Is This Anything?

by Jerry Seinfeld

  Phone Machine

  Have you ever called someone up and you’re disappointed when they answer?

  You wanted the machine.

  You’re totally thrown off.

  You go, “Oh… I… didn’t know you’d be there.

  I just wanted to leave a message saying, ‘Sorry I missed you.’ ”

  So because of the phone machine,

  what you can have is two people that don’t really ever want to talk, and the phone machine is like this relationship respirator keeping these marginal, brain-dead relationships alive.

  Why do we do this?

  Because when we come home we want to see that little flashing red light.

  And go, “All right, messages.”

  People need that.

  It’s very important for human beings to feel they are popular and

  well-liked amongst a large group of people that they have no interest in.

  I love my phone machine.

  I wish I was a phone machine.

  I wish if I saw somebody on the street I didn’t want to talk to I could just go,

  “Excuse me, I’m not here right now. If you just leave a message, I can walk away.”

  I also have a cordless phone, but I don’t like that much.

  Because you can’t slam down a cordless phone. You get mad at somebody on a real phone,

  “You can’t talk to me like that!”

  BANG, it’s over.

  But a cordless phone—

  “You can’t talk to me like that!

  All right now, let me just find that little thing to turn this off

  … Just hang on, I’m hanging up on you.”

  And when the phone machine breaks,

  people scoop them up and carry them in their arms like sick children.

  They yell at befuddled repairmen,

  “What do you mean there’s nothing you can do?”

  The phone machine is like your little message fisherman.

  You come in the door, “How was the catch today? They biting?”

  I’m sure somewhere someone has returned a phone machine,

  like a bad lure, because it didn’t get enough calls.

  I would say the concept behind the car phone, and the phone machine,

  the speaker phone, the airline phone, the portable phone, the pay phone, the cordless phone,

  the multi-line phone, the phone pager, the call waiting, the call forwarding,

  call conferencing, speed dialing, direct dialing, and the redialing,

  is that we all have absolutely nothing to say,

  and we’ve got to talk to someone about it right now.

  Cannot wait another second!

  You’re at home you’re on the phone.

  You’re in the car you’re making calls.

  You get to work, “Any messages for me?”

  You’ve got to give people a chance to miss you a little bit.

  Cell Phone Speech

  Why does everyone talk like the person on the other phone

  is trapped in a submarine on the ocean floor?

  “You’re breaking up… Hang on…!”

  “Breaking up”?

  What is this, Apollo 13?

  You’re at the mall, take it easy.

  You’re talking to somebody at the food court Cinnabon…

  That you can see from the escalator as you’re coming down.

  Paint Apartment

  I’ve been in the same apartment for years.

  I just keep painting it.

  The wall outlets are just a mound of paint with two slots in it.

  It looks like a pig is trying to push his way through from the other side.

  And every time I paint it I think,

  “Well, it’s just a little bit smaller now.”

  I realize it’s just the thickness of the paint, but still…

  Each time, it’s coming in on me a little bit more.

  I think eventually someone will open the front door

  and it’ll be just a solid white block with an eye.

  People will go, “Wow, that guy painted too much.”

  Toaster Room

  I don’t cook.

  I have a kitchen.

  I’ve been in it.

  To me, a kitchen is just a big room to hold a toaster.

  That’s the way I think of my apartment.

  Bedroom, Living Room, Toaster Room.

  Winter—I’ll turn that dial thing up.

  Make the toast darker.

  Summer—I turn it down.

  With the sun and the hot weather I like it a little more on the light side.

  That’s as into cuisine as I get.

  My other big home cooking interest is using the right size plate.

  I don’t like using too big a plate.

  I’m not exactly sure what it’s a waste of.

  I guess having to wash unutilized plate area.

  I’m wetting it, soaping it up, rinsing it, drying it.

  And it wasn’t needed for anything.

  Also, when I’m making my bed and I tuck in one side of the sheet I stay bent over as I move to tuck in the other side.

  Why stand up and then bend over again?

  When I finish with my cereal, I put the bowl away with the spoon in it.

  Why go to a separate drawer to get a spoon every morning?

  How often am I going to use that bowl and not need the spoon that goes with it?

  I’ll worry about that situation when I’m faced with it.

  Diet

  Everybody wants to know everybody’s diet.

  “You look okay, what do you eat?”

  Here’s mine:

  I eat pretty good.

  But if I’m hungry and there’s something in front of me, I eat that.

  When I get back to my hotel late at night after doing a show,

  if there’s a room service tray in the hallway and there’s a roll on it,

  that doesn’t look too bad…

  I would and have eaten it.

