Wing Chun: Hello?

Sarah: …Dude.

Wing Chun: …I know.

Sarah: Dude.

Wing Chun: I know.

Sarah: You know that scene in Jason and the Argonauts with the skeletons?

Wing Chun: I…don’t think so.

Sarah: With the, where they’re swarming?

Wing Chun: I’d remember a skeleton swarm.

Sarah: Yeah, probably — okay. In Attack of the Clones, where the clone army is, like, assembling, and the camera sort of pans back while they’re all getting dropped out of that ship pod whatever thing, and the sound effect is just this foreboding chank chank chank chank chank —

Wing Chun: Sure, sure, and you know it’s CGI, but you’re still like, damn.

Sarah: Right!

Wing Chun: Let me see if I can possibly guess where you’re going with this.

Sarah: Well, tell me I’m wrong. Tell me you aren’t picturing the massed army of the GBC hunkering down behind their helmets in tortoise formation all Gladiator-stylee.

Wing Chun: I am now. Heh.

Sarah: Tell me you aren’t also picturing Feldman circling the perimeter of the tortugo all, “Guys, come on! Guys! Seriously! There’s flaming arrows, let me in!”

Wing Chun: Aaaaaactually, I was picturing a certain game-show host out in front of the non-heavenly host, snacking on said flaming arrows.

Sarah: Oh, obviously. My mistake.

Wing Chun: You’re right about how big it’s getting, though. You might have to rename it the Girls’ Bike Battalion.

Sarah: I know, right? “GBC Company.” It’s insane lately, I don’t even know where to start.

Wing Chun: The new Pope?

Sarah: From what I read, I don’t think the new Pope is having any of that gender-bending boys-on-girls’-bikes nonsense.

Wing Chun: Yeah, probably not.

Sarah: Not so much with the progressive thinking on gender, Benny.

Wing Chun: No. Or on anything else.

Sarah: No, not so much.

Wing Chun: …

Sarah: Do it.

Wing Chun: …

Sarah: Do it.

Wing Chun: Shut up, Pope.

Sarah: That’s what I’m talking about.

Wing Chun: And now I will be talking about your boy Chris Klein.

Sarah: Oh, man. I hope you packed a lunch because we’re going to be talking for a while, but! Not my boy.

Wing Chun: Um, you paid to see Here On Earth in the theater, therefore he’s your boy, no refunds, no exchanges.

Sarah: Um, YOU paid to see The Notebook in the theater!

Wing Chun: Uuuummmm, NOT the point!

Sarah: UUUUUUUUUMMMMMMMMM, I agree! The point —

Wing Chun: — isthatyouthinkhe’shot!

Sarah: …No, that is not in fact the point.

Wing Chun: And yet you don’t deny it.

Sarah: I used to think he was hot. Then I saw American Pie and got over it.

Wing Chun: Uh huh.

Sarah: Look. I would admit it if I still thought he was hot. I admitted that I thought Scott Glenn was hot, didn’t I?

Wing Chun: YOU THINK SCOTT GLENN IS HOT?!

Sarah: …

Wing Chun: Just kidding, just kidding. You did tell me that.

Sarah: And?

Wing Chun: And when we found the Girls’ Hearing Aid Clu–

Sarah: You know, I’ve never liked you.

Wing Chun: Hee hee.

Sarah: Never.

Wing Chun: Okay.

Sarah: Okay, seriously: Klein. Twice the legal limit? What the?

Wing Chun: Well, he broke up with Katie Holmes.

Sarah: But he got caught before they broke up, I thought. Isn’t that why? They broke up?

Wing Chun: You know, I don’t know, because at first I thought they broke up and then he went out drunk-driving, and then I thought he went out drunk-driving and she was like, “That’ll do, pig,” and broke up with him, but now I think it’s the first one again, because…Tom Cruise?

Sarah: Tom Cruise got caught drunk-driving? Man, where have I be–

Wing Chun: Nnnnnnnno no no no no. Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes.

