Break Up With Your Reanimated Boyfriend Day!

You tried dating for a little while after your boyfriend died, but most of the guys you met were jerkoffs. So you spent a few weeks descending into the mad sciences of reanimation (you can take a course online) and you perfected the technology to bring your boyfriend back to life.

Now that he's back, you're glad to not have to sleep alone anymore, but after a few nights you started remembering all the things that bugged you about him (the way he picks his toenails in the bathroom with the door open, the way he'd occasionally try to make a story funnier by talking in "black voice") and there are a whole bunch of new things he does that bug you now that he's returned from the dead (when the black pus leaks from his eye sockets he likes lick it off his fingertip, and also his legs are really stiff so you have to wheel him around on a handtruck whenever you want to go out to dinner). You're realizing that you painted him in kind of a rosey light when he was dead, and now you're regretting having reanimated his corpse. It's time to break the news to him.

"I don't think we should see each other anymore," say to him.

"It's all right," he'll say, shocking you with his instant understanding. "I'm grateful that you took the time to bring me back to the living, but you deserve better than a guy who feels spontaneous electric currents pulsing through his limbs, causing him to thrash about with great force."

"Wow," you'll say. "You are just...such a great guy. I was really worried--"

Just then one of those pulses of electricity will cause his right arm to swing out wide, knocking your head off of your neck as easily as if you were a plastic doll. He will mourn you briefly, then he will trudge off to a castle and wait to be hunted for having popped the head off of a pretty young girl.

Happy Break Up With Your Reanimated Boyfriend Day!

Corporate Dennis Day!

Everyone in town hates Corporate Dennis because the only thing Corporate Dennis cares about is the bottom line. As far as Corporate Dennis is concerned, things like the arts and charity and loving one another should be considered hobbies that you try and squeeze in on your free time if you have it. Corporate Dennis isn’t interested in anything that can’t be monetized, which is why you’re so ashamed to have gone back to his place with him last weekend, and why you’re doubly ashamed to have allowed him to come over to your place when he called you late last night.

Right now Corporate Dennis is sitting in the chair by your bedroom window staring at you, still under your blankets. What are we doing he’s asking you. There’s nothing about you and me that benefits either of us financially.

Shrug your naked shoulders and tell Corporate Dennis you don’t want it to continue between you two, but you also don’t want him to do anything else but crawl back under the covers and make you feel the way he made you feel last night.

I feel it too is what Corporate Dennis is telling you right now. I don’t see the point in anything but putting my lips on your skin. I don’t want to go anywhere except inside of you.

I hate you, tell Corporate Dennis. I blame you for everything that’s wrong with this country. I get excited when I hear about bad things happening to you.

And yet Corporate Dennis is asking you.

And yet I want you to chew me up and leave nothing left Corporate Dennis.

Corporate Dennis is back in your bed now, and he’s asking are we a metaphor for capitalism and its nefarious effect on even the purest of souls?

No, tell Corporate Dennis. We’re just a girl and a boy in a bed in a room.

Happy Corporate Dennis Day!

The Mission To Find Out What Happened Up There Day!

Your father was an astronaut, one of the ones who went up in a rocket but when he came back he was someone else. Same body, same face, different Daddy. You're certain of it.

"He was one of the best," the head of NASA will say to you during your interview today. "Any child of your father will always have a home at NASA."

Tell the head of NASA that the reason you've decided to become an astronaut is to go out there into space and find whatever it is out there that changed your Daddy into the blank xerox copy of the man that got sent back home.

The head of NASA will nod his head. "You aren't the first. In fact, there's a whole shuttle mission being staffed up with nothing but kids of astronauts who want to find the alien sons of bitches who sent their parents home full of static and dead stares. We want you on board."

The head of NASA will hand you a contract that says you want to sign on for The Mission To Find Out What Happened Up There.

You'll give the contract a quick read. "But you're sending us up there to wipe them out. Not to bring back. Not to study."

The head of NASA will say, "Of course." But he'll look away when he does because he doesn't want you to guess that the only reason you're being sent into space is because the beings who changed your Daddy and all the other Daddies aren't up there in the cosmos, they're RIGHT HERE IN THE NASA OFFICE BUILDING BECAUSE NASA IS RUN BY ALIENS! Also, once you're out of the Earth's orbit they're going to pump a gas into your craft that murders you all in a few breaths. You can't fight NASA, kiddo.

You Stink Of Tears Day!

