Excited at being chosen to be a speaker at the AARP@50+ event, last week Connie Chung snuck away from Maury long enough to leave a message on my phone. We have this code so that Maury, who is insanely jealous, doesn’t know where she’s heading out. He thinks she’s going to play bingo at Our Lady of the Immaculate Retirement Village, but in reality as she talks she hits numbers on the phone and spells out in tone (just like when you tried to play Funky Town when you were a kid) where to meet up. Beeping 3-3-7-2 to me … D … E … S … C … she wants to go see The Descent. Where, Connie? 6-2-6-6-7 spells … M … A … N … N .. . Oh, Mann’s Chinese Theatre … Obvious choice. Connie likes to support her “ethnicentricity” as she calls it. I don’t think that really counts as an Asian cultural experience, but whatever. *-*-7-0-0-*-* … “See you there at 7:00, Connie!”, I said to no one in particular, since it was her voicemail I was listening to (we rarely talk voice-to-voice because of Maury’s rage-aholism). We are complex little creatures, I tell you.

I just wish Connie hadn’t shown up to the theatre drunk … again. Taking a taxi is not a good enough reason in my opion to appear in public drunk at any time. But that’s Connie. “I’m not driving! You know I can’t drive anyway!” I had to hold my tongue. Connie’s always danced to the beat of her own jello shots. And then the chit-chat started.

She first started talking during the previews, which I kind of found a little annoying, but what the heck. She had some good dirt about Mel’s drunk driving arrest. Apparently being the “Queen of News” (a self-titled moniker in that sad Kathy Griffin sort of way) still has its benefits – Connie had a screening of the DUI arrest at her house Wednesday night as a fundraiser for her charity, Chung-ky Gals, a support group for overweight Asian women. She also told me Annie Coulter was going under the knife finally “to have her hog sliced off … you know … her hog!” Connie said, nudging me and pointing to her crotch. Annie is a close friend of mine and it pains me to see people gossip about her (especially when it’s not true – Annie’s … hog … was cut off 7 months ago). Then there was a terrible National Guard commercial mixed in with the previews – it was sooooo poor in taste I thought I was eating at Olive Garden. And then the lights went down.

“Oh, you should have seen what Maury pulled out of his ear this morning – I swear it had roots!” Connie stage-whispered (which is a fancy way for saying you talk softly realllllly loudly). “Oh, well, tell me after the movie – I can’t wait to hear, but I’ll have to!” I responded. Shifting in her seat, Connie said, “I’m thirsty. I should have peed before I came in here. Luckily I bought big empty cup with me.” And then Connie burped. No, strike that. Connie belched. “That lager was deeeeeeLISHous! But it tastes like … pickle sauce … What’s that called? Oh yeah, RELISH!” The guy in front of her turned around and said, “I’m sorry, but if you want to talk, can you please talk outside?”

“Don’t be an eff-ing asshole, man! Come on, Brad, let’s move away from these negative people!” she replied, and then Connie gathered up her plastic bags full of crap (god is she moving out or what? I’ll have to ask later … ), making sure she made plenty of noise, and moved over to the next aisle. I was just too preoccupied with Connie’s drunkenness and her rude behavior to enjoy the movie, so I excused myself to the restroom.

“Do you want to just use my cup to pee in? You’re going to miss the end of the movie when they are all rescued by the husband who didn’t really die!” Someone shouted, “GODDAMMIT! YOU RUINED IT!” at her and I knew it was time to get the hell outta there. (Editor’s note: I am not pee-shy, but this is the one time when it wasn’t safe to pee in the theatre, that was for sure. Not that I have done that. At Mann’s. It was a different theatre. And a foreign movie. I didn’t want to miss anything! I’ve said too much. But all that running Lola ran in the film … it made me have to pee and I didn’t want to sit through it a second time. Oh the irony!) .

