situation where I literally cannot tell if the person on the other end is a woman that has smoked more than a carton of ciggies a day, or a man who, on the best of days, merits the term “effete” lobbed at him, or maybe an alien that sucked up an entire gravel driveway on their way into work at the call center this morning.

Anywhoodle, this situation ends up involving a lot of involuntary “YesMa’am-YesSir-YesThankYou-YesPlease-s.” (It starts of strong and resolute and then sort of tapers into a questioning whisper).

In my head, I keep telling myself, “Whatever you do, do not use a personal pronoun toward him/her/it.” But to no avail. If I had just decided on one and kept it consistent, I’d have a 50/50 shot. Had I gotten it wrong, maybe he/she/it would have just assumed there was a bad connection. But, nooooo. I kept having to cover me bases.

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If I Were A Rapper…

I think I’d go by the name, “Fairly Nefarious.”

It’s new. It’s classy. And it reflects my toughness and my desire to do ill (as well as my proclivity to burn in the summer’s sun).

(Although I’d really have to figure out some sort of simple obfuscation for the spelling of it, and that could take me a lifetime. 

Best bet: If we could all agree that the ‘/’ mark can represent the scales of justice and in this case can substitute for the word, ‘fair’, my best guess is to go with “/ly Ne/ious”. Can we all agree from this point hence on that meaning? If not, I’m open to suggestions…

PostHaste, people! My burgeoning career hangs in the balance.

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Writers As Children – ee cummings

“Snack Time”  

Edward Estlin Cummings Age 7

I have a fig newton

but it is

alas

no

(handy-dandyAmericaEndorsed)

Propaganized 

O-R-E-oooooh

Smooth and delicious

with the cream of which i dream 

and of thee i sing.

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CBS – What Will You Come Up With Next?

In some sort of brilliant marketing idea, two head writers for CBS shows are switching roles and writing for the others’ show. Sounds kinda neat, right?

Some opportunities to open up creatively. Stretch your legs, get out of your rut. But the two shows?

CSI and Two and a Half Men. Huh? Those two shows couldn’t be more different.

We think that you’ll be able to tell when you see the episodes. Expect to see Grissom bedding Catherine Willows. Grissom teasing Nick relentlessly about being a loser that no woman would have, about being broke, about loosing women to other women.  It’s going to be wall-to-wall laugh tracks on CSI!

We also know that Two and Half Men will have to start with an opening song from The Who. I predict it’ll be “Anyway, Anyhow, Anywhere” (or possibly “Pinball Wizard”). Also, predicting that Charlie will wake up with a dead body in his bed. Charlie and Alan will proceed to figure out what happened using tackle-boxes filled with flashlights and Q-tips.  Expect many beautiful overhead vista shots from helicopters  everytime we come back from commercial. Maybe the Miniature Killer makes a pitstop in Malibu? Little diorama left on the doorstep of our favorite two and one half men.

NBC will be up next. Expect Marc Cherry and Carlton Cuse to change places and the we”ll see a polar bear chained in the basement of the newest neighbors on Wisteria Lane. No more gossip between the ladies of Desperate Housewives, now they’ll learn useful information that could help their friends, but they won’t share the tiniest morsel, just like on Lost!  No talking to each other.  But we the viewers will learn all about the H-wives via flashbacks and flashforwards.  Maybe another neighborhood will come in to play (The Others)?

Meanwhile on the beaches of Lost, Kate gets locked out of her tent completely naked (“She’s so klutzy and kooky!”). Sun’s baby is really Sayid’s, not Jin’s. Hurley’s coming out of the closet. The Voice Over woman will probably parachute into the neighborhood. And Bernard and Rose? Their secret is going to rock you to your core…

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The Follow Up to Silverman/Damon Video

On the Jimmy Kimmel show following the Oscars, Jimmy answered the Sarah Silverman/Matt Damon video with a little video of his own with…Ben Affleck, of course!

The only startling thing about this video is who Jimmy got to be in it. Some of these people probably haven’t even been on his show! But we have Brad Pitt fulfilling every woman’s fantasy and showing up as a delivery guy and Harrison Ford pulling up next to the happy couple in his convertible to blow kisses (vaguely reminiscent of American Graffiti).

And then the song breaks into a ‘We Are the World’ type anthem complete with Joan Jett, Robin Williams, Don Cheadle, Perry Ferrell, Macy Grey, Benji and Joel Madden, Josh Groban, Huey Lewis, Lance Bass, Pete Wentz, Cameron Diaz, McLovin (backed by a gospel choir), and Rebecca Romijn. 

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