Sarah: Katie Holmes got caught drunk-dri–

Wing Chun: They’re dating. Each other.

Sarah: I…the words are in English, but I don’t understa–

Wing Chun: Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes are dating each other.

Sarah: Hee hee hee, good one.

Wing Chun: Thanks, except the thing is, they’re dating each other.

Sarah: [inhales lengthily]

Wing Chun: [drops phone, claps hands over ears]

Sarah: WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT?!

Wing Chun: IIIIIIII know!

Sarah: What the…what…but…what in…what…what what WHAT?

Wing Chun: I know, and I…don’t know.

Sarah: Tom…Cruise. Of Mission Impossible. That Tom Cruise.

Wing Chun: Yes.

Sarah: And Joey Potter. That Katie Holmes?

Wing Chun: It does look like her in this picture, yes.

Sarah: I…I just absolutely do not know what to do with this information.

Wing Chun: I don’t think anyone does.

Sarah: Well, I guess Chris Klein knew what to do with it, in the end.

Wing Chun: And I have to say, I don’t disagree with his choice there.

Sarah: Oh, nor do I. In fact, I’m tempted to make the same choice myself and I don’t even know these people, because…seriously, what? WHAT?

Wing Chun: Exactly. Which is why I think maybe the timeline is not what we’ve been told it is.

Sarah: Wait, so you think she cheated on Klein with Cruise and that’s why he tied one on — excuse me, “tied two on” and got behind the wheel?

Wing Chun: Yeah. Because the other explanation, which is that he tied one on and then she Brenda-stomped into the arms of Cruise, makes no sense.

Sarah: That she is in the arms of Cruise at all makes no sense. He’s twice her age, half her height, gay, and in a cult.

Wing Chun: “And so it was that the Girls’ Lawsuit Club was founded.”

Sarah: At the same time as the Girl, Please Club, then, because: Girl? Please.

Wing Chun: Oh, I’m not disputing your claims. But he’s a little sensitive about these things, I think.

Sarah: …

Wing Chun: What?

Sarah: Nothing.

Wing Chun: Just say it.

Sarah: No, I mean I have nothing else to say on the subject. I am speechless.

Wing Chun: I just keep thinking that I could not have come up with a more random Hollywood pairing if I had tried. Not if I had spent a week trying.

Sarah: I…no, I don’t think I could have either. I mean, maybe Michael Jackson and Lisa Marie?

Wing Chun: It’s the only one that comes close, and honestly, that one makes more sense to me. I mean, it’s a twisted kind of sense, but still. Sense is at least sort of lurking nearby. This, no.

Sarah: No, I know what you mean. This…I don’t know what this is. “Cavorting around Rome”? What?

Wing Chun: I know, right? Tom Cruise does not cavort.

Sarah: No, he doesn’t. He strides purposefully.

Wing Chun: On his tiny little legs.

Sarah: Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome my co-defendant.

Wing Chun: Heh.

Sarah: Unless it’s all just a big marketing opportunity.

Wing Chun: Now that would make sense. It would gross me out, but it would make sense. They both have huge hype-y movies coming out soon.

Sarah: Plus the alternative is that they’re actually in love, which…well, I hesitate to call it “gross,” but —

Wing Chun: Well, it’s creepy at best.

Sarah: Hee.

Wing Chun: What?

Sarah: Oh, I’m just imagining Billy Joel emerging from rehab, hearing about this unholy union, shrieking like a schoolgirl, and dashing back inside all “let me stay, LET ME STAY!!”

Wing Chun: You know, the fact that it might signal the end of days would explain the uptick in GBC activity we’ve seen recently.

Sarah: Heh. Like in Ghost Busters when the grid is all overloaded.

Wing Chun: Hee. Now I’m picturing Joaquin Phoenix in a tinfoil beanie, fleeing Mr. Stay-Puft.

