Listener Mail: An Andy Breckman Christmas Story

Here's one of those stories about how our Andy-sampled zingers lead to trouble and hilarity. From Listener B. (@halfassbuddhist on Twitter), who notes that he has changed all the names in this story.

My girlfriend’s friend Dee had a small dinner party on Christmas eve. There were eight people there, of those eight, I only knew my girlfriend Claudia and her friend Dee.

As dinner was winding down, the conversation turned to a Liza Minnelli concert we had attended earlier in the year, and why on earth we went. (Because it was a friend’s birthday – and it was a hoot). People started asking why she was famous, and I pointed out that her Dad was a successful Italian film director who went on to have a big Hollywood career, and her mom was Judy freakin’ Garland! My girlfriend Claudia said, “that’s what everyone says about Liza Minnelli – she came out of Judy Garland’s twat!”

At that point, I looked at the person sitting on my left and said, “Hey, that brings up an interesting question – were you vaginally delivered or caesarean?”

Eve, Dee’s cousin, said she didn’t remember (best answer). Dee’s 81 year old mother said vaginally. Frank, a working actor who had been tossing off zingers all night said, “Caesarean, and I wasn’t breast fed, either,” which got a few “that explains a lot…” reactions. The question went around the table until it ended with Gail, an older, overweight, gray-haired lady who said softly, “Vaginally – and I don’t think this is appropriate table conversation.”

She said this not looking at me, but across the table at Frank, the wiseacre. “I’d expect something like this out of you,” she said while glaring at Frank and refusing to look at me, two seats to her left.

Up to that point it had been a pretty loud and raucous party, but things went flat like someone had let the air out of a balloon. I just sat there thinking about what to do. Since an Andy Breckman gag had got me into this, I decided the thing to do would be to wait until we were leaving, and shake this lady’s hand and tell her to go to hell, but I wanted to keep it one on one, not in front of everyone. I was screwing up my courage for this (it’s not everyday I tell someone to go to hell) when Gail, the lady who put a damper on the evening, got up and said she was tired and it was time to go. No one else got up to say goodbye and I was trapped in my seat – I never got a chance to tell her to go to hell!

As soon as she left, I started to complain that I didn’t get my chance to tell her to go to hell, and Frank said, “wait, did she really bother you? That’s Gail, she doesn’t like any of us, especially me and your girlfriend. I’m not sure why Dee even invited her.” My girlfriend said, “I told you about her. Dee used to work in her shop. Frank’s right, she hates all of us – she’s the one that used to be married to Don McLean.”

Frank (and a few others) asked, “Don McLean? Who’s that?” but I screamed, “Oh my god! That was an Andy Breckman bit. I’d love to take credit for it, but that whole vaginal vs. caesarean thing is an Andy Breckman bit."

At that point, the question changed from 'Who’s Don McLean?' to 'Who’s Andy Breckman?'

Have you ever offended anyone previously involved with Don McLean? Tell me about it.