Today your cubicle mate is going to lean in close to you and jokingly wave his hand in front of his nose.

“Pew!” he’ll say. “Smells like tears over here.”

“Sorry Larry,” you’ll say to him. You’ll start crying again.

Larry will put his hand on your shoulder. Then your upper back. He’ll rub his palm on your upper back, like your mother used to.

“Is it because you confessed your love to me on Friday, and I said that it could never work out between us, but then I kissed you anyway and we went to your place and had sex all night Friday and all day Saturday, then on Sunday I said that I still don’t think it will work out between us, but I hope we can still share a cubicle. Then on Sunday night I called you and said to come over to my place, which took you ninety minutes and two trains. Then after we had sex I told you it still won’t work out between us and I’d like you to go, and so you had to go back out into the cold in the middle of the night and wait an hour for the first of your two trains to arrive, only so that you could go home and call me over and over again, leaving me voicemails that I deleted without listening.”

“You didn’t listen to my voicemails?” you’ll ask.

“Pssh, hell no,” Larry will say.

You’ll decide right then and there that Larry’s not worth your tears. You’ll stop crying, get up from your desk, march into your boss’s office and quit. The job market being what it is you won’t work again until 2013.

Happy You Stink Of Tears Day!

Meet Her By The Fandango Ticketing Machines Day!

She said she has a husband and a daughter and she can’t just give them up for some torrid affair with a man she met on the train. She said she has to get you out of her life, that she has to cut it off, once and for all, because you’re all she can think about and it’s time for her to think about her family again. She said it has to be goodbye, that she can’t go on with the lunchtime hotel rooms and the lies about working late. She said it’s over.

“If that’s really your decision, I’ll respect it,” you said. ”But if you change your mind, tomorrow evening you can find me at the Sony Loews Cinerama Dome Stadium 28 where I’ll be seeing Faster starring Dwayne Johnson. If when you wake up in the morning you still want it to be over, I’ll never contact you again. But if tomorrow you find you’ve changed your mind, meet me at the Sony Loews Cinerama Dome by the Fandango ticketing machines in the lobby at 7:10 PM. The movie starts at 7:40 and I like to get there a half-hour early to get good seats.”

She said she means it, it’s over, and you’re going to be seeing that movie by yourself tomorrow.

“I wouldn’t be able to make it through the night if I believed that,” you told her. ”I already bought two tickets. When I get to the theater tomorrow, I’m going to buy two Dasanis, two Dove Brand Cream Pops, and two trays of Nacho Cheese Hot Pretzel Bites. Meet me there. Meet me by the Fandango ticketing machines.”

She told you to stop it. Stop tempting her. You grabbed her by her shoulders, the both of you in tears.

“Meet me there!” you shouted. ”Meet me by the Fandango ticketing machines! I love you too much to let you walk away from happiness like this. Tomorrow you are going to go to the Sony Loews Cinerama Dome Stadium 28 and you are going to meet me by the Fandango ticketing machines no later than 7:10 PM and you and I are going to see Faster starring Dwayne Johnson. Do you hear me you beautiful little girl?”

She shook her head no.

“Meet me there,” you said.

She shook her head no.

“Meet me there,” you said one last time.

It’s 7:18. You can feel the Nacho Cheese Hot Pretzel Bites getting cold. The Dove Brand Cream Pops are turning to mush. You wish that the theater were more crowded, that there might be too many faces gathered around the Fandango ticketing machines for you to be sure. But you’ve studied every face, and none of them are hers.

You drop her Nacho Cheese Hot Pretzel Bites into a garbage bin, along with both of the Dove Brand Cream Pops. You take one last look around the lobby. The area surrounding the Fandango ticketing machines is desolate, as if the other moviegoers knew the area had been reserved for heartbreak. You consider throwing away her ticket as well, but you decide to hang onto it. The last thing to remember her by, a movie ticket she refused to claim.

You make your way to the up escalator. It’s blocked by a suitcase.

Her hand is still on the handle. She’s smiling at you through tears. You take the suitcase from her. You take it because you’re worried if you don’t, she’ll change her mind and run back outside.

“I’m afraid I threw away one of the trays of Nacho Cheese Hot Pretzel Bites,” you say to her.

“Then we’ll just have to share,” she says.

You rise. The escalator carries you. You float higher and higher, fleeing the world below, so that you can begin your life together in Theater 12 for the 7:40 screening of Faster starring Dwayne Johnson.

