The Funniest People in Families, Volume 4: 250 Anecdotes

Some samples: 1) Susie Essman plays the foul-mouthed Susie Greene on the HBO comedy series "Curb Your Enthusiasm." Her tirades, which are many, are filled with profanity delivered in many original and colorful ways—she rivals the foul-mouthed Jay of Jay and Silent Bob fame in her talent for profanity. She uses this talent of hers in real life; in fact, her family uses “Susie Greene” as a verb. For example, while she and her 16-year-old daughter were walking on Broadway, a creep grabbed her daughter’s bottom. Ms. Essman says, “Oh, he got so Susie Greened, I can’t even tell you—I went crazy on him!” After proper and just revenge had been exacted on the creep, her daughter said to her, “Y’know, you just Susie Greened him.” Ms. Essman replied, “Let that be a lesson for you! You Susie Greene anybody who ever does that to you!” 2) The mother of Theodor Geisel, aka Dr. Seuss, was very encouraging to her son. He once showed her a drawing he had made of an animal with enormous ears. He told her that the animal was called a “Wynnmph,” and his mother said that of course that was the animal’s name and that his drawing of it was wonderful. In addition, his mother encouraged him to read and play piano as well as draw and actually used his love of reading to bribe him to practice his piano lessons. When he played well, she took him to a bookstore and let him pick out a book for her to buy for him. 3) Lesbian humorist Garbo participated in a gay and lesbian bowling league where one Halloween she saw a drag queen bowling in three-inch stiletto heels. This is definitely against bowling alley rules, but the manager didn’t say a word—this drag queen was big. Garbo herself bowled on an all-lesbian team called the “Girl Gang,” but when a gay friend named Ron joined them, they offered to change the team’s name. As it turned out, they didn’t have to change their name—Ron thought that it was accurate.