by Jenny Lawson
It’d be easier to judge this moonshine still harshly if my daughter hadn’t helped build it.
The next day Victor drove to my parents’ house so that we could celebrate our anniversary, except I don’t celebrate anything with that certain unlucky number in it, because I’m still OCD. I made him swear to just tell people that this was simply “our second twelfth anniversary,” which would have worked perfectly if Victor took my phobias seriously and didn’t have a death wish. Instead he kept saying the unlucky number over and over, and I was all, “This is exactly why I didn’t want to celebrate at all this year, because if you don’t stop saying that number I will divorce you, and that’s totally the kind of thing that would happen on an unlucky year, so fucking stop tempting fate.” Then he raised an eyebrow and said innocently, “What number? You mean, ___?” AND THEN HE SAID THE NUMBER AGAIN. This is when I decided I would just cut one of his testicles off sometime this year, because that will take care of all of our bad luck in one fell swoop, and then we’ll still stay married, because all the unluckiness will have been used up in an intentional ball-removal accident. Victor explained that there was no such thing as an “intentional accident,” and was a little baffled that I’d jumped right from divorcing him to removing one of his testicles, but this is our second twelfth anniversary, so he really should be used to that sort of thing from me by now. Plus, you don’t even need two testicles. Lance Armstrong seems to be doing pretty well with just one.2 And also, I’M SAVING OUR MARRIAGE, ASSHOLE.
For our anniversary my mom babysat Hailey so that Victor and I could go to Summer Mummers, a melodrama-vaudevillian play that’s been going on every summer since the forties in Midland, Texas. There’s lots of booze, and you’re encouraged to scream for the hero and boo at the caped villain, and to buy bags of popcorn to throw at the stage whenever the evil mustachioed bad guy comes out. Unfortunately I have a weak arm, and so I ended up just throwing it at the people directly in front of us. They turned around, and Victor surreptitiously pointed at the people sitting next to us as if to blame them for it, but our neighbors noticed, and then a terrible popcorn battle broke out. Then Victor stood up on his chair and yelled, “I WILL END YOU PEOPLE,” and bought three hundred dollars’ worth of popcorn. It was one of those moments when I realized how lucky I was to be celebrating a second twelfth anniversary with someone willing to spend all the money we’d planned to use on a fancy hotel room in order to buy pallets of popcorn just so he could bury perfect strangers in a drunken, Napoleonic endeavor. We fucking destroyed those people.
The evening was perfect, except for the one time when Victor went to reload (buying another pallet of popcorn) and I was attacked by a guy who looked exactly like Sam Elliott, and I got so much popcorn down my dress it looked like I’d developed a series of horrible tumors. Also, you know when you get that annoying piece of popcorn stuck in your teeth but you can’t get it out because it would be too embarrassing to dig it out in front of strangers? Imagine that happening, but instead of it being in between your teeth, it’s stuck in your ear canal. And by “ear canal” I mean “vagina.”
Then the cancan girls came out and everyone sang along to “Deep in the Heart of Texas” and “The Yellow Rose of Texas” with the live orchestra. Then a man onstage quoted Sam Houston, saying, “Texas can make it without the United States, BUT THE UNITED STATES CANNOT MAKE IT WITHOUT TEXAS!” and everyone in the entire fucking audience yelled it along with him, and I thought, “Wow. It’s really no wonder that the rest of America hates us.”
After the whole play/melodrama/burlesque thing ended, I looked down and saw these small patches of blood on the floor, and I was a little unsettled, because Victor had been threatening to put rocks in his popcorn in order to take out the front row. But it turns out that the carpet was red, and that was the only part of it you could see under the piles and piles of popcorn.
