WCJ: "It's Funny Cuz It's Sad!" December 17, 2001
Hey everyone, and welcome back to the first official episode of Season Three of West Coast Jeff! Granted, it is about three months late. And since you've missed a lot, it's pretty cumbersome...so let's get right into the action.
It may be winter now, but we can't just gloss over the fall. Fall is a strange time in LA, especially since the leaves don't change colors here. So, to honor my East Coast color-changing heritage, I decided to dye my hair in protest of all the lush greenery here. SO, for the first time...West Coast Jeff had BLUE HAIR! It's all gone now, but you can check pictures at It took a number of tries to get the blue to stick, during which my hair was a weird combination of blue and blonde and brown. It wasn't pretty.
A special thanks to the two Smurfinators: ArtRalph & His Third Nipple and Chafing Amy, who lately has been protesting her nickname and officially applied for a new one.
Well, be careful what you wish for: We offered to change it to Poopy Procacci when the plumbing in her house got a little backed up. And still she bitches. I explained to her that we don't normally just dole out nicknames willy-nilly, and here she was with TWO and she still wasn't happy! Keep in mind, when her character was re-introduced last season on WCJ (see Episode 7), Amy was pissy that she had NO nickname during The College Years. Sheesh, you just can't please some people.
She got so mad that she catapulted herself through my front window a few weeks ago. Or fell, depending on whom you talk to. You see, ArtRalph's friend Spider-Dan was in town for a meeting to become a regular on West Coast Jeff. During the intense negotiations, he sat on a wobbly chair in my dining room, causing it to collapse. Fearing legal action, we hired him immediately. Welcome aboard, Dan!
After a brief celebration, I pieced the chair together haphazardly and, realizing that it was completely broken, placed various items & doo-dads on it so no one else would sit down until I had a chance to deal with it properly.
Moments later, Amy stopped by to pick up a tampon. She started telling a story and being generally distracting while I was playing at the table. She picked up a few items from the chair. Then she removed the doo-dads. Before too long she sat on the damaged seat. That lasted about a third of a second before tragedy struck. The chair collapsed into the front window! Shards of glass loudly crashed onto the balcony & into the driveway below.
Luckily, Amy's lightning quick reflexes allowed her to jump up, scream, and run into my bedroom before any of us really realized what was going on. She was quite horrified as wacky neighbors & loved ones came over to inspect the mayhem and survey the damage. In retrospect, I probably didn't help the situation any when I screamed, "And if you mouth off to me again, you're going through THE OTHER WINDOW, MISSY!"
But, no matter how I tried to make her crack up laughing, Amy was shattered. I'd never seen her so broken up about anything before. The real tragedy in all this is that jokes like that littered the evening as we picked up the pieces outside and made it into a pile of broken-ness.
Speaking of piles of broken-ness.back by popular demand: A brand new Pile Of Greg, by WCJ's official roommate, Goatee Greg:
dude
are you having word trouble
if you are
just use numbers insteadit will make you feel better
than eating red crayonsthis will solve everything
gerg
Another brilliant pile from the world of Greg. As scary as that is... nothing is ever as scary as HALLOWEEN!
This year, I went out as a grade-school staple: Paint By Number. Ridiculous. I drew all over a white shirt & pants, stuck numbers inside of each shape and actually velcroed markers to my back. The result: A painfully interactive costume. See the pictures at http://www.pond.com/~uhjeff/halloween2001.html
In other holiday news, Thanksgiving came and went. This year my parents offered to fly me home, and I accepted on one condition: I could take my nephew Bret (9) to see Harry Potter. So, I called my brother Chris, who owns the entire collection of Nucera nieces and nephews, and he agreed. So, I booked my flight home and I called StupiDonna, my sistah. "Donna! There's going to be an impromptu West Coast Jeff Turkey Trot Special, sponsored by Tina & Ralph!!" Then I told her that I was taking Bret to see Harry Potter. She laughs and says "Ummm... Bret hates Harry Potter. I asked him if he wanted to see it and he said 'No way.Harry Potter's gay! I hate him!'." Then she laughed & laughed & laughed. Thanksgiving was ruined!
