I was shocked and amazed when I got this otherwise innocent email:

Subject: Godzzzzzzzzzzzzilla
Date: 05/26 12:25 PM
Received: 05/26 12:32 PM
From: Institute for Health and Healing Library, ihhlib@sirius.com
To: Darren Norris, darren_norris@filemaker.com


I did not have the pleasure of seeing F&L nor Bulworth. I did (not) see Godzilla at the drive-in. I fell asleep. Have either of you have been to the Drive-In near Cow Palace? It's a skanky hole!

Skanky Hole!! Skanky Hole? Could this be the same place I loved? I couldn't believe it! Such slander and from a place of healing, no less! This person who I shall refer to as ihhlib so as to protect her identity (besides, you know who you are anyway, don't you Pammy Pam Torno?? So, forget it, I'll just call you Pammy Pam). Well, of course I promptly directed her to my review and rather than a swift apology or even a leisurely reneg, what does she offer in return?? Oh, nothing shy of the most acrid argument this publication has ever known or at least witnessed since the first days (if you don't remember "Boingomania," go here). And what better way to celebrate those early raw and gritty days than with an homage of sorts. Here it is, in all its uncut glory, reformatted as a dialog (to give the feel of a real tet a tet and so that the insults have the necessary piquancy), but narry a word altered. If you're weak-hearted, turn back now:

