Chiz & That
Last week had been circled on the calendar since May when Sue and I each bought a pair of tickets to Twenty One Pilots (TOP) concerts in Boston. Given they are her favorite band and were only playing six cities on their tour—four shows in each respective city in venues ranging from tiny clubs to large basketball-slash-hockey arenas—we felt lucky that they chose a locale eighty miles northeast for one of their weeklong residencies. Much like our shared belief that there’s something magical at work when vacationing in Maine, TOP Week seemed to have a similar alchemical vibe throughout, brimming with peculiar revelations, curious encounters, unending comedic moments, and pure joy. Due to my current reading material, David Sedaris’s second collection of diary entries, I’ve chosen to share highlights from each day in much the same fashion as my diary-ing (careful how you pronounce it) idol. Please enjoy my brazen lack of originality.
Monday, 10/18
“Do you think he left detailed yet still vague instructions about how to find his unmarked tombstone at Arlington?” I text a few friends upon learning of Colin Powell’s death.
“I’m sure he told Tyler Perry at least,” George William replies.
“I did love Madea Goes to Abu Ghraib!”
*
Sue and I embark on an afternoon of grocery shopping and detour to a farm stand in hopes that they have some end-of-season tomatoes. She grabs ten baseball-sized ones while I put an injured yellow jacket limping around the oatmeal raisin cookies out of its misery. Upon spotting a gigantic stuffed banana that I missed when walking in, I tell the cashier how we’ll be doing an imperative photoshoot—due to all the recent banana shenanigans (bananagans?)—in advance of her judgment. Upon leaving, she’s filing her nails with an emery board, making me ponder for the zillionth time why I bother worrying why strangers might give a damn about the idiotic shit I do in public.
Upon walking into Aldi, a purple-and-black-haired woman casually says, “Hi Sue!” Sue meekly returns the greeting, giving me her trademark “I have no fucking clue who she is and am ghosting her now” look.
“What’s your name?” I ask the friendly stranger after being abandoned, learning her name is also Sue. “How do you know Sue?”
“We went to high school together,” Sue-2 tells me. “I’d hang out with her in the bathroom every morning when she put on makeup she wasn’t allowed to leave the house wearing.”
I reconvene with Sue and provide these details, her telling me, “I saw a lot of people in the bathroom, and she doesn’t look the same anymore. I have no clue who that woman is.” When I show her a carton of almond eggnog—sadly, there’s no photo of seventeen-year-old Sue-2 on it for reference—she gets so excited that she quickly sucks in her clear plastic mask, almost inhaling it off her face. Minutes later, I overhear her talking to someone and fear Sue-2 has cornered her before seeing her best friend Nichole’s mother animatedly chatting her lobes off instead.
“Did you see that she got collagen in her lips?” Nichole’s mom says about a shared acquaintance. “That’s expensive!”
“I miss when you could just be sassy to your husband and get it done for free!” I reply.
At the register, a gelatinous puddle creates a minor scene.
“There’s water on the floor,” a woman tells an Aldi associate.
“Thanks,” she replies. “I’ll page someone.”
“Oh yeah, a lady’s water broke a minute ago,” I tell them.
“Ohmygod! REALLY?!” the woman says.
“I didn’t see it happen, but it sure looks like it!”
While the cashier rings our items, I make casual conversation with him.
“It’s way too quiet in here,” I say.
“I know. It’s weird.”
“Let’s tell the filthiest jokes we know. You go first!”
“Uhhh…”
While cashing out at yet another grocery store across the street, I stand away from Sue and consider Kristen Chenoweth’s appearance on the cover of a trashy periodical while Sue inputs her PIN, accidentally providing an incorrect digit.
“Try again, pretty lady,” I whisper in her ear after quietly creeping within inches of her.
“Oh hey, stranger!” Sue replies, semi-startled.
“I like you,” I tell her much to the cashier’s growing horror. “I’m gonna play with your hair even though I don’t know you.”
“It’s okay!” Sue says to the cashier. “I know him!”
