I Broke My Bib, Banana Hammocks, Ironic Rainbows, and Me, Also Known As, How I Survived A Week On Cape Cod Without Becoming An Ax Murderer

Howdy, fooligans.


I'm BAAAAAAAACCCCKKKK!!!!


Don't play that funeral dirge just yet, and don't whip out those black jeggings I know you've been dying to wear to a funeral but just haven't had the chance so you've been waiting for someone to kick the bucket and contemplating quietly in your closet at night about who you wouldn't miss that much if it meant being able to wear those jeggings, and get ready.


Oh, and disclaimer.


Some of the comments that I write down on this blog may be vaguely homophobic. I myself am NOT, and I repeat NOT a homophobe, but spending time around my cousins and brother I found them to be a little less accepting of the alternative lifestyle. Please, if you are gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, questioning, whatever, do NOT take offense to these. I understand that they were made in poor taste, but if you take a step back, they are kind of funny.


And now I can proceed now that I will not feel like an asshat for writing some of what I'm about to write.


No one hate me...


And so we go....


*******


I just spent a week with my cousins. A week. That is a long time to spend with my cousins, who might just be the second most dysfunctional family in the world, second only to the Barosins. My loverly family. Hoofreakingray.


So me, my mother, and my little brother Josh packed up into our van and drove to the Cape last Saturday. My dad and my older brother Jake were at a baseball expo in Connecticut and didn't get to the house we were renting until Sunday, so for right now, it is like they don't even exist. Capisce? Capisce.


My mum, being the crazy lady that she is, said that we were going to get to the Cape house at 3 in the afternoon to get in because we couldn't get in before then. We left the house late, mostly my fault because I was on YouTube for a good forty minutes before we left and I forgot to pack my bag (I ended up forgetting flip flops and sunglasses. I was going to the beach. I am a dunce. You can all laugh at me. I encourage it.) and then we got stuck in some traffic going over the Sagamore (teehee, sag more. Oh help me) Bridge and we didn't get to go to the Heritage Museum but guess what time we showed up at the house?


3 on the dot.


My mother is a robot. Does that make me a cyborg? Will you all still love me if I'm a cyborg? Please say yes! I need the love!


I'm stopping.


My cousins were already there. Let's meet this cast of characters, shall we?


Craig: Craig is my second cousin, once removed or some other shit like that. He's funny, but yells a bit. Married to Denise, father to Leo and Fiona.


Denise: Denise is Irish. She has an accent. I love Denise, because she is honestly hilarious. Married to Craig, mother to Leo and Fiona.


Leo: Leo is the only cousin I have who is my age. I am technically 7 months older than him, and infinitely more beautiful and wiser and all around better. He is fricking HILARIOUS though. He just has these gems. Has ADHD. Thinks he can sing. Son to Denise and Craig, brother to Fiona.


Fiona: Fiona is 13, she just had her Bat Mitzvah, and she has the Jewish entitled daughter whine down to a T. I actually asked my mom if I sound like that and my mother said "Oh GOD no." She is slightly mean to Leo, and by slightly I mean she told him that no one would ever love him. Has her funny moments. Kind of obsessed with death. Daughter to Denise and Craig, sister to Leo.


So we were on the very tip of Cape Cod, in Truro. This is the part of the Cape that is rapidly disappearing. Eventually, Provincetown will be an island.


Speaking of Provincetown, has anyone ever been there? I liked it, I liked the indie vibe I was getting from it, but my older brother got totally freaked out by all of the PDA that was exhibited there. Not calling him a homophobe, but he did seem a little on edge during our first excursion. Where nothing weird went down at all. The weirdest thing we saw was guys wearing tiny little towel skirts, passing out menus for a restaurant and a couple of honest-to-goodness drag queens.


I saw my first drag queen you guys; this is a proud moment. And they were RuPaul drag queens, too! Proper drag queens. I almost got a picture with one, but then I chickened out.


Our second excursion into P-Town was for Karnival. Now here is where I can understand Jake, Leo, Craig, and my Dad's discomfort.


Karnival (supposedly) in two words: Tastefully outrageous. Now get rid of tastefully and you have Karnival. I saw more banana hammocks than I ever wanted to in my life on Thursday. Coupled with the fact that I woke up at 5 to see the sunrise, I was in a fragile state. Now, mind you, I'm not exactly as innocent as a rosebud. I watch some, shall we say, raunchier shows, like True Blood and Shameless (Oh Showtime and HBO. Gotta love shows on after midnight when you have insomnia, no?), but I'm still a proud carrier of my v-card. Yay for teenage prudes! We seem to be a minority these days. Anyfloozle, there were guys walking around in tighty whiteys. And some of these underpants were, um, stretched. I think Fiona was scarred for life. I know Jake and Leo were.


Now, bringing Leo to P-Town was a funtime bonanza. Leo, unfortunately, has filled the role of buttmonkey of the family. He is the butt of all of the jokes. He's as straight as a ruler, is desperate for a girlfriend, and that just makes it easier to insinuate that he's gay. One of the best jokes I made this week was made in passing. We were at another light house, and being cheap Jews we decided not to pay $5 to get to go inside (what can I say? Stereotypes have to come from somewhere!) and we were looking out at the ocean and I say to Leo "Hey Leo, you know how you're dying to have a girlfriend?" And he looks at me, not really knowing where this is going but he answers anyway because he's an idiot with "Yeah, and? Everyone knows that." And that's true, it's practically common knowledge. So I finish with "Wouldn't it be ironic if you ended up gay?" That got him in stitches. Then he punched me and said that there was no way.


Craig is evil when it comes to Leo. He said more than once that he was going to drop Leo off in P-Town so he could live with "his people". It's all in good fun, but I feel kind of bad in retrospect because everyone was picking on Leo. But he sets himself up for it.


Example. We went out to dinner at this restaurant called the Beachcomber. Right on the water, on this huge cliff of a sand dune. It was crazy, like a 15o ft fall to the beach below if you walked too far. The food was good, but I had to get a salad due to my ridiculous dietary restrictions, but I mooched some calamari off of Fiona's plate. I payed for it later, but while it was going down it was delicious. Leo got a whole lobster. You know how you get bibs with lobster, because it is a notoriously messy food? Well, Leo gets his bib out, and promptly breaks it. Which is so like him to do. So he leans out past Jake, and says to a girl who clearly works there (she's wearing a Beachcomber t-shirt, has a towel over her shoulder, and just finished wiping down a table) "Excuse me, ma'am? Do you work here? I broke my bib; could you get me another?" Oh, Christ, he caught the mickey for that one. We were making fun of him for the rest of dinner. And he ate his lobster with out butter or anything. He also ate the tail in one go. It was disgusting.


Some of Leo's other gems.

(In response to my feeling better after eating a hot dog (I don't eat red meat. That was the exception)) Just remember *blibblbalfblblkbbls* I just motorboated a rack...of lamb. You should eat red meat.

-Karnival should be a really healthy parade. -Why? -Because it's full of fruits! (homophobic, but you have to admit it's funny)

And this is my favorite.

At Karnival there was this one float which was advocating PFLAG, Parents and Friend of Lesbians and Gays, and there were teenagers walking behind it, bedecked in Mardi Gras beads and lots of rainbows, chanting "1,2,3,4 Open up the closet door, 5,6,7,8 Don't assume your kids are straight". Which is catchy. It also inspired this.

"9, 10, 11, 12 Denial is the only cell. Denial, one of the stages of grieving. Because you know your son is dead to you, so why not decide to live a lie?"

Soooo homophobic, yet with such good comic timing. Leo should do stand up. For realz.


I suppose I'll write more about this later, when I have more time to remember the stuff we did in better detail, but I will have to do that at a later date, because I'm tired, it's friggin' hot, and I have cousins from Paris whom I've never met invading my home tomorrow. I will let y'all know how that goes.


Oh, and to explain ironic rainbows. My parents and Denise and Craig went into P-Town one night and left us children at home. On there way into P-Town, there was a huge rainbow in the sky stretched over the haven for those in the alternative lifestyle. If rainbows have a sense of irony, this one sure as shit did.


Well, it's about midnight, and I've completely caught up on all of my Internet. So, here's looking at you, kiddos.


See ya later, fooligans.


Parting joke:

Why did the plane crash?

The pilot was a tomato.

Just say it out loud. Can't keep a straight face, can ya?

Love and kisses,

L.