Happy Meet Her By The Fandango Ticketing Machines Day!

Find A Reason, Any Reason Day!

Maybe it's because you got messed up when you were a kid after your adoptive mom met your biological dad and fell in love with him and then your adoptive dad hooked up with your biological mom but they realized it was just a vengeance boff so it didn't work out. Or perhaps someone locked you in a locker for twelve minutes when you were in middle school. Whatever the reason is, you need to find it today. Might be that you need a reason to finally say "you know what, fuck this" to the Clown College T.A. you've been banging for a grade bump on your mid-term, or maybe you're looking for a reason to finally write that letter to Richard Roeper telling him how much he got wrong in his review of "Faster." No one cares what you need the reason for, we're just rooting for you to find one. It's rare in life that anyone gets to behave in a manner that is 100% justified, but we think you can be the first. Get back in therapy. You need a hand with this.

Happy Find A Reason, Any Reason Day!

Your Son Joined A Rock Band Day!

They're in the driveway waiting to take him away to the life of rock n roll.

"Let me talk to them," say.

Go outside and approach the coolest one in the band, the one with the longest feathers dangling from his ear ring.

"Do you all do drugs?" you'll ask.

The rock band member will say yes.

"When you do drugs, will you keep an eye on my son to make sure he doesn't do too many?"

The rock band member will shrug and say he guesses.

"I assume there are girls in that van," say to him.

He'll raise his hand for you to high-five him. Do so.

"Any of them dead?"

The rock band member will shrug and say he's no doctor.

"If my son ever has sex with a girl and she dies, will you help him get rid of the body? Help him hide it in the drop ceiling of a hotel room?"

The rock band member will say they have an agreement. You have sex with it and it dies, it's your responsibility.

"So you believe in responsibility," say to him. "That makes me feel more comfortable."

The other band members will stop playing air guitar and air keyboards so that they can set fire to your recycling containers. Watch the blaze rise and know that there's nothing you can do.

"Rock n roll," say.

"Rock n roll," the rock band member will concur.

Turn to your son. "You're 14 now. I can't tell you what to do anymore. This seems like a rock band you can trust. I give you my blessing."

Say goodbye and hug him to your chest. His fishnet top will get caught in the buttons of your shirt. You and your son will laugh. The last time you'll laugh together, because rock n roll is going to change him. Rock n roll changes everybody in the end.

Happy Your Son Joined A Rock Band Day!

Start Collecting Your Teardrops In A Jar Day!

If you start collecting your tears in a jar then one day you'll be able to tie someone who's made you cry to a chair and pour the jar of tears down his or her throat so that he or she can literally choke on your tears. Make sure when you pour the jar of tears down the person's throat that you pour it really fast to ensure that they'll choke. If they manage to just swallow your tears, that's a sign of strength or resolve or something, and all this collecting your tears in a jar stuff will have been for no other reason than to make the person who made you cry feel good about him or herself. Though, the "swallow my tears" thing is usually about swallowing your own tears. Swallowing someone else's tears just means you managed not to choke when someone poured a jar of tears down your throat.

This making someone choke on your tears thing is worrisome. Just start collecting your tears in a jar (do it by crying over an open jar!) then when the time comes maybe we'll just have you throw it in someone's face or pour it down the waistband of their sweatpants or something.

Happy Start Collecting Your Teardrops In A Jar Day!

The Ballerina With The Terrible Father Day!

You are the ballerina with the terrible father, the father who yells and did the hitting in the house before Mom got away. He's the father that the neighbors shake their heads about when they hear the yelling and the drinking. You find your escape in grace.

"Such grace," says one of the dozens of ballet critics watching you float like a feather on your show's big opening night. You're the star of the ballet about the kitchen utensil that comes to life but instead of murdering the whole town it dances.

"You know hers is the terrible father," says the other ballet critic.

"She clearly finds her escape in grace," the first ballet critic says except now he's getting shushed because shut up!

Everything will seem to be going smoothly until your terrible father makes a racket in the lobby then shoves his way past some ushers and into the aisle of the theater. He'll stumble down toward the stage shouting about how beautiful you are and how beautiful your mother was and how they all escape into some kind of grace or other in the end. You'll pause in your dance long enough to catch his drift, then you'll lock your eyes with his and you'll get up on your toes and here it comes, the dance that says everything to Daddy that you never ever could've said with words, the dance that with every bounce and jump and kick-ball-change (what's ballet?) tells Daddy you're angry and you're sorry and you wish it could have been better for him and you and mom but this is it for you two, you're done with all of it.