  I figure, what are the odds that somebody in a hotel room would go,

  “Hey, before we put the tray out, let’s inject a roll with poison, leave it in the hall,

  in case there’s a comic coming back to his room at two o’clock in the morning—we can kill him.”

  Restaurant Check Timing

  I have never liked the standard restaurant

  “Check at the end of the meal system.”

  Because money is a very different thing before and after you eat.

  When you’re hungry, money means nothing…

  You’re like the ruler of an empire.

  CLAP, CLAP,

  “We must have more appetizers, more drinks!

  Little fried things in the shape of a stick or a ball.

  This will be The Greatest Meal of Our Lives.”

  Then after the meal when you’re full,

  you can’t remember ever being hungry ever in your life.

  You see people walking in the restaurant, you can’t believe it.

  “Why are these people coming in here now?

  I’m so full.

  How could THEY eat?”

  You’ve got the pants undone, napkins destroyed, cigarette butt in the mashed potatoes.

  You never want to see food again as long as you live.

  And that’s when the check comes.

  This is why people are always mystified by the check.

  “What is this?

  How could this be?”

  They start passing it around the table.

  “Does this look RIGHT to you?

  We’re not hungry now, why are we buying all this food?”

  Nightclub of Clothes

  So, I assume the clothes I’m looking at are the best of what was left in your closet?

  They’re the lucky ones.

  They got picked.

  They got to go out.

  Anything you’re not wearing right now is jus
t home, hoping to get picked tomorrow.

  Shirt is like,

  “He never picks me.

  Used to wear me all the time.

  Lost a button…”

  It’s a lot of waiting.

  In the closet.

  In the hamper.

  In the drawer.

  That’s why laundry day’s the most exciting day.

  The washing machine is like a nightclub for clothes.

  It’s dark, bubbles happening, they’re all kind of dancing around in there.

  Shirt grabs the underwear, “Come on, babe, let’s go.”

  You come by,

  open the lid, they all freeze.

  “Would you close the door, please?

  This is actually a private club…

  We have a dress code.

  It’s ‘Clothes Only.’

  Nothing is allowed to be on anyone.”

  Sometimes I take the clothes out, they’re all twisted together.

  I don’t even want to know what happened.

  Dry Cleaning

  I’ve got to go to the dry cleaner tomorrow and have a fight with that guy.

  I don’t even know what it’s going to be about.

  But that’s why you go to the dry cleaner.

  So you can walk in and say,

  “Well, it’s ruined.”

  And then he can say,

  “We’re not responsible.”

  Let’s get one thing straight about dry cleaning right now.

  It doesn’t exist. There’s no such thing as dry cleaning.

  My first question is,

  “What the hell is dry cleaning fluid?”

  There’s no dry fluids.

  There’s no way of cleaning with dry, washing with dry, or doing anything with dry.

  Dry itself is nothing. You can’t use it. You can’t do anything with it.

  It’s not there. It doesn’t exist.

  We walk into these places with the big signs out front, “Dry Cleaning,” and for some reason

  never question how they were able to put this absurd concept over on us.

  If I gave you a filthy shirt and said, “I want this immaculate. No liquids!”

  What are you going to do? Shake it? Tap it? Blow on it?

  * * *

  You almost can’t get something dirty with dry, let alone clean it.

  And “One-Hour Martinizing.”

  You know what I think One-Hour Martinizing is?

  I think they just put the clothes in plastic and give it right back to you.

  That’s One-Hour Martinizing.

  You can get One-Second Martinizing if you want it.

  I wonder if the dry cleaners ever wear the clothes?

  Why not?

  Imagine bumping into your dry cleaner at a party and he’s wearing your sweater?

  (loud whisper)

  “Hey!!

  What the hell are you doing?!

  That better be ready by tomorrow.”

  Dry Clean Only

  “Dry clean only” is definitely the only warning label that human beings actually respect.

  They’ll look at cigarettes,

  “This will give you cancer, kill you, your kids, your parents, everyone.”

  “No, screw it. I’ll do whatever the hell I want.”

  “Don’t drink this medicine and operate heavy machinery.”

  “Ahh, who cares? Glug, glug, glug…

  That’s for people that don’t know what the hell they’re doing. I’m a pro.”

  But if you have something that’s dry clean only,

  and somebody goes to put it in the washing machine,

  “Don’t put it in the washing machine!

  It’s dry clean only!

  Are you crazy? You out of your mind?”

  Gentle Cycle

  When I do wash I always like to use the gentle cycle.

  Sounds so much more humane.

  Or the gentle/gentle cycle.

  You could put a baby in there.

