The Funny Thing Is...

  See how versatile it is?

  The finishing touch was the three dots after the title (the ellipsis, as we say in bookbiz). My first stab at it was “The Funny Thing Is Dot Dot Dot,” but in the end I put real dots instead of words.

  The final result: The Funny Thing Is…

  My hope is that this chapter has helped you have a greater appreciation for book titles and a better understanding of all the trouble I went through so you can walk into your neighborhood bookstore, sporting goods outlet, or pawnshop and confidently ask for The Funny Thing Is…The funny thing is, you probably already did.

  That Was Then or Then Was That

  or Anyway, It Was Before Now

  Did you know we have seven hundred TV channels now? It’s a wonder we get anything done.

  Seven hundred channels—when did this happen? I can remember when I was a kid, we had five channels. And we didn’t have a remote. You had to hate something so much that you would be willing to get up and walk five feet to change the channel. If that wasn’t enough, you had to guess at the volume, because it was different when you were up close than when you sat back down again. “Damn Bonanza—those horses are so much louder when they run!”

  It was a different time, it was a simpler time. We were entertained so easily. We would watch anything. We’d watch a flying nun. We’d watch a talking horse. We are so much more sophisticated now, watching people eat bugs and marry strangers for money. Almost makes you miss Mayberry, doesn’t it? I loved Andy Griffith. By the way, did anything ever happen on that show? When you’ve got time for whistling, you’ve got a lot of time.

  Commercials used to be six minutes long, and they told us how delicious cigarettes and alcohol were. Man, they were happy smoking and drinking, those people. They’re still happy, but they’ve concentrated all their happiness into thirty seconds now. People in commercials are happy all the time. Especially that woman in the shampoo commercial. She’s too happy. I don’t think our children should see people that happy on television. I fell for it, though—I bought the shampoo. I’ve got to tell you, I was shampooing for a good half hour…and I never got that happy. Finally I just had to fake it.

  I get so invested in the lives of those commercial people. Thirty seconds and suddenly you care. That old man who can eat corn on the cob again…I’m happy for him. He couldn’t eat it for a while. He can now. That woman on jury duty—“Gotta go, gotta go, gotta go right now, gotta go, gotta go, gotta go”—she’s gotta go! And the judge doesn’t understand. I’m so happy by the end of the commercial. “And I don’t have to go right now.” Ah—fantastic.

  So many of the commercials on TV these days are for anti-depressants. There are so many—Prozac…Paxil…And they get you right away. “Are you sad? Do you get stressed? Do you have anxiety?” Yes, yes, and yes. I have all those things. I’m alive.

  I don’t want to take a pill. If you want to understand real stress, I say, go to Africa. Go follow some Bushman around. He’s getting chased by a lion. That’s stress! You’re not going to find a Pygmy on Paxil, I’ll tell you that right now.

  But I understand why people need help. The world can be a depressing place. If you want proof, just turn on the news. There you go. Depressing. I was watching the news the other day, “brought to you by Paxil.” (That’s smart advertising. You watch the news, and suddenly you need it.) When I was a kid the news was on once a day. You either caught it or you missed it. Now the news is on twenty-four hours a day. And that’s not enough. There’s a guy talking, and there’s a crawl going along down there. But that’s not all. You’ve got the guy talking, you’ve got that crawl going, you’re online, you’re typing in your opinion on their poll—“No, I say to that, no!” Suddenly you’ve stopped paying attention to the crawl and you start listening to the guy, and then you look back at the crawl again. You catch the end of something—“Madonna’s left foot.” What about Madonna’s left foot? What happened? You’re waiting for it to come back around again, and it goes to commercial…. “Are you sad? Do you get stressed…?”

  There should just be one crawl that goes around over and over again. “Things are getting worse.” That’s all we need.

  And then there’s the local news. They want you to watch every single broadcast they’ve got. It’s not good enough that you’re watching the one you’re watching. They slip in these teasers that are just so incredibly cruel to get you to watch again later. “It could be the most deadly thing in the world and you may be having it for dinner. We’ll tell you what it is, tonight at eleven.”

  “Is it peas?”

  I feel so sorry for newscasters, because they know we can turn off the news. We don’t have to watch, but the news is their job. Not only do they have to read the stories, but they don’t know what’s coming up next. They’re just reading the prompter, and they’ve got to go through a huge range of emotions. They have to jump from one thing to another without flinching. “There were no survivors…. And next up: Which candy bar helps you lose weight? Still to come: Is an asteroid headed toward earth? But first, where to find the cheesiest pizza in town! Also, a disturbing new study finds that studies are disturbing.”

  The newscasters are practically schizophrenic by the end of the broadcast. No wonder they snap by the time they talk to the weatherman. It’s like a fantasyland that they enter all of a sudden. “And now let’s go to Johnny with the weather. Johnny, when are you gonna stop this rain and bring us some sunshine?”

  “I’ll stop the rain when you stop the carjackings, Colleen.”