You will dance and the terrible father will weep with fallen shoulders in the aisle and everyone will say “we were there when a peace was made between a father and his little girl. They might never speak again, but only because her feet already said everything that needed saying and man we had great seats.”

Happy The Ballerina With The Terrible Father Day!

The True Meaning Of Thanksgiving Day!

On the day you discovered the true meaning of Thanksgiving, you woke up at the bottom of a 20-foot pit dug into the floor of a basement. You were naked, the rocks underneath you were cold, and there was a bucket on a rope descending down toward you.

The bucket was being lowered by a man in a burlap mask leaning over the top of the pit. When you asked him why he was doing this to you, he stopped lowering the bucket so that he could lift his burlap mask to reveal the most disfigured, disgusting face you’ve ever seen. Then he continued lowering the bucket.

When the bucket finally landed beside you, you were terrified to see what was inside. Was it lotion to rub on yourself? Acid to throw at your face so you could look like him? You kept your hands over your eyes while the man at the top yelled wordlessly. Then he threw something down at you.

It was a salt shaker.

When you finally looked inside the bucket, you saw a plate overflowing with turkey, stuffing, cranberries, sweet potatoes, the biggest most abundant thanksgiving plate you ever laid eyes on.

You looked up and saw the man had lifted his mask just enough to free his mouth, and he was eating from a plate of his own.

You realized then that you’d only been kidnapped and dropped into that pit because this man was lonely, and he knew that the only way he could avoid another Thanksgiving by himself was to dig a twenty foot pit and trap someone he'd abducted inside it, forcing them to have dinner with him.

You lifted the plate from the bucket and began devouring the food. You had never eaten anything so delicious. Looking back, you're not sure if it was the food you were tasting, or the togetherness, the joy of knowing that just by being there at the bottom of that pit, you made someone feel a little better on Thanksgiving day.

“Happy Thanksgiving!” you shouted up at the man.

“RRRHGHHHA RGGHA RGHHHA RGHHA,” he shouted back.

When you finished your plate, you asked the man if you could have your clothes back. That's when he started dropping bugs on you and he ordered you to masturbate while he watched or else there'd be more bugs. You did what he said, because you didn't want the bugs. It's been many years now since your first Thanksgiving in the pit, and every day you do disgusting things to yourself so the man at the top of the pit will save you from the bugs. You've come to love this man, not just because he's the one who decides whether you get the bugs or whether you don't deserve the bugs, but because he's the one who, all those years ago, taught you the true meaning of Thanksgiving, which is togetherness.

Happy The True Meaning Of Thanksgiving Day!

Vegan Stephen Day!

Today Vegan Stephen is going to pound on your door and beg you to let him in. You'll hear a mob outside in the street. Voices. Angry voices.

"I need a place to hide," Vegan Stephen will say.

"Are you that vegan?" you'll ask.

"It's a personal dietary choice! Let me in dammit!"

"It upsets me," you'll say. "When I found out you were vegan, I was kind of pissed. Why don't you just eat what I eat?"

Vegan Stephen will pull a wad of cash form his pocket. "Do you want money? Is that it? I'll give you money if that's what you want!"

"Vegan money? God no."

You'll hear pounding on the front door of your building. The people chasing Vegan Stephen are getting closer.

"Jesus Christ, do you know who's down there?" Vegan Stephen will plead. "Do you have any idea what they'll do if they find me?"

"Like, if it was your birthday and I baked you a cake, would you refuse to eat it just because it had some milk and eggs in it?"

"And butter! Yes! Save me, please!"

You'll consider it. "Jesus, butter too. I hadn't thought about that. It just seems like you're trying to call me a terrible person by living this way."

The first door to the vestibule will come off its hinges and you'll hear them pounding at the second door with their shoulders. They'll be on the stairs soon.

"They're after me because I found out something about the police, something that threatens us all! They want to silence me! I'll do anything if you just let me in."

Tell Vegan Stephen that you want him to eat a piece of bacon. If he eats a piece of bacon, you'll protect him. He'll agree and you'll let him in. While you're cooking bacon, he'll crack you over the head with your fireplace poker, run downstairs and open the front door to let in all the vegans outside who were only pretending to be a bloodthirsty mob. While you bleed on the floor, they'll rob your apartment of all of its possessions, then they'll look inside your refrigerator and judge you.