  Won’t hurt it.

  I don’t know what the machine’s doing in there that’s so gentle.

  But it’s very private.

  Because you pick up the lid on the machine, it stops immediately.

  “Would you close that please?

  Can’t you see I’m in the middle of a very delicate cycle?”

  Engaged

  I got engaged about 10 or so years ago.

  Didn’t want to get married, that was the closest I got.

  I can tell you this, if you’re engaged and you don’t want to get married…

  It’s a little tense.

  Being engaged is like being on just that first part of the roller coaster where you’re going

  up and up and you have no idea what the rest of the ride is.

  You just hear that, “click tick, click tick, click tick.”

  “Boy, this thing goes up pretty high…”

  You get to the top, they give you a ring and a piece of cake and you just go,

  “Aah-aah… we’re marrr-iiieeeddd.”

  Commitment

  Why is commitment such a problem for a man?

  I think that for some reason when a man is driving down that freeway of love,

  the woman he’s involved with is like an exit.

  But he doesn’t want to get off there.

  He wants to keep driving.

  And the woman is like,

  “Look, gas, food, lodging.

  That’s our exit.

  That’s everything we need to be happy.… Get off here, now!”

  But the man focuses on the sign underneath that says,

  “Next exit twenty-seven miles.”

  And he goes, “I think I can make it.”

  Sometimes he can, sometimes he can’t.

  Sometimes the car ends up on the side of the road.

  Hood up and smoke pouring out of the engine.

  He’s sitting on the curb all alone.

  “I guess I didn’t realize how many miles I was racking up.”

  Mozzarella Relationships

  There’s no easy way to break off any relationship.

  It’s like the mozzarella cheese on a good slice of pizza.

  It just gets thinner and longer but it doesn’t want to break.

  One way to end the relationship is adultery.

  You can’t just “have” an adultery.

  You must commit adultery.

  And of course, you can’t commit adultery unless you have a commitment.

  So you must make the commitment before you can even think about committing it.

  There’s no commit without the commit.

  Then you can get caught, get divorced, lose your mind, and they have you committed.

  Cheating

  Some people actually cheat on the people that they’re cheating with.

  Which is like holding up a bank and then turning to the guy you’re robbing it with and going,

  “All right, now give me everything you have, too.”

  Why stop at just what’s in the bank?

  Friends After Dating

  I think that if you’ve had a relationship with someone

  and you try to become friends afterward, it’s very difficult.

  Because you know each other too well.

  It’s like two magicians trying to entertain each other.

  The one goes, “Look, a rabbit.”

  The other goes, “So?… I believe this is your card.”

  “Look, why don’t we just saw each other in half and call it a night, okay?”

  Baby Life

  My sister’s having a baby.

  Everyone gets excited when a baby is born.

  Except the baby.

  Because it’s no fun being a baby.

  They don’t know their bodies are going to grow.

  They’re born, they look down, they think,

  “Well, I guess this is the body I’ve got.

  You’ve got to be
kidding me.

  Tiny hands, giant head, lousy plumbing.

  Where am I going to find a tie that long?”

  At 6 months old they immediately put you in charge of complicated toys you have no idea how to operate.

  I had a Busy Box in my playpen.

  All those knobs, buttons, switches.

  I’m working this thing.

  I didn’t know it’s not connected to anything.

  I’d make in my pants, everybody gets upset.

  I’d think, “I got this thing set way too high.”

  Every meal, they sit you down, strap a bib on you.

  You think, “Alright, lobster.”

  And you don’t get it.

  Bachelor Party and Bridal Shower

  I have a friend who’s about to get married.

  They’re having the bachelor party and the bridal shower the same day.

  So, it’s conceivable that while the girl’s friends are giving her sexy lingerie,

  the guy could be at a strip club watching a table dancer in the exact same outfit.

  That’s a special moment.

  Bad Gifts

  To me, there’s no better gift than a paperweight to express to someone, “I refuse to put any thought into this at all.”

  And where are these people working that the papers are just blowing right off of their desks?

  Is their office screwed to the back of a flatbed truck going down the highway?

  Are they typing in the crow’s nest of a clipper ship?

  What do you need a paperweight for?

  Where’s the wind coming from?

  Touch Face Relationship

  If you’re in a relationship, there’s pressure.

  That’s a fact of life.

  You can see it whenever you ask someone about their relationship.

  Because they are immediately a little nervous,

  the first thing they will do is touch their face.

  “So how is it going with Judy?”

  (scratching chin)

  “Not bad.”

  And the higher up on their face they go,

  the worse the relationship is getting.

  “Heard you’re having some problems.”