I Hate Everyone...Starting With Me (8 page)

I hate gay weddings.
I’m thrilled about the equal rights thing, but I really don’t want to see my mechanic, Ralph, wearing a white dress with a sweetheart neckline and a train.

Gay weddings are like the War on Terror—they go on forever. No “wham, bam, thank you, Sam.” Gay weddings are like a lifetime commitment…
for the guests.
They start at seven and they end in October. Why? Because stereotypes be damned, gays love parades, that’s why. And a gay wedding is nothing more than a parade with crudités. (One of my gay Jewish friends even threw a parade at his mother’s shiva. Instead of mourners there were mummers and the casket was pulled on a huge “salute to whitefish” float.)

I hate lesbian weddings.
I never know what to say to the mother. “You’re not losing a daughter, you’re gaining a carpet muncher” just doesn’t seem right. I went to a lesbian wedding recently. One of the brides
was butch and the other was fem, yet they both wore gowns. Of course, one of the gowns was satin and one was flannel… and did you know that Timberland had a bridesmaids line? I didn’t.

It was a gorgeous affair. Everything was done in pink and white. There was an ice sculpture of Rosie O’Donnell and gift bags from Home Depot.… And the catering?
C’est magnifique!
—salmon, trout, halibut, bass, scallops, shrimp, tuna. All fantastic. The only thing I didn’t like was the dessert. They served ladyfingers and even with an entire bottle of Moët and a shot of Irish coffee, I just couldn’t.

My favorite moment was when the Universal Life minister,
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an unfortunate-looking woman named Lotus, who had Medusa-like hair and chin stubble, pronounced them married and the brides exchanged kisses. Some of the guests thought it was poetic and some of them thought it was awkward. And the straight guy sitting next to me thought it was hot because “Who doesn’t like a little girl-on-girl action?”

I hate interfaith marriages.
Melissa’s friend, David Levyschwartzberg, married a German girl, Fraulein Helga Bunker. She wasn’t European or Prussian, she was German! It was a horror. Instead of a veil, Helga wore a helmet. Her wedding song was
“Deutschland
Uber Alles.”
The limo she came in had a sidecar. And the wedding gown,
uggh!
The train was filled with people. Above the door to the bridal suite was a sign that read,
“Arbeit macht frei.”

What I do love about weddings
is reading the announcements in the
New York Times
. It’s the highlight of my Sunday. I read the wedding announcements in a very specific order: First I check out the gay couples. The lesbians always have jobs like “professor of women’s studies” or “postal supervisor” or “soccer coach.” And the gay men are always eight hundred years old because they’ve been together since 1972 but just got the right to be married in 2011. And I look at their pictures and think,
You waited all these years so you could fuck
that?

And then I check out the interracial couples and play the Which Family Is More Disappointed? game. And if I see a really old, moneyed WASP marrying an inner-city black woman, my heart skips a beat:

But the best, best, best thing I like about weddings is the sex. Because once you get married, you don’t have to have it anymore.

Unless you have a fetish about huddled, starving factory workers making pots and pans, this is a boner-killer.

Forty minutes into this three-hour movie, Caligula is screwing a horse. No amount of hand-holding or coy snuggling will get you through this evening.

It’s really just
Old Yeller
with a wrinkled Jennifer Aniston. Only in this film, the wrong dog dies.

So much for the cutesy-poo postcoital shower.

If Kate Winslet had dropped twenty pounds, maybe the fucking boat wouldn’t have sunk.

This is the story of a family of musical children who hide in a cemetery to
avoid the Nazis and then run away with a soldier and a nun… are you moist yet?

Unless you love pool, or you find the prospects of Jodie Foster with a man stimulating, this is not a date flick.

You’ll never want oral sex again.

I know, you’re thinking,
But everyone loves
The Wizard of Oz. But not for a first date. Judy Garland and thousands of midgets? Please.

I fucking hate that people are crude and don’t have manners anymore.
The last time a man leaned over and opened a car door for me we were on the freeway, and the last time a man pulled out a chair for me I was in Aspen and we were on a ski lift. Maybe I’m old fashioned, but I believe when a woman enters a room, men should stand up—and gay men should stand up at least halfway.

Manners matter. For all of his failings, Kadafi had a “please” and “thank-you” for everyone. Idi Amin sent lovely notes after every dinner, cannibal
or
vegetarian. Ted Bundy
always
opened the car door for those girls. As busy as they were, if those men could find the time for etiquette, so can you.