*
Moore sends an email with an open invitation to provide a list of my favorite film scores (“Oh darn,” I think, “I don’t have time for yet another movie list! Self-sike!”):
Angelo Badalamenti, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me
Georges Delerue, Contempt
Duke Ellington, Anatomy of a Murder
Jerry Goldsmith, Chinatown
Bernard Herrmann, Taxi Driver
Justin Hurwitz, La La Land
Henry Mancini, Touch of Evil
Ennio Morricone, Days of Heaven
Herbert Stothart, The Wizard of Oz
Dimitri Tiomkin, Rio Bravo
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
Tuesday, 10/19
Sue stops by The Outlet to say hello, prompting Gary Half-Banana to suggest I take a quick break after he comments that it’s 4:20. Upon returning three minutes later he says I could’ve taken more time.
“Nah, we ripped a bowl in the woods. I’m baked out of my fucking mind.”
*
After texting two friends who are invited to the upcoming reminiscence about my deceased pal Travis, neither has replied forty-eight hours later. Unwilling to wait until I see them to make things uncomfortable, I opt to contact Brett a second time.
“Man, my asshole smells like your chapstick.” After waiting thirty seconds I add, “Oh shit, wrong person. Sorry.”
He never responds.
*
Finally watch Jerry Lewis’s The Ladies Man, a film that accomplishes two unimaginable feats: (1) it solidifies my belief that the man was a stone-cold genius largely because (2) he designed the single greatest film set I’ve ever seen.
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
Wednesday, 10/20
Arrive at Sue’s to find her in a pink tee shirt showcasing her DIYdeas: she’s painted on the current ovular TOP logo in blue, covering it in glitter; her braided ponytails are held in pink and blue scrunchies with accompanying color-coded ribbons; she’s also sporting pink and blue bows, Crocs, nail polish, duct tape on her fingers, and need I go on?
*
Spend a few hours perusing the European works at the Museum of Fine Arts, observing about a cherub’s exposed nethers, “Look at his cock-covered cock.” Sue reacts like I’m having a stroke. “Oops, I mean his shit-covered cock,” I offer a bit too loudly while a loner in a Bathory tee shirt eavesdrops nearby. Sue comments on learning about Monet from Clueless, we briefly visit with a deeply unimpressive Mesopotamian head sculpture, and peruse the gift shop’s postcard selection—after viewing two astounding Dutch paintings, one being the most detailed rendering of a vase imaginable—then find red and purple Adirondack chairs on the museum’s lawn, eating Korean barbecue-flavored popcorn and admiring the fearless geese who parade by us in search of, one can only assume, curried grasshoppers.
*
We drive to Allston for dinner and are beside a homeless man at a red light. Sue laments that she’s brought only enough money to treat herself (and me) on such a big day.
“Who brings money hoping to give it to the homeless?” I ask her prior to a rant. “‘Bill, why’d you take on a THIRD job?’ ‘Oh man, my second one isn’t providing enough income to give to the homeless, so I felt the need to work an additional twenty or so hours per week to show them how much I care. Even opted to not have the tax withheld so I could give as much as possible!’”
Upon getting discouraged after failing to locate a parking space near Roxy’s Grilled Cheese, we approach a T stop and realize there’s a Stop & Shop adjacent to it.
“Now you’ll tell me the restaurant’s next to The Baba Ganoush Emporium!”
While waiting for our three grilled cheeses and rosemary truffle oil fries to be prepared, we realize there are no tables inside. I suggest buying something from the place next door so we can patronize one of their outdoor tables, walking inside a Turkish joint serving…baba ganoush! “TOP Magic,” Sue predictably (and giddily) intones while I point to the lucky Taylor Swift tour shirt I’m wearing and shrug. We get discouraged by fries the size of pinky toes only to realize that the other container we ordered, still in the paper bag, is full of a fresh batch containing ones longer than the teeth of septuagenarians who once were lookers.
*
Get to our seats and a group of six rich-looking thirty-somethings are sitting beside us. Blonde women with blown out four-hundred-dollar haircuts, dudes in suede shoes, and everyone holding a can of hard seltzer or Bud Light. Sue and I immediately grow cynical, questioning why they’re at the show, never mind in front row seats. As soon as the show starts, the guy to Sue’s right proves to know the lyrics to every song, making us feel like judgy cunts. But when he and his buddy make a bathroom/beer run midway through the show, I tell Sue, “I’m gonna go grind on their wives until they get back!”
Seeing TOP with a full band yields some of their funkiest performances we’ve yet witnessed, plus Tyler Joseph walks within four feet of us before climbing the scaffolding to conclude “Car Radio.” For only the second time, I break my personal rule and take video during a concert. The other time? A TOP show.
