The World of Simon Rich Read online

  SIMON RICH is a graduate of Harvard University, where he was president of The Harvard Lampoon. Shortly after graduation he became a writer for Saturday Night Live. He worked on Inside Out for Pixar and is currently writing and producing the hit comedy Man Seeking Woman. He lives in New York City.

  PRAISE FOR ELLIOT ALLAGASH

  “A sharp, clever, blisteringly funny debut.” The Times

  “Clueless for boys … suspect that, if he had a literary ancestor in mind as he charted Seymour Herson’s rise, it was not Austen or [Amy] Heckerling, but Evelyn Waugh … studded with rococo set pieces of ruthless masculine one-upmanship … a joy to read … Open the book on the beach or by the lake, and shed a crocodile tear, if you can muster one, for the craven ambition of youth.” Daily Beast

  “A true original and incredibly readable … Funny, smart and generally bloody brilliant – read it.” Heat

  “A canny mixture of wish-fulfilment, fantasy and morality tale … The most enjoyable classroom comedy since Tom Perrotta’s Election.” FT

  “If ever a book seemed custom-made for adaptation into a successful teen movie, the debut novel from Saturday Night Live writer Simon Rich is it. The plot is like that of the greatest film John Hughes never made: less Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, more Ferris Bueller’s Adolescence Off … a winning comic formula. Peppered with riotous teen angst – and effortlessly readable – this is a novel that one consumes like a pleasantly tangy packet of crisps.” Tom Cox, Daily Mail

  “Rich is intimately familiar with the subject, and nails everything. The novel is assured, deft in its rendering of teen relationships and, perhaps more remarkably, funny without resorting to the kind of gross-out humour common in this sort of setting. All laughs and no barfs, it’s a breezy read.” Guardian

  PRAISE FOR WHAT IN GOD’S NAME

  “Divinely funny” Vanity Fair

  “One of the funniest writers in America … Rich evokes enough of the hellish qualities of Earth (Lynyrd Skynyrd, Walmart, a screenplay for Finnegans Wake) and of the little things that we’ll miss (Lynyrd Skynyrd, Walmart, a screenplay for Finnegans Wake) that it feels like a little love letter to the world. Thanks, life. Good of you to let me drop by.” Daily Beast

  “Truly hilarious” Eva Wiseman, Observer

  “Hilarious and touching … rest assured that you’re in good hands here … obviously Rich is crazy good at hysterical sharp dialogue. But the bonus here is that his head is matched by his heart. Rich lends the potentially gimmicky story real emotional heft and avoids condescending to his characters (or readers). At its best, What in God’s Name reads like a screenplay for a film that might sit comfortably beside Woody Allen’s early absurd works in a Netflix queue … a clever, endearing novel.” Entertainment Weekly

  “Elliot Allagash, drew comparisons to Evelyn Waugh and P. G. Wodehouse. His new novel, What in God’s Name, evokes another titan of English comedy: Douglas Adams … Funny and occasionally touching, What in God’s Name is satire that avoids sanctimony … Rich knows how to balance the smart with the funny. When What in God’s Name bares its teeth, it’s because it’s laughing.” New York Times

  “Rich’s play on office politics and his understanding of the comic potential of human relationships is accurate enough, producing an appealing mixture of subtle and laugh-out-loud funny.” Independent on Sunday

  “Like Kevin Smith’s Dogma via Neil Gaiman’s Good Omens, it takes a lovingly satirical swipe at religion.” Grazia

  PRAISE FOR THE LAST GIRLFRIEND ON EARTH

  “A collection of sweet stories full of whimsical, gently moving tales of love and loss, thwarted come-ons and doomed crushes … Put it in your pocket and take it out whenever you need a five minute break from the tedium of everyday.” The Gloss

  “Most original and highly amusing. Rich manages to turn the banal into the absurd … hilarious and touching … and impossible to put down. A perfect cheer-up for the romantically challenged!” Image