I made it to the door just as the police were coming in. They said, “Where is she sitting?” and I’m sorry, readers, but I pointed and said, “That’s her, sir. That’s the one who ruined the film. Ms. Connie Chung. And I think she’s drunk.”

And Connie hasn’t called me since.

I did pick up the phone when it rang last night during dinner, but it was just random tones spelling out gibberish. “Kitten. Fly. Wall through. Kachoo.” “Connie, are you okay?” I asked. And then I heard it. Not Maury’s voice, not Connie’s voice, but a woman’s voice, soft and gentle, the voice of a mother, any mother, every mother.

“Oh, you found the phone again you little devil. Who did you call this time? Sorry, whoever you are!” the woman said into the phone, and then there was just a click and finally that old lady voice recording telling me that if I’d like to make a call, would I please hang up and try my call again, or dial the operator.

I sat there, a little sad. I missed the ending to a really good movie. And I had betrayed Connie, one of her last few friends, and I betrayed her.

Christie and I have this on-again-off-again friendship and I really think she’s a sweet gal, but she keeps marrying down. I told her on her first marriage just as she was ready to walk that aisle, “Christie, this is your one shot at true happiness. Don’t blow it.” Did she listen? No. She just laughed and said, “Too late!” Crass. Husband number two, I’m talking to her from Spain as she’s ready to walk down the aisle … again. “Listen, the starter marriage got you a house and a car. Don’t spread yourself too thin on #2.” She giggled when I said that and added, “TOO LATE!” God she can be so crass. Husband number three. God almost takes them both in a helicopter crash in Colorado in 1994 and I tell her, “Defy god! Go back and get married where the copter crashed and make this one stick!” Again she giggled, “WHY DO YOU THINK I’M MARRYING HIM?” Ugh. She always shouts into her cell phone. And again, crass. She didn’t even bother calling me this last time when she married Peter Cook. And you know what? I would have still given her words of encouragement. I would have said, “Listen, third strike and you’re out – but not in pee-wee league. You keep swinging until you get to first base!” I imagine her chortling and adding, “Oh, he’s already made it to home plate … along with his team!” God she can be so crass, even when I imagine her talking.

Christie stumbles out of her Cabrio and runs to the door, screaming all the way. Kind of like that Marianne Faithful song, The Ballad of Lucy Jordan. As I walk up to the door behind a now-sobbing Christie, Ithink to myself, “God, if there’s one person you shouldn’t get marriage advice from, it’s Courtney, who completely redefined the term shotgun wedding but whatever, Christie, whatever.” Always the gracious hostess, Courtney invited Christie to join us at IHOP and she sat there in our booth, makeup smeared and crying about something that Peter, the now-ex-husband, said to her. Apparently she’s a little long in the tooth , if you know what I mean. Her pantry is now a two-car garage. Her crawlspace is now a rumpus room. Her vagina is as sloppy as a Rush Limbaugh at a drug store filling a photocopied receipt and using fake id to purchase narcotics with cash while coming down from his last Oxy pill. That’s not a euphemism, and I’m sorry, but it’s the truth. He said if she were a dynosaur, she’d be a Sloppylottapuss.

I couldn’t order anything. I just had a coffee. And then a thought came to me.

“Christie, it’s not like you haven’t had a little work done here and there to freshen up the years,” I said, taking her roadmappy hand. “Why don’t you hire a ‘decorator’ to trim the curtains in your basement?” She gave me the Evil Eye, but deep down (and probably dangling outside a little bit) she knew it was the perfect solution. “And if that doesn’t work, Christie, maybe they can cast you in the next Harry Potter movie with your big pink wizard’s sleeve.” Courtney kicked me under the table. “OW!” I exclaimed, exaggerating the pain.

“Fine. I’ll do it. Just as long as no one finds out,” Christie relented. “Oh, no one will, Christie,” I assured her, as I wrote down the number of an amazing gynorejuvenator that I know, “no one will.”