Sarah: Oh, man, Mr. Stay-Puft. Can you imagine the size of that bike?

Wing Chun: I can imagine the entire Busey family caught in the treads.

Sarah: How would they even build a girls’ bike that big?

Wing Chun: It’s like the pyramids. Untold thousands died in the service of this testament to…to…

Sarah: Stay-Puftankhamen?

Wing Chun: And his bride…

Sarah: Do it!

Wing Chun: …Stay-Puftiti.

Sarah: Niiiice. Although, as much as I’m enjoying the Stay-Puftymandias concept —

Wing Chun: “Look upon my works, ye marshmallow, and despair!”

Sarah: Right, but — that’s the thing.

Wing Chun: That he’s the Colosstay-Puft of Rhodes?

Sarah: Hee. No. That he’s a giant marshmallow.

Wing Chun: Well, if he can walk, he can ride a b– ohhhh, yes, I see the issue.

Sarah and Wing Chun: “…DAWSON!”

Sarah: He’s Dick kibble for sure.

Wing Chun: Yeah, you’re right. Plus Mr. Stay-Puft doesn’t strike me as a substance abuser.

Sarah: Me neither, actually. Maybe some anger management needing to happen there.

Wing Chun: Maybe. But you know who’s got some problems? Mr. Peanut.

Sarah: Boy, does he. Pants, Mr. Peanut. Look into that.

Wing Chun: Seriously. And lose the monocle.

Sarah: And stop circling the fort on your Schwinn Pixie and shouting, “Tally ho!”

Wing Chun: Fortunately, Mr. Peanut’s GBC tenure will, I suspect, be a short one.

Sarah: “…DAWSON!”

Wing Chun: Yes.

Sarah: God bless that hungry man.

Wing Chun: And while we’re on the subject, which, when are we not, but anyway, you know who I hope Hannibal Lecter puts in a pita?

Sarah: The Trix rabbit?

Wing Chun: Excellent plan, but no.

Sarah: Toucan Sam?

Wing Chun: No, but if we’re wishing death on cereal-adjacent animated birds, that cuckoo-for-Cocoa Puffs…thing has got to go. What is its name, anyway?

Sarah: …Sonny?

Wing Chun: Right, Sonny. I hate that cuckoo.

Sarah: Yeah, he needs to chill. I mean, I like a chocolatey puff myself, but dude. Anyway.

Wing Chun: Anyway: Bobby Fischer.

Sarah: Oh, Jaysus. I still don’t understand why Iceland took his ass in.

Wing Chun: I guess Björk’s not nutty enough for them anymore?

Sarah: Or she’s the benevolent kind of nutty, and they wanted to balance things out with some mean, bigoted nutty? I don’t know.

Wing Chun: I guess. Man, he is twenty pounds of crazy in a five-pound —

Sarah: — beard.

Wing Chun: Lord, seriously. Who would even hang out with his frizzy ass besides Lecter?

Sarah: The Unabomber?

Wing Chun: The dudes from ZZ Top?

Sarah: Hee. “She’s got a biiiiike! / She knows how to use it!”

Wing Chun: Hey, every bike’s crazy ’bout a sharp-dressed man.

Sarah: I always loved how the one dude in ZZ Top without a beard’s last name was…Beard.

Wing Chun: Heh. I kno– OH MY GOD.

Sarah: What, what?

Wing Chun: Speaking of ironic names!

Sarah: What?

Wing Chun: Lecter should not eat Bobby Fischer next. Lecter should eat…Dawson.

Sarah: But —

Wing Chun: Not Dawson comma Richard. Dawson Dawson.

Sarah: Dawson Daws…DAWSON LEERY.

Wing Chun: YES.

Sarah: Why did we never think of that before? Because it’s perfect!

Wing Chun: I agree! We get rid of Van Der Beek, Lecter has a gigantic head he can make casseroles out of for a month, everybody wins!

Sarah: Brilliant! But what’s our excuse for putting the Beek in the GBC?

