From Justin Gawel: Eccentric Dirtbag
Yes, is a Wilma Pennybuckle available?
Oh, terribly sorry, you’re already on the line. Although, I probably should have saved my “terribly sorry” for what I’m about to tell you because, honestly, it’s just going to seem like I’m marginalizing bad news now.
No, please, I insist, Mrs. Pennybuckle, stop guessing. To the best of my knowledge, no conspiracy exists that causes your grandchildren to keep putting on weight, I don’t think your pharmacist is trying to poison you, and I don’t think because your new mailman being black is an omen that a “tribe” of Nigerians moving in to the unsold house down the street. Further, I’d assume should they existed they would use the “family” and not don’t use the word “tribe” to describe themselves.
Honestly, I’m calling you today to inform you that your husband, Bucky Pennybuckle, has died in Jamaica. Now I didn’t know him personally, but it seems like he was a man with a fun name to say and I am terribly sorry for your loss.
Interesting, you were unaware he was in Jamaica?
Hmmm, he said Omaha on business for the annual shower cap convention.
Ah ha, if by “Omaha” he meant “Montego Bay, Jamaica,” and by “annual shower cap convention” he meant “sex tourism extravaganza,” and by “business” he meant “three nights of sensual pleasure spent with various women before being robbed, bound, and having his face beaten to a pulp with a piano leg before being dumped in a sugar cane plantation,” then, yes, he was being very transparent and honest.
No, there was no trace of any actual business happening on this trip, unless by “business” you mean—
I see, I see.
Yes, I really am getting some mileage out of that gag.
Now, I realize this is a little personal, but did your late husband every show a proclivity for any specific fetishes? We’re just trying to figure out if the ropes, bondage hood, and nipple clamps were put on him to make him easier to bludgeon, or if that was just what he was into.
I’m sorry, Mrs. Pennybuckle, I’m sure Mr. Pennybuckle would vomit with anger as well if he had, as you so eloquently put it, “had known he was going to die in a country run by drug-addicted, dark gypsies.” Now I must interject, Mrs. Pennybuckle, because the population here genuinely does prefer to be called “Jamaicans.”
How much infidelity occurred?
I mean, it’s difficult to say, but the authorities did recover an oddly descriptive erotic itinerary in his hotel room with very strange crudely drawn pictures drawn in it. If those figures were correct, he had been with three call girls his first night that he had in a position he referred to as “The Devil’s Baccarat Table” and then on the second night it appears he met a very frumpy night receptionist and utilized a move he dubbed “Jonah and the Whale.”
I’m sorry, I didn’t realize that that reference on the Sabbath would nearly give you a stress migraine. I’ll give you a second.
Anyways, it appears he was killed on the third night of his excursion. Make no mistake, it appears that infidelity definitely occurred, as the black light investigation revealed stains on nearly every surface of his hotel room. However, that may have just resulted from the housekeepers half-assing it these days.
No, no, please, please, Mrs. Pennybuckle, I do not want to hear about your exploits while he’s away; this isn’t a time for one-upping.
That’s really not helpful either, Mrs. Pennybuckle, I’m not going to discuss the ethnicity of the housekeepers just so you can comment on their apparent lack of work ethic.
Honestly, Mrs. Pennybuckle, I really just needed to break the news and have you tell me where I can send the body.
No, leaving the corpse with one of his mistresses is not an option; in fact, the women are actually leading suspects in this investigation.
No, we can’t just fly him coach back home; that’s completely out of the question
I assure you, Mrs. Pennybuckle, people would notice a dead passenger on the plane.
Okay, I’ll be sure to ship it out as quickly as possible and the funeral home will notify you when it arrives.
Yes, I’m sure his friends and family will be surprised.
I mean, there’s no reason you can’t lie or not give specifics about his demise. I’d be sure to have a closed-casket ceremony because no one is going to believe he died from a heart attack or stroke if they see his disfigured, battered face and that regrettable Jamaican braid he had put in his hair.
Frankly, I don’t think the mortician is going to be fix it. Mr. Pennybuckle’s face is completely busted—like it’s a cross between an old, melted candle and a Salvador Dali painting.
