Roast*

Trust me, that's all real. I swear on my mother's grave that those bushy, Groucho Marx eyebrows were not Photoshopped. That's not Martin Scorsese you're looking at, either.

That's Dave.

That's the guy who chooses "spunky" as the first word to describe himself in the "About me" section of his MySpace page. Because he wants you to know how spunky he is, how he apparently has very much in common with so-called riot grrls. And Teresa Heinz Kerry.

"Hi, I'm Dave, and I'm spunky!"

Of course, I might be way off-base? I might be misinterpreting the connotation? Because sometimes gruff football coaches like to squint in approval at one of their rookies and say, "I like yer spunk, kid? Keep it up?" Maybe that was what he was going for?

But then again, Spunky Dave, he likes to drink his Blue Moons with orange peels.

That's Dave. Spunky Dave.

That's the guy who -- depending on who you talk to -- either once saved the passengers of a bus with a bomb on it during the mid-90s, or he got voted off of American Idol last week.

That's the guy who actually likes that annoying OONCE OONCE OONCE OONCE beat.

That's the guy who never fails to leave the top five buttons of his dress shirt unbuttoned. Very much like the guy in this video.

That's the guy who... well, if our life was an episode of Friends, then I would be Chandler, and he would be Joey.

That's the guy who had no idea what a kilt was last Saturday when the rest of us were debating whether its origin was Scottish or Irish. His girlfriend was very gracious about it, about how he's lived under a rock all these years, but I of course did not resist the opportunity to ridicule him then as I am doing right now.

That's the guy who once confided in me about the fact that he used to have sexual fantasies about Ricki Lake.

That's the guy who's thinking twice about asking me to be the best man at his wedding one day. The night after Phil's wedding, when we were talking about how red Phil's face turned during my speech, Dave looked at me nervously and said, "...Are you going to do that to me at my wedding?" And I was all, "Yeah motherfucker. I'mma get you bad. I don't do toasts. I do roasts!"

That's Dave, who turns 26 today.

*Concept stolen from my blog entry written in May 2005 called "Roy", minus ANY mention of redeeming qualities at the end.