  “The Last Girlfriend On Earth is silly, surreal, sometimes sad and always laugh-out-loud funny. This collection will have you giggling/crying/squirming in recognition, and wondering what exactly Simon Rich has eaten to dream all this stuff up … This collection pulls off the tough trick of being both heart-warming and hilarious – it’s a must-read if you’ve ever so much as had a crush on someone.” Heat

  “Pithy, occasionally bonkers … expect any weeping to be of the laughter-induced variety.” Time Out

  “A James Thurber for our times, in Borges’ suit wearing Flann O’Brien’s hat.” Ian McMillan, BBC Radio 3 The Verb

  “It would be almost a relief to find that The Last Girlfriend on Earth was another of those American humour collections by a writer falling short of their hype as an heir to David Sedaris and James Thurber, just to be reassured that Rich wasn’t good at everything. As it happens, it’s brilliant: a kind of modern version of Woody Allen’s Without Feathers for anyone who’s been in love … Only a couple of times within the next 29 pieces does Rich hit a note that’s not either topsy-turvy imaginative, riotously funny or hugely insightful … Beneath the clear ambition to make people laugh, there’s another book lurking here: a guide to the idiocy and sensitivity of men that could be more valuable to the opposite sex than a million ‘How To Please Him’ women’s mag articles. Rich has a wisdom about male-female interaction that most have to wait far, far longer than 28 years to gain.” Tom Cox, Observer

  THE WORLD of SIMON RICH

  The World of Simon Rich is drawn from Free-Range Chickens and Ant Farm, as well as uncollected pieces, which have appeared in The Occasional and Observer Magazine.

  First published in Great Britain in 2016 by

  Serpent’s Tail,

  an imprint of Profile Books Ltd

  3 Holford Yard

  Bevin Way

  London

  WC1X 9HD

  www.serpentstail.com

  Copyright © 2016 Simon Rich

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the publisher of this book.

  A CIP record for this book can be obtained from the British Library

  eISBN 978 1 78283 308 6

  Contents

  Growing up

  Terrifying childhood experiences

  A conversation at the grown-ups’ table as imagined at the kids’ table

  A day at UNICEF headquarters as I imagined it in third grade

  When I lost my first tooth

  A conversation between the people who hid in my closet every night when I was seven

  If adults were subjected to the same indignities as children

  I still remember the day I got my first calculator

  Playing nice

  Our thoughts are with you

  Letters from camp

  My mom’s all-time top five greatest boyfriends

  Math problems

  Frogs

  I can only think of two scenarios where high school math would come in handy

  Ouija board

  Rebellion

  Bar mitzvah

  A fantasy I had in seventh grade

  Pen pal

  If life were like middle school

  Ninth-grade experiments

  What I imagined the people around me were saying when I was…

  My friend’s new girlfriend

  Animals

  Free-range chickens

  Dalmatians

  He
rbert Hoover

  Prehistoric life

  The dog X-files

  Animal cruelty

  Lost puppy!

  Ant farm

  Going to work

  Great astronaut quotes throughout history

  Employees must wash hands

  Notices for tonight’s magic show

  Physician’s Lounge

  Swim at your own risk

  Choose your own adventure

  Actor’s nightmare

  Demands

  Gotham City Hall

  World’s oldest profession

  Worst nightmare

  The only e-mails I could receive that would justify the frequency with which I check my e-mail

  An interview with Stephen Hawking

  The final moments of the Titanic

  Inside the cartridge

  Role playing

  Crayola Co.

