Mark sits down at the dinner table, takes a sip of his Coke.
He drinks Coke with every lunch and every dinner he eats with us. He is possibly addicted to Coke. None of the rest of us drink Coke (although the girls would like to drink Coke with every meal and find this inconsistency in the beverage rules mightily annoying). When the girls are too vocal about the unfairness that plagues their lives, Mark makes big AHHHHH sounds every time he takes a sip. This drives the girls crazy, and they argue that someone immature enough to flaunt special Coke privileges is not mature enough to have those special Coke privileges in the first place.
And then Mark tells them to go to college and get a job and apply for a mortgage and buy a house and throw a housewarming party . . . to which he will bring a six-pack of Coke as a gift.
That man cracks me up.
So anyway, Mark sits down at the dinner table and takes a sip of his Coke.
Mark is very particular about the serving of this Coke. It must be served in a pint glass (like for beer) and if someone is ludicrous and offers him Coke in any other size glass (or god forbid, a plastic cup), he shakes his head sadly at the waste as he dumps it down the drain and starts over. The glass must be filled almost to the top with ice (regular ice not crushed ice because that would be insane). If there is even a tiny bit of accidental crushed ice in his glass, he gets totally whiny about how his drink is too watery (so whiny that I have been tempted on occasion to throw bits of food into his glass when he is not looking just so he has something real about which to bitch). There must not be a straw in the glass, because he is not gay and he does not suck soda through tiny hollow penis stand-ins (Mark has never actually made his objection to straws clear to me, but I feel fairly confident it’s a gay blowjob phobia). The can (not bottle, because Mark is confident that the cans protect the Coke from light degradation better than the bottles) must be at room temperature (not cold because then the bubble to liquid ratio is somehow thrown off, rendering the soda undrinkable and whine-inducing).
Pint glass, regular ice in the proper amount, no straw, soda poured from a room-temperature can.
So anyway, Mark sits down at the dinner table and takes a sip of his Coke.
The girls eye him crankily.
AHHHHH.
I feel the need to mention here that Mark still drinks like a monkey. By which I mean that he picks up his drinks with two hands, pinkies extended. So not sexy. If there ever comes a time when Mark is horrifically murdered for no particular reason that the authorities can discern, and I am sitting quietly on the porch drinking Coke from an ice-cold bottle through a straw? You’ll know I was finally driven to monkey mayhem.
So anyway, Mark sits down at the table and picks up his pint glass with both hands, pinkies extended (like a fucking monkey, I tell you), and he takes a sip of his Coke.
AHHHHH.
He reaches with both hands to set the glass down, “You know what I realized today?”
“That you have misunderstood the phrase two-fisted drinker?”
He glances at me but ignores my words, “No, I was thinking that we have never watched the movie Harvey with the girls! They would love that movie! I was talking to Maj about it earlier . . . we need to see if Harvey is available on Netflix.”
I look at him, “Harvey? Really?”
Maj is helpful, “Daddy said it was about a bunny.”
Mark takes another sip of his Coke, “Yeah, there’s a great big bunny. It’s a great movie! I can’t believe we have never watched it with the girls!”
I am confused, “Harvey, babe? You sure you are thinking about the right movie?”
“The one about the giant bunny.”
“Yeah, Harvey has a bunny, but it is a bunny of the giant hallucinated sort.”
Maj snorts with laughter, “What?”
Mark is thinking, “I just remember that there was a bunny and it was a great movie.”
I serve myself some pasta, “Hmmm. Because Harvey is perhaps an old James Stewart movie about alcoholism and mental illness and dysfunctional families. Just saying.”
Maj and Kallan snicker.
Mark thinks some more, “OK, so maybe I am not thinking about Harvey. There’s a giant rabbit, though.”
“That kind of narrows the field, babe. Not too many movies about giant rabbits.”
He reaches two-handed for his Coke and takes a sip, “Harry . . . something. Now I am thinking it was Harry something.” He puts his Coke down, “Harry and the Hendersons! That’s the movie I was talking about! Harry and the Hendersons.”
I stare at him, “OK, first? That was a terrible and horrifically annoying movie. And second? That movie does not have a huge rabbit . . . that’s Bigfoot. They hit Bigfoot with their car and then take him home to be a member of their family.”
“No way. That was a rabbit.”
“Not even. Bigfoot.”
He does not believe me, so I pick up my phone and Google it . . . “Look. Harry and the Hendersons . . . BIGFOOT.”
Maj and Kallan giggle happily.
Mark is thoughtful for a moment, “Huh. Well, I don’t know what movie I am remembering, then. But it was good and I think there was a rabbit. The girls would like it.”
“It was good and you think there was a rabbit?” I push my plate away and sink my head into my arms, completely unable to stop laughing. Through tears of glee, I manage to get out, “I just love you so much.”
Mark burps an enormous Coke burp.
AHHHHH.
I erupt into new fits of giggles.
Kallan leans over to speak to me in conspiratorial fashion, “That husband of yours is quite a catch.”
Mark burps again, just to demonstrate that he can.
Kallan waves her hand in front of her face as though to clear the burp from her breathing space, “Yes, he is quite a charmer. You are a lucky lucky woman.”
I look at Mark, who lifts his eyebrows and picks up his glass again and extends both pinkies in exaggerated fashion. Still holding the glass this way, he swings it in my direction, “Cheers!”
So . . . much . . . giggling.
He is a monkey.
Or maybe Bigfoot!
Or a giant hallucinated bunny rabbit.
And I am completely insane!
Something like that.
It was a good movie.
