"...but actually, I gotta wrap up here." " So, I'm just gonna..." " Oh, okay." "So that means I can't pour your coffee." "I'm just thrilled that you've got something to do today." "How do you know I've got something to do?" "Well, why are you in a hurry otherwise?" "I got something to do today." "Okay." "I gotta run up to the roof." "Why are you going up to the roof?" "Well, I have a job this week." "What are you talking about?" " Well, you know Mr. Graham, right?" " Mm-hmm." " He's going away for a week." " Right." "And, I'm taking care of his pigeons on the roof." "Huh." "Well, you know those pigeons..." "Mr. Graham, he's a very sweet guy and since his wife died..." "Since his wife left him, those pigeons are his life." "She did die." "No she didn't, she left him." "She flew the coop." "But do you know anything about pigeons?" "Because he'd be devastated if anything happened to those birds." "Well, I mean, Mr. Graham gave me, you know, a basic idea of what they are." "Mm-hmm." "I didn't know until he told me." "But, umm, they are, they're mammals..." "Ahh, I really think you should think twice about it because, first of all, you may not be qualified to take..." "How many pigeons does he have?" "I think there's twelve." "Twelve pigeons." "It's a big responsibility, Ben." "That's all." "Dad, they're pigeons." "I mean, it's not like I'm taking over day care center or something." "Mm-hmm." "You know, I'm going to be getting up early every morning..." "Yeah." "You know, like 6 A.M." "I mean it's going to be more along the lines of a farm lifestyle for me now." "Mm-hmm." "You know, because I..." "I got birds to feed." "So I, you know..." "Yeah." "You can help, or you can get in my way." "I would prefer you help." "Can't I do a little of each?" "Do you have something on, like, an upper deck?" "'Cause the lower deck is..." "It's too..." "Laura?" "Yeah, I'd like to reserve that." "And, ahh, could you overnight..." "Hey, Laura?" "Excuse me, Laura, where's the Wyman file?" "Could you hold on a second?" "If you could just point to it." "Could you point to the file?" "I'm trying to work out some business stuff." "I'm sorry, Laura, but just point..." "Okay, go ahead." "Umm, I'm gonna have to call you back, okay?" "I'm so sorry, okay... bye." "What?" "No, I-I-I need the Wyman file, that's all." "I'm sorry I interrupted you." "I didn't realize that you were on an important call." "Well, you know, I'm trying to make plans for my vacation." "It's hard to, you know, to get good stuff at the last minute like this." "When are you planning to go away?" "Probably..." "Tomorrow night." "Y'know, my recollection is that you don't have that many vacation days coming to you." "In fact, I think you're overdrawn right now." "Well then, what's five more?" "You can't go." "You can't..." "First of all, you have to give me notice." "You can't..." "I'm not quitting." "I just would have appreciated some notice, next time." "Well, I didn't know until now." "Now you know that next time I appreciate notice." "Where you going?" "Well, we're going on a cruise in the Caribbean." "Who's we?" "I'm going with my college roommate." "Ahh, that sounds great." "Yeah." "Would you send me a card from the Caribbean, Laura?" "I'd love that." "I'll be back before you get it." "Would you bring me something?" " All right." " Thanks." "What do you want?" "I don't know." "Something Caribbean." "You know, like salsa or, umm, some kind of Caribbean garb." "You want Caribbean garb?" "Yeah." "Or salsa." "Okay." "Salsa picante." " Dr. Katz..." " Yeah." " I've got work to do." " Okay." "Tell me something about your childhood." "Tell me something about your parents." "My dad is a third... one two... yeah, third generation Irish-American..." "Mm-hmm." " Grew up in Boston." " Right." "I don't know if you know anything about the working-class Irish of the industrial East." "Well... he's not here to judge anyone..." "Be you white and catholic or catholic and white..." "Can't we all just get along?" "!" "But you still spend time with your parents now." "When I was living in Los Angeles," "I had my parents come out to visit me from Boston." "I would always go back there and finally... you know what?" "I'm tired of always going out to see them." "I'm going to have them come out and see me." "♫ Mistake!" "♫" "Don't you wish you had that guy in your life?" "Uh-huh." "Who lived in your closet..." "Tuxedo and a top hat." "Every time you screwed up, he'd just pop out." ""I'll just cut my own hair."" "♫ Mistake!" "♫" "So my parents came out and it was me and my parents and my girlfriend and her parents..." "My girlfriend's parents are like 20 years younger than my parents." "Ya know, they're teachers, they're very intellectual." "Right." "You know, but everything was great until, you know, my father finally let go with his opinions and got