FUF #40

Good morning. If this post magically appeared in the middle of the Broadway version of "Jesus Christ Superstar," the actors might get confused and ask, "What's the FUF, tell me what's a-happening, what's the FUF, tell me what's a-happening." I would then explain to them that I don't know how to FUF them.

Yes, friends, it's another Follow Up Friday, and I'm here to FU. I'm warming up my fingers to dive into some items that are loosely related to old posts, other items that I just feel like writing about, and then the magical world of the Car Watch. I hope you took your Dramamine, 'cause this ride's about to get rocky.

If I can do math correctly (and studies have shown that I can't), then yesterday's post was my 250th. To quote Chazz Michael Michaels from "Blades of Glory," that number is "mindbottling." I truly never expected to come within 240 of that number, so I guess it's fair to say that I think about a lot of stuff.

In yesterday's post, I wrote about my overseeing of the magazine section of my high school yearbook. I found another feature in there that I had forgotten about: "People We Never Knew Were Related." All I did was find funny (or strange) pairings of people with the same last name and print them. Here were my favorites:

Axl/Pete Rose
Karl/Groucho Marx
Homer/O.J. Simpson
Nolan/Meg Ryan
Rodney/Stephen King
Bruce/Robert E. Lee
George/Denzel Washington
Pope John/Ru Paul
Ben/Aretha Franklin

I signed it as Peter "Calvin" Klein as a final ba-dum-ching! I would think that Klein was commonly known enough that the references to Calvin would have died out by now, but I still get it fairly often. "Any relation to Calvin?" they'll ask. Depending on my mood, I'll either answer with a terse "No" or say, "Nope, though that wouldn't be too bad." I've been tempted to answer affirmatively one of those times, but it hasn't happened yet. "Yes, and my mom is Anne Klein. Kevin Kline, the actor, is my brother but spells it differently to be funny, and Henry Winkler's character of Coach Klein in 'The Waterboy' is my uncle." That would probably elicit a response in the realm of, "Geez, sorry I asked."

By a show of hands, how many of you remember what Auto-Followers are from several months ago? Oh good! For the uninitiated, those are words like "scantily" that always seem to precede one word and one word only. I found a new one, and it's definitely a Class 1 Auto-Follower in my book: ulterior. I'm proud of that one, and it's going on the Post-It on the inside cover of my planner with the rest of the good ones.

I was in the Coffee Bean awaiting my iced coffee (half regular, half decaf) when a man walked up to the register. "I'd like a small Colombian," he said. Out of the side of my mouth, I said to my co-worker Rob, "I sure hope he's talking about a coffee drink." I realize now that I could've made a funnier joke referring to either Angelina Jolie or Madonna, but it's probably too late. What's the secret to timing? Comedy! Damn, I screwed that one up too.

And now, put your hands together for this week's edition of the Car Watch. Seriously, put your damn hands together. I hardly ever ask you for anything; is that really so difficult that you can't just do that to make me happy? Thank you, I appreciate the effort.

RighterLady, still my favorite reader from the Garden State, wrote in saying that she saw a plate that read "ONE MSM." She claimed that neither she nor her husband could figure out its message, but I find that hard to believe. It's so clearly "One More Sausage, Ma'am" that she must just be pulling my leg.

I saw a plate the read "2 LYFF." That's not blogworthy on its own, but the license plate frame brought it to that level. It read, "It Says...To Life." Here's an idea, if you have to twist what you want to say so much that you're unsure if people will understand it unless you quite literally spell it out for them, maybe you should choose something else. I guess "TO LIFE," "2 LIFE," and "LCHAIM" were already taken.

Quite similarly, my friend Greg called me to say he saw a plate that read, "SWTHRKY." After he and his girlfriend Ceil tried figuring it out for a while (Southwest Thurkey? Sweat Her Key?), they got close enough to see it say that it was in loving memory of "Sweet Horky." And that brings the grand total of people I've heard of named Horky to a whopping one.

I was walking with my co-worker Rob last Friday when I saw a plate that read, "TGIF 01." I was very pleased to see that, because it's only accurate one-seventh of the time and I happened to catch it then. Go me!

I saw a bumper sticker that was so classy it just had to be included: "Get off my ass or I'll fart." Unfortunately, I was behind him trying to get onto the freeway in traffic, so I just had to cross my fingers.

My homey Rockabye saw a plate that read, "DUK DSY." He was confused that it wasn't the other way around to refer to Daisy Duke from "The Dukes of Hazard" and short shorts fame. I feel compelled to remind him that Jessica Simpson played that character in the movie version, and she would probably find nothing wrong with that license plate whatsoever.

My lovely wife saw a license plate frame that she forwarded on to me: "Dr. Dr." on top and "The Mental Dental" on top. It's either someone with a PhD in Psychology and a DDS degree or Steve Martin from "Little Shop of Horrors."

Lastly, my favorite brother called to tell me that there was a car with lights on top behind him that looked like a police car. When it passed him, he saw that it said, "Postal Police" on its side. The Post Office has its own police department? Why? "Sir, back away from the envelope. That zip code is illegible and it is highly unstable." In all seriousness, does anyone know why this exists? More importantly, are they hiring?

Have a great weekend, mis amiguitos. I'll be back here on Monday for more of the inane things that jostle their way to the front of my brain. Please remember to write to ptklein@gmail.com with anything at all. Shaloha, homepeople.