No, Mrs. Pennybuckle, I honestly don’t think this is Obama’s fault.
Okay, okay, enough, really! This is a phone call with a stranger about your logistics with your late husband’s death not a chance for you to get on your soapbox and rant about minorities.
Well, yes, there’s no denying that Richard Dawson was the best host of Family Feud, but could you please save your “gravy faced” discussion and banter about Steve Harvey for another time? I’m finding it offensive and I’m a little embarrassed to even be listening to your tirade!
I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have scolded you; I didn’t realize that was how you deal with grief.
Okay, I’ll let you grieve. I’ll send his body out as soon as possible. They’ll keep investigating here, but his bloodstained Tommy Bahama shirt has not yielded any leads or given us any names.
Yeah, seriously, you’re right, that’s totally like something out of Burn Notice.
Shut up, no way! I’m a huge Burn Notice fan too!
An extra threatening letter from the gas company, an envelope speckled with blood addressed to a senator, a third subscription to Bathtub Gin Aficionado: seriously, anything would be better to receive in the mail than an invite to this dinner party.
Ugh, and it’s from the Mayfields. I know they’re going to badger me into going; I can’t just cease contact, take the credit hit, and use the oven to heat the apartment until spring like I do with the gas company.
Dinner parties, junk coupons, and Ted Kaczynski—this is why people are no longer excited to receive anything in the mail.
The Mayfields are the overbearing pseudo-friends who insist on throwing these things. Yes, the Mayfields are truly the worst. Their friendship is like that rash I have from losing that McNugget in my long johns—too easy to acquire, but nearly impossible to get rid of.
My laissez-faire approach to distancing myself clearly hasn’t been working. The Mayfields interpret my immature mannerisms as a “cry for help” instead of being non-confrontational ways to get them to stop inviting me. Why do they want a guest who shows up an hour late, brings only half a bottle of fortified wine for dinner, and then eats all of their children’s gummy vitamins before falling asleep in their dog’s bed?
You’d think the three far-from-PG stories I perpetually trod out about the same day in that Sizzler bathroom would scare them off, but they just keep inviting me. It’s like they’re trying to break me and mold me into a fanciful and respectable person—it’s like my first semester at the Attractive Man Magic Academy all over again.
Excuses fail me, I’ve used everything in the book from my dog is sick to Grandma needs to go to the pound to be put down. The Mayfields see right through my attempted ploy, insist they won’t take no for an answer, and assert that I be by at five tomorrow.
I show up at quarter-to-seven and I’m surprised that they’re just sitting down for appetizers. Well played, Mayfields, give me an earlier time knowing I’ll show up apathetically late. I give them the now-two-thirds-empty bottle of a very oaky 2012 drifter wine that only tastes like oak because I accidentally got bark in it on the way over. I let their slave-child take my bathrobe turned overcoat and slump into a chair
This weird root for an appetizer is absolutely abhorrent. I don’t care if you brought it back from your trip to Ecuador, Mayfields; every bite still tastes like a gritty family of un-delicious mice died in my mouth. Fantastic, someone had to ask about their trip—now we’re going to be launched into a twenty-minute story with only minimal explosions, predictable plot twists, and only partial nudity.
We sit down for dinner and placed in front of me is some sort of bowl filled with nothing but ruffage and boiled chicken. Blechh, I can already feel my taste buds drafting a collective suicide manifesto.
Call me old-fashioned, but, instead of chicken, how about hot pocket slices in the salad? And you know what could make that dish even better? Just a hot pocket in its crisping sleeve that I’m eating in a bubble bath as I’m alone in my apartment reading Heaven’s Gate fan fiction while I’m not at this shitty dinner party.
I’m just going to use this bowl as an ironic ashtray, because this salad couldn’t be farther from Flavor Country.
Casserole for dinner lets me know that Mrs. Mayfield is capable of combining measurements together and following minimal instructions to create something that tastes like molten garbage. I promptly empty my plate into the dog’s bowl because if I wanted to eat a bunch of food mixed up with a bunch of other food that together smells like low tide I would have just licked that pool of vomit off the bathroom floor at Red Lobster when I had the chance.