Wing Chun: Have we met? He sucks.

Sarah: Well, Donald Trump kind of sucks too, but we can’t really put him in either until he gets caught with a joint or goes bazoo.

Wing Chun: Good point. Plus he’d insist on renaming the fort the Trump World Bicycle Center or some damn thing.

Sarah: Yeah, who needs that.

Wing Chun: He can visit, though, on his gold-plated bike.

Sarah: Why would he visit?

Wing Chun: To see how Apprentice Chris is doing.

Sarah: Oh, riiiiight. Attended, I assume, by George and Carolyn.

Wing Chun: On tricycles.

Sarah: Hee. Guess they’re installing a spittoon in the fort to go with that stripper pole.

Wing Chun: Oh, no, he won’t start dipping again. He promised.

Sarah: I wish he’d promised not to start crying. Lord, was that uncomfortable.

Wing Chun: Oh, I know. Can you imagine if they started giving him shit and pretending they wouldn’t let him join? Because you know Belushi would do that just to be a wise-ass, and then he’d just be bawling…

Sarah: Oh, God. That made me sad, a little.

Wing Chun: As sad as the poem Jim Morrison will write about it?

Sarah: Shut up, Jim Morrison.

Wing Chun: Won’t happen.

Sarah: I know. But hey, Vinny Pastore might beat him up!

Wing Chun: Jim Morrison?

Sarah: Yeah.

Wing Chun: Not a Doors fan, Big Pussy?

Sarah: Not a sanity fan, apparently, with the fiancée-beating and the, you know, being a crazy nutbar.

Wing Chun: Oh, man. Of all the Sopranos guys I thought would do something like that, he’s honestly the last. Well, the second to last, I don’t think Dominic Chianese’s about to open a can on anyone.

Sarah: You know, I’m kind of not surprised, because Pastore was sort of an ass on Dinner for Five.

Wing Chun: But that’s a talk show. With eating. Unless I missed the episode with the fistfi–

Sarah: No, I know, but he just blabbered on the whole time about his days as an extra and wouldn’t let anyone else talk, which first of all was boring, and second of all, when you’re at the same table as P. Diddy and you won’t let him get a word in edgewise?

Wing Chun: Like P. Diddy is so interesting?

Sarah: Well, he’s more interesting than “oh, I pushed a coat rack through a scene in GoodFellas,” and anyway, I don’t get the impression that Diddy is a guy you want to talk over.

Wing Chun: I don’t get the impression that Diddy is a guy who has anything to say.

Sarah: I’ve been watching Making the Band 3, and I have to disagree. Diddy has plenty to say, all of it is bitchy, and I wanted to hear what he thought of acting with Vince Vaughn, but no, Pastore has to be all flappity-fling-flang-blah about his job as a bouncer, like, no one cares.

Wing Chun: You realize that you are defending Diddy. Out loud.

Sarah: I…well, I’m not exactly…defending? Him?

Wing Chun: You are defending Diddy.

Sarah: Well. Maybe a little.

Wing Chun: Why? Why would you do such a thing?

Sarah: Okay, look. I don’t want to be best friends with the guy. I just want to hear him gossip about movies and other famous people, and more than that, I don’t want to hear Vinny Pastore tell another boring story that has nothing to do with movies, and I certainly do not want to hear Jon Favreau bring up the fact that he got cut from Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle yet again, like —

Wing Chun: Sustained.

Sarah: — we know you…wait, what?

Wing Chun: Objection totally sustained. Favs does that on every episode. Every single episode.

Sarah: I’m saying!

Wing Chun: Is that a drinking game yet? Because, God. And to hear him tell it, he got cut out of so many scenes —

Sarah: — that they actually cut like two thirds of the movie, I know!

Wing Chun: And it’s not that I don’t like his movies, because I do. Swingers is a great movie.

