Oh boy: high school. Seems like just yesterday, doesn’t it, for anybody reading this who may have gone to school yesterday? For the rest of us, though, man alive – WHAT A LONG, STRANGE TRIP IT WAS. Did anybody have a good time there? I know like, six people who really optimized their time from grades nine to twelve, and for the rest of us, it was really a practice in, well, having a lot of great stories about feeling clinically insane for four years straight. THE MEMORIES!

So with that in mind, let’s watch Romy and Michele’s High School Reunion because not only have I begun to quote Janine Garofalo in almost every situation imaginable, I really need to justify eating nothing but jelly beans and candy corns as part of a very healthy, pivotal lifestyle.

1. “Even though we’ve watched Pretty Woman like, a thousand times, I never get tired of making fun of it.”

Because that’s what best friends are for, guys! Watching heart-wrenching films and laughing at all aspects of it that are kind of the worst (thus THE BEST). Hands up if you’ve got Titanic memorized and weep but you shout “GO BACK DOWN THE MAIN STAIRWELL LIKE I TOLD YOU!” at inopportune times like to someone trying to get up a very busy staircase.

2. THE DANCE

Which came first? The Romy and Michele or A Night At The Roxbury? Answer: R&M. Better answer: WHY ARE YOU READING THIS WHEN YOU COULD BE LEARNING THE DANCE!

Seriously.

And on a side note, I tried speaking exactly like Lisa Kudrow’s character for about two weeks after the “I hate throwing up in public!” – “Me too!” exchange, which did not go over well in my grade six classroom filled with people who only wanted to watch Space Jam and was located in Ontario, where everyone sounds Canadian.

3. The Janine-Romy exchange is exactly like running into someone you went to high school with at the mall who you really didn’t expect to see again because maybe they don’t have Facebook

Right? “I didn’t know you lived in LA!” – “Well, now that you know, will we be getting together a lot?” As Kanye West once said, “LOLOLOLOL” because CORRECT.

4. Facebook had made this movie basically impossible today

Facebook has ruined a lot of things like the spontaneity of, say, everything that happens in the bar scene in Sweet Home Alabama, but now it’s made high school reunions basically unnecessary. RIGHT? I mean, have any of you gone to a high school reunion as of late? Negative, because we’re all on Facebook, and there are people we have specifically added or not-so-specifically added because maybe someone egged your house on your 17th birthday (hi, person I’ll never forget!). So what I’m saying is that this movie is ’90s in every sense of the word. The only thing that would make it more ’90s would be if Romy and Michele worked at a video store.

5. Seriously, though, Romy and Michele are all of us

Or maybe some of us. Me, mostly, and my best pal Ashley who spent a lot of time with me learning a secret handshake that we had to do at our lockers EVERY MORNING because otherwise our day would be incomplete/a total failure/doomed for disaster. We would even do a sped-up version if we were running out of time because WHAT IF we didn’t do it and say, something terrible happened because of that fact? Exactly like The Butterfly Effect in that maybe we missed our handshake one day and that was why that movie was even made. (I’M SO SORRY, YOU GUYS.)

6. Serious question: are the popular girls from your high school still all friends today?

Probably not, let’s be real. Or MAYBE THEY ARE. Okay, wait, are you defining “popular” as “nice and well-liked”? Because there’s nothing wrong with being nice and kind and having lots of pals because of that, and I am actually not referring to those people at all. But you know, the girls who put magnets on somebody’s neck  brace while making them sing The Music Man. Are THEY still friends? ARE THEY? Did YOU put magnets on somebody’s back? If so, hit me up and tell me about whether you are still friends with the people who let this go down.

7.  I ALSO WENT TO PROM WITH MY BFF

So remember when I made this particular Old Lady Movie Night ALL ABOUT ME? (I’m so sorry.) But still! I went to prom a few times, and once was with a gentleman-friend, the second was with one of MY BEST FRIENDS and the third was with TWO OF MY BEST FRIENDS because I don’t know how to not be completely obnoxious in a public setting. And we danced and we laughed and we did not get gentleman-caller dates, but WHO CARES because we line-danced to ‘Come On Eileen’ and there’s nothing wrong with that. In fact, there is everything right with that. Horrah!

8. I love you, Alan Cumming

I need to know on a scale of one to ten how many of you would RUSH to the dance floor with Alan Cumming, who totally rules. All of you! I knew it. Let’s dance, Alan Cumming. Let’s go to prom! (Please never make me go to prom.)

9. “I’ll dance with you, Romy”

Is the new way of showing that you are best friends forever and ever amen. SISTERHOOD. Best friends. Guys, I don’t know how many times I can say “best friends” in this post, but I’m pretty sure it is eight thousand times MORE because we’re only at the painful prom scene and they haven’t even rented their sweet car yet. Basically what I’m saying is that we’re on a journey and it’s beautiful and it might take us all to our high school reunions, but I hope not because that’s fine, I’m just going to go out for dinner with friends instead.

10. When Romy takes the chips out of Michele’s hand, it’s just like, NO WHAT ARE YOU DOING

Hashtag tragedy.

11. LOL at the “Discount Outlet”

Two of my friends have had this as an inside joke since they watched Romy and Michele when they were wee ones. And since then, I will describe places like the place I have had to buy groceries at the dollar store I hear they sell tights as ‘bargain discount outlets’ because I have stolen their inside joke and made it my own. And I’ll give that joke to YOU for about fifty cents because I am the owner of my own Bargain Discount Outlet called, “Help Me, I’m Poor.”