As we walked out, I noticed that a woman I’d seen sitting off in a corner was walking in front of us. She’d obviously been expecting something else when told she was going to see “live theater” that night, and she’d seemed both frightened and appalled by everyone’s boorish behavior. As she walked through the drifts of popcorn she muttered to her date, “Ugh . . . What an offensive waste of food. Just think of all the starving children in Africa.” She may have had a point, but I thought it was a little offensive to want to give starving people popcorn touched by vaginas. “Here you go,” I could imagine her saying condescendingly to the villagers. “Take some more vagina popcorn. This batch was only on the floor for an hour. You need it more than we do.” It seemed insulting, and I felt pretty certain that even starving people would have turned their noses up at it. “No, no. We’re fine. Really. Please stop with the vagina popcorn.” Also, the popcorn was kind of stale and gross, and I know this because I ate some, and then I felt very sick later. Victor pointed out that it was no surprise. I was eating from the same bag of popcorn that I’d thrown at people, and that they’d thrown back, and it would land in my bosom and I’d scoop it out and throw it back at them, and then they’d volley it back, and inevitably some of it was landing in the sack I was eating from, and I’m pretty sure that’s how I got swine flu.
The next day we went back to my parents’ to set off fireworks for the Fourth of July, and as we finished up the Roman candles my dad said, “Oh! I promised the grandkids we could set off the cannon tonight,” and Hailey screamed, “Yay!”
“You promised my preschooler that she could light a cannon?” I asked in disbelief.
“No. Of course not,” he replied. “I told Tex he could do it.” And that seemed much safer, because Tex was fucking six. I looked at my sister to see whether she was okay with her kid lighting a Civil War cannon, but she just kind of shrugged, because she’s used to this sort of thing, and had learned to pick her battles.
My parents’ backyard. The gas pump is not functional. The cannon and chickens are.
“Are you sure this is safe?” Lisa asked, and Daddy assured us that he was only going to let Tex pack and prep the cannon—which consisted of Tex standing right in front of a giant fucking loaded cannon—but my sister was fairly undisturbed, because she knew Daddy probably couldn’t get the rusty cannon lit anyway. And she was right. But then Daddy decided he just needed more fire, so he brought out the blowtorch to light the dodgy cannon. This was when I ran for my camera, because I knew no one would ever believe me. The cannon would undoubtedly be loud and unneighborly obnoxious at that time of night, but then I remembered that the neighbors had been setting off fireworks at midnight all week long, and I thought it would kind of be kick-ass payback if the cannon actually did go off. And it did. And it was awesome, and no one died or got blood on them, so we considered it one of the most successful nights that week.
As we walked back inside for our final night at my parents’, Victor pointed at a table that had been raised up with chains to the ceiling of the carport. He said there seemed to be a dead bear on it, and I assumed that Victor was drunk, but when we went out to pack the car the next morning I realized Victor was correct. My first thought was that I probably need glasses, because it’s probably odd to not notice a dead bear floating on a table in the backyard all week. But then I realized I hadn’t actually noticed the cannon at first either, and blamed it on the fact that I was too distracted by everything else. Because that’s the kind of backyard they have. One where cannons and floating bears don’t stick out.
I stared at the bear and wondered whether Daddy was trying to raise him from the dead, à la Dr. Frankenstein when he hoisted his monster up to the roof to attract the lightning. But then I realized it was probably just a polite way of getting a dead bear out of the way when you had company over, and in a way it struck me as being kind of ingenious. Like window blinds, but with dead bears.
Victor agreed that it made sense, but then he looked a little shaken and insisted we go home immediately, because whenever all of this starts to seem rational to us that’s usually a sign that we
need to leave.
1. My mom just read this chapter and asked me to clarify that the goats are outside animals. They don’t live here in the house with us. I’m not sure why I have to clarify that, but then I reread the chapter with new eyes and I guess that goats sleeping at the foot of our beds wouldn’t be that strange, comparatively. So, yeah, the goats don’t live in the house with us. That would be weird. And unsanitary. Plus, the goats aren’t even ours. They’re rented goats, because my dad has too much grass, and his friend has too many goats. This all makes sense if you live in the country. Probably.
2. Please ignore this sentence if Lance Armstrong is dead when you read this. I swear, he looked totally healthy when I wrote this, but the guy isn’t going to live forever, because he’s not a vampire, y’all. So I thought I should clarify that as of this moment Lance Armstrong is awesome. Even with only one ball. Hell, especially with only one ball. I’m going to stop now.