You trusted a vegan and look what happened. Look at what happens when you trust Vegan Stephen.

Happy Vegan Stephen Day!

The Boyfriend Pact Day!

You and your girlfriends have made a pact that you're all going to have steady boyfriends by the end of your senior year. It's going to be a fun, crazy time as you and your friends go on date after date with geek after geek, trying to decide how low you'll go to make sure you honor your pact and score yourselves a boyfriend.

Janice will end up with Greg, a kid on JV lacrosse.
Megan will end up with Joey, an asthmatic who's sweet behind those glasses.
Louise will end up with Keith, her chem lab partner who it turns out is secretly a really good website designer. He's gonna make something of himself.
Gina will end up with Walter. Walter's the class treasurer and he's had a crush on Gina since junior high.
You'll end up with Gina's dad. It just happened. He gets breakfast at the diner where you've been waitressing to pay the bills ever since your Dad went to Iraq. Gina's Dad is leaving his wife for you and Gina's furious. The other girls are on her side. Janice still hangs out with you sometimes, but you're pretty sure she just reports back to Gina what you tell her about you and her dad.

He's really good to you. And you like making him happy. You're 18, an adult, it's your life and your heart and you never expected to hang onto your high school friends forever. At least when you're standing alone at graduation, and you see Gina's dad smiling at you from the stands with nothing but love in his eyes, you can take comfort in the fact that no matter who you ended up hurting, you honored your end of the boyfriend pact.

Happy The Boyfriend Pact Day!

The History Of Melanie Day!

Your Dad and Mom have sat everyone down in the living room to tell them about this girl Melanie again.

"No one ever mattered so much to us," Mom says. "Not even you kids."

"You kids owe your life to Melanie," says Dad.

"If we hadn't both fallen for her so deeply," Mom continues. "We wouldn't have felt the need to be together, to be with someone else who understands how wonderful Melanie was. That's really the only basis for our love. We share a love of Melanie."

"One day you'll have kids too," says Dad. "And you'll realize that as much as you care about them, you can't help but care just a little bit more about this girl you dated for a few weeks in college."

"I dated her for seven weeks and four days," Mom jumps in. "Your father only dated her for three weeks."

Dad gets up and storms off, slamming the bedroom door behind him. You know he only went in there to pull out the box of photos of Melanie and he's laying on his back with the photos spread over his chest like a blanket made out of the days when it was still possible to believe he deserved a girl like her.

"It all started when Melanie came running into the lobby of my dorm to escape from the rain," Mom says. She tears up when she talks about the shape of Melanie's right breast which, as you've heard a million times, was slightly more oblong than her left.

"We stayed in bed for two days," Mom continues. "In a way, I'm still in that bed. Under those covers, feeling her bare stomach against my own. In my mind, I've never left that bed. When I married your father, saying I do, my thoughts were in bed with Melanie. When I was giving birth to you kids, with every pant and push, I imagined Melanie's breath mingling with my own. Her breath smelled like apples. Always apples."

She goes on and on like that, not even thinking about signing the bank papers. Just looking back on every milestone. Your first day of kindergarten. Your high school and college graduations. Your own wedding to your husband of seven years. During all of those special momentous occasions...

"I felt Melanie's lips against the skin of my neck," Mom says.

"But something about Mom must have been lacking, and she saw something in me that filled that void," Dad says from the doorway. He's come back out, his cheeks wet with tears.

"I only started dating your father to find out why Melanie left me for him," Mom says. "I'm still not sure."

Ask them once more if they're ready to sign the bank papers. The house sold a week ago and the buyers are wondering why they haven't received the notarized documents yet.

"What if Melanie's looking for us?" Mom says.

"We've had the same address for forty years," says Dad. "What if the day after we move, she finally decides to contact us again, and tell us which one of us she loved more?"

Get angry and make them sign. They'll do as you say, and they'll move out a week later. Not twelve hours after they've left their home, Melanie will arrive on the doorstep, looking forward to seeing faces she hasn't seen in so many years. She'll knock on the door, but there won't be an answer. She'll knock again. And once more. Then Melanie will peer through the window and see that the floors are bare. She'll know she's too late, and she'll get back into her car to go visit this couple she dated for a few months in grad school (MFA in Art History).

Happy The History Of Melanie Day!

Drug Dealing Nuns Day!

You're the Mother Superior of a nunnery that's about to be shut down by the city because your nunnery is behind on the rent and the city wants to build more bowling alleys. You need to come up with thousands of dollars very quick.

