Reversal

Tonight Jon Horne threw me a real curve ball.  We were sitting in a class, quietly sharing witty banter in the back of the room when Jon made this reference:  "Should I go get a huge hammer and smash some vegetables?"  I stared at him with a blank look and then squinched my face.  "What?"  With a twinkle in his eye, he whispered, "You know, Gallagher" and promptly erupted into laughter at his own joke.  JON HORNE REFERENCED THE COMEDY OF GALLAGHER AND I DIDN'T GET IT.

Once he connected the dots for me, I was totally with him, but man.  He reached further back than my pop-culture brain was able to go.  Tightly-fitting striped shirts, a huge hammer, and a watermelon... lucky for you all, he's still touring.  And you can check his dates HERE.

Commiserating with Joseph Gordon-Levitt

Have you seen the film 50/50?  It's good.  I think really good.  (Get the Kleenex) And admittedly OK, it's vulgar, but hey it's Seth Rogan + Seattle, what would you expect?

There is this one scene in the movie when I literally laughed out loud, totally getting the interchange between Levitt's character, Adam Lerner when he meets his therapist, Katie McCay for the first time.  McCay is played by Anna Kendrick.  In this scene he is surprised to find a young woman as his therapist and they have the following conversation:

Adam:  "I'm sorry.  How old are you?"
Katie:  "Twenty-four."
Adam makes the joke, "Who are you, like Doogie Howser?"
Katie: "Who?"

For the record, Jon Horne knows who Doogie Howser is.  What he may not be able to identify is Doogie's theme music.  A pity really.

Christmas Sweatshirts from 1991

Spooner and I looked at each other during the typical beat of silence following this type of question:

"What is puffy paint?"

Then the challenge presented itself, how does one explain puffy paint?  "Er, well, hmmm.... let me think. [beat]  OK, it's like this paint that comes out of little squeeze bottles, and you don't use a brush or anything, and it sort of puffs up on its surface and dries after a few hours."  Completely inadequate explanation.

We tried to use an example.  "Jon, do you remember when you were a kid and people would iron-on, like Christmas images to sweatshirts, and then they would use this paint to outline the images?"  Oh Lord, explaining this process makes the sweatshirts sound even stupider than they look (difficult to achieve, yet possible.)  In the end, Jon did not have any cob-webbed memories of puffy paint.  Neither did his contemporary and fellow Naval Flight Officer, Dan.  Also born in the mid-1980's.  Spooner and I felt and fought both the sting of old age, and the urge to make personalized t-shirts.

The Special Sauce

Note: In Florida a lot of our friends are closer to Jon's age than mine.  I fear I occasionally teeter on the see-saw of "Did you know Horne's wife is thirty-one?!!"

We have potential friends, Lyle and Jessica down the street.  We like them.  They are going to have a baby soon.  Also I like Lyle because he saved me, in what could have been an embarrassing, age-induced-guffaw during our first double date.  They took us to their favorite local sushi spot a few weeks back and Lyle explained all the wonderful things about Sumo Sushi.  This included the Sumo Sushi Special Sauce.  Upon Lyle's introduction of the special sauce, I immediately quipped something extremely witty I'm sure about "Did G Love know it was on loan to Sumo Sushi?" or something.  And gah!  The immediate silence that followed my quip!  I felt heat rising in my cheeks and I said, "Please tell me one of you gets this reference."

Hooray for Lyle! (he had older siblings, thank God) who replied, "Oh I got ya, 'My baby got sauce, Your baby ain't sweet like mine' I know G.Love and the Special Sauce."  I nearly flew across the table and hugged him.  "Thank you, Lyle."  Relieved and relevant.

Tool Time

Erin: "... Jonathan Taylor Thomas. [beat]  Do you know who that is?"

Jon:  "No."

Erin:  "Yes, you do."

Jon (slightly offended):  "Then why would you even ask me?  I was only the THE biggest Home Improvement fan."

Hold Me Closer, Tony Danza

I am a Gen X-er.  I am married to a Millenial.  Our birthdays are 6-7ish years apart.  This means that we often have, what we affectionately refer to as "Generational Moments."  These are times when one party makes a comment/joke along the lines of pop culture references, current events of our childhood, etc.  These quips are generally greeted by blank stares, dropped-jaws, confusion, or beats of silence from the other party.  I keep meaning to write these down because they're pretty funny.  Here's a recent exchange which qualifies as a Generation Moment.  Enjoy.

 Jon Horne:  "...I could be the boss of that guy."

 Erin: "Could you tell Tony Danza who's the boss?"

 Jon Horne: "What does that even mean?"