I’m just going see what they have in the fridge—oh, good, they have ingredients for nachos. Seriously, how hard would it have been to just make me nachos, or just not pester me into coming at all?
Eating my nachos with the other guests in uncomfortable silence was the highlight of the evening. Things got much worse when Mr. Mayfield brought out a tray of fruit for dessert. Fruit is not an acceptable dessert. We’re talking about dessert in 2013, not a Christmas present during the Great Depression. God, this fresh watermelon is awful; it doesn’t taste like the Starburst flavor at all. Thankfully, I’ll just have another cigarette for my after dinner treat.
Finally, dinner is technically over and I’m ready to leave. On the way out the Mayfields said, “Thank you for making it, Justin.” To which I replied, “Yeah, I’m going to be honest because you’re clearly not getting my passive aggressive message, but let’s never do this again.”
Mrs. Mayfield weeps; Mr. Mayfield escorts me out before consoling her.
That’s why they call me Bad Company, I can’t deny. Bad, Bad Company, till the day I die.
A low gurgle escapes out of my open mouth, along with a hearty, grizzly bear-esque yawn. The clock reads quarter to seven, but that clock has been stopped for days and is rarely correct anymore. Although unsure about how long I slept, one thing’s for sure: I need Crunch Berries.
I scour the apartment, but to no avail. I’m aching for those sweet, sweet berries and grinding my teeth like the berry junkie I am at the mere thought of packing up a nice, fat bowl of that tasty goodness.
Ask not for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee. Fate knocks but once, and I realize it’s time to go. I grab my bathrobe, the apartment’s “casual” merkin, and my wallet, which, in reality, is a sandwich bag filled with crumpled bills and coins. In twenty seconds, I’m out the door on my sidewalk surfboard.
I power-saunter into the first set of automatic doors, through the airlock, and then pass through a second set of automatic doors into the grocery store. The airlock seems necessary; otherwise the rank odor of that bag lady’s foul jowl sweat that’s entwined with the rancid fragrance of rotting food could escape and stink up a little neighborhood that I’m quite fond of called Planet Earth.
Not used to buying food from places that aren’t convenience stores or gas stations, I’m overwhelmed. You’d think I’d have been here when I had bought my Crunch Berries originally, but no. Up to this moment in my life, every box of Crunch Berries I had eaten had either been given to me as a present or had been left to me through the last will and testament of dead relatives.
The cereal aisle was looking flush with a United Nations of breakfast sorts. It’s moments like this that make me especially swell up with patriotism. Unfortunately, as I neared the cereals beginning with “Captain”, I realized that there was but one box of Crunch Berries left and a little girl was Jack Reaching for it.
An involuntary grunt came out of my mouth, like that of a wild boar ready to eat, mate, or furiously nap. I lunged for the box of Crunch Berries while the tiny female simultaneously grabbed it. Now that this box was up for debate, the girl’s father stepped in and also took hold of the prize.
“Alright, Rummy, it’s her birthday and she wants Crunch Berries so just let it go.”
“Rummy?” I thought to myself. I’m not drunk, I’m not a card game played by old ladies trying to kill time before they die, and I’m certainly not the former Secretary of Defense. At this point the little girl had cowered, along with her mother, behind her father and a rack of Nabisco cookies. Surely, even it was her birthday, which she had yet to verify, there I stood, not her, locked in tussle over a box of Crunch Berries.
I tried to explain that I really wanted these Crunch Berries, but he wouldn’t listen. I knew I wanted it more. The moment intensified and Little Miss Birthday Boo-Hoos started the waterworks. From there her father tapped into his reserves of pent up aggression, leftover, I’m assuming, from raising a child instead of doing what he wanted to do with his life.
His nostrils flared. He clenched his jaw. I could tell right then that was the incident he decided to take a stand on, you know, just to make sure that he is at least still in control of something in his life. I’m sorry, pal, I realize you’re going through a thing here, but, buddy, this is your Waterloo.
I released my grip and dropped my hands to my sides. Overly proud and a little surprised it hadn’t escalated, the dad took the box into both hands and admired it, like it was a trophy won through years of hard work and dedication.