a little hammered." "Well, I should have known he got drunk, he turned red." "Let's see:" "You're Irish, you get drunk, you turn red." "Physiological signal we developed years ago in case there's a sudden insurrection against the British, we know who not to give loaded firearms to." ""I'm tired of the oppression." "We're charging the palace." "Shamus!" "Urghh, you're red." "Kelly!" "Urghh, you're red, too." "Screw it, we'll do it next week." "Give me a guiness!"" "What's up, Ben, because I've got about two minutes here." "Yeah, I just, uhh, I've been, uhh, reading up on pigeons." "And I'll tell you something, there is a lot of beautiful history behind the bird." "Okay, Ben, tell me one thing I don't know about pigeons." "Did you know that in World War I, pigeons served the allied forces." "They actually had rank." "You know, there was, like, lieutenants, sergeants..." "There was even a colonel." "You know, uhh..." "But I'll tell you something." "One of the most well-known military pigeons was G.I. Joe." " Is that true?" " That is true." "Because, if it's not true, you're, you're going to embarrass me with that information." "No, I, first of all." "I'm going to blurt it out at a cocktail party." "Yeah, don't do that." "I'll tell you, there is one pigeon Mr. Graham has, Duke..." " That's his name?" " Yeah." "And that's a great bird." "Is he, like, the ring leader, you think, of the pigeons?" "Well, I think he's probably the smartest, maybe the oldest." "Mm-hmm." "And he has some special qualities." "Oh yeah?" "Well, Duke is the only pigeon I can really let out that will come back." "Mm-hmm." "He's like a boomerang." "You know there's a pigeon on my ledge right now!" "Kill it." "Ben, did you check on the birds this morning?" "What birds?" "You were supposed to feed Mr. Graham's pigeons." "Who's Mr. Graham?" "Ben, this is not..." "You're not..." "Dad, relax." "I'm kidding." "I was already up there, they're fine." "Okay." "I'm just checking." "I mean, hey, did you read about the big snowstorm coming?" "No." "They're expecting as many as 24 inches." "24 inches?" "!" "That is an enormous blizzard." "This is, this..." "Yeah, that's a big storm." "I remember when you were little, you used to get in bed with me and we'd listen together, mm-hmm." "For the school cancellations." "That's right." "And sometimes I'd fall back asleep." "Mm-hmm." "And you would just tell me school was cancelled." "I remember putting on, like, so many layers, Ben, that sometimes I couldn't find you." "Right, right." "You know, we'd put on a tee shirt, we'd put on a sweatshirt, we'd put on your snow pants." "And the snow pants you loved, because you could fall over and it wouldn't hurt." "Yeah." "Those were exciting days." "Ben, this could be an exciting adventure for us." "I don't know why you're so cranky about a storm." "We love storms!" "We're storm people!" "I don't know how to deal..." "If there's a huge snowstorm, what do I do with the, with the birds?" "Ben, the birds will know what to do." "They're, they're not new at this..." "This "being outdoors-in-a-coop" business." "You think I just leave them be while..." "If it's 2 feet of snow they won't..." "You know, they'll do fine, Ben." "What about heavy wind?" "They can't calculate the wind chill factor." "Well, what if it sleets, and tiny pellets kill them?" "Yeah, uh, Ben, you can get paranoid about it, or you can..." "Well what if, umm, what if the electricity goes out?" "And, what if people loot, and..." "Take the pigeons?" "Yeah." "You know what could be the most..." "A very elegant and simple solution to this problem?" "Kill Mr. Graham." "I was going to say cardboard, but I think, I think your solution's much better." "Thank you." "Why can't we kill him with cardboard?" "Ha ha ha, alright." "I'm trying to remember, Meryl, who referred you to me." "Well, I have a lot of friends who've been to see you and they all really, they really respect you." "Or, they've at least been to see you twice." "Right." "So, what is it that brings you here and brings you to therapy?" "Well, I worry that I'm not spending enough time with people..." "I'm spending too much time with my dogs." "I have four dogs." "Right." "And I..." "I pretty much..." "I live in a herd." "Yeah." "I'm sort of like Jane Goodall, only without all that irritating research." "Mm-hmm." "A lot of people don't want to come visit me because I have four dogs." "Especially my one dog, Louis." "The thing about him is he's got what I refer to as a "greeting disorder"." "Mm-hmm." "His welcoming ceremonies can go up to, and including, maybe an hour and, and that's just the injury part." "Dr. Katz's office." "Laura, can you hear me okay?" "Yeah, I can hear you." "I'm out here with, uhh, my new friends and I wanted to introduce them to you, one-by-one." "So, uhh, hold on and say hello to