Domestic comedy

“Our knowledge of Los Angeles is vast and shallow!”

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[In the latest episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm, “Igor, Gregor, & Timor,” we were pleased to notice and understand a passing reference to the Park La Brea Apartments.]

Domestic comedy

“That house was already mid-century modern; then they renovated it to make it look even more mid-century modern. I guess now it’s mid-century postmodern.”

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Domestic comedy

“You know, if you grow up with one version of something, any other version is going to strike you as ersatz.”

“Even if it’s the original. Put that on your blog.”

We were talking about the television series Lassie. The Lassie of my childhood is the Timmy-Ruth-Paul version. I’ve never really cottoned to the Jeff-Ellen-Gramps version, which came first. Indeed, without Jeff-Ellen-Gramps, there’d be no Timmy-Ruth-Paul: Timmy came on the scene as a runaway orphan hiding in the Jeff-Ellen-Gramps barn. Ruth and Paul bought the farm from Ellen and adopted the runaway. COZI TV is running four hours of Lassie this afternoon, two hours of which are Timmy-Ruth-Paul.

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[Did you know that before there was June Lockhart, there was Cloris Leachman? She was a tightly wound Ruth Martin, something like the Phyllis Lindstrom of just-outside-Calverton.]

Domestic comedy

“How did you know to get the grass seed in right before it rained?”

“I am connected to the earth.”

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[Used with permission.]

Domestic comedy

“It’s too bad we can’t go there on Wednesday. The phở is cheaper on Wednesdays.”

“We’ll just have to get phở -price phở.”

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Domestic comedy

“You know, I think competitiveness is a default male setting.”

“It is not.”

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Domestic comedy

[After a partial rendition of “Nighthawks at the Diner.”]

“So do you like my Tom Waits imitation?”

“It affects me physically.”

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Domestic comedy

“I never met a substitute chord I didn’t like.”

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[Elaine and I were playing pre-dinner-party music, violin and guitar, for a good cause (the Y): “Autumn Leaves,” “Lullaby of the Leaves,” “On a Little Street in Singapore,” “Pennies from Heaven,” “Boulevard of Broken Dreams,” “Mood Indigo,” “Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?”, and “When Day Is Done.” If you’re wondering about substitute chords, this Wikipedia article should leave you thoroughly confused.]

Domestic comedy

“I have no desire to sleep with Marcus Aurelius.”

“And he has no desire to sleep with you. Or if he does, he’s praying to get rid of it.”

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Domestic comedy

[Who’s our fixer?]

“You’re the fixer. You fixed the pencil sharpener . . . no, you tried to fix the pencil sharpener.”

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Domestic comedy

“I thought you said ‘Help yourself.’”

“No, I said ‘Laurel.’”

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[If you’re lost: yanny or laurel.]

Domestic comedy

[Star Trek. Shatner front and center.]

“What acting.”

“What acting?”

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Domestic comedy

"I'm so glad that you're not a fraud."

"Thank you."

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Domestic comedy

[After tearing a paper towel in two.]

“That wasn’t very even of me.”

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Domestic comedy

“Did I ever tell you about the etymology of apple?”

“No.”

[Discourse follows on Genesis, the pomegranate, and la pomme de terre.]

“But where does the word apple come from?”

“I don’t remember.”

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Domestic comedy

“It’s not like that apple I ate in the Garden of Eden — I mean, Los Angeles.”

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[To be specific, a farmers market in Silver Lake.]

Domestic comedy

“What a riot!”

“What a hoot!”

“Man, I’m bushed!”

[Our daughter Rachel is back for a few days and has spent some time reading through her childhood diaries and notebooks. Rachel was at times a dedicated diarist, one whose writerly voice, we have now learned, was heavily influenced by 1950s chapter books. These exclamations are from Rachel’s twelve-year-old diaristic self, used here with her grown-up self’s permission. That self is still given to saying “Holy Toledo!”]

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Domestic comedy

“‘The devil’s spawn’: isn’t that a little extreme?”

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Domestic comedy

Caught on tape:

“This is a close-up of our real family life: having boring stuff doing.”

That’s our son Ben — at four or five? — as he roamed the house with a Fisher-Price tape recorder, interviewing and reporting. He and Rachel made countless cassette recordings: music, newscasts, skits, streams of consciousness. The energy of it all! We were listening earlier this week.

Since early August, I’ve kept my dad’s last word — “Thanks” — in the space below this blog’s title, as what Blogger calls “blog description.” With the turn of the year, I’m going to begin varying the description again, starting with a few of these words from Ben back in tykehood.

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Two hundred blog description lines
Fifty blog description lines

Domestic comedy

“And you asked him?”

“Yes.”

“And he deigned to reply?”

“Yes, he deigned.”

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