Pun in the sun

Hello and good morning, readers of my words. We are fully entrenched in mid-May, so if you live in a place in which there actually were April showers, I hope you're fully reaping the benefits of them by now. I'm in L.A., so my seasons are basically "sunny" and "why isn't it sunny?" Even as a life-long Californian, I find it funny when my fellow Angelinos complain about a couple of days in a row of temperatures in the 60s. (Hey, it looks like my name could be found in the word 'temperature.' That's almost interesting.) Ready for some random thoughts and observations for this Friday morning? Here goes:

God bless the internet. Oh sure, there's a very dark side of illegal and immoral activity that can spread to a larger population because of Al Gore's invention, but there are so many benefits. For now, I shall sing the praises of one Craig's List. Weeks back, my friend Dusty purchased Laker playoff tickets. Knowing full well that everyone would by trying to get them at the same moment, we strategized and went after Game 5 of the second round. All that needed to happen was for the Lakers to win in the first round and not sweep in the second in order for us to go. When the second round schedule finally got set, Game 5 coincided with concert tickets that my lovely wife and I had purchased a while back. Naturally, I wanted to do both of these things, and we turned to Craig's List. I asked if anyone had tickets to the other night of the concert and wanted to swap with ours. Since they were general admission tickets, we didn't have to worry about pricing or seating differences. Sure enough, within a short amount of time, a young lady wrote and said that the second night was better for her. We met up in a supermarket parking lot, exchanged tickets, and wished each other well. Ta-dah! I ended up truly having my cake and eating it too, seeing a kick-ass concert and then hurting my throat as I screamed the Lakers on to victory. Here's what gets me about this whole thing: where else in the world is a service provided that helps people come together without anyone making money off of it? Craig's List is not only free to people like me who want to post or reply to something, but there isn't even any advertising on it. As a consumer, I would gladly accept ads on the site to support it since I'm getting all of the benefits for free. Maybe I'm just jaded by how overly capitalistic everything has become, but the fact that the site doesn't make any money just blows my mind. Craig, thank you. You helped me have a very fun week of events.

News flash: Jokes aren't funny when you have to explain them. Shocking, I know. As I've mentioned before in this space, I did some improv comedy for a couple of years when I was considerably younger. One of the most important aspects of being in an improv scene is knowing when to swallow a funny line you have if the timing's not right. It's very difficult, but if it doesn't fit there, let it go. I know this, and I try to apply it to my everyday humor as well. I even scoff at people who don't do this, since I'm a card-carrying humor snob and all. The thing is, I failed miserably earlier this week. I was standing in my boss's office with a few others, and he said that he was meeting someone named Dennis later. I immediately made some connection in my head to Dennis sounding like "dentist," because that's what I do. (I also immediately jump to a hilarious "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" scene with someone called Dennis, but that's not relevant here.) Then, my boss said that his meeting would be at 2:30. My brain made the requisite "dentist" and "tooth-hurty" connection, and it wanted my mouth to share it with others. I had a quick second thought, which was something like, "But they don't know you think of dentists when that name comes up, so this won't make any sense." It was too late. What followed was an awkward exchange with a bunch of "kindas" and "ya knows." After the stumbling explanation was completed, my co-worker Rob said that he actually would've found that funny if it hadn't needed the accompanying explanation. Hey, look at that: you can't spell "comedy hypocrite" without Peter.

Ah, let's talk about friends for a minute, shall we? There are many kinds of friends and ways in which to categorize them. For right now, I shall make two large categories: Ones who find out what you dislike and try to avoid said annoyance, and ones who find out what you dislike and make it their goal to include said annoyance in every possible aspect of your relationship because they think it's funny when you get all pissed off. My good friends Dave and Dusty are in the latter group. If they know that I'm waiting for them to meet me somewhere, they'll send me a text message saying they're running twice as late as they actually are. Why? Because they want me to be upset and angry; that's funny to them. I have an old and a new example of what I'm talking about.

