The spouse and I say the same thing when we encounter a bad driver: “That guy hasn’t got a brain in his ass”. It’s what we say, and it makes no sense at all. But it is a tribute to my husband’s late father, who always said that when he saw someone driving badly.

That’s perfect, donnah.  My father used to say this about me all of the time: “My son doesn’t drive slow and he doesn’t drive fast, he drives half-assed (half-fast).”  I wrote and read his eulogy and snuck that in there.  I heard the priest emit a little gasp on the altar behind me when I repeated it.

This is old, but back when I was in theater school, one of my classmates did some extras work on “The Color of Money,” which was shooting in Chicago. He came to class one day and said “Yeah, I was right next to Paul Newman yesterday. You know, up close, that guy is kinda ugly.” And yes, he was serious.

So my then-boyfriend and I had a running gag about how the hideousness of Paul Newman forced us to turn away from his visage on television, magazine covers, etc.

When my stepdaughter started dating she was going out with this effeminate douchenozzle that had never been out of his Garage Mahal subdivision. When we suggested driving to a nearby town (Everett, WA) because they had some pretty cool clubs and such he turned up his nose and declared Everett “ghetto.”

Years later (she’s in her mid 20’s now) whenever we drive through any area of affluence we declare it as being “ghettt-o.” It drives her batshit.

We have a couple. The first is the black Republican Ron Christie pundit who’s on MSNBC alot.  If you’ve seen him, he is incapable of doing anything but regurgitating the most ridiculous right-wing claptrap.  My husband started calling him “cross-eyed mu**afucka” a few years ago.  Now every time I see him, I instantly blurt out “cross-eyed mu**afucka!”

Another thing we have fun with is what we do in the car.  When I work in Philly we ride in together, so that’s about 2.5 hours total in the car.

You know those annoying an dangerous people who’ll cut across multiple lanes of traffic to get to something?  We’ll yell the following:

Cutting people off to get to MickeyD’s or any restaurant:  “HUNGRY!”

going into any mall or store parking lot:  “SHOPPING!” OR “SALE!”

Nearly killing people to go to church:  “JESUS!”

We also have some choice nuggets for the Asian drivers out here but that’s a whole other subject.

“I wrote and read his eulogy and snuck that in there.  I heard the priest emit a little gasp on the altar behind me when I repeated it.”

That’s great. I love it!

My sis and I have tons of ongoing gags; people who don’t know us well think we’re nuts.

Years and years ago there was a tv commercial for Corn Pops, and the cartoon character spokesman was a dinkly little cowboy. He was bragging about how big everything was, something about the big taste of Corn Pops, only I think they were called Sugar Pops back then. My sis and I stole a stupid line from the commercial, “See my pocket watch? Big as a pancake,” and said it over and over. Once, when we had run it into the ground and didn’t know when to stop, my dad pulled the car over and told us that if we didn’t knock it off, he was taking us home.

Geesh, what a grouch!

We still say it, proving how dorky we really are.

My first partner Howard and I liked to torture ourselves by watching Live with Regis and Kathie Lee.  Yes, children, there was someone before Kelli Ripa.  Regis once released a record album (yes, children, there was music before mp3s) called “It’s Time for Regis.”

Anyway, it’s a morning show, and since one tends to have one’s first bowel movement of the day around that time, if one of us felt nature’s call we would tell the other, “It’s Time for Regis,” and then go drop a Regis and flush him away…

Howard’s father was a Hungarian Jew who got out of Europe in the 1930s, and he was full of slightly fractured schtik that we emulated, such as:

When preparing to leave the house, and checking one’s pockets for all necessary accoutrements:

“Spectacles, testicles, pocketbook.”

When stuck behind someone who was in no particular hurry to get anywhere:

“Until she scratches her ass, two fleas could get married.”

My current husband has a few of his own that are now ingrained into my consciousness, including the oldie but goodie, when ready to depart:

“Lesbian on our way.”

My ex wife and I had a running gag for years with a piece of candle wax.  Yes, candle wax.  It had accumulated at the bottom of one of those big cylindrical candles and I pulled it off and put it in her brief case.  I was disappointed because she didn’t say anything but then I found it in my laptop bag while sitting in my airplane seat a few weeks later.  She had waited for the right time to get me back.  The wax went back and forth and traveled all over the world for about two years and we each had it spill out more than once in work situations where the appearance of a random piece of red wax was difficult to explain. My most embarrassing was onto a table in a boardroom while I was setting up for a presentation.  I feigned astonishment.

