"I'll take that, take that and I'll take that." "Ray, why is everybody giving you mo...?" "Oh, my God, did you win the celebrity death pool?" "Is Jason Bateman dead?" "Oh, no." "No." "Nah." "People are going in on a group wedding gift for Andrew in accounting." "Wait a sec, and-and you're all invited?" "Why... why wouldn't I be invited?" "I'll tell you, but first, could you grab me another creamer?" "That's why you weren't invited." "Why, 'cause I got you the wrong creamer?" "What are you, back on soy?" "I thought you were worried about growing man-boobs." "No." "I'm talking about poor Kevin." "You didn't even stop to say hi to him." "You just gave him a walk-n-wave." "It makes people think that you think you're better than them." "Are you kidding?" "!" "Come on, I don't think that I'm better than..." "God, this is a terrible time not to remember his name." "And you just said it, too." "Was it... was it creamer?" "Mmm, mmm." "Look, if you want people to think differently, you got to stop doing walk-n-waves and start doing stop-n-chats." "What's a "stop-n-chat?"" "What's it sound like?" "You stop and chat." "Two questions, a joke and you're out of there." "Watch a pro." "Hey, Kevin!" "Big plans for the weekend?" "Oh, probably just hang out at home, work on my..." "Deejaying." "You gonna watch the game?" "Uh, yeah." "On my new 65-inch flat-screen." "65 inches?" "!" "Son, that game gonna watch you, baby!" ""Watch me."" "That's what I'm saying!" "Now, that's how you make friends around the office." "Now, get my creamer." "So you didn't get invited to a wedding." "Who cares?" "I'll make a cake and we can do the chicken dance." "And if I get drunk enough," "I'll probably even throw a garter at you." "It's not that I didn't get invited to the wedding, mom." "It's that I didn't get invited because everyone thinks that I think that I'm better than they are." "Of course, I'm sure you are better than them." "Would you stop it?" "The only reason you're saying that is 'cause you're my mom." "No." "I simply have a realistic view of the world." "I'd never tell your sister she's better than other people." "I mean, she's better than some people." "Eh..." "Mom, nobody is better than anyone else." "Oh, please, we rank everything." "What's the best restaurant." "What's the fastest car." "Which president was the hottest." "Kennedy had the looks, but I'd go with Clinton in the sack." "So, why can't we rank people so we know who deserves our attention?" "Because it sounds evil." "Oh." "Oh, stop being so dramatic." "It's the way of the world." "Think about when you were a kid and we'd go to the store." "We'd always stop and talk to the Bradshaws because they had a trampoline in their backyard, but we'd just give a quick wave to the Thompsons because they had a trampoline in their front yard." "Yeah, I remember that, and we... we barely waved at all to the Bowdens." "Yeah, that's because they had a car door that was made entirely of duct tape." "Oh, my God." "You're the one who made me this way." "You raised me to walk-n-wave." "I raised you to know your place in the world." " You're welcome." " No-no-no." "I don't think I'm better than anyone else." "I have to undo this." "Tomorrow, I am gonna stop and chat with everyone I see." "Even that blind janitor I usually tiptoe around." "I'm ashamed to say we once shared a large bathroom stall." "He still doesn't know." "Mom, can you help me with my math homework?" "I want to get good with numbers in case my looks fade." "Yeah, sorry, honey." "I have to go teach my "yoga in the dark" class." "It's for large women who refuse to wear yoga pants in the light of day." "Plus, I have to stop on the way and pick up the motivational pizzas." "You should go ask grandpa." "Hey." "Why would you send her upstairs to talk to grandpa when I'm sitting right here?" "Um, sweetie, when it comes to academics," "I think, because you were home-schooled, on a commune, by a teacher named Strawberry, there might be some gaps in your education." " Like what?" " K through 12." "Look, for Mikayla's homework," "I just think dad's better qualified to help her." "Wait a second, there is no way your dad is smarter than me." "Adam, he was an engineer." "Okay, you know what, people keep saying that, but I have never seen Tom the engineer." "I've only seen" "Tom, the guy who gets his head stuck in the mailbox." "I ordered a bust of mark twain and wanted to see if it would fit." "By the way, we owe the mailman a tube of chapstick." "He used his to grease my ears and slide me out." "Dad, he