• DARREN-Are you nuts? Please point your internet browser here if you want my full laudatory assessment of the wonderful Geneva Drive-In. I can't believe you'd call it a skanky hole! Now, Stonestown, that's a skanky hole! The Geneva is grand, swell, and a bunch of other great words. Shit, man. Did you see any of Godzilla at all? What other movies were playing? The Geneva enables you to get a peak at them all....one of its many virtues....damn!
• PAMMY PAM(After reading my review. The quotes are from said review)-"The snack bar is chuck full of goodies..."-Goodies? Eeeww, not even I would eat the "burgers" and beef burritos they pass off as snacks, and I'm no fallen fruit vegetarian hippie like you!
• DARREN-Oh great! Let's just attack the hippie! Burgers and beef burritos are inherently disgusting--any civilized, fully evolved human being knows this to be true. The Geneva is, in, ok, a very forceful way, trying to say, "Hey, let's not eat food with animal flesh! Why don't we just skip those hot dogs, hamburgers and beef burritos--the ones we've purposefully made to appear as disgusting as they REALLY are--and have a healthy natural treat like popcorn! Or, if we feel like being naughty, how about some candy! We don't need to eat flesh to have FUN!"
• PAMMY PAM-Any civilized, fully evolved creature who only eats vegetables would only have back molars for chewing and four stomachs to digest the fibrous muck. And yes, I like to attack the hippies the same way YOU like to change the words in my quotes, which if you ask me is pretty dirty fighting (this refers to my brilliant tactic of changing words in other people's emails in order to demean their arguments).
• DARREN-Shit! I only have one stomach, but unlike yours, it's not full to the brim with undigested steak.
• PAMMY PAM-"...a bathroom that is old enough to have some charm, but not so old that it stinks..."-I HAVE to disagree with you there. We got there when the theater just opened, and the bathroom was atrocious. It looked like the toilets were never flushed, and don't even ask me about the stench.
• DARREN-Well, I don't know about the ladies' room, but the men's room was fine by me. Not a festering stool to be found, just clean, happy bowls waiting for customers. I just assumed that the ladies' room would be as clean and maybe even cleaner. But, maybe you're confused...I meant the restroom didn't "stink" BEFORE I went in there, after is another story (one of the caveats to being a vegetarian: all the bad stuff doesn't just sit in your stomach--actually, I just peed, but I'm trying to make a point). If you took a big, fat shit and then were repulsed by the stench, that's your own fault, PT!
• PAMMY PAM-You vegetarians are the reason there's a growing hole in the ozone layer--disseminating your noxious gas for all to smell. Don't talk to me about stench, Methane Man. I took no shit, and that place stank. Maybe the smell of your farts was so overpowering from the last time you were there that it invaded the girls' bathroom and called it home!
• DARREN-OH, maybe it was! My farts ARE powerful! So, you'd better watch out! But that's no slight on the Geneva. I don't think I've met a cleaning product that can fully erase the memory. The technology just isn't there yet. What can I say? I'm heir to the Coleman Colon--now you know why I can't get a girlfriend!
• PAMMY PAM-"...prewrapped buckets of popcorn for easy transport, and rudish teenage snack bar workers who talk to their boyfriends/girlfriends long enough to remind you that the drive-in is really about love alive..."-Okay--maybe that might make for some cool drive-in atmosphere. But I saw no evidence of teen love. All I saw were screaming kids and exhausted parents. A loveless evening if you ask me.
• DARREN-Hmmm...let's analyze that last paragraph: "exhausted parents," "screaming kids." That sounds like love to me! Kids screaming at the joy of youth! Aah, the freedom to covort around this wonderful drive-in! And parents exhausted by altruism: "Hey, honey, let's do this just for the kids! I'm so exhausted from all of this FUN I've been having. Yup, the ol' grey mare just ain't what he used to be. But, look at our kids! They'll be sure to drop off from all of the FUN they're having and then, just maybe, we can muster up the energy to relive those old drive-in memories!" Hubba Hubba! If that ain't love, then what is...?
• PAMMY PAM-Not even you could possibly be convinced by the above WEAK argument.
• DARREN-Big D. felt the love. I'll let the argument stand since you couldn't think of an adequate rebuttal. I may be a hippie, but at least I work hard on my emails. That's because I CARE! And because I'm not all sluggish and lazy from all that meat in the stomach (mmmm...I could go for some kale right about now...yummy).
• PAMMY PAM-As for the popcorn--why the hell does it have to be plastic wrapped? So what if popcorn falls to the ground on the way to your car? Isn't popcorn on the ground part of the movie experience, too? Don't you care that the use of plastic is anti-environment, Hippie? Or, are you merely a holier-than-thou vegetable eater?
• DARREN-OK, flesh-eater! You knock the Geneva for being "skanky," but when they try to institute a very shrewd trash preventing measure, then you knock 'em again! "Who cares if popcorn falls to the ground" to become a rotting, festering, mold-encrusted nodule of shit "on the way to your car?" I do, and the folks at Geneva do, too. They care about you, Pammy, even if you don't care about them. They wrap your snack in plastic to keep things clean AND to keep things fresh. I s'pose you'd rather go to yer typical movie house and get rotten, styrofoam-tough kernels or better yet, why don't you just go to Tommy's and get a sloppy sausage sandwich. Not I! The Geneva's got what I need. Wrap it up, I'LL TAKE IT!
• PAMMY PAM-"One thing which I think may be peculiar to the Geneva is the fact that all four screens are practically in a row. When I was a kid, I remember having to look out of the back window to see scenes of any of the R-rated films playing, but at the Geneva, if at any time (oh! the many times!), I grew bored, I could always glance sidelong and see Ice Cube fight off excessive computer animation or see Jim Carrey do that stuff that he does."-You didn't find that at all distracting? Plus, the screen we watched the movie on was rather dark and out-of-focus, and there was a fuzzy blob on the lower left corner of the screen, making it even more difficult to concentrate. Putting aside the skankiness of the Geneva, I think it was a bad movie anyway. Steve was awake (for this word, I cleverly inserted this word--BAKED) the whole time, and can attest to that.
• DARREN-NO! I found it just fine: a multimedia experience for the whole family to enjoy. Maybe that fuzzy blob was just piss-poor computer animation. Maybe the difficulty in concentration stemmed from a formulaic plot and noisome soundtrack--and if the screen was out-of-focus, don't blame the Geneva for trying to add a little art to otherwise boring action fare.
• PAMMY PAM-Touche.
• DARREN-Touche nuthin'. Didn't you read the last paragraph? I smoked your ass!
• PAMMY PAM-You can go ahead and brag to all your hippie friends that you won the stupid Geneva theater argument. BUT ONLY because I have WORK to do, and I don't have time for these back and forth email shenanigans. BTW, if i say "touche," it means you won on that point, dummy. Let me just close by saying "GENEVA SUCKS" and your butt smells and I am better than you in every way possible!!
• DARREN-You're gonna be a star! As far as the hiatus in "colon problem phone call production" (this is what Pam does for a living--talk to people on the phone about their colonaches) is concerned, I'm sure Dr. Ihhlib will understand, especially if they see that your emails have come from one of the Coleman Clan, not the wimpy yuppy whiners I'm sure you usually get.....now, I'll go off somewhere to cry patchouli tears.