My nephew is the only child in America who HATES Harry Potter! When I brought this to his attention, he commented, "Yeah, I know. Everyone in my class is really into it. But I just don't care. Isn't that weird?" A true Nucera: a completely nonfunctioning member of society. And only at age 9! Chris did a fine job.
But the plans were already made so I came home and thought, "I've flown in simply to have Thanksgiving with my entire family now. I'll be here again in a month. Oh. My. God." I was all aggravated until I heard that Bret had acquiesced. "I really don't want to see it, but I'll go because Uncle J wants to take me."
I never got pity from a 9-year-old before. It was a new low. But of course, I have no shame and I took him up on his offer. His sister, Taylor (5) and Jimmy (11) wanted to go as well (since they're normal children) so the four of us piled into Grandpa Ralph's mini-van and headed off to the movies right after Thanksgiving dinner.
Of course, nothing can ever be easy when my father is involved. We were worried that the movie was sold out, so he dropped us off and I took the kids inside to see if we could get tickets while he parked. He walked into the lobby just in time to see the cashier hand back my Discover Card, telling me that they only accept Visa & Mastercard. I handed her cash, and all was resolved, so we sent Grandpa home. Of course, in Crazy Ralph's mind, my credit card got declined because it is maxed out. By the time I got home from the movies, my parents were convinced I was filing for Chapter 11. "You need money!? Why didn't you just ask for money?" Tina chimes in: A, B, D, A. . .
Anyway, the kids loved the movie, especially Bret who decided to take the book from me so he could read it. And so, I left Philly with a sense of accomplishment. I'm now that weird uncle from far away who comes in every once in a while and makes the kids have fun. I can't wait till the West Coast Jeff Christmas Special (slated to begin 12/21!!).
Unfortunately, that is the only Holiday Special I'll be a part of this season. The scrooges at ABC decided to forget about doing our much-anticipated Wayne Brady Christmas Special, almost sending me into downward spiral of homelessness and destitution. Not to worry, though-the six new episodes we shot will begin airing sometime in January. Keep it right here for show times.
And more Scrooge-like tragedy struck the night of the Wayne Brady wrap party! ArtRalph, organizer of the shindig, had haphazardly strewn his leather jacket on the back of a chair. Hours later, a drunk Ralph stumbled over and said "Hey...hey ya know......no one toook my....my.....myleatherjacket." He pointed, I nodded. "See? Ya See it? It's right there? Do...dododoya see it?" He drooled, I laughed. Cross-eyed, he continued, "I mean... ..ONLY IN AMERIC...AMERICA..." (he gets me in a patriotic headlock that he thinks is a friendly arm-around-your-shoulders motion) "...can I leave a leather j....jacket on a chair in a room full of...of...ofwhaddyacallits..." (pointing his beer at our co-workers) "...and not...not....uhhhhhhh....you know...not..." (both of us on the verge of passing out as he slowly deprives my lungs of air...making him stumble as I struggle) "...yaknow... not-nahhh-notworry!" He releases me and I smile, feeling the color returning to my face. Then he petted the jacket on the back of the chair for a moment before stumbling off into a cloud of blurry danceyness.
Ten minutes later, Ralph, having drank the equivalent of the Indian Ocean in beer, was singing what to do "If You Get Caught Between The Moon & New York City" (I know it's crazy, but it's true.) Suddenly he stopped and almost burst into tears when he saw the chair, sans jacket.
Now, before you say anything, I DID NOT TAKE IT. And to Drunky Drunkerson's credit, he didn't even accuse me. (Take a note, Goatee Greg.) It's safe to say Ralph was more than a little disappointed. He wandered around like a little boy, separated from his parents and puppy, asking people (and sometimes tables) for help. His voice shaking like he's on the verge of tears. "I...I lost my jacket! Have you seen my leather jacket?" The final thirty minutes of the party consisted of Ralph & I wandering around the venue looking for his "favorite jacket ever." But alas, it was gone.