didn't mean..." "And at least I'm smart enough not to talk about people when they're in the room." "I'm sorry, Tom." "I didn't mean you're not smart." "Oh, good, because it's preposterous that you would think you're smarter than me." "I'm not sure that I would say" ""it's preposterous."" "No." "They probably didn't use words that big on the commune." "Stop." "This is not a competition, and insults are not the way to prove who's smarter." "No, you're right, honey." " We should take an IQ test." " I'm game." "Deb, find a test online." "I'll get my slide rule." "I'll find my brain crystals and thinking candle." "So, you know..." "Oh, there's Doug." "He's perfect for the stop-n-chat." "If you want people to think you're down to earth, let them see you talking to Doug." "Just be prepared... he's the kind of guy that butters both sides of the bagel." "If you know what I mean." "I-I-I..." "I do not." "He puts butter on both sides of the bagel." "It's odd." "Hey, Doug Dynasty." "What kind of potato chips today?" "Barbecue." "Sour cream and onion are my favorite, but I didn't feel like I deserved my favorite today." "Well, you know who's all that and a bag of chips?" "My boy, Nathan." "I'm going to lunch." "You got this." "Two questions and a joke." "Hey, man." "So, Doug..." "Doug-out..." "Doug, Doug, goose." "You got big plans for the weekend?" "You gonna... you gonna watch the game?" "No." "To be honest, uh," "I'm thinking about embarking on one of life's greatest adventures." "Gonna propose to my girlfriend." "Just kind of sucks, 'cause I don't really have anyone to talk to about it." "Kind of a serious subject to make a joke about." "Um... okay." "Well, uh..." "Let's talk about it." "Oh, yeah, right." "Like you could understand my problems." "You're a fancy TV reporter." "I bet you don't even have one loose tooth." "No." "Doug, you and I are exactly the same." "Come on, so, uh..." "You, um..." "You picked out a ring yet?" "No, I don't have any money." "Well, don't let that stop you." "I mean, you-you've got love and-and boyish good looks and a real interesting PacMan watch." "And..." "Oh, that's who that is." "Look, I'm sure you'll..." "you'll figure it out." "Well, I do have a ring of my grandmother's, but... it's kind of complicated 'cause my mom doesn't like my girlfriend." "You know how moms can be." "Yeah, I do know how moms can be." "Mine lives with me." "What?" "!" "Nate Miller lives with his mom?" "Doug Dascal lives with his mom, too." "Who's Doug Dascal?" "Me." "Yes!" "Of course it is, but I mean, you know, who is Doug Dascal?" "The man..." "D-don't tell me now." "Listen, I'm not gonna tell you how to live your life." "But-but I am gonna tell you that you can't let your mom live it for you." "So if... if you want to propose to your girlfriend, propose to your girlfriend." "You know what?" "I will." "This has been really helpful." "Thanks so much, Nate." "Oh, no thanks needed... just one guy stopping and chatting with another." "Oh." "You're not the standoffish turd that everyone says you are." "Oh, wait." "Hang on a second." "The lunch rush is coming." "Oh, okay." "Okay..." "I got your IQ test scores back from the web site." "Sorry for the delay." "Uh, Adam, I also got back our free credit report, and let's just say, uh, after this is done, we've got a much bigger issue to deal with." " So, Adam, this is you." " Okay." "Oh, my God." "This is horrible!" "That's got to sting, dummy." "You know what?" "You can't trust these stupid standardized tests." "They're notoriously biased." "You won, honey." "Biased towards smart people." "Wait a minute." "Let me see those scores." "This is impossible." "29th percentile?" "Dad, I mean, I get how some of these categories might not be your strengths, like composition and rhetoric, but math and science?" "You were an engineer for 35 years." "I don't know what happened." "I'm old." "Ah, don't worry about it, Tom." "At least you're the second smartest guy in this house." "Oh, actually, Deb, um, is Mikayla's goldfish a boy or a girl?" "It's a girl, you idiot." "Have you ever seen its wiener?" "No, mom, I'm not going to let you ruin this for me." "Okay?" "I-I-I helped out a coworker today, and it felt great, and it's opened up a whole new world for me." "Well, that is a world that's not meant to be open." "There's a natural order to life that must not be disturbed." "I mean, haven't you ever seen Jurassic Park?" "Wait, how can you compare humans genetically engineering dinosaurs to me helping out a coworker?" "Because Dougs in