Walking through the garage afterward, I keep singing the line “Don’t you shy away,” mumbling the ensuing lyric due to its indecipherability.
“He says, ‘Manifest a ceiling,’” Sue tells me, which is better than literally anything I thought it might be.
“What’s that supposed to mean though?”
“I dunno! Genius Lyrics didn’t tell me everything like they’re supposed to!”
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
Thursday, 10/21
Get an oil change and text my buddy Josh about the large numbers of Asians seen in Boston yesterday, questioning if the city is home to a significant Asian population.
“Even the Asians I know joke about it,” he replies. “I had a co-worker who was like, ‘My fiancé and I just bought a new house!’ ‘Oh cool, where? Lexington?’ ‘Fuck you…yes.’”
This is the same guy who, upon hearing from a mutual friend in high school who had bought MacBook parts from someone on eBay, asked, “Was the guy in Palo Alto?” only to be told, “Yes, you fucking racist!”
Wonder if he ever regrets studying Latin, not Mandarin, in high school.
*
Sue says the phrase “fer shiz,” a term she’s used in place of “for sure” all fourteen-and-a-half years I’ve dated her. This leads to her explaining how the word “chiz” is used in iCarly, along with its overlap in other Dan Schneider-helmed TV shows. Surprised by this reveal, I ask her if his shows share similar DNA—color schematics, set design, thematic consistencies—prior to explaining my favorite scientific theory: the auteur theory. It’s a French film theory that I’ve been obsessed with since my early teens. It posits that a director is the true author of a cinematic work. Citing my most beloved practitioners (Jacques Tati and David Lynch) along with others she knows well (Wes Anderson and Quentin Tarantino), we subsequently begin applying the theory to TV showrunners. I leave her house aghast that she’s been unknowingly watching teenager-friendly auteur television, ready for a deep dive into reading about the inner workings of the Schneiderverse.
In unrelated news, Sue also coins the term “agnostic snot stick” although the details escape me. Tough chiz.
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
Friday, 10/22
Have a job interview on Zoom and wear a white collared shirt, blue and yellow tie, and pinstripe navy blazer. After joking all week about wearing only my lucky jockstrap below the camera’s eye, I instead don the matching pants in case, for any unexpected reason, I’m asked to confirm my commitment to the potential new employer. Hedging my bets, I leave on my slippers.
*
Two sixty-something regulars chat at The Outlet regarding whether Caligula or Dumpster Baby is a sicker movie until I trot out my time-honored, incontrovertible choice: Salò. Noel’s curiosity is instantly peaked—“Order it for me!” he says before I can provide a plot description—but the typically combative John isn’t having it.
“But have you seen Dumpster Baby?” he asks me, as if any other movie directly led to the director getting run over with his own car, his testicles being crushed with a metal bar, and his body being set on fire.
“No, but it doesn’t matter,” I reply. “Just see Salò. If you say it isn’t worse, I’ll watch Dumpster Baby.”
The two of them talk about the severed penis scene in Caligula, the kind of stuff the best friendships are founded upon. Sue arrives and we chat for a few minutes about visiting Boston’s Public Garden before the TOP concert tomorrow. John proceeds to buy a Steely Dan CD after I discuss their latest live disc with a different regular, leaving my fingers crossed on his viewing my movie recommendation (and feeling repulsion). However, I now dread what may be found in the Public Garden.
*
“What’s the exact opposite of Reaganing?” I text my buddy Rick, the biggest fan I know of the term originated by 30 Rock. “McGoverning? And how long will Alec Baldwin be experiencing it?”
“The opposite of Reaganing is Tayloring, as in Zachary Taylor, who was the shortest serving president and died because he got sick after not wearing a winter coat to his inauguration, so if we are sticking to presidents as the theme then the opposite of Reaganing is Tayloring.”
*
Watch Zola, the first film based on a Twitter thread, and am more taken with Riley Keough’s outstanding performance as a stripper—specifically her incomparable accent combining ebonics, trailer trash aesthetics, baby talk, and a southern inflection—than anything else. At one point she says, “I’m so hungry I could eat a dick right now,” and while taking a bite of paprika-drenched zucchini I think to myself, “With butter or mustard?”
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
Saturday, 10/23
Recounting how I talked to my high school friends in gym class, I tell Sue when I first became anxious about Moore’s loud speaking voice, specifically when he would tell Josh and me that he watched Return of the Jediyet again, yelling as if we were standing in an airport hangar: “Stop screaming about stuff that makes us look like dorks!”