My group of friends went and saw "Dude, Where's My Car?" when it came out years ago. My best guess as to why we'd go to that movie in the first place is that we were in a phase where we really enjoyed horrible movies. "John Carpenter's Vampires" would come on and we'd watch the entire thing, even if that was the third time that day. We grew out of that phase, quite fortunately. In any case, I hated the movie. One three-second part made me laugh, and that was it. Much worse, one aspect of the movie infuriated me. The screenwriter was trying incredibly hard to add a new slang term to my generation's vocabulary. The main characters said that everything cool was "shibby," and they said it over and over and over again. I told my friends how angry that made me, especially since it was a stupid word that had no chance of catching on. Naturally, they've spent the last seven or eight years saying "shibby" or the modified "shib" about everything. Man I hate my best friends sometimes.

The other example is a very recent one. I'm actually coming around to liking this, which will completely foil their plans. They know how I feel about "PIN number" and "ATM machine," so they want to say as many of those redundancies around me as possible. A week or so ago, Dave said, "LOL out loud!" to me. He's also asked me, "What the wtf?" Instead of being monumentally irked by this, I actually find it funny (since they're doing it on purpose) and have tried coming up with some of my own. I've used "For your FYI" (which I've heard used in real life), and I'm going to work in "FBI investigation" sometime soon. Hey, that sounds way too good; have I said that one unknowingly in the past? Yikes, I may have. "An ongoing FBI investigation" sounds very normal, unless you say, "An ongoing Federal Bureau of Investigation investigation." I have to think more about that one, because even though it puts the same word together twice, we can't use "an FBI" as an investigation (a la the "M" in ATM and "N" in PIN). Ya know, nevermind. That one is fine and correct even though it sounds redundant. My bad. I'll think of more. As soon as ASAP.

My favorite brother called me after hearing an ad for some car rental company. Their phone number was 1-800-RENTACAR. He heard that, realized that the final R was unnecessary, and wanted my thoughts on what else that could be. My first thoughts were 1-800-RENTACAMEL and 1-800-RENTACALIFORNIAHOOKER. Someone in need of a hockey teammate might dial 1-800-RENTACANADIAN and be unpleasantly accosted with descriptions of full-coverage insurance. Playing around a little with the letters on each button, if someone dialed 1-800-SENTBACK in hopes of reaching a rebate or customer service center, they would unfortunately be asked about their desire to upgrade to the luxury sedan instead.

And now, the segment that none of the kids in the neighborhood are talking about: Car Watch!

I saw a license plate that read, "GD KDS." I had several thoughts about what this could be. I suppose the most logical interpretation would be simply, "Good kids." However, my very first thought was "God Damn Kids," said in the voice of an old crusty neighbor whose geraniums had just been accidentally smushed by an errant basketball. It could be "God Kids," either saying "We are all God's children" or "God is a practical joker." So many blasphemous possibilities, so little time.

My homey Rockabye saw a license plate frame that I understand but refuse to support: "My Saturn is better than Uranus." Yes, I understand the pun they're making, but it just doesn't make any sense once you strip that layer away. Seriously, tell me, Saturn driver, how exactly is your car better than that planet? It's not even a case of comparing apples and oranges because at least those two are both kinds of fruit. Your car is more accessible to you than Uranus, I'll give you that, but it's just a stupid comparison to make. How many similar objects are there to your car that you know of? And how many similar planets? Ooh, you're so moded. Just to make sure I don't lose sight of the pun (since that's the only reason for the frame at all), I want to go on record and say that I actually prefer my anus to your car as well. So there.

Last but certainly not least, Rockabye also sent in this bumper sticker: "Make salads, not war." I never knew that was a viable alternative. All this time, instead of the exorbitant cost and loss of life associated with war, we could've been knee deep in greens, veggies, and maybe some assorted Italian meats or garbanzo beans. Oh the possibilities! (Hey, I made salads at an Italian restaurant for a couple of years and then at another place for a week. I chose that over war, and I'm damn proud of that, even if I did it unknowingly. Where's my Nobel Peace Prize?)

Ok folks, I've had enough jibber-jabber for a week. Before I depart, I want to wish a very happy birthday to my good friend Lisa today. Also, a happy early anniversary to our friends Jesse and Danielle, and a happy early dentist appointment to me. (It's not at 2:30 though. Damn, I totally should've interrupted my workday for a mildly humorous pun. Next time.) Have a glorious weekend and week, my peeps. As always, please email me at ptklein@gmail.com with anything about anything. I like the attention. Shaloha to you all.