I believed firmly that some other drunk had just mistaken it for their jacket and left with it. Then I realized that, since Ralph consumed all the alcohol at the party (not to mention all the parties up to four miles away) that this was not the case.
As days went on, it became apparent that Ralph's jacket found a new, sober home. But Ralph was still devastated. After all, his very nice leather jacket was stolen. Since his birthday was fast approaching, I spearheaded Operation: "Purchase Ralph A New Coat of leathER!" AKA: Operation: PRANCER!
One by one, I called our friends to rally against this travesty. We were determined to not let Evil win! And so.everyone agreed- Let's chip in! Then I called his roommate, DaveLip. Dave was like "uhhh no. I was with Ralph when he bought that jacket. It's not leather. It's made of like recycled aluminum or something." What? I've seen this jacket. It's NICE. Certainly if it isn't real leather.it's not made of old cola. He continued. "Yeah... it was $14 at Boscov's." Fourteen dollars? This can't be the same coat. Can it?
Oh, but it can. Turns out that Ralph was wrecked over a jacket that cost LESS THAN DINNER. My theory is that maybe it wasn't stolen after all. Perhaps someone touched it the wrong way and it simply disintegrated into a pile of dust.
But, since Ralph was hard on his luck, having just lost his less-than-dinner-jacket and his job at The Wayne Brady Show, we got him a healthy gift certificate toward buying an ACTUAL leather jacket in a story of true birthday spirit. I also had my job-carpet ripped out from under me (??), but was fortunate enough to have been offered a position with Jeff Stilson, former head-writer for The Wayne Brady Show, as his assistant on MTV's snazzy new reality-sitcom "The Osbournes"! Yes, we're chronicling the many wacky and whimsical adventures of Ozzy and his actual family. I still can't figure out if it's funny or sad. My basic function so far seems to be to watch tapes of Ozzy and his wife & kids in their everyday lives. They are all completely crazy.
The job already has it's benefits for me: I work with the woman who played Alice in The Brady Bunch movies. Fantastic...she's friggin' hilarious. Stand-up comic Sue Kolinsky has also joined the ranks of regular cast members of WCJ's work family. (Who has already noted that my friends are "fuckin weirdo's") As a special bonus, on my first day, a chimp came into our office (with a trainer). It was none other than Michael Jackson's chimp Bubbles' daughter! Yes, chimp royalty.
Amongst the hilarity there, the chimp's trainer lamented that his chimp was his social life. And when asked if humans could mate with chimps, he didn't hide his disappointment very well. It was a little scary.
It's always interesting when you start a new job.the people generally take about a little time to warm up to you and show you how they truly are. There's a girl in my office that yells at people who bless her when she sneezes. I think she's trouble. There's also one who runs around and does cartwheels all the time. Damn bundle of energy. She's trouble, too, I bet. And there's a guy who, just as I was writing this, had his first high-5. He's almost 30. He's just plain weird.
The ChairOrganism of Jeffyism, Kevin Kibelstis knows a lot about weird people in offices, and wrote a story about his particular batch. WCJ is proud to present, for the first time in print "Pasty Feet" in a very special edition of Kevin's Korner:
"Pasty Feet"
So, I'm sitting at work one day in the beginning of Summer. For those of you who do not know, I work in an office where the girls (they are not women, trust me... they are girls) outnumber the men (women reading this may sneer at me now... especially if they work in my office) by a number of 10-4. It's really not a bad ratio, at least from my point of view. At any rate, as you can probably assume, there's a good male-female rivalry going on, which usually involves the girls banding together to argue whatever irrational idea one of them believes in while we guys try to inject a little bit of logic into their thought process (and usually fail). Case in point:
One afternoon the girl who works next to me, Alicia, saunters in for her 2:30-11 shift. Along with 2-3 of the other girls in the office, she has an unholy hatred for socks. Therefore she was wearing a pair of black sandal/flip flop/high heel thingies. They were very, very black, mind you. Now Alicia is the type who is very much into appearances and fashion (I should mention at this point that she is also sickeningly cute, with big, brown eyes that would put Bambi to shame and a pout that could melt Antarctica). So anyway, by this point she had already been laying out in the sun every morning and was rather tan, except for her feet. Her little, pasty, white feet. And now, with the black heels on, they looked really, REALLY pasty white. But they're feet, and feet aren't really supposed to tan... this is by far not her sin. But anyway, I turned to her and simply said, with only the intention of helping the poor lass, "Alicia, you know, you really shouldn't wear shoes that dark when your feet are bare. It makes them look really white."