That’s great, Lawnguy.

I have a friend whose parents, the Cooks, had good neighbors and they had ongoing exchanges like that. Once, the neighbors asked the Cooks to watch their tomato plants while they were gone on vacation. When they came back, they found that the Cooks had picked all the ripe tomatoes and had tied bananas to the vines. The neighbors never said a word.

A few weeks later, the Cooks noticed that their neighbors had dug a hole in their front yard to plant a balled tree. Under cover of darkness, Mrs Cook put a little wooden treasure chest filled with junk jewelry in the bottom of the hole. Later the next day, she saw that the tree had been planted, but the neighbor never said a word about finding the treasure chest.

Months later, the Cooks hosted a party. Her neighbor came over wearing all of the junk jewelry. Mrs Cook never said a word.

I love a good running gag!

John Mahoney and Dennis Farina have been gagging each other for years, ever since Farina made his first professional appearance onstage at Steppenwolf with Mahoney. The way the story came down to me is that Mahoney had told Farina he’d be sure to help him remember his entrances, in case the stage manager screwed up the cues. So on opening night, Mahoney came tearing backstage and said “DENNIS! Where are you? You’re supposed to be out there!” Farina bolted onstage—to find the house lights still up and the audience reading their programs.

I also heard that Farina had some of his old cop buddies show up with a warrant to arrest Mahoney on charges of impersonating an actor.

And Newman and Redford were always doing shit like that to each other. Didn’t Newman have Redford’s Porsche turned into a sculptural cube or something?

That’s great donnah.  I would love to have neighbors like that.

Another one that I had going with a bunch of co-workers was to grab the bag of whoever was leaving straight from the office on a Friday for the Hamptons or the Jersey shore, remove most of the clothes from said bag and replace them with stuff like bags of coffee from the break room and later on, outlandish items of clothing like a “Homey don’t play that” t-shirt, plaid pants, saddle shoes, etc.  Almost everyone was very careful after the first time it happened to them but one guy got taken at least 3 times over a few years.  This was before most people had cell phones so it made going to work on Monday more fun because we could look forward to seeing the victims.

These are great.  I’ll bore you with another, more recent, that I’m sure will be in the lexicon of a few of our friends for years.

Back in January, we lost a dear, dear friend - he had just turned 48.  It was sudden and a shock.  He had many more friends and acquaintances than even his family realized.  Since he was not religious and had really made no plans for his demise, his sister decided to hold the funeral that the tiny funeral parlor. Needless to say, it was filled to overflowing - people were lined up around the block at one point to get in.

One person who was asked to give a eulogy was more of an acquaintance (and also a minister) than an actual friend.  As the repast was going to be held at our departed friend’s favorite bar/billiards place (across the street from his house and also our Drinking Liberally bar), this acquaintance/minister relayed a story (mostly African Americans in attendance) of meeting our friend back in the day in this bar.  He built an entire, loooonnnng, eulogy over the game of pool. Picture pool and you can picture the awful analogies - the cue ball as God and the other balls being led to the right pockets as all of us. 

The thing that got us trying desperately not to laugh was the likening of the rack to the trinity.  And after he made that one, he said “Eric once said to me, ‘rack ‘em’”. (And in hushed tones the minister said again) ‘rack ‘em.’ (And barely above a whisper said one more time) ‘rack ‘em’. 

He bowed his head and left the podium.  I left fingernail impressions in my husband’s thigh.  As soon as we got outside and away from the old black ladies with big hats, we both lost it.

It became the toast at the repast at the bar.  I have a feeling that “rack ‘em” will be uttered at many a funeral.

Wow, that’s a great story - makes mine seem kind of trivial but I’ll tell it anyway.

Several years ago for Valentine’s Day I bought my husband (who is an Elvis fan) a box of candy which had a big picture of Elvis on the box lid and inside a light activated sound device that played the first few lines of “Love Me Tender” when you opened the lid.  I don’t remember specifically how this started but, after the candy was gone, we removed the singing device and started leaving it for each other in places where it would generate a surprise.

Like I say, this was years ago it started and I can’t believe the thing still belts out “Love Me Tender”.  Right now it’s in one of my bureau drawers waiting for inspiration for a new place to sing unexpectedly to the Mr.

I have a running inside joke on the radio program. I will occasionally throw in the ‘TROGDOR’ scream at opportune moments.

If you don’t know who Trogdor is, you don’t get the joke, but it is such a strong MEME among insiders, I always ways get a few thank you emales after airing a Trogdor scream.