Stabbed by Chicken
A couple of years ago one of my fingers swelled up like an enormous wiener. The kind you get at the ballpark that plumps when you cook it. Not the other kind. That would be weird. I don’t even know why I’m clarifying this. You know what? Let’s start again.
A couple of years ago one of my fingers swelled up like an enormous vagina. Kidding. It actually just swelled up like a giant swollen finger. It looked like I was wearing one of those “we’re number one!” foam fingers, except that I wasn’t. Sometime during the night I had been struck down with a case of lethal finger cancer. Victor rolled his eyes and muttered that I was a chronic hypochondriac, and I glared at him and rubbed my enormous nonfoam finger down his cheek, whispering, “Thinner.” Then he made me go to the doctor. Alone. Because apparently he thinks I’m strong enough to handle a finger cancer diagnosis with absolutely no support. Or because he’s emotionally shut down and didn’t want to consider my own mortality. Or because he thought I’d just injured it again, like the time when our dog stabbed me with a chicken in the finger. Probably the last one.
This is the point where I would go into detail about my finger cancer, but my editor just read this and told me that you can’t claim that your dog stabbed you with chicken and not logically explain that. I told her that logic didn’t enter into it and she agreed, but probably not for the same reasons. So, fine. Here is the prequel to the cancerfingersplosion story, which I pretty much just pulled from my blog because it happened years ago and I only vaguely remember the details. Because I blocked them out. Because my dog tried to kill me. With chicken.
Blog entry: I can barely even type this because my hand is all swollen, but I was just carrying my pug (Barnaby Jones Pickles) into bed when he suddenly did this flip that almost broke my middle finger, and then he ran in between my legs, and I fell so hard that I couldn’t even move. And just to make it more festive, the dog was jumping on my head (probably to make it seem like we were just play-wrestling and that he wasn’t trying to murder me, in case witnesses were watching), but I wasn’t falling for it, so I yelled for Victor, who found me lying on my stomach in front of the fridge. He was all, “What. The fuck. Did you do?” and I said, “The dog tried to kill me.” Then Victor leaned down and raised an unnecessary eyebrow as he said in disbelief, “Our dog? Our tiny little dog did this to you?” and I was all, “HE’S LIKE A NINJA!” Then Victor said, “He’s a fucking pug. He can’t even reach the couch,” and I was all, “I’M VULNERABLE, ASSHOLE,” and then Victor tried to help me up, and I screamed because I’m pretty sure you’re not supposed to move an accident victim, because they could be paralyzed.
Victor agreed to let me just lie on the floor, but only if I would wiggle my feet for him, but at that point I was too afraid that the jostling of my legs might cause my spinal cord to snap, so he picked up the phone and I yelled, “DO not CALL AN AMBULANCE,” and he sighed, saying, “If you don’t move your legs I’m going to call the ambulance. Except that I’m probably going to get arrested for domestic battery, because what the hell happened?!” And I was all, “Oh my God, there are a lot of marbles under the refrigerator. When did we have marbles in the house?” Then Victor made that noise that usually accompanies him putting his hand over his face and shaking his head like he can’t even believe this is his life, but after a few seconds he paused and said, “Wait. Where is all this blood coming from?” And that’s when I noticed I had a long, shallow gash on my hand, and I propped myself up on my elbows to look at it, saying, “How the hell did that happen?” And that’s how we figured out I wasn’t paralyzed.
I half suspected that Victor had poured fake blood on me just to distract me into moving, but he almost never has fake blood on him. He’s just not that kind of guy. He might have a tape measure or an expired credit card, but if you need a fake arm or a bear claw you’re looking at the wrong guy. It was nice, though, to see that I was bleeding, because then I knew that at least Victor would take me more seriously. However, I quickly discovered that the main reason he was freaked out about the blood was that we hadn’t sealed the kitchen grout yet, and that this would surely leave a stain. It was a bit uncaring, but I understood his aggravation, because if I ever ended up abducted, this bloodstain could tie him to the murder, but I didn’t mention it, because I didn’t want to give him any ideas. Also, he may have just been pissed about all the marbles under the fridge. But I brushed off his silly housekeeping concerns because I suddenly realized that I was bleeding BECAUSE I’D BEEN STABBED BY CHICKEN.
