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Monday, July 28, 2003

Lyle and Linda Lurker

So I have this idea for a new sitcom. It's called "Meet the Lurkers." It's about Lyle and Linda Lurker, the creepy couple I now live with. Living with Lyle, an inconsiderate, hairy, and apparently hemophiliac hobbit of a roommate was bad enough. In fact, it was worse than Greg, Kaspar, or Drunko. But now the missus is here too. For an extended visit. In my room. Replete with kissing.

I shudder.

"Fuck God and all his shitty little angels!" — a quote from tonight’s play that I’m too Catholic to say myself. You’d think a play about he court politics of Louis XIV would be high drama enough, but those fucking lurkers have driven the entire group to gossip like bored housewives. Call me fucking Mabel. Apricots, oranges, and cauliflower.

I thought of a name for my column for next year: "Artful Dodging." It's from Oliver Twist. The Artful Dodger is the boy who seduces Oliver into a life of crime and dresses like a grown man — ostensibly, someone whose premature maturity generates comical situations. He's bad but lovably funny, so he gets away with stuff. Maybe it smacks of literary snobbishness, but it’s not like that wouldn’t be entirely inaccurate either. I considered playing on the word "dodgy," but I think "Artful Dodging" sounds better. And of all places, I got this epiphany not from reading Oliver Twist itself, which I didn't like, but from reading a biography on Alan Moore.

The Changing of the Guard kind of blew. I'm all for ritual and ceremony. Fuck, like I said, I've Catholic. But it's not so cool when you gotta stand alongside representatives of every nation on unforgiving cement for more than an hour. "Girl in pink! Please get off the fence!... Girl in red! Could you please get off the fence!... Girl in mauve...." The marching band was pretty good. Is it me, or did they play "Sound of the Swinging Symbol"?

If I had the offer to live at Buckingham Palace, I think I'd pass.

Speaking of old things, Bob Hope died today at the age of 400. Now who shall regale the nation with golf jokes at the president’s expense? In fact, a lot of people have died since I went all British. Barry White, Drewfish, ol' Bobby Hope, and those incorrigible Hussein brothers. Some good, some bad.

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