"We have no choice," you'll tell the bunch of nuns you have to see like every fucking day. "We need to sell drugs."

The nuns will faint. When they wake up, they'll ask, first, if they made a mistake going the nun route since it was either this or roadie-ing Lilith Fair and at least at Lilith Fair you don't have to dress in a glorified burka. Then they'll remember why they fainted and they'll ask if you're serious about selling drugs.

"We have no choice," you'll tell them. "We have to think of the kids. If we get shut down those kids will have no one to teach them Sunday School. It's for the kids."

"But who will we sell the drugs to?" the nuns will ask.

"The kids," you'll say.

The kids will love the drugs you sell them and you won't be able to re-up your supply fast enough. Sunday School will be a little chaotic since all of the pre-teens and young teens you teach will be on the floor high off their asses. As the kids get more addicted, raise the price on the drugs. Raise it just a little bit, but not so much that they'll go out to the street for cheaper stuff. Little kids can usually be counted on for the comeback when they find the right high.

When you've sold enough drugs to the kids to pay your rent, throw a little party telling them all that your convent isn't going to be shut down and Sunday School will continue without any interruption. The kids will ask what this means as regards them buying more drugs from you. Tell them there won't be any more drugs and then hit their hands with rulers until they kick their habits. All but two of the kids will kick. Those two will become prostitutes.

Happy Drug Dealing Nuns Day!

PS: I think I'm moving this blog over to tumblr. Make a note or something.

Ferry Murder Day!

Today you're going to be late for work because there's going to be another ferry murder. The lights will go out by the interior snack bar, and when they come back on the snack bar clerk will be dead. Written in his blood will be the letters P.F.

"Nobody leaves the ferry until we know who did it," the captain will announce. "Sorry, transit authority rules."

For the next four hours you'll float still in the middle of the river as a retired private detective, who just happened to be on board, engages you all in a game of cat and mouse, trying to suss out from each of your whether you had the motive, the weaponry, the appropriate temperature of blood in your veins. Though you were all told to stay together, you'll one by one wander off into other parts of the ferry where you'll be found murdered too.

Late tonight, after all of the questions have been asked and all of the brandy has been drunk, all but one of you will be dead. The one who is still alive is named Paul Frank. That's right, the Paul Frank. The one who puts the monkeys on his clothes. He'll steer the boat into dock, and he'll step onto shore to accept his new fame as the fashion designer who killed more people on water than any other fashion designer in history (behind Sergio Valente, Gloria Vanderbilt, and whoever was the guy who dreamed up those Ocean Pacific tee shirts because that guy killed a lot of people).

Happy Ferry Murder Day!

Love House Day!

You can hear Randy upstairs punching the wall behind his bed and screaming the name Marsha, the love of his life, the one who said no.

You can hear Louie in the room next door scratching against the wall as he writes the name Patty in his own blood.

You can hear Janine downstairs pacing the ground floor, dining room, living room, kitchen and back, as she tries to walk Darren's name out of her head.

Can they hear you? Can they tell by the sounds you're making that you're packing all your things into a couple of bags. Will they hear you crawl through the window and down the roof, tossing your bags to the lawn. Will they hear you drop to the ground below and take off running for a new place to live, one that doesn't remind you with every creak and footstep that you've never been in love?

"I tried," you told your roommates one night long ago, back when you were still able to talk about it, before it got embarrassing. "I drink a lot when I'm around people. But I still never seem to let anyone in."

"Sometimes it takes more than drinking to lower your defenses," Louie said. "Sometimes you have to give up on a dream or two."

You've given up on five dreams (wealth, beating your dad in a fistfight, taking a balloon ride around the world, learning to text and drive, and becoming an eccentric but brilliant barista) and you don't know how many more you have left to give up on. It's becoming clear, you're probably never going to fall in love. Your housemates know it. They had a meeting.

"How can we share a home with someone so incapable of feeling what we feel?" Janine whispered. They were at the breakfast table and you were outside, crouched down just beneath the open window.

"The other day I saw him trying to practice loving a pillow," Randy said. "After a while, he just started punching it. Broke my heart."

"I think if we ask him to leave he might be relieved, honestly," said Louie. "I mean, he can't enjoy having us walk around mooning over the objects of our affection all day long. Also, what if he's contagious?"