  How I imagine life in the U.S. Army (based on the commercials I’ve seen)

  How college kids imagine the U.S. government

  War

  Moon landing transcript

  Relationships

  One-way ticket to Mars

  Being of sound mind

  Moses

  I think my teenaged daughter knows I read her diary

  Last Supper

  What I want my tombstone to say when I die of encephalitis next week

  When the “guess your weight” guy from the carnival got married

  Love coupons

  Stadium proposal

  Sultan of Brunei

  First poem

  Daily life

  Donors needed

  Inn questionnaire

  Jewish Web MD

  Moving sale

  Roller coaster guidelines

  Spontaneous combustion

  The official rules of boxing

  Secret Service

  Logic problems

  Dear Mr. Wilkinson

  Time machine

  Amusement

  Opium wars

  All-you-can-eat buffet fantasy

  The eleventh hour

  Next move

  Invisible

  Medieval England

  Patron of the arts

  If life were like hockey

  colombiatourism.com

  When small talk goes wrong

  The odds

  Desert island

  Glorious battles of the American revolution

  A day in the life of the Swiss Army

  Any person living or dead

  Nostradamus: the lost predictions

  Guinness Book of World Records

  God

  Jesus

  The ride back to Beersheba

  Repent

  Karma

  Everything happens for a reason

  Intelligent design

  Why do bad things happen to good people?

  A miracle

  Saint Agnes the martyr

  God has a plan for all of us

  Orel Hershiser

  Made for each other

  A conversation between God and the man in a football helmet and a Speedo who’s always shouting things next to the local Aldi

  Acknowledgments

  Growing up

  Terrifying childhood experiences

  – Got your nose!

  – Please just kill me. Better to die than to live the rest of my life as a monster.

  – What’s that in your ear? Hey– it’s a quarter!

  – Why is everybody laughing? I have a horrifying brain disease.

  – Peek-a-boo!

  – Jesus Christ. You came out of nowhere.

  A conversation at the grown-ups’ table as imagined at the kids’ table

  MOM: Pass the wine, please. I want to become crazy.

  DAD: Okay.

  GRANDMOTHER: Did you see the politics? It made me angry.

  DAD: Me too. When it was over, I had sex.

  UNCLE: I’m having sex right now.

  DAD: We all are.

  MOM: Let’s talk about which kid I like the best.

  DAD: (laughing) You know, but you won’t tell.

  MOM: If they ask me again, I might tell.

  FRIEND FROM WORK: Hey, guess what? My voice is pretty loud!

  DAD: (laughing) There are actual monsters in the world, but when my kids ask I pretend like there aren’t.

  MOM: I’m angry! I’m angry all of a sudden!

  DAD: I’m angry too! We’re angry at each other!

  MOM: Now everything is fine.

  DAD: We just saw the PG-13 movie. It was so good.

  MOM: There was a big sex.

  FRIEND FROM WORK: I am the loudest! I am the loudest!

  (Everybody laughs.)

  MOM: I had a lot of wine, and now I’m crazy!

  GRANDFATHER: Hey, do you guys know what God looks like?

  ALL: Yes.

  GRANDFATHER: Don’t tell the kids.

  A day at UNICEF headquarters as I imagined it in third grade

  [UNICEF sits on a throne. He is wearing a cape and holding a sceptre. A servant enters, on his knees.]

  UNICEF: Halloween is fast approaching! Have the third graders been given their little orange boxes?

  SERVANT: Yes, your majesty!

  UNICEF: Perfect. Did you tell them what the money was for?

  SERVANT: No, sir, of course not! We just gave them the boxes and told them to collect for UNICEF. We said it was for “a good cause,” but we didn’t get any more specific than that.

  UNICEF: Ha ha ha! Those fools! Soon I will have all the money in the world. For I am UNICEF, evil king of Halloween!

  SERVANT: Sir … don’t you think you’ve stolen enough from the children? Maybe you should let them keep the money this year?

  UNICEF: Never! The children shall toil forever to serve my greed!

  [UNICEF tears open a little orange box and rubs the coins all over his fat stomach.]

  UNICEF: Yes! Oh, yes!

  SERVANT: Wait – your majesty! Look at this! Our records indicate that there’s a kid out there – Simon – who’s planning to keep his UNICEF money this year.

  UNICEF: What?!? But what about my evil plans? I was going to give that money to the Russians so they could build a bomb!

  SERVANT: I guess there’s still one hero left in this world.

