a very surreal evening

How to look like the King of Hollywood for four hours:

1. Attend the premiere party for The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, a huge gala event held at Hollywood’s famed Sunset Room.

2. Bring a date for the evening with whom you were set up, who turns out to have been a Maxim cover model.

3. Meet up at the party with LOTR star John Rhys-Davies (“Gimli the Dwarf”), who seems to have been told by his agent that you’re the greatest thing since sliced bread; have him spend much of the evening introducing you as such to the other stars (Elijah Wood, Liv Tyler, Orlando Bloom, etc.), and to agents and execs.

4. Sit, champagne glass in hand, and wonder quietly how in God’s name this is your actual life.

|   
December 16, 2002

so little time

On Monday, I head to California. I return the following Saturday. Then, the very next day, I move to my new apartment.

Which means I have exactly the next two days to pack for my trip West and box up the entire contents of my apartment, all the while continuing the mad fundraising push needed to get Cyan’s first feature off the ground.

Sleep is for pansies.

|    
November 22, 2002

save the date

SantaCon NYC has officially been scheduled for December 14th. While I’ll be living bi-coastally for much of December (and January), I sure as heck will be back for this; a yearly “not-for-profit, nonpolitical, non-religious demented Santa Claus convention” is simply too good to miss.

[For more information about how to participate, in New York or other major cities, head to the home of the inimitable Cacophony Society. You may already be a member!]

|  
November 16, 2002

shaken, not stirred

Question: What’s the ideal costume for a Halloween benefit ball wherein you’ll be spending the first half of your evening playing with the swing band (requiring you to wear black and white) and the second half drunkenly womanizing in usual style?

Answer: Tuxedo + Martini Glass + Toy Gun = James Bond. Clearly the fastest route to Pussy Galore. (My apologies for perhaps the worst double entendre in the history of this site.)

The problem, however, seems to be that, post 9/11, toy guns are in rather short supply in NYC. So, having exhausted my neighborhood options, tomorrow I’ll be swinging by the Mecca of all red-blooded children – the worlds largest Toys R’ Us, in Times Square (the place is so big, it has room for an indoor ferris wheel; had I visited at the age of seven, I’d doubtless have fallen to my knees and kissed the ground upon entering) – in search of the perfect pistol (one that says, “please take this costume as a playful endorsement of martinis and baccarat rather than of right-wing, NRA nut-job gun ownership ideals and secret-agency-driven subversion of peaceful, productive, legislatively-driven foreign policy”).

Oh, and I’ve got to pick up my good bow-tie from the cleaners. The key to pulling off Bond is a hand-tied bow-tie, which you can leave undone towards the end of the evening for a rakish tilt that women, inexplicably but universally, dig.

|  
October 29, 2002

the charity continues

Despite still feeling sick as a dog, this afternoon I donned my tux and headed off to Merkin Hall to play a benefit concert with the Park Avenue Chamber Symphony. While I was tempted to beg out, the cause was too good (the concert raised more than $20,000 for music scholarships at the Lucy Moses School), and, in the end, I was glad I had slogged through, as it gave me my first chance to play Merkin, a venue famous as having some of the best acoustics in New York (though perhaps having the worst name).

A few other upsides to attending:

– The conductor, David Bernard, who is now one of my favorites in New York. Not only does he have a clearly articulated (and unique) sense of what he’s looking for musically, he seems to be having much more fun while conducting than nearly anyone I else I play for. He conducted the entire concert from memory (i.e. without using a score), looking thoroughly enrapt the entire time.

– The soloist, an exceedingly talented violinist. Not only did she nail the Mozart Concerto in A, but at the reception following the concert (still begowned in full Cinderella-style regalia), she was absolutely putting the moves on me. And she was cute. Sadly, cute in a high school senior, Lolita-esque, “fifteen will get you twenty” sort of way. But cute none the less. (And, no, I didn’t get her phone number. Come on, people, I have some scruples.)

|   
October 20, 2002

the truth, revealed

1. Comedy Central’s debut foray into made-for