  The weather is the happiest part of the news. It really is. You know, weathermen are usually very happy people. And at some point they’re going to say, “It’s a beautiful day” or “It’s gonna be a beautiful day.” Usually that moment’s associated with the weather and sunshine, but it’s nice to hear that positive reinforcement even when the crawl underneath the weatherman is telling us unpleasant news. I’d like it if they could incorporate “It’s a beautiful day” into the crawl. Horrible news wouldn’t seem as bad if it read, “Get out your sunglasses, ’cause it’s a beautiful day for the ozone layer to deplete!” or “It’s a beautiful day for the world to explode.” That sounds much better.

  It seems to me that the crawl actually takes the focus off the entire news team. Back in the days of the “five channels,” the anchormen and the weatherman had the spotlight—they were the stars. It was their show and the crawl was something babies and swimmers did…on a beautiful day.

  Ellen’s Personal Home Tour

  I’d like to take a moment to talk about you, reader. I think it’s safe to assume that you have an active imagination. (You’re reading a book, that’s why I assumed that. And that’s also why I’m calling you “reader” and not “Carol” or whatever your given name is.) The imagination is very important in reading. Books are not like television, as I’m sure you’ve noticed. You have to do a lot of imagining when you read. I bet that’s why more people watch TV than read books these days. It’s so much easier to have a machine do your imagining for you. But then you have to wonder, is the easier way always the better way for me? (I know the answer, but I’m going to let you figure out for yourself. It will be more rewarding for you that way.)

  In this chapter I’m going to take advantage of that imagination of yours and take you on a literary tour of my private home, and in the process, I won’t have to get my carpets dirty.

  Unfortunately, most celebrities don’t devote chapters in their books to describing their homes in detail to their fans. So they end up being listed on a “Map to the Stars’ Homes” here in Hollywood. Now, I understand why people want to buy those maps. The idea of getting to see where your favorite movie, television, and/or vaudeville star lives is thrilling. I’ll admit to you, reader, I bought a “star map” once myself. Ever since I was a girl, it was my lifelong dream to see Ernest Borgnine’s driveway from fifty feet away.

  The day I moved to Hollywood, I made my dream happen. I saw that long stretch of asphal
t partially obstructed by that huge, iron gate and I thought I’d never recover. I mean, the Ernest Borgnine! Even his name sounds famous.

  I mention this to point out that there’s nothing wrong with curiosity. I’m curious to know what your home looks like, too, reader. You, I have a pretty good idea of what you look like. Jean shirt, khaki pants, curled up on your couch with a parrot on your shoulder and your Pekinese, Muffin, panting furiously in your lap. Man, those dogs breathe a lot, don’t they? I mean, I know they have to breathe, but I think they overdo it just to get attention. It works, too. Look at how much you ignore that nameless parrot and pay attention to Muffin. And why are those dogs’ tongues purple? Or am I thinking of pugs? That’s a silly question. How could you know what I’m thinking? You can’t; you can only imagine what I’m thinking. But I know what you’re thinking right now: How could she know exactly what I’m wearing and what I’m doing? Is she some kind of wizard? I know it’s creepy, but it’s not wizardry. You don’t win an Emmy for comedy writing by not knowing your audience.

  Anyway, let’s not stand here on the threshold any longer. Welcome to my home. Let me just get the door here…. I’vegot the key, right…ummm, this key ring is so confusing…. Okay, wait…here it is…. No, that’s the key to the maid’squarters…the chauffeur’s quarters…my personal training facility…bowling alley…Here we go! The front door! Once again, welcome to my home! One second…this lock is a little sticky…stupid lock…. There. And here we are! Finally! The front foyer!

  Now, I wanted to make this a very warm, welcoming room, so I covered it from floor to ceiling in tan shag carpet. Isn’t it nice and quiet? And it gets very warm in the summer. I’ve had people tell me that once they walk into this room, they don’t want to go into the rest of the house. Isn’t that nice?

  I like this room the most because you can’t break anything in here. Not even if you try! You could throw a vase straight up into the air and it would just hit the ceiling, bounce off a wall, land on the floor, and not even have the tiniest chip in it. And the whole thing would take place in complete silence.

  There’s a spiral staircase on our right that leads up to the second floor, but we’re not going to be visiting that floor today. I don’t mean to sound bossy. It’s just that I have to set boundaries. And, if I asked you where you wanted to go, I’d have to go the way you wanted to go, but if another person read this and wanted to go, say, to the rumpus room in the basement, then I’d have to write another version of this book for them. Another version would mean the cover photo would have to be slightly different and I would have to add a “.01” to the title or something to signify that it was a new version of the book. I don’t think it would work to put one of those yellow stars that say ALL NEW VERSION on the cover because really, the rest of the book would be the same, except for this one chapter.

  I mean, I can’t open up the possibility that every chapter could be customized for every reader. It would make me seem insecure. When you have an idea, you’ve gotta stick to it!

  My grandma used to shout that at me when I was a child. I knew she was trying to be supportive, but why did she have to shout it? She never yelled at my brother. She’d just creep into his room at night and whisper, “All that glitters is not gold.” Come to think of it, maybe I got off lucky, because he’s been scared of anything glittery ever since. It’s really very sad. He lives a glitter-free half life. He can’t ever go to Mardi Gras. Children don’t want to do arts and crafts with him. He can’t even look at a piñata. But hey! This isn’t a chapter about my brother’s grandma-induced neuroses, it’s about my beautiful home.