There’s a reason pride is one of the seven deadly sins.
As he took that brief second to revel in his apparent victory, I took a swift step forward and knocked the box out of his hands onto the floor where I quickly scooped it up and bolted the other way down the aisle.
Enraged, he chased after me. From the looks of him he appeared to have been an athlete at one point in some very distant life that he was desperate to cling to. I rounded the corner, my bare feet gripping the linoleum like a rally car gripping a tight turn.
As he took the turn, his clumsy, dad loafers skidded across the floor as he lost his balance and slid into a table full of ice cream samples.
“Stay cool, dude,” I catch-phrased back to him while he shook his fist in disdain and then put, what I can only assume to be, a cyanide tablet in his mouth.
I hurdled a seeing-eye-dog. I didn’t need to; a couple was holding the man and his dog out of my path already, but, really, I just wanted to see if I could do it.
I tore into an open checkout lane and jumped into a slide down the rail of the conveyor belt. The cashier, oblivious and caring exactly as much as someone who is paid eight dollars an hour should care, took my exact change as I finished coasting down the railing before snapping her gum in a way that said “I had no idea I’d be this aroused at work today.” Don’t sleep on the champ, sweet cheeks.
I sprinted out the door and hopped onto my skateboard like I was some sort of cereal-obsessed Marty McFly. Huey Lewis And The News could have played over the scene: me valiantly riding away on my skateboard, Crunch Berries in tow, and that bitter little birthday bitch having to settle for those non-boxed, generic Crunch Berries that come in bags, like they’re weird milk in Canada.
Great empires fall, the brightest stars burn out, masterpieces fade, and minivan backseats inevitably become sticky, disgusting, and uninhabitable places. The enfilthment of a backseat is like erosion; a slow process, but, given the time, sediment from all regions will be deposited in the minivan’s backseat usually taking the form of spilled colas, spilled Kool-Aids, and spilled science fair projects.
You can’t fight the machine on this one. Like a moth to light, the backseat of any minivan is going to attract a certain level of nasty, stank trash-doody. Frankly, you’d be better off trying to get water to boil at sixty degrees Fahrenheit or tying to teach a mentally impaired horse how to read rather than trying to keep a minivan backseat clean. I realize it would still be near impossible to teach a non-mentally impaired horse to read, but it would be extra tough if the horse was, how should I say, wealthy in the chromosome department. I’m off topic, I don’t mean to debate the tenants of equine literacy, but, basically, what I’m trying to say is that it’s a pseudo-law that a minivan backseat will get disgusting.
If you’re not taking care of children currently because you never had kids, you’re kids abandoned you, or maybe they’re dead or something then I can safely assume that you’re not in the market for a minivan. But, for the experience, flashback to 1997—my mom, taking care of two kids who take up every spare minute of hers with bickering over watching Clarissa Explains it All or The Wonder Years, decided to purchase a 1997 Plymouth Voyager. Flash, swag, prestige—driving off the lot I can assure you the minivan had none of those qualities, and, somehow, had even less of those qualities years later when my mom sold the vehicle in exchange for a partially used gift card to Applebee’s.
The lack of resale value was not my mom’s fault. In fact, I distinctly remember wiping boogers on everything I touched in that van. I remember the time I started digging in the crevices of the seat only to discover a treasure trove of Jolly Ranchers and Skittles that were all fused together in a hair-covered, sugary cluster that was big enough to choke a dog. I put the wad back in the seat; knowing that it would be a fun surprise for someone else down the road. It didn’t stop there though, every vacation in which fast food was ingested over car rides resulted in a few rogue fries escaping into the seat folds and sodas being spilled in the cup holders thus creating sticky pools of syrup which were resistant to any cleaning attempt.
The field trips didn’t help. A seventh-grade trip to see an afternoon performance of the musical Grease turned sour after a fat, mean girl was assigned to ride with us. I mean, the knowledge of having a chubby child in your car is already going to hurt the resale value, but that wasn’t enough for Little Miss Two Mayonnaise Sandwiches For Lunch, no, even though we were leaving for the play right after lunch she still saw it necessary to bring a goodie bag filled with pretzels, Slim Jims, and Ring-Pops that she proceeded to hoard and munch on during the ten-minute ride to the show. In the spirit of Grease I won’t tell you more, tell you more anymore detail about this large mammal grazing in the backseat of said van, but the result of her presence was a half-eaten and melted Ring Pop jammed in the seat pocket, a bunch of wrappers in the storage compartment, and a streak on her seat that we all prayed was just chocolate.