And that was it. That was all I said. Just a little bit of advice from a guy who, in some ways, can barely tell two colors apart. Those two elements, color-blindness and the fact that I am a man, should in fact have rendered my opinion meaningless. But, from her sad, sad expression-- eyes enlarged and bottom lip quivering-- apparently she heard this as, "Goddamn Alicia, you have the ugliest freaking feet I've ever seen. It's a shame no one will ever want to marry you because of those feet. Eegad." I think that's what the other girls in the office heard, too, because they were on me like a pack of wolves at feeding time. "She does not have ugly feet!" they yelled (did I say that? no...) "Like yours are so pretty," they accused. (A. They have never seen my feet; B. Did I ever say mine were better looking than hers?). "Stop picking on Alicia," they demanded, as if I had been calling her a nanny-nanny-foo-foo. So I tried to defend myself, but failed, and was swarmed under by their shrill cries. So fine, I let it drop. Whatever.
The next day dawns, and once again I am at my desk as Alicia comes in. She sits down quietly, folding her sandal-fitted feet under her chair and pouting softly. "I hate you, Kevin," she says.
I sigh. "Why?" I ask.
"Because you told me about my feet yesterday, so I went home and used self-tanner on them."
I blinked, and then looked down, and yes, her feet were no longer pasty white, but a nice healthy tan... except for a few racing stripes that seemed to run up the sides from her toes to her heel.
"I was walking around while I had it on, and now I have racing stripes! All because of you!" she accused, and I laughed heartily. In fact, pretty much everyone laughed at that point. And we enjoyed it immensely.
"Why the hell would you listen to anything I said?" I asked her. "Don't you know any better yet?"
"Why the hell would you listen to anything he said?," the girls in the office yelled. "Don't you know any better?"
She mentioned that she didn't have enough tanner to get between her toes, which I'm grateful for, because that would look just plain freaky... who the heck tans BETWEEN their toes? At any rate, it was nice to see that although I get yelled at and mocked whenever I make certain observations, apparently the ChairOrganism of Jeffyism holds just enough sway in people's lives to get a young woman to dye her feet in funny colors and designs.
Thanks, Kevin, for contributing to West Coast Jeff! And, as always, if you've got anything hilariously fascinating to write about, feel free to send it along. Please. As you can tell, I'm starving for material.
I think that about does it for our Post-November-Sweeps wrap up. Next time, I'll bring some other stories to share with you, including one I like to call "Avacado Head"
Until then, let me present my last thousand words. These pictures are of me on an historic piece of Hollywood. They were taken on an exact replica of the I Love Lucy set that was reconstructed for the 50th Anniversary Special. I can't tell you what a thrill it was to be able to see this set, let alone walk on it and have (secret) photographic evidence of it! These pictures are absolutely one of my favorite moments I've experienced here in Los Angeles. Without any more gushing, here I am on television history: http://www.pond.com/~uhjeff/ilovelucy.html
Have a great undetermined-period-of-time, and don't forget... you can read old episodes of West Coast Jeff, and get web-exclusive WCJ bonuses at Sean Quinn's Official Web Site: WCJ-I: http://mywebpages.comcast.net/quinntv/westcoast.html
Okbye
--Jeff (UHJeff@mentosfaq.com)