They said all in favor then they all said aye. You're getting the deed done before they have to do it. You're going to throw your bags out that window and you're gonna take off tonight, before they have to try to break it to you gently. Go find a new place to live. You never know, you might finally be able to find some love for yourself if you're living in a place where your dumb housemates aren't hogging it all.

Happy Love House Day!

Be The Airplane Crazy Day!

When you look at the seat next to you it'll be empty so you should go to the flight attendant and ask if she's seen your daughter. When the flight attendant says that they checked the manifest and you came on the plane alone, without a daughter, and that a half-hour ago when you were boarding you were telling everyone how glad you are that you don't have kids, tell her that she must be confusing you for someone else. Go back to your seat and sit next to the tall Asian man who's been sitting there all along, or so he says. Sit quietly and become suspicious that the flight attendants have stolen your daughter.

Go to the bathroom to look for your daughter and you'll find a bloody, murdered corpse slumped at the base of the toilet. Scream until the flight attendants drag you back to your seat. Insist to them that there's a dead man in the bathroom and there's clearly a murderer on the plane. They'll check the bathroom, then return to you and say that the bathroom is empty and free of blood. They'll even let you check for yourself. You'll go and see that the dead man is gone, and you'll become suspicious that the flight attendants murdered the man and threw him out of the plane and that they know how to clean bathrooms really fast.

Back at your seat, you'll suddenly be covered in bees. You'll jump up swatting at them to get away from you, then the flight attendants will tell you there aren't any bees. Look down at your body and become suspicious that the flight attendants can control bees.

Open the inflight magazine and you'll find nothing but articles about why passengers on planes should ignore strange activity and not ask questions because sometimes planes serve a more important purpose than mere travel. At the end of each article there will be a question in italics that reads: "Do you even remember buying the ticket to board this plane? Do you even remember where you're going? Or why you're going there?"

Show one of the articles to the flight attendants. They'll read it for a second, then show you the magazine again and point out that all of the articles are normal, and the one you were reading is about the new soul album by a reunited Eurythmics. Go back to your seat, certain that the flight attendants know how to change what's in magazines just by touching them.

Back at your seat, you'll find that someone booby trapped your seat with sharp spikes and when you sat down on them you died. Tell the flight attendants and they'll say that nope, you're still alive. They'll even pinch you to show that you're still there. You'll become convinced that flight attendants have the ability to control life and death.

Finally, make love to a flight attendant. He will impregnate you with the daughter you remember clear as day having boarded the plane with, the one who disappeared earlier. The flight attendant, you're certain, is able to take a life, snuff it out and regenerate it at the moment it came into being.

"Savor every moment," the flight attendant will say to you as he wipes the sweat from his brow. "Don't let her grow up so fast this time."

"Why did you take her?" ask him. "If you were only going to give her back to me."

While slipping back into his uniform, the flight attendant will tell you that they needed her for a few minutes, they needed all of you in fact, but that you're not needed anymore. You'll go back to your seat feeling those first tiny flutters of a beautiful new life inside your body. You've been given a second chance to enjoy those first seven magical years of your daughter's life again, all because you decided to save a few bucks and fly Spirit.

Happy Be The Airplane Crazy Day!

Last Will They/Won't They On Earth Day!

You used to say that you wouldn't have sex with Jeff if he was the last man on earth. Well guess what. The apocalypse just happened and Jeff is the last man on earth so it's up to you having sex with Jeff if you want the human race to continue.

"No," say.

Jeff will sit down on a piece of the broken Statue of Liberty and feel bad because there's still rejection even at the end.

"But... Then we're just handing it all over to the machines and the intelligent rodents," Jeff will beg.

"Sorry," tell Jeff. "I meant what I said at that Christmas party. Not if you were the last man on earth. How would it look? Everyone heard me say it."

"But they're all incinerated," Jeff will say.

Tell Jeff that you can't in good conscience unleash upon the planet the kind of human race that would be born from a sex act between disparate castes of attractiveness.

"That's not a race I wanna be a part of," tell Jeff. "Sorry."

You and Jeff will continue to live together platonically, working together to keep warm and fight off all the stuff that's turned huge and/or smart thanks to radioactivity. Jeff will grow stronger and a little more attractive, and he'll comfort you sometimes, but it's still not clear whether you'll ever be able to drop your superficial dating rules and finally realize that you two were made for each other since you have no choice, making you two the last will they/won't they couple on earth. Except this time we all hope it will be will they not because it would make us feel warm and happy, but because it's the only way there will be future generations who might tell our stories and carry on our traditions. Also, for there to be future generations not only would you two have to have sex but so would your kids. With each other. Sorry.