cubicles and Nathans on camera aren't meant to coexist." "Mom, you are wrong." "You should have seen the look on Doug's face." "All it took was five minutes of my time." "I changed his life forever." "She said no." "I proposed and she said no." "My life is ruined!" "Welcome to Jurassic Park." "Look, Doug, I know you're upset, but you'll be okay." "Any woman that turns you down doesn't deserve you." "This is the worst day of my life." "And I've had a punctured rectum, so you can imagine how bad today is." "Was it recent?" "'Cause I could put a towel under you." "I gave her my grandmother's ring, like you said." "I thought it would be romantic to ask her at work, but she said no, and then we fought in front of everybody, and I left without getting the ring." "My mom is going to kill me." "Aah!" "Listen, listen, uh, Doug," "Doug, come on." "The-the-the... the measure of a man is not how he acts in times of success, but how he responds in times of adversity." "That's so beautiful." "Oh, Nate, I wish I'd had you there." "Maybe things would have turned out differently." "Listen, you got to come down there and talk to her." "Maybe she'll reconsider." "Uh, Nathan, can I talk to you in the kitchen?" "I-I-I need your long thumbs to help me open something that requires, uh, long thumbs." "Excuse me one-one second." "Okay, I'll just wait here with my stupid short thumbs." "Get him out!" "Get him out now!" "He's a social grenade." "Throw him out the window and let him destroy somebody else's life!" "Look, mom, I can't do that." "I'm the one that pulled the pin!" "I warned you about this!" "You can't lift somebody like him up." "He can only drag you down!" "You got to cut him loose!" "No." "Mom, listen, I don't want to be that guy." "Besides, everybody saw me hugging him today at lunch." "I can't cut him loose, because I'll never get invited to a wedding, and everybody will think that all I care about is myself." "God, I hope it's not a summer wedding." "My linen suit is huge on me." "Sorry to bug you, but would it be inappropriate to ask to take a bath?" "Hmm, that a new exercise ball?" "Yeah." "A 300-pound woman popped one last night." "I asked if her baby was okay." "Turns out she wasn't pregnant." "Or a woman." "It wasn't a good night." "So, what-what do you think the weight limit is on one of these things?" "Oh, let's see." "It, uh..." "It says 120 kilograms." "There's 2.2 pounds in every kilogram." "Carry the decimal." "I wouldn't put anyone over 260 pounds on this ball." "Unless it's Kevin James." "I could watch that guy do anything." "Oh." "I knew it, dad." "I knew it." "You're still smart." "You still know stuff." "I don't know what you're talking about." "You tanked that test on purpose, dad." "Why?" "I thought you wanted to beat Adam." "I did." "Then I realized he was really struggling when he asked if he could phone a friend." "Yeah, he called me." "He asked me to explain al-ga-bra." "And then I thought, if Adam has to sit with Mikayla every night, he'll be forced to learn everything they left out at the commune." "Oh, I get it." "Fractions are like a big pizza with the slices taken out." "Cool." "Now I can be pretty and smart." "Me, too." "It's nice knowing I got a really smart dad." "Yeah, once Mikayla helps Adam get through elementary school, she'll think her dad is really smart, too." "Ah." "Oh, God, what a relief." "You know, for a minute there," "I was really starting to think you were losing it." "Even looked into what kind of home we could send you to." "FYI, we... we can't afford a very good one." "We were basically gonna have to throw you down a well." "Naughty McGee's?" "Please tell me we just have to walk through here on the way to where your girlfriend actually works." "Look, I know what you're thinking, but what we had was real." "Uh-huh." "For my birthday, Amber gave me a free lap dance after I paid for four regular-priced ones." "Come on, let's get a table up front." "Maybe she'll sweat on us." "Oh, good." "Hey, Nate." "Ray, what are you doing here?" "I'm here for Angela's bachelor party with some guys from work and Susan..." "Who's a little too into it." "Bounce, bitch." "Bounce!" "Hey!" "Hey!" "Hey!" " Are you here with Doug?" " Yeah." "Thanks to your stop-and-chat, I sat down and got all wrapped up in his personal drama." "No, no, no, no, you don't sit down, Nate." "You screwed up the stop-and-chat and turned it into a sit-and-fix." "A sit-and-fix is just for friends and family only." "Not for coworkers, man." "Nate, hurry up." "She's coming on!" "If