Sarah: Oh, I could live with it if he brought up Swingers every time, but no, it’s Mrs. Parker —

Wing Chun: — which was ten years ago, get over it.

Sarah: Which was ten years ago, get over it, or it’s goddamn Rocky Goddamn Marciano —

Wing Chun: — augh, which nobody saw and which every time with that one, too.

Sarah: I know! So, I’m not defending Diddy so much as I am dissing Favreau.

Wing Chun: As I said, objection sustained. Man, I thought I was the only one who noticed that he does that.

Sarah: No way, dude. Everyone notices it. Eeeeveryone except Favreau.

Wing Chun: Didn’t someone call him on it once, though? Wasn’t Faison Love like, “Yo, enough with the Marciano, no one cares”?

Sarah: I think it was Kevin Smith, actually, and also, stop having Faison Love on.

Wing Chun: Aw, no love for the Love?

Sarah: Fine with the Love, would prefer more variety.

Wing Chun: That is a good show, though.

Sarah: It’s a great show. But it would be even greater with more judicious use of the Favecdotes.

Wing Chun: And a hundred percent less Favtee. Or Goatreau, if you prefer.

Sarah: Yeeeeeeeah, that quote-unquote beard needs to go. I think he’s doing it to hide weight gain and it’s having the opposite effect.

Wing Chun: Well, and maybe…Small Salad for Five?

Sarah: Hee. Dinner for Atkins?

Wing Chun: Man, we’re mean.

Sarah: He’s not even in the GBC, poor guy.

Wing Chun: Not if you don’t count that scene in Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle where he drank all that absinthe.

Sarah: Or that scene in Rocky Marciano where he…where he…

Wing Chun: Got…drunk? And…did something bad?

Sarah: Yeah, that one. Heh.

Wing Chun: Although he could get some insane footage out of the GBC membership, that’s for sure.

Sarah: Oh my God, can you imagine? Busey, Jim Morrison, Ted Kennedy, and…

Wing Chun: Vince Vaughn.

Sarah: Oh, totally.

Wing Chun: Or, since we’re going to get sued anyway, Tom Cruise.

Sarah: Oh, man. Tom Cruise, Mimi Rogers —

Wing Chun: Whoa, Mimi Rogers. Way to dig deep.

Sarah: — Nicole Kidman, and Penelope Cruz.

Wing Chun: Oh, Lordy. Assuming any of them could talk under the terms of their twenty-nine-billion-page non-disclosure agreements.

Sarah: Well, yeah. But if they could…that’s some vicious circle action, right there.

Wing Chun: Even viciouser: Tom Cruise, Liberace, Paul Lynde, and Rupert Everett.

Sarah: Sincerely, I would cut off an arm to see that. An arm and the corresponding breast. That is awesome.

Wing Chun: We are so sued.

Sarah: Yep.

Wing Chun: Tom Cruise, we’re just kidding. You’re tall, you’re het, Scientology is a totally legitimate religion…I’m forgetting something.

Sarah: You’re not that old, and Vanilla Sky was just misunderstood.

Wing Chun: Yes. Thank you.

Sarah: Although, you know what’s kind of a bummer is that, if Tom Cruise were gay, which he is most certainly not —

Wing Chun: Slept with him myself!

Sarah: Meeeee too!

Wing Chun: Don’t sue me!

Sarah: Meeeee neither! But iiiiiiif he were! Whiiiiich he isn’t! If he would juuuuuust come out already! It would do a lot for aaaaaaaacceptance! Because he’s a biiiiiiig movie star!

Wing Chun: …

Sarah: …Waiting!

Wing Chun: …

Sarah: Waaaaaiting for the crack! Youuuuu can’t resist! Do it!

Wing Chun: Heeeeeeee’s actually a little movie star!

Sarah: Knew it! Nice one!

Wing Chun: Well, this has been lovely, but I have to go phone my lawyer.

Sarah: Ooh, good idea. See you in court.

May 2, 2005

Tags:   GBC