  UNICEF: Noooo!

  [Runs out of castle, sobbing.]

  SERVANT: Thank God Simon is keeping his UNICEF money.

  SECOND SERVANT: Yes, it’s good that he’s keeping the money.

  THIRD SERVANT: I agree. Simon is doing a good thing by keeping the money from the UNICEF box.

  SERVANT: Then we’re all in agreement. Simon should keep the money.

  When I lost my first tooth

  ME: You’re never going to believe this. I was hanging out with my friends and all of a sudden, a tooth fell out of my mouth. I think there’s something seriously wrong with me.

  MOM: Looks like the tooth fairy’s coming to town!

  ME: Who?

  MOM: The tooth fairy. She visits children in the middle of the night and takes their teeth.

  ME: Is she … a cannibal?

  MOM: No, she’s a fairy.

  ME: What else does she take? Does she take eyes?

  MOM: No, just teeth. And when she’s done, she leaves a surprise under your pillow.

  ME: Oh my God.

  MOM: I wonder what it’ll be this time?

  ME: Okay … let’s not panic here. There’s got to be a way to trap her or kill her. We just need to think.

  MOM: You don’t want to kill the tooth fairy.

  ME: Why not? Wait a minute … I see what’s going on. You’re in cahoots with her! God, it all makes sense now … how else would she know that I had lost a tooth in the first place?

  MOM: I think someone’s getting a little sleepy.

  ME: Wait until Dad finds out about this!

  MOM: He knows about the tooth fairy, sweetie.

  ME: Jesus
Christ. How high up does this thing go?

  MOM: Let’s get you tucked in.

  ME: Listen … as long as we’re laying it all on the line, you might as well be straight with me. What other fairies are you working with? Is there a face fairy?

  MOM: There’s just a tooth fairy, sweetie. She comes every time you lose a tooth.

  ME: What do you mean “every time”? I’m going to lose more teeth?

  MOM: You’re going to lose all of them.

  A conversation between the people who hid in my closet every night when I was seven

  FREDDY KRUEGER: When do you guys want to kill him?

  MURDERER FROM THE SIX O’CLOCK NEWS: How about right now?

  DEAD UNCLE WHOSE BODY I SAW AT AN OPEN CASKET FUNERAL: I say we do it when he gets up to pee. You know, when he’s walking down the hallway, in the dark.

  FREDDY KRUEGER: What if he doesn’t get up?

  MURDERER: He’ll get up. Look at how he’s squirming. It’s only a matter of time.

  DEAD UNCLE: Man, I cannot wait to kill this kid.

  MURDERER: Same here.

  FREDDY KRUEGER: I’ve wanted to kill him ever since he saw my movie.

  DEAD UNCLE: Hey, do you guys remember that night-light Simon used to have?

  MURDERER: Man, that thing scared the heck out of me.

  FREDDY KRUEGER: It’s a good thing his mom got rid of it. Now there’s nothing to stop us from killing him.

  (Everyone nods in agreement.)

  DR. MURPHY: Hey, guys, sorry I’m late. I was busy scheduling an appointment with Simon, to give him shots.

  FREDDY KRUEGER: No problem.

  (Freddy Krueger and Dr. Murphy do their secret handshake.)

  MURDERER: It’s getting kind of crowded in here. Chucky, can you move over?

  CHUCKY: I’m over as far as I can get.

  MURDERER: I need more space than you’re giving me. I’m a lot bigger than you.

  CHUCKY: Are you calling me short?

  DR. MURPHY: Hey, guys, relax, all right? We’re all here for the same reason: to kill and possibly eat Simon.

  MURDERER: (Sighs.) You’re right. I’m sorry.

  CHUCKY: Yeah … me too. I kind of lost perspective.

  DEAD UNCLE: Hey, it looks like he’s getting up! Wait a minute … where’s he going!

  CHUCKY: I think he’s running into his mom’s room!

  DEAD UNCLE: Maybe we should follow him?