Happy Last Will They/Won't They On Earth Day!

Rooftop Rochelle Day!

Rooftop Rochelle has set up some plastic chairs on the roof of your building. She goes up there for a few hours every evening. You can join her up there if you want and listen to her talk about the time she talked a guy down from the ledge of a building.

"I still feel terrible about that," she'll say. "What was I thinking? He could have ended it right then and there. Now for all I know he's probably still out there, alive, trying to figure out how he's going to wake up again tomorrow. He has to get out of bed and get dressed every morning and it's all because I was so persuasive with my bullshit about how life is a gift or whatever."

"You didn't know then," tell her. "How could you, Rooftop Rochelle? You were so young."

Rooftop Rochelle will say that that's no excuse. She could have looked around and seen the looks on the faces of those who weren't 23. She could have seen how their mouths hung open just a little bit, like they constantly felt like they'd just been socked in the gut and they couldn't get enough breath. She could have taken a moment to think that maybe if a guy had the moxie to climb out onto a ledge, he probably knew something she didn't.

"If I could go back in time," she'll say. "I'd push him."

Rooftop Rochelle will ask you if you think she's a horrible person.

"No," tell her. "I think you might have been back then, when you decided to get a whole bunch of pats on the back for convincing a guy to live when he obviously wanted to die. That was selfish and cruel, but you know that now and you feel bad about it. And no one should expect more from you on that."

Rooftop Rochelle will hug you in gratitude and then she'll go in for a kiss. She just wants to work out some stuff on your body, but this is the only way you're ever going get the chance to do it on a rooftop. Lay back and let her get angry all over you.

Happy Rooftop Rochelle Day!

Switching Gears Day!

Karen had just decided she was done with Lenny, that New York is a mistake, that she wasn't going to get back into the car with him after the check was paid. She wasn't sure how it was going to work out, her getting away from Lenny, without a big scene, a lot of tears, Lenny pulling out all the stops to convince her to come along. Lenny had convinced her to give up on so many things over the past three years (a continuing education program, her brother in a mental hospital, cigarettes), he was a master at it. Karen knew she couldn't hold her ground against him, that a confrontation would end the way they always ended, with Karen agreeing to whatever Lenny was begging her to agree to. There could be no parking lot shouting match, no laying it all out on the line in an honest and direct manner, the way that Lenny maybe deserved after three long years taking care of her (he covered more than a few months of her rent). Karen knew the only way out was to sneak out a bathroom window, slip into the kitchen and out the back by the dumpsters, pretend she left something in the car while they were still eating and then take off with the first trucker who might think this was his lucky day. Time's running out for all of us, so if being honest is going to keep you from doing what needs getting done, fuck honesty is how Karen saw it.

But the check was paid, the coffee cups were almost dry, and New York was only a short walk through the parking lot and ten more hours of driving away. That would be that, she was certain. If she left that restaurant through the front door with Lenny, that would be that. But leaving that restaurant through the front door with Lenny was looking like it might be the only option, at least until the front door opened and the men in the rubber masks started yelling for the cash drawer, unaware of the cop in the men's room already radioing the two squad cars parked in the back.

How we gonna get out of here?

I ain't goin' to jail.

If we don't step out soon, they're comin' in.

Karen tried to disguise it with a pretend cough when she said, "Hostage!"

"Karen?" said Lenny. "You okay?"

Suppose we could take some hostages with us.

Hostages?

It's the only way I can see.

"Human shield!" Karen said, under cover of a loud pretend sneeze.

"Karen," Lenny said. "Try to hold them in. Don't draw attention to yourself."

Cops won't shoot at us if we got one of the customers blocking their line of fire.

Which one should we take?

Not sure. Who would cops be least likely to shoot at?

"Women!" Karen fake coughed. "Brunettes!" she fake sneezed. "Late twenties in the booth by the window!" she fake hacked and fake wheezed and even faked snorted a tiny little snort.

I think I know which one.

They took her with them, drove her halfway across the country before finally agreeing to set her free and never tell where they last saw her. She lives in Flagstaff now, happy enough, occasionally wondering if trying to end it with Lenny in a more confrontational manner would have been better than spending 18 months tied up in the backseat of a stickup team's Cutlass, but she's pretty sure she did the right thing.

Happy Switching Gears Day!