cracker." "Cracker... say something to Laura." "Do that little noise." " Cute, isn't he, huh?" " Yeah." "I'm gonna put biscuit on..." "Hold on one sec." "Biscuit, say hello to Laura." "Sounds like cracker but, hold on..." "Wafer, wafer!" "Actually, I had a pet psychic come to my house to talk to Louis and find out why he was doing that." "And the pet psychic couldn't really give me any insight to Louis, but she did explain to me that my littlest dog, winkie, is a healer." "Yeah." "Which was sort of a surprise to me because the only thing I see winkie doing on a regular basis is walking really slowly from one side of the house to the other licking the floor." "Ummm..." "My little dog Winkie is..." "Got a weight problem really." "If he was a human, he would be like four feet high and weigh 200 pounds." "I think one of the problems that's apparent to me with your dogs is that often you start a story about your dogs with the phrase "If he were a human"." "Yeah, isn't that sad?" "That's not sad, it's telling." "Yeah, I'm not sure they aren't humans." "But, that would be really sad because my dog Louis then would be a 56-year-old guy swallowing tennis balls." "Would that be so bad?" "I took, uhh, a group photo of the pigeons." "I put little ties on them." "It's like a class photo." "I'm actually up here right now 'cause I'm just securing the coop, because of the storm." "Have you heard the storm's coming through?" "Yup." "Yeah, and it's gonna be here tonight and I'm a little concerned, actually, 'cause it could affect the pigeons." "Well I'll be long-gone before the storm because I'm leaving for a cruise." " I heard you're going on a cruise." " Yup." "Y'know, there's a good chance that uhh, your flight will be canceled." "Ben, don't piss me off." "So they dictate the tempo and the pace of your life, these dogs?" "Well, they've been moving mealtime..." "Every day they move mealtime down, another half an hour." "Mm-hmm." "It used to be at like 9:00 in the morning and now it's at 7:30 in the morning and they're trying to move it to 7:00." "It's like the early-bird special, I think." "That's what they're looking for." "I think they think, that if they keep moving it a little bit each day earlier and earlier, there's some sort of a quantum physics moment where all mealtimes meet and it's all one continuous meal." "Yeah, Laura, why are you going on a cruise?" "I mean, are you going with your grandparents, or?" "No." "I'm going with my college roommate." "How old is she?" "My age." "A cruise is typically something that, you know, either newlyweds go on or older people." "No, it's not, y'know, it's like being at a big resort." "Yeah, but you're on a boat." "It's awful, you can't get off." "It's like prison." "And then you stay in little rooms, and you eat bad food and then you see bad entertainment." "And, Laura, whatever you do, don't do any skeet shooting because, clay or not, those are pigeons." "Hey, Todd." "Hey, what's up man?" "A lot's up." "What's going on?" "Well, I've been working hard this week, y'know?" "I'm a little tired." " Really?" " Yeah." "What have you been working on?" "Well, there's a guy in my apartment building" "Uh-huh." "He has a coop on the, on the roof." "Do you know what a coop is?" "A pigeon coop?" "Yeah." "No." "So, this week he's away..." "And I'm, looking after the pigeons." "Really?" "Well, people scoff at it, Todd, and they're wrong." "Well, enjoy the cleaning of the pigeon sh..." "Y'know, there's going to be a big storm, Todd..." "Yeah, I know." "Coming through." "I know." "Are you going to close the uhh, the store down or?" "Close the store down?" "Yeah, I mean, I hear there's going to be two feet of snow and there's going to be heavy, high winds." "Hey, toy stores don't close around Christmas, do they?" "Is this a riddle?" "'Cause I'm not good at them." "Snowstorm equals "Let's go rent a movie"." "There's a mob of people who want videos for the storm." "Well you know, Todd?" "If you look around..." " Yeah." " The store now." "And then look around again..." "Uh-huh." "Unless people are hiding, right." "There's no one here." "Storm's a-comin'." "Storm's a-comin'." "You know, here's the other wrench in the plan:" "I've never seen anyone here." "And I come here pretty much daily." "You're hurting my feelings." "No, you know, I'm not making fun of you." "Oh no, no." "I-I don't know why I thought you were." "You know what, don't take it personally." "If I were making fun of you, I would say other stuff." "I wouldn't talk about the video store." "Right." "I'd talk about your personality and how you dress funny." "Really?" "And stuff like that." "And how you're, you're kinda weird and yeah." "A loner type." "And who knows what you do on your own time?" "I mean, I would say stuff like that." "Really?" "I wouldn't talk about the video store." "I think this is probably