  So, let me throw open these French doors and lead you into my living room. To the left, the length of the wall is covered with that nature-scenery wallpaper like they used to have at the dentist’s office when I was a kid. This particular scene is a lake in autumn; beautiful fiery reds and oranges, with the calm of the dark blue lake in the background. It’s gorgeous and scuff-resistant.

  That sets the perfect tone for my sunken conversation pit, the centerpiece of the room. These were very popular back in the seventies, when people were really interested in talking. I find now they’re just as useful for drinking and waiting for dinner to be served. All the furniture in the pit is brown and the carpeting is a dark apricot. I wanted the overall effect to be pit-like, but most people don’t get it. A lot of people assume I’m colorblind.

  To the right, I have a wall of floor-to-ceiling windows that look out over my professional Ping-Pong court. Comedy is my life, but Ping-Pong is my passion. It’s great to sit in here in the summer and watch a match. If you’re in the pit, you’re watching at about knee level but that’s when you realize the game of Ping-Pong is all in the knees. It’s awe inspiring.

  Let’s plow ahead and go into this back hallway. The kitchen is on our left, but there’s nothing too exciting in there to show you, unless you love sponges. I had everything in my kitchen made of sponge. That way, the spill cleans itself up and no one ever cuts their finger. But it’s not that interesting, just very bouncy to walk around in.

  Now, this back hallway stretches one hundred yards in both directions. This not only helps reduce sound when I’m having late-night parties and babysitting, but I can also do my wind sprints without having to go outside. These are the things you dream of when you’re house hunting, but you don’t think you’ll ever actually find.

  At the end of each hallway are matching guest bedrooms that have been decorated to be the mirror images of each other. I loved this idea when I thought of it, until I realized I had to look at one room, walk two hundred yards, look at the other room, and then think about how they were the same—but opposite. It’s not as “freaky” as I wanted it to be. It kind of just seems like a hotel.

  This first guest bathroom here to our right has its own shower, sauna, and karaoke machine. I know it sounds extravagant, but it was here when I moved in. I think it’s the perfect combination: You can take a sauna to warm up your vocal cords and free your throat of any phlegm, then hop into the shower and crank up the karaoke machine for some of the best shower singing you’ve ever done in your life. It’s the kind of setup I never knew I needed before, and now I can’t live without it.

  In fact, a lot of the really fancy stuff here, like the second-floor Olympic-size swimming pool and the tanning bed breakfast nook, came with the house. The man who had this house built was the guy who invented “doing lunch.” Apparently, he made a mint off of that idea, so when he was designing his new dream home, the sky was the limit. He lived here for two years and then got an idea for a dreamier dream home. That happens all the time here in Hollywood. Dreams are a dime a dozen and so are the homes that are built because of them.

  So that’s the whole tour! I mean, I could show you the grounds but I don’t want to get my slippers all grimy. Besides, the gardeners haven’t trimmed the topiaries in a while, so the hedge that’s supposed to look like a dolphin looks like a dolphin with a beard and pants.

  Here, I’ll just have you picture a beautiful garden, whatever a “beautiful garden” means to you—and then spray some Glade. That’s just what my backyard is like! In fact, that’s what everyone’s backyard is like in Hollywood.

  Thank you for coming into my humble home, reader. I hope it was all you imagined it would be, and more! Now, if I could just ask you to let yourself out that screen door right past the stained-glass window depicting me performing live onstage, it would be such a help.

  Toodle-loo!

  Things to Be Grateful For

  I’d read somewhere that it’s good to keep a gratitude journal. We forget how many great things there are in our lives and when you start jotting them down and really get introspective about even the littlest of things, it’s amazing how all the terrible things in life don’t seem as bad.

  Gratitude can surprise you. Once you start seeing things in a positive way, you can make almost anything seem like a gift.

  At first it’s difficult to get to the things
that matter. My journal started off like this:

  I’m grateful for air—I need it to breathe.

  I’m grateful for food—I need it to live.

  I’m grateful for water—it’s what my body is 80% of.

  Then, after listing five pages of life-sustaining needs, I became angry with my journal (as you probably already are) and decided I needed to dig a little deeper.

  Animals don’t talk. At first I thought, Oh, that’s a shame, poor things can’t communicate to us. But then I thought, If some people are annoying, think about how bad it would be to come home from work and listen to your dog or cat tell you what it did all day long.

  First, your pet would berate you for not paying enough attention to it.

  “Well, it’s about time! It seems like you’ve been gone forever. I have no concept of time and I’m aging faster than you, you’d think you’d want to spend as much time with me as you could. Why’d you even get me? To pet once in a while? Oh! Thank you, master. Look, I’m bored. I have this one flea that is driving me nuts. I give and give and give. I’m your best friend, I love you unconditionally, and what do you do for me? Oh, you feed me. That same boring dry food every day. I see what you eat. You think I’m stupid? I know there’s variety in your meals, but I, for some reason, don’t deserve anything but this monotony.”

  Then the animal would go into a longwinded, boring monologue about the day.