12. Ramone + Romy = The Greatest Scene Of All Time

I would like to talk about the fact that she says phrases like “The earth is moving!” and “I am Columbus, you are America, discover me, just discover me!” and “Oh, is that an earthquake? No, it’s Rrrrrramone!” and “Fill me with your giant love wand!” which made ME say phrases like that . . . iiiin every day conversation in elementary school when I was trying to be “funny”. And I was, because I did not know what those phrases meant until my Mom heard me saying them and was like “OH GOD DID YOU SAY THAT IN FRONT OF YOUR TEACHERS?” (Probably!)

13. Shout-out to the “business woman special”

Which should be a real thing. Is that a weird thing? No, of course not, or my name isn’t Anne “I tried to order a fake business woman special from my local diner when I was 17″ Donahue!

Somebody please save me from myself.

14. Greatest soundtrack of all time (OF ALL TIME)

So FYI we’re at the part where Romy and Michele are in the car and they’re listening to every top 40 song of 1980-something (including ‘Karma Chameleon’) and I have just realized that we have no songs like that AT ALL in 2012. Grandmas are not going to throw down to LMFAO at weddings in forty years, and that’s just something we’re going to have to accept and mourn.

Karma Chameleon indeed.

15. I like Mary and Rhoda equally

This isn’t even an argument, you know? THEY BOTH RULE. Everybody likes Mary. Everybody likes Rhoda. And if you do not know what shows I am talking about, I need you to take a step back and get your Google on, and then get your DVD buy on, and then we need to have this debate only to realize it is NOT a debate.

Personally, I am the Lou Grant.

16. I hate the dream sequence

This was really hard for me to admit, but I hate it, you guys, I really hate it. It TOTALLY takes away from everything wonderful, and I always fast forward it which is what I’m about to do now. See you on the other side, my friends! Feel free to fill in the blanks in the comments because I can’t, I just can’t, we’re missing valuable Garofalo time.

17. I miss Cameron Manheim

A lot of people rule in the world, but Cameron Manheim ALSO rules. Also I interrupt this praise to bring you “We had a fight, like, five minutes ago” which is exactly what is said when people keep asking where Romy and/or Michele are.

OH GOD I GOT TRICKED INTO WATCHING PART OF THE DREAM SEQUENCE AGAIN.

Oh, wait, no I didn’t. It’s fine! FALSE ALARM FALSE ALARM.

18. If you’re reading this, Lisa Looter, let’s just be friends for real

Honestly, if there’s anything she can’t do, tell me now because I don’t think I’m wrong. Of COURSE you are the associate editor of Vogue, Lisa Looter, that just makes sense. And you liked their outfits in high school! And you like their outfits now! Imagine Lisa Looter and them just started being seen at parties that appeared on the internet (but they were classy parties and we all got to go)? IMAGINE.

19. “Three kids! Wow, you must feel really tied down.”

OKAY, so honestly, obviously if you have kids that is actually lovely and wonderful. And I bet if you are reading this, you’ve never used your kids to make other people who don’t have or want kids feel bad about themselves. But Christy has, and you know what makes me laugh? When Romy just calls her out on being the worst. SHE IS THE WORST. So we can laugh at this because everybody here who has kids loves their kids and it’s beautiful and we love that they love their kids, but we do not love Christy who is so mean.

20. Heather Mooney’s entrance into the reunion is my life

A girl walks into a bar, and the bartender says “WHY DID YOU WALK IN HERE SO ANGRY?” And I say, “Shhhh…. just get me a warm glass of house red, please.”

21. But then they tell off The Plastics!

Man, THE PLASTICS. Also known as “The A-Group.” I love how this story never, ever fails us. And honestly, provided we look past the fact that even the cruellest people in high school were likely dealing with the same sort of weird, traumatic youth we were all privy to, wouldn’t it feel GREAT to just deliver the ultimate “BOOM!” while the associate fashion editor (or anyone) stuck up for you? OH WAIT, THOUGH, I forgot to acknowledge when Heather Mooney does that thing by spitting beer out of her mouth when they announce the Dallas Cowboys guy.

22. THE DANCE!

ANOTHER ONE! You know what they say: I can watch choreographed dance scenes TIME AFTER TIME. (Get it? Because the song is called ‘Time After Time’.)

I hear it was improvised. (Maybe. I may  have also just made that up to seem factual and important.)

23. It’s true: everyone DOES make everyone’s life hell in high school, though

CORRECT. Guys, even we probably did at some point. Teens are nuts! We were all nuts. If you paid me $25925825825 dollars I would STILL not re-visit high school because what a disaster. I mean, no, not totally a diaster, but think of the da-rama. All of it! All the time. We made errors. We made people’s lives hell. So if you are a teen and reading this, two things:

1) If you are making somebody’s life hell, quit it! You’re better than that.

2) If your life currently feels like hell, it totally won’t feel that way in like, two years, and you will watch movies like Romy and Michele and laugh and laugh because it’s SO TRUE. (Just stick it out.)

24. And then the babely cowboy enters

And you know what? There’s nothing wrong with acknowledging a gentleman’s beauty like I am about to right now. And he had a stutter. And apologizes for being the worst. And it’s glorious! Cue: a makeout scene that rivals Jack and Rose. You jump I jump, lovely cowboy. Jump into a warm embrace.

25. “Let’s fold scarves.”

Greatest closing line in cinematic memory. Here’s where I wish out loud that Citizen Kane actually ended with the sled (SPOILER ALERT!) having “let’s fold scarves” painted on it.

“I feel like I’ve given birth to my very own baby girl.” – Michele Weinberger