the best aspect of your life." " Really?" " Yes." "So I don't need, like, an exciting pigeon hobby to keep me going?" "And one thing that I see when I travel, that kills me, is teenage panhandlers." "Right." "It infuriates me." "And it makes me feel old that I get angry at that stuff." "I mean, don't get me wrong." "There are people on the street that need help, that should get help, that don't get help." "But then, there are these 17-year-old kids hanging out in front of the record store," ""Got any change?"" "Right." "$500 leather jacket, $200 leather boots." ""Got any change?"" "I mean, I don't mean to seem insensitive, but, I thought it took time to become a bum." "I didn't know you could rocket right into it." "I mean, I've been a comedian for a long, long time." "And I always used to complain," ""It's so stressful." "It's such a stressful job." "It's so stressful."" "And then I thought:" "You know, grow up." "Is there any job that isn't stressful?" "I mean, what job out there doesn't stress you out of your mind?" "And then one night I was actually performing and one guy shouted out, "Bingo caller!"" "And I thought, okay yeah, there's one... bingo caller... one." "Right." "And then I thought, no, wait a minute..." "Bingo caller?" "Every day you go to work and have the hopes and dreams of countless, helpless, and elderly people resting on your every move?" ""I-7, I need my medicine."" ""N-3."" ""I hate you!"" "I don't think we're going to get that much snow." "I don't believe them." "They're always saying that and they're always wrong." "They never know." "Well you know why they say that?" "It's big business." "That's so stupid!" "No, weather has become a major industry." " Oh yeah." " It's pathetic." "It used to be just the guy saying it's going to be cold tomorrow, or it's going to be a little big muggy." "And now, they have like, logos and music and they get the whole world pumped up over a few inches of snow." " Can't wait 'til it snows." " Me, too." "Well, it's already snowing." "I love it, I'm so psyched." "I am pumped!" "Yeah." "There is something about a storm that makes people drink more and feel..." "There's a certain sense of desperation." "Oh, it's an amazing time." "Yeah, it's very weird." "I always notice a difference in here." "Do people drink more during a storm?" "Oh yeah, people are weird." "It's sort of, it's like a full moon." "It's like, it's liberating us in a certain way, I think." "What do you mean?" "Well, you know, the storm is coming." "Certain choices that you ordinarily make in your life are going to be made for you by nature." "It permits you to do almost..." "Why don't we holdup a liquor store just for fun?" "You know, birds are creatures of nature." "They're built to survive this kind of storm." "I'm just not sure I-I-I've secured them well enough." "I mean, one major gust of wind could blow that whole coop out." "So maybe you want to, uhh, maybe you want to go up and secure the coop." "I'm not going out there." "It's freezing." "Well, you can't have it both ways, Ben." "Well, all I'm saying is maybe I should go up there right now and bring the birds in here." "I mean, would... bring them in with us?" "Would you allow me to bring the birds into the apartment?" "Until the snow clears?" "No, I would not..." "I would not permit that." "Because, they carry all kinds of disease, birds." "Dad, I've touched them all week and I don't have anything yup." "Except these sores." "I'd like you to get a check-up when this whole thing blows over." "Yeah." "I find it hard to believe that you wouldn't take in twelve birds." "Especially Duke, who has..." "I think, a superior intelligence." "Well, why don't we take in Duke and see how that goes." "Well, we'll put them all in the den." "They won't... and we'll shut both doors and they won't get out." "You know what, Ben?" "Try to relax." "Enjoy the storm, enjoy the night." "Mm-hmm." "In the morning, we'll go up together, we'll look at the birds and I'll bet you they'll be fine." "Alright." "Well, you know, I hope you're right." "Let their frozen blood be on your conscience tomorrow if the worst happens, okay?" "Okay." "So, that's okay?" "It's okay with me." "I will have frozen blood on my conscience." "Yeah, okay." "You let their rigid bodies and their "xs" for eyes, you let that be on your conscience." "Okay." "It's a deal." "You're gonna to go to bed?" "Yes." "Even though with the dead bird thing?" "I can sleep through "dead bird"." "Mr. Graham's only things in his life that he cares about, you're willing to take away from him." "So, let Mr. Graham be on your conscience tonight, too." "Good night." "Good night." "You're going to go to bed with that?" "I'm going to bed with..." "Let Mrs. Graham, who died..." "No, she didn't die, she left him." "No, she died." "Can I just review the things" "I'm