“You said that?!” Sue says before laughing uncontrollably. “I can’t picture you being a typical teenager about anything. I always picture you as a thirteen-year-old adult.”
*
Unable to locate a parking space in Somerville, we’re surprised to find a nearby Market Basket that’s overrun with people, grabbing four bags of Lesser Evil popcorn for the post-concert ride home. After circling the area for more than a half hour—cussing a blue streak Martin Scorsese would admire—I park back at Market Basket because Sue ordered doughnuts from a place down the street. Upon learning they make yeast, not cake, doughnuts, I half-jokingly wish that any future terrorist attack on American soil occur in Davis Square.
While driving out of town, we see a Jesus statue that looks like The Chosen One is shrugging.
“Bet he’s saying, ‘I didn’t have anything to do with the parking situation,’” I tell Sue.
*
“You should only panic buy things you need, like paper products and select foods,” I say.
“I panic bought Manic Panic!” Sue counters.
*
After learning the vegan diner we’d planned to eat at all week—discussing exactly what we’d likely order from their vast menu during the ride north—is closed to give employees a rest, Sue and I walk in a nearby Indian restaurant.
“Dine here?” our future waitress asks, us questioning if her tone suggested she would prefer to be absent our company.
Ready to place our order, we glare at our waitress while she stares at a plate and finishes her dinner. Three more couples intermittently surface as I pour sweat eating overly spicy baingan bharta, the waitress’s tone becoming increasingly disinterested when a single man arrives.
“Pick up?”
“No, I’d like to eat here.”
“Two?” she asks with nobody else in sight.
“Just me.”
“Uhhh, sit here,” she says while waving her hand at the entire restaurant and promptly disappearing.
Sue brushes her turmeric-stained orange tongue before I debate if it's worth trying to pinch a loaf, hoping I don’t incur a ruby pucker, or what Sue thought the term was for a rectal prolapse. (She meant a “pink sock,” but at least we finally discovered her porn name.)
“Work with me, anus,” she says on my behalf.
I’m proud to say that in a restaurant that prefers things in twos, it was meant to be(hind).
*
Driving to find the lot where I purchased a pass on ParkWhiz, Nancy (my GPS) says, “You’ve arrived” as we’re nowhere near an exit.
“Are we supposed to park in the Charles River?!”
*
We take our customary loops around the TD Garden concourse to inspect how fans are dressed. At one point, a teenage girl gets Sue’s attention.
“Your Crocs are siiiick!” she enthusiastically tells her.
“Thank you,” Sue replies as we continue walking before informing me “it’s not about the drip, it’s about the drool.”
*
Upon getting to our seats, I do a double take at being back inside a large arena after twenty-three months, a setting I’ve long found thrilling. The girl to my left informs us that she was sitting a few rows behind us at Wednesday’s show. She and her boyfriend had driven up from Long Island for the second time in four days, evidence of TOP fan dedication.
Prior to an intimate medley of uplifting covers, the band congregates around a mock campfire on stage and encourages fans to sit down and relax. When the campfire won’t ignite, the self-described “crabby” frontman, Tyler Joseph, deadpans, “We only paid twenty-five thousand dollars for it.”
During show closer “Trees” I hold Sue in my arms as we sway to our favorite song to hear live. I resist a running joke I’ve been making all week—grabbing one of her ponytails and saying, “Get over here!”—until the house lights flip on.
Despite security’s immediate insistence that we leave, we scamper around the floor for a few loose pieces of blue, pink, and yellow confetti to add to the bagful a generous girl gave us after the previous show.
*
Bemoaning that no bootleg tee shirt vendors (Sue’s preference) are lingering outside, I’m ready to give up hope until a guy on the street shouts, “SHIRTS! TEN DOLLARS!” Then I suggest the wrong way to the parking garage only for Sue, not known for having any sense of direction, to correctly guide us back. On the Mass Pike, she alertly tells me we have a left exit upcoming, completing a trio of correct instincts that gast all my flabber.
“Sniffing out tee shirt vendors, knowing the walking directions, and pointing to the left exit?! Are you getting ready to circumnavigate the globe tomorrow, Blebbz? Hopping in the stern and setting the sails?”
Next thing I know, she’ll manifest a ceiling.