Here’s a little ditty I wrote for the Listen To This Series at 35 Below Theatre…

Once upon a time I lived with two roommates.  I owned the house we lived in.  Annalisa was a sweet girl who was a massage therapist that worked out of the house.  She had quite the eclectic personality.  One day, she would meditate for 5 hours and the next day she would listen to psychology book on tape on how to find and keep a man.  Then the next night she would put on a pink tutu and a purple wig and ride her bike to a solstice party.  I would inevitably find her bike crashed into a bush in the front yard. She was also a little overly sensitive, which was good for me, because I tend to be on the opposite end of the spectrum when it comes to sensitivity.  So it was good practice for me to not be so……blunt, harsh, I don’t know which works better.  I would think I was being extremely conscious of how I approached her, I’d say things like, “Hey, Annalisa, are you going to be in the bathroom for much longer, because if you are, I can shower downstairs, I’m totally cool with that, just let me know.”  She’d answer and I’d go about my business and then later that evening she’d say.  “So this morning, when you asked about the shower, you kinda hurt my feelings…….”  Regardless of this, she was a really good roommate.

Then I had another roommate.  Named Blimey.  Blimey lived in my basement, so he had his own entrance and his own full bathroom so we basically just shared the kitchen, which he didn’t use that often.  Blimey was about 10 years older, maybe 12 and I’d known him for a number of years because we were climbing partners.  Now, Blimey obviously isn’t his real name, but it was his nickname.  The reason he had this nickname was because of his accent.  He wasn’t a foreigner, he was from CT, but his accent was a cross between a Cajun/Creole accent and someone from Jersey.  We used to love to tease him about it and he’d say, “I don’t why I talk this way, I’m adopted okay?”  It was pretty funny going to some rural areas of Kentucky, Tennessee and West Virginia with him because people never knew what to make of him.   Now, Blimey was a pretty good roommate, he kept to himself and we’d go days without talking or seeing each other.  We would often joke how we had to go on climbing trips to catch up with each other.  So for the most part he was great, EXCEPT.  He would always eat my food.  Now this drives me crazy for a number of reasons.  One, it’s mine.  Don’t eat it.  Two, I was raised in a household where we really had to ration our food, so we had to make it last.  Of course this has carried into my adult life so I continue to ration food like we’re in a depression.  I also grew up in a household where you always saved the last of something for someone else.  Which was kind of funny because the last of everything would sit in the fridge until someone FINALLY ate it.  Third, I worked a lot of hours, and wasn’t there that often so I wanted to have a few staple things in the house always.  Basically milk, eggs, and cheese.  Well wouldn’t you know it? These were the exact things that Blimey liked to eat too.  And he ate mine all the time.  And I mean all the time.   He would rarely replace them.  The other thing is these were the items that I always purchased that were organic.  Why?  Well for one, they last longer so it was nice to have that option, and two, they taste better.  It’s not like everything I bought or buy is organic but I would definitely spend the money for eggs and milk to be organic.  So if Blimey did replace them, which was rare, he would replace them with milk and eggs from the gas station down the street.  Yeah, classy.

I had asked him time and time again not to do this, but it just seemed never to get through to him.  It was really frustrating and had been happening for over a year.

So one night, I come home on a Friday evening after working late.  I am the only on there and I am craving some ice cream.  I’m not a big ice cream person, so having a pint in the freezer lasts me a long time.  Well, guess what else Blimey liked to eat?  Ice cream!  So I go into the freezer and low and behold my ice cream is gone.  So I’m upset, right?  I call Blimey, he answers right away.  I yell at him, “Blimey!  Damn you, you ate my ice cream!”  He says, “I’m sorry, I’m at Scullys I will bring you some right now.”  So Blimey comes home and brings me two pints of Ben and Jerrys.

“I really hate it when you eat my food dude.”

“I know, I’m sorry, it was late and I was stoned and I forgot to replace it.  I won’t do it again.”

I forgive him and go on my way.  Keep in mind this is on Friday.  So Monday, I come home from work, it’s pouring down rain, it’s around 9 pm and Annalisa is watching TV.  Blimey is gone, he went up to CT for 3 weeks.  So I  come in, and I’m tired and I have PMS.  Or as my brother used to say, I’m about to start my pyramid.  I go to get some ice cream and both pints are gone!  Both of them.  That’s right, in 2 days time, 48 hours, Blimey has eaten both pints he bought me to replace the other one he ate.  Aaaaaand he’s gone for three weeks!  I am so angry now.  I am pacing in the living room.  Annalisa says, I’ll go down to the gas station and get you some ice cream, which as you can imagine just makes me more angry.  I’m quite over eating things from the gas station.

“That is it, that is it.  I am going to do something to teach him a lesson.”

“What are you going to do?”

I am pacing in the living room, right back and forth, racking my brain, when it hits me and I stop.

“I am going to shit in his ice cream.”

“Excuse me?”  says Annalisa

“Yes, I am going to buy some ice cream, take the ice cream out, put it in the a container marked lentils, because Blimey will be like, what the hell are lentils? And I am going to shit in the ice cream.”