The Kelly Blue Book rated the brown stain as “undesirably tragic” and proclaimed that it was certain to doom the re-sale value of the vehicle. By the end the person we sold the van to declared he would be selling it to the booming Detroit ashtray industry that would turn said minivan into several hundred trays for ash. A fitting afterlife for an existence spent being filled with garbage. And, akin a morbidly obese scuba diver dying after being mistook for a trophy fish and harpooned, it was a sad end to a sad life.
Hey, quick question, Hot Dog: how can you tell if someone doesn’t watch any television? Actually, it’s rather simple; for you see anyone who doesn’t watch TV will assuredly tell you right away how they don’t watch TV.
They lay in wait, like a conceited mountain lion, waiting for a moment to pounce as soon as someone mentions anything they watched on the tube. From there it’s a downhill ambush on the, now one-sided, conversation. Incredible, how suddenly a pedestrian discussion about how racist or incompetent Terry Bradshaw has become or speculation about The Office’s Jenna Fischer’s belly button depth can be instantly derailed in favor of them filibustering about how “they don’t have time for that inane chatter.”
Way to steal all the fun out of the conversation, you little fun-burglar. Hey, buddy, at least TV taught me not to interrupt until the commercial break, but you come in, on your high horse, touting your anti-television gospel. It should be noted I’m taking the liberty of assuming you’re interrupting my conversation while you are literally on the back of some unfortunate, drug-addicted equine.
However, non-sober stallion or not, I thought in the spirit of manners you shouldn’t impede my stimulating discourse about what I think Matt Lauer smells like on the air. It’s quite rude, and, to be honest, you don’t see me trying to change the subject when your going on an on about the donation you gave to the Humane Society, the charity fun run for fat-orphans with low self-esteem and Lou Gehrig’s disease you’re setting up, or how you insist on paying a carbon tax on everything you buy.
Lisa Frankly, I think carbon can pay it’s own taxes and if I’m going to help someone, besides myself, on their back taxes, the list starts and stops with Wesley Snipes. Further, I honestly think these fat orphans are the ones who could benefit from running more than you and the others who want to pat themselves on the back. Do I air these grievances? Nope, you don’t see me interrupting; I just keep keeping my mouth shut and continue to fantasize about hitting you with my car.
How incredibly fascinating you are; boy, to go through life not doing something the rest of us do. Your time must be so freed up from not watching television that you’re able to find time to read all the great philosophers, travel the world, and achieve self-actualization. You don’t see the rest of us bragging about not doing things; I wasn’t vaccinated, but you don’t see me prancing around all smug, clamoring about how great my immune system is for keeping me polio-free all these years.
Seriously, have we become so boring that we need to talk about the things that we don’t do to make conversation? I don’t tell you about how I don’t exploit children for cheap labor. I don’t tell you about how I don’t shoot up Vicodin mixed with barbecue sauce because I’ve heard great things about the smoky, smooth, yet flavorful and relaxed high it provides. I haven’t even broached the topic about how I’m not using my neighbor’s name and apartment address to commit mail fraud. Why haven’t I told you about said lack of mail fraud? Well, because it would be a lie, since I’m about six months into my personal best mail fraud caper. Sorry, humble brag!
My tribe of one has spoken and the verdict reads: we like television and we don’t like you. Don’t try to convert me; I’ve seen your side’s zealots and believe me when I say that I don’t like what they’re preaching. This adult baby likes his mouthwash mug full and his TV on during marathons of circus or funeral accidents. Call me old-fashioned, but that’s just how I am. Don’t try to tell me how green the grass is on the other side; the other side does not have a video of daughter in mourning discharging a barrage of thunderous farts during their eulogy that end up overshadowing not only their dead mom’s funeral, but their dead mom’s entire life.
