Phoebe Buffay

I’ve been re-watching “Friends” lately and it’s cementing itself again as one of my favorite sitcoms. The highlight of nearly every episode (almost inevitably distracting me from whatever my wife and I are talking about) is Phoebe. She’s such a random and lovable character. It’s kind of impossible to not like her if you have any humanity. So in case you need reasons to love Phoebe, here are four of my favorites:

Phoebe has this wonderful undying optimism. Her life has sucked and yet she’s almost always happy. Her dad walked out on her family, her mom committed suicide, her step-dad went to prison, and the list goes on. I know she’s there for comic relief at times, but most characters with her past would be a dark humor instead of the ray of sunshine that we get for ten seasons.

I’m also not sure that there is a character on that has so many amazing one-liners. Maybe Fat Amy on “Pitch Perfect”, but throw in Phoebe’s silly songs and she easily trumps Fat Amy. Her naivety, yet having so much harsh life experience, makes her off-handed comments so much more enjoyable.

Fun little theory of mine, just to be silly, is that Phoebe also had some mad ninja assassin skills. Don’t ever get on her bad side. Remember that episode where she got replaced as the musician at Central Perk? Did we ever see Terry the Jerk again? I mean, he was mentioned again a year later, but we never saw him again. Did we ever again see Stephanie who knew all the chords? Nope. Never. Only explanation is that sweet little Phoebe offed both. Plain and simple. She used her street skills to assert herself.

Final reason to love Phoebe: Smelly Cat. Not even exaggerating, sometimes when I’m stressed I can just calm myself by singing Smelly Cat to myself. Remember that episode where she got to do the Smelly Cat video? Also that time that it got turned into a jingle? And then there were all the people she tried to teach it to, like Stephanie (before she offed her).

What are you favorite things about Phoebe? Any favorite one-liners or songs?