Hodgepodge. Grab-bag. And New Thing #29.

Several things:

(1)

Wet Hot American Summer is on Comedy Central right now. I just turned on the TV and there it was. Wet Hot is one of my favorite movies. It's way good. Beyond way good. Better than The Godfather. (For reals. I mean, I understand comparing Wet Hot and The Godfather is like comparing apples and oranges, but if you watch Wet Hot and The Godfather back to back you'll be like, "wow, that was a really good apple, and the orange was good too, but I think it's been in Marlon Brando's mouth.") I've seen Wet Hot so many times. (Nine times in the theater--swear to God--and it was only in the theater for, like, 4 weeks, and only on two screens in LA.) I saw the movie once and then couldn't stop going to see it. It was like a sickness. This disease that I didn't mind having. And I'm a bit of a hypochondriac, so that's HIGH PRAISE.

So I'm watching Wet Hot on Comedy Central right now. And I understand that they have to cut certain things for "broadcast decency standards" or whatever--like, apparently they're allowed to keep the line "Beth, since you're going into town, could you buy me some lube?" but they have to cut the line "it's for my pussy"--because this is TV not HBO--but then THEY CUT THE ENTIRE "GOING TO TOWN" SCENE. What the eff? That's wrong. It's wrong. They should not be allowed to do that. You cannot let people watch this movie without the "going to town" scene. It's all about the "going to town" scene. The "going to town" scene is when the whole movie shifts from slightly absurd to completely absurd. The "going to town" scene is essential. If you're going to cut the "going to town" scene, you might as well not even show the movie.

This is like watching a massacre and not being able to do anything to stop it. It's like watching the Titanic crash. It's like watching George Bush give his State of the Union address. I can't do it. I can't watch. I turned off the TV. I silenced Wet Hot American Summer. Maybe I'm just hurting myself, but I think it's seriously fucked up that they would show this movie without the "going to town" scene and I refuse to watch any more of it.

(2)

I wrote that pseudo-diatribe against Comedy Central at 3 in the morning (it not even really against Comedy Central, it's more a diatribe against whoever decides what we can and cannot watch on our tellys, so I guess the diatribe is against Broadcast Standards and Practices, but are they really the ones who decide what we can and cannot watch, or are they just the people who enforce what has already been decided) and I just woke up and read it and was like, "what a non-satisfying post." Not that every post has to be a full meal, but that post is so short and I'm used to giving my blog readers at least a little more meat.

(3)

(4)

I just looked at my stat-counter, which shows me how people found my blog, and someone found my blog last night by googling my name. Not unusual, I guess. But what is unusual is that this person who found my blog by googling my name is located in Wolverhampton, England. More specifically, the University of Wolverhampton.

Now, I don't know anyone at the University of Wolverhampton (to my knowledge at least) (if someone out there knows something I don't, i.e. that someone we went to college with--or high school with--or regularly play poker with--is now at the University of Wolverhampton, throw me a bone and let me know, k?) so I assume that this person at the University of Wolverhampton is googling a different person named "Erik Patterson." After all, there are other Erik Pattersons out there. Lots of 'em.

I know about all of these other Erik Patterson's because I've googled 'em. Of course I have. You've googled your name too--plenty of times--so you know what I'm talking about. There's this Erik Patterson who's a painter and another Erik Patterson who writes poetry and he's all gangsta and shit and another Erik Patterson who actually plays honest-to-goodness sports.

I used to think it would be fun to get all of the Erik Pattersons together and have, like, a convention. It'd be, like, a whole gaggle of Erik Pattersons gathering together in some conference hall and we'd have Quizno's cater the event and we'd see if we have anything in common other than our names.

What if there was another gay Erik Patterson and we fell in love and we became a couple and got married in Canada and then we were Erik Patterson & Erik Patterson? Oh, man, figuring out whose mail was whose would be pretty damn difficult. Every day would be like an Abbot and Costello routine.

"Hi, I'd like to introduce you to Erik Patterson...and this is Erik Patterson."
"I thought he was Erik Patterson?"
"He is."
"Then who's he?"
"Erik Patterson."
"He's Erik Patterson?"
"He is."
"Then who's he?"
"Erik Patterson."

Would marrying someone with your exact name be the ultimate in narcissism? My friend Mike Schwartz recently flirted with someone named Mark Schwartz and I know he had issues with the fact that their names were so similar, but dating someone with your exact name...would that be the ultimate in narcissism?

(5)

I went off on the whole "Erik Patterson" thing and I totally forgot my point. Which was that this person was googling me from England. And when I saw the word "England" on my stat counter, I literally felt homesick. I lived there for four months in 1998 and I've only been back once since and I desperately want to go back. Maybe I should organize this Erik Patterson convention and schedule it to take place in England. If anyone out there can help me make that happen, hit me up, won't you?

(6)

New Thing #29 happened last night. I read my essay "My Armpit, Or Why I Owe Parker Posey and Apology" at Show and Tell. It's funny, I used to be "an actor" but I gave that up and I haven't been in front of an audience in a really long time and I was nervous. And after the show last night people kept coming up to me and saying, "that was great--you were great--were you nervous?" And I would be like, "could you tell?" And then they'd be like, "well, yeah--it was a great essay though--I just noticed you were nervous." I think it's because I was planning on sitting and then at the last minute I decided to stand and that threw me off a bit. Anyway, it went really well, the house was packed, people laughed at all the right places, people felt sorry for Parker Posey at all the right places, and hopefully I'll do it again sometime.