taking to bed on my conscience?" "Fine." "I got some pigeon blood, frozen pigeon blood." "Frozen pigeon blood." "I got some frozen pigeons and Mr. Graham." "And you have a deceased Mrs. Graham." "No, she's not." "She's fine, Ben." "She's having the time of her life." "Good night!" "Dad, check it out." "They look fine, Ben." "Well, yeah." "I mean, I think it's..." "They look like they slept better than you did, although it's hard to tell a well-rested pigeon from the rest of the pigeons." "Well, you know Mr. Graham can't complain." "I mean, I did my job." "Do you feel reassured that they can survive on their own?" "I suppose, although, there wasn't as much accumulation as I first thought there was going to be." "Yeah." "But dad, isn't it..." "It's nice to be up here." "We, first of all, we've never spent a lot of time on the roof together." "It's really beautiful up here, Ben." "You can see, you can see..." "You can see the whole city, really." "Yeah." "And, and, and the snow is now softly falling." "And the pigeons are purring..." ""Prrrrrr."" "I do a little impression of them." "You had me going." "You know dad?" "Yeah." "Maybe you should think about taking the day off, staying up here with me, we'll... you know there's..." "We'll sit out, we'll..." "There's nothing I'd..." "We'll feed the pigeons, we'll..." "There's nothing I'd love more, Ben." "But just like you have a sense of responsibility towards the pigeons" "I feel the same sense of responsibility towards my patients." "Yeah, but you know, I bet you, you know, people are gonna be getting a late start anyway, today." "'Cause of the snow build-up." "So maybe you just stay in for the morning?" "Well, but can you imagine somebody digging their way out of their driveway, traveling in the snow to my office, getting there and I'm not there?" "Yeah." "The other thing is I bought 30 loaves of bread." "Yeah, I really should go into work." "The other thing is Laura," "Laura is not going to be in there." "So, I mean..." "No actually, she is." "Her flight got canceled, so, she is coming in today." "Ah-ha!" "Ha-ha-ha!" "I told her so!" "Yeah." "Ben is right... a lot." "You know, dad, though, if you're going to leave," "I really wanna show you my prize bird, before you go." "Okay." "You see the big bird right there?" "That's Duke?" "That's Duke." "He's a good-looking bird." "He's a beautiful bird." "Yeah." "But let me show you how, how amazing Duke is." "Okay." "Alright, Duke?" "Are you ready?" "And... fly!" "And Duke will..." "Where's it?" "Duke will turn around and come back." "That's..." "I mean, this bird is like, hones in on the coop." "Duke!" "He's uhh, he's definitely flying way out there now, but he'll..." "Yeah, I don't think..." "Uhh, he, yeah..." "Well..." "Duke!" "Did you do anything that might have pissed him off?" "Well, I... maybe if we..." "Wave our hands, dad." "Give him a target." "I think what's important is that you remember him at his peak." "Duke was definitely Mr. Graham's favorite bird." "It's gonna be an adjustment for him." "Now this doesn't bode well." "No." "Duke!" "I'm sort of just a permanent loser at love, is what I feel like." "Well..." "I've never really had a successful love relationship." "I sort of, when I see happy couples," "I feel like I turn into Margaret Meade." "I just sort of stare at them and I think," ""What are they doing, exactly?"" "Did you say you were a loser at love?" "Yeah, I'm a very big loser at love, yeah." "I think a better way to say it, is that you haven't been lucky at love yet." "That's... yeah." "I think it's important, Meryl, that you use language that doesn't exclude hope." "Well there's no hope for the past." " Well, that's true." " Right." "I'm not going to nickel-and-dime you on this." "No." "I've been going out with my girlfriend for three years now." "And now..." "I'm getting hit on." "Right." "When I was single and could do something about it..." "Nothing!" "Yeah." "And they..." "I guess they say it's that confidence factor, if you're not looking for something?" "I mean, maybe that's true." "Apparently I don't even realize it, but I'm walking through nightclubs like Cary Grant." ""Hello, darling, good to see you." "No, I don't have time for drinks, but why don't we brunch on Sunday?" "And what do you mean you won't look fantastic?" "You always look fantastic because you are fantastic." "I'll see you on Sunday."" "But the same club, the same people, but you're single..." "Suddenly you're climbing through a hatch in the back like Vincent Price." ""I couldn't help noticing you sitting alone at the bar." "Why don't you look at me when I'm speaking to you?"" "Oops!" "You know what the music means, Dana, our time is up." "Uhh..." "Yeah, I know but, see I don't..." "I actually feel worse now than I did when I came in." "Are you listening anymore?" "Umm..." "Boy!"