you miss the beginning, the rest of it's not gonna make any sense!" "Oh, look at that!" "Nathan, you're here with Doug?" "Of course he is." "He's a man of the people." "Hi, honey." "Oh, Doug, no." "Please don't cause another scene." "Look, I told you." "I'm not marrying you." "Look, I think there's still a chance for us." "Look, Doug, you're not getting it." "Here's our relationship." "I dance for you." "That's it." "You're right." "I never realized it was so one-sided." "I can fix that." "You let me dance for you." "Uh... oh." "Doug!" "Oh..." "Is Doug allowed to be put there?" "Can I go up there, too?" "No." "Susan..." "Ernie, report to the stage immediately." "We've got a leaper." "Doug, come on, buddy." "Come on down." "Nobody wants to see this." "No." "I am dancing until Amber loves me back, or until I make $1,000." "Thank you." "Make that two leapers." "I'm sorry, miss." "Um, how about we just get his ring back, and then we'll be gone?" "He didn't pay for my time in the champagne room earlier... two hours." "Well, I wanted to get through my whole poem." "It's his grandmother's ring, okay, so just give it back to us," " and then we'll just..." " You're not getting this ring!" "Listen, come on." "Nathan, you're ruining my moment!" "She doesn't love you, Doug!" "I'm trying to get your ring back so you can leave here with a little dignity!" "No." "Whoa!" "Whoa!" "Whoa!" "Hey!" "I'm helping." "I'm just helping!" "I've been going to strip clubs since I was 11, and never once did I end up in jail." "Thanks for dragging me into this, Nate." "Hey, let's not play the blame game." "It's clearly Doug's fault." "Who falls in love with a stripper?" "Richard Gere." "That was a hooker, and that was a movie." "This is real life." "There's a man doing his business on the toilet right there." "Hey, I have a name." "I thought she loved me." "I'm so stupid." "How could I think that a beautiful woman like Amber would fall for a walking marshmallow like me?" "Might as well put me on a stick and roast me, except I'd probably burn and turn black, and you'd have to scrape me off on a rock, and the poor rock would be made fun of by the other rocks" "'cause he's covered in me!" "Oh, my God!" "Doug, you got to stop beating yourself up, man." "Ever since the day we sat and talked, you've just been so down on yourself." "How does somebody end up like this?" "Douglas Marie Dascal." "I can't believe you!" "Giving your grandmother's ring away to some fantasy girl and getting arrested." "This is a new low for you." "And you punctured your rectum on my best candle holder." "I told you, you couldn't jump over that couch!" "I think I know how he ended up like this." "I thought your father was the king of all the losers, but you've just taken his crown." "I wish your twin brother had been born instead of you!" "But you ate him like you eat everything else!" "Hey, listen, what happened tonight wasn't all Doug's fault." "Hey, you're that newscaster." "What, are you doing a story about what a screw-up he is?" "Look what you've done now." "It's gonna be all over the news." "Thank God your grandmother never woke up from her boob job to see this." "No." "No." "I'm not doing a story." "This is just the result of a wild night out with a friend." "You're Doug's friend?" "Yeah, I'm his friend." "Me Doug, this Doug, Douglas Marie?" "Doug is a great guy." "He's determined, he's resourceful." "Most of his teeth aren't loose." "And he's willing to tell people how he feels no matter the fallout, and that takes courage." "I'm glad we're friends." "So, see you at lunch on Monday?" "Yeah." "I'll bring the sour cream and onion chips, 'cause we deserve 'em." "Who would have thought?" "My son's friends with a celebrity?" "Maybe the right kid did chew their way out of the womb after all." "Hurry!" "Hurry!" "Get him out of there!" "There's no VIP cell?" "You just put him in with the riffraff?" "Oh, my God, get them both out." "Oh, my baby, are you hurt?" "Mom, I'm fine." "I protected him." "Nobody makes Nate a bitch on my watch." "I can't believe they put both of you in with just a bunch of filthy, lowlife criminals." "I have a name." "It's Darryl." "Maybe now you're ready to admit that you are better than some people." "No." "You know what, mom?" "I'm not better than anybody." "But I do have a better mother." "Just remember, anything you say can and will be used in this year's holiday letter." "Oh, hey." "You must be Nathan Miller's mom." " You know, we should..." " Hey, you." "That's called a hey-you-and-walk-on-through."