Coincidentally, this is also when I realized that no one would ever believe this scenario, and also that Victor was definitely going to jail, because who gets stabbed by chicken? I do, apparently. It was one of those dried, sliced chicken-breast treats that I’d been holding in my hand because I was going to feed it to Barnaby Jones, and it was slightly dangerously ludicrously sharp and apparently quite stabbable with enough force. It seemed unbelievable, but it was the kind of thing that could happen to anyone who fell onto a shiv made of poultry. Except that now that I consider it, I’m probably the only person in the world to ever get knifed by a chicken. So I win. Or lose. Maybe both.
And then I explained to Victor that it was just that I got stabbed with a chicken, and he started to call the ambulance again, because he assumed I had a concussion. I sighed, tugging on his pant leg to get his attention, and gave him a demonstration by grabbing the chicken shiv and making a stabbing motion with my good hand. And then he stared at me in bafflement and hung up the phone, because he finally understood, or maybe because he thought I was threatening to stab him. Victor explained that he didn’t know what he would tell the ambulance drivers anyway, because, “There’s no way anyone would believe that our adorable dog could do this sort of damage,” and he said it in a really condescending and judgmental way, and I think that’s why I found myself defensively screaming, “YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT HE’S LIKE WHEN YOU AREN’T HERE.” This was when Victor tucked Barnaby Jones under his arm, saying, “Don’t listen to Mommy’s ravings, Mr. Jones,” and carried him to bed so they could watch Mythbusters together. I may have yelled from the floor, “He would have pushed me down the stairs, if we had stairs.” I also may have implied that Barnaby Jones would probably rip out our throats while we slept, now that he’d developed a taste for human blood, and Victor yelled that Barnaby Jones couldn’t hear the TV because of all of the shouting, and that he wasn’t going to talk to someone who was overreacting on the kitchen floor. I explained that “overreaction” is a common symptom of a person going into shock, and he said that it wasn’t, and so I had to go look for my medical dictionary myself, with my broken finger, and I couldn’t even find it. I shouldn’t even be allowed to type this right now. I should be wrapped in a warm blanket and not be allowed to go to sleep. Or I should be made to go to sleep. One of those. Or maybe I need a hot toddy. I probably knew the correct procedure for this sort of thing before the dog gave me a concussion by trying to kill me with chicken.
P.S. Victor totally owes me, because he would have gone to jail automat
ically because he was wearing only a half-shirt, and if you aren’t wearing a whole shirt when the police come, you go to jail. That’s how jail works.
P.P.S. Just to clarify, it’s a half-shirt in that it’s sleeveless. It’s not the kind that ends under his nipples. Victor can’t really pull that sort of look off. I don’t know whether you go to jail for that kind of shirt. Probably so, though, if there’s a nipply half-shirt, a dog, and a bunch of human blood involved.
P.P.P.S. How do you know whether your pupils are dilated? What are they supposed to look like normally? Why is WebMD so complicated? Why can’t I stop reading about cancer when I’m trying to look up concussions? Great. Now I have cancer. Thanks a lot, Barnaby Jones.
Updated: Went to the ER this morning. Explained the situation. They wrote, “Stabbed by chicken,” on my chart. Then they asked whether I had any “psych issues,” but I thought they said “psychic issues” and I was all, “Like . . . can I read your thoughts?” Then they put me in a private room. I think the lesson here is that you should fake mental illness to get faster service. Turns out, though, that it’s just a sprain, so I have to wear a splint until it heals, and I also have to keep it elevated. Here’s a picture of me driving myself home:
Stop honking at me. I’m disabled, you bastards.
Awesome. The people in my neighborhood are lucky to have me.
P.P.P.P.S. Several of my friends have implied that Barnaby Jones was probably just acting in self-defense, since you’re not supposed to give dogs chicken bones, but these are fancy, filleted, boneless chicken breasts. Meanwhile, I’m eating ramen noodles, and his sweater cost more than my entire outfit. Way to blame the victim, people. I may never play the ukulele again.