Now, let me do a little side bar here.  I am not an evil person, I never wanted to get Blimey sick.  I never thought he would actually eat the shit in the ice cream, I figured it was kind of like a mobster who sends a pigs head in the mail, or something like that.  I’m not gonna hurt ya, I’m just trying to get my point across.  I would make sure that it was very easy to tell it was poop, and it wouldn’t be eaten.

Now, clearly, Annalisa was a little uneasy.  I’m not sure how I feel about there being shit in our freezer.  I told her that I wasn’t sure if I was actually going to go through with it and maybe I would just put dog poop in the ice cream instead.  That seemed to ease her mind a little.

I didn’t really think about it for a few days, my anger had passed and with Blimey gone for 3 weeks I couldn’t confront him about it anyway.  Then one day I came from work and Annalisa was in the kitchen.

“I’m in”, she says.

“What are you talking about?  In what?”

“I’m in on the set up, the hoax, whatever you want to call it?”

As I said, I had forgotten about it and I asked again, “What the hell are you talking about?”

She goes to the freezer and pulls out a gallon of mint chocolate chip ice cream. Here she said, “I bought this gallon of ice cream.  I even ate half of it so you can poop in it.  Here, go for it.”

I was stunned.  Sweet, sweet Annalisa was going to be my co-conspirator on a plan that I hadn’t fully decided to go through with it.  So she hands me the ice cream, and apparently expects me to do my business on command.

“Ahh, let me think about,” it I say.  “I’m not sure if I just want to put dog shit in there instead.”

“No,” she says, “you have to teach him a lesson once and for all, it’s got to be the real deal.”

“All right, all right. We have some time before he gets home.  Let me umm…get in the mood and I’ll do it.”

So the next night I am stage managing here at ACT for the Rebelles, the burlesque show in town.  I’d been at rehearsals everyday that week and it was nice to have opening here and behind me.  So I go out drinking with a few of my friends after the show.

We end up at my place around 2 am and we’re loud enough to wake Annalisa up.  She doesn’t mind, this is part of the coolness of her, that she doesn’t want to kill me when I show up at the house at 2 AM with three guys.  She starts telling them of our scheme to get Blimey back and the boys are loving the story.  I tell them that I don’t think I have the gall to actually go through with the act.  I barely get these words out of my mouth when my friend Francois goes into the freezer grabs the ice cream and calmly walks in the bathroom.  The rest of us sit there bewildered as to what just happened.  He comes out about 10 minutes later and hands the box to me.  Everyone is standing around me, because of course we have to see it for it actually to be true.  I open the box for all of us to see the teeniest of tiniest turds that you ever did see.  It’s the size of a poop that you would expect from a puppy.

“That’s it?  It’s sooo……….small.  Dude, you’re like 6’4, how can you even produce something that small?  The taco bell dog could produce something bigger than that.” I say.

“Hey, you try pooping on command at 3 am and let’s see what you come up with,” he says.

Regardless, you can still tell what it is, there’s no mistaking it, except you would think it would of come out of the butt of 6 lb shitz hu.   We put it in the freezer and waiting for Blimey’s return.

Flash forward a week.  It’s a Saturday in the middle of summer and I come home from work to find Annalisa lying in my bed, watching TV with the window air conditioning blaring.  She is visibly in pain and rubbing her stomach.

“What’s a matter with you?” I ask.

“I have cramps and all I wanna do is eat some ice cream, but I can’t because there is poop in it.  Ahhhh…….”

I also notice that Blimey is home and he is cutting the grass.  At least he’s doing something, right?  I decide to crawl into bed with Annalisa and enjoy the air conditioning and crappy television.   It’s not long before Blimey takes a break, we hear the lawnmower shut off and soon his heavy steps are in the house.  He comes to my bedroom door, doesn’t knock and just throws the door open.  Shirtless, sweaty and full of piss and vinegar.

“Oh, must be nice, must be nice to be sittin’ in here in air conditioning while I’ll out there mowing the lawn.”

Keep in mind, this is the first interaction I’ve had with him, in three weeks.

“Blimey, you ate my damn ice cream again.”

“He starts to laugh, I know, haha, and I was drivin’ away, thinkin’ haha bitches I’m ate your ice cream and I’m gone and not gonna be back for three weeks, you can’t do nothin’ to me.  I can’t believe you even remember.”

“I hate you.”

“But the jokes on me,” he says, Annalisa and I both sit up in bed.

“Oh yeah?  I ask, why is that?”

“Because you bought mint chocolate chip, I hate mint chocolate chip!  It’s the only ice cream I won’t eat.”

“Noooooooo!” screams Annalisa, gets up, goes to the kitchen takes the ice cream out of the freezer and throws it in the trash.

I went that night to stage manage the Rebelles again.  And again, went out after the show.  I just happened to run into my friend Francois, and I tell him the story.  He tells me to get some Rocky Road and give him a call.

We never actually told Blimey that we did it.  I did however, tell my friend Rose, who told her husband, who then told Blimey.  Apparently he was concerned with his well being and thought he might actually accidentally mistake a pile of poop for ice cream.  Blimey never told me that he knew, but he did stop eating my food.