I grew up with a guy who, to this day, has the worst manners of any human I’ve ever seen. People were so repulsed by his lack of decorum they’d stop him and say, “My God, you must’ve been raised by wolves!” And he’d say, “Yes, I was.” His name was Henry Wolf (technically he was raised by the Wolfs, but why nitpick?) They lived down the hall in apartment 9J. Let me tell you, the Wolfs were pigs. Roaches took a look at their kitchen and committed suicide.

I hate bad table manners.
For example, according to etiquette, you’re always supposed to leave something on your plate. Unlike Kirstie Alley, who doesn’t even leave the pattern. And never, ever put your elbows on the table. If you do then you can’t free up your hands to smack the whiny little brats sitting next to you—or grope your best friend’s husband.

I hate people who chew with their mouths open.
Chewing is the start of the digestive process and I don’t want to watch it. If I want to see a foreign object in someone’s mouth I’ll look at Colin Farrell’s sex tape. I don’t want to witness the beginning of the process any more than I do its end. It’s food, not feed; you’re a person, not an animal, so unless you go to a restaurant where they serve cud, unless your name is Elsie and you have an endorsement deal with Borden’s, zip your lips. As I tell my grandson and all his little friends, “Children, if you’re chewing, your mouth shouldn’t be open wider than your mommy’s legs when the FedEx man visits.”

I hate people who talk with food in their mouth.
Don’t do it!!! You’re not interesting enough that whatever it is you’re going to tell me can’t wait until you swallow.

Let’s say you’re an accountant or an actuary and we meet at a cocktail party. (Okay, the odds of that aren’t good, what with my being beyond famous, a great diva, a fashion icon and ambassador to five third-world countries and you being, well, an actuary, but for the purpose of this book let’s say we do meet). We’re having canapés and hors d’oeuvres—maybe lump crab or mushroom caps or, if it’s a Hasidic event, something overcooked and bland. Anyway, you shove a deviled egg into your puss and immediately start whining about balance sheets or nose hair or basketball, and I’m standing there, bored and nauseous, dodging bits of yolk. How is this okay? No one, and I mean no one (unless they can help my career), is fascinating enough to start a conversation when they have a mouthful of chopped liver. So unless you’re going to warn me that Freddy Krueger is sneaking up behind me with an ax, finish chewing first.

I hate people who make sucking sounds with their teeth.
It’s both vulgar and mystifying at the same time. What have they got stuck between their teeth that tastes so good? Certainly nothing I cooked.

If a person has something stuck in his teeth, tell him! You can say things like, “Bet that meal was good. I see you’re saving some for later.” Or “I’m glad to see you’re not one of those people who feels compelled to brush.”

I hate double-dippers,
those inconsiderate slobs who put their crackers in the dip, take a bite, and then dip in again. That is so disgusting. Now the hummus is contaminated—like the Ohio River or Courtney Love’s bloodstream.

I hate people who blow their nose at the dinner table
and then look in their hankie. What do they think they’re going to find? “Look, I just blew out Jimmy Hoffa… and he’s covered in snot!”

I hate nose picking,
especially in restaurants. It’s a disgusting habit, but as it turns out, a prerequisite to getting a job as a cabdriver in New York City. I know sometimes you have to remove something from your nose—mucus, dried phlegm, or just part of your old nose—but once you’ve finished the excavation please don’t flick it or wipe it on your napkin. There’s a reason God gave the woman at the next table dolman sleeves.

I hate people who belch.
In Japan, burping is the sign of a good meal, but in America it’s a sign that someone needs a good antacid. I used to have a business friend
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who burped at the end of every meal and then said, “You know, in Tokyo that’s considered a
compliment!” So I went to his house and shit on the table and said, “In Libya that means you’re rich enough to eat.”

I hate people who don’t use silverware.
Unless you’re in Morocco or Ethiopia, do not eat with your hands. In Morocco they eat
everything
with their hands, which makes it very difficult to enjoy soup (although it is a lot of laughs watching them eat pudding). Ethiopia’s a little better because they have nothing to eat. So while their stomachs may be bloated, their fingers are squeaky clean.

I hate men who don’t pull out a lady’s chair at the table.
Unless it’s a wheelchair. Yes, watching a helpless paralytic wriggle around on the carpet sure is funny, but helping her back into her chair is a huge pain in the ass. I’m a giver, but I don’t lift. And since I’m on the topic: Can we talk about handicapped etiquette?

I hate the handicapped and their privileged parking.
Why should the lame be able to park close to the mall entrance while I have to schlep through the rain and the wind and the sleet to do my shopping? Dollars to donuts I’m going to spend more than they will. How many pairs of crutches does one need, or reflector lights or stick-on rails for the bathroom?