untitledlife

untitledhusband has this… perversion. He likes turning on the most inappropriate TV programs during family functions. Sometimes it’s planned, sometimes it’s not.

I recall the time when he busted out Jerry Springer’s “Too Hot for TV” at his mother’s house during the annual Christmas gathering. The extended family had just returned from holiday mass. All had begun to gather in the living room, the women in their festive holiday sweaters and the men with their clip-on ties.

There was talk of jam recipes from the “Taste of Home” magazine, so-and-so’s upcoming Mary Kay party, and the guy down the road who’s too cheap to plow out his driveway. About this time, untitledhusband decided it was time for Jerry. I don’t know what was more mortifying, seeing a 300-lb transvestite doing the James Brown power splits, or watching the strippers take each other down in a baby pool filled with chocolate pudding. All this, on a TV that in 20 years had witnessed nothing more racy than the boobalicious babes on Hee-Haw or the rare panty flash that occurred during a Lawrence Welk dance segment.

untitledhusband just sat in the corner and shook. From deep within his gullet emerged this whole-body laugh — the kind that makes no sound, except for some spittle gurgling in the back of his throat. The rest of the room was dumbstruck by the blasphemy, as all the churchiness they’d collectively gathered not even one hour ago was being systematically sucked away by the evil that is Jerry Springer.

This moment is seconded only by the time he flipped on the Howard Stern show when his dad came for a visit. The topic this particular day was, of all things, pussy farts. Some lady had a microphone down her pants as she sputtered out the national anthem, or something that sounded like that. untitledhusband was laughing. His father was laughing. I just sat there, thinking to myself, “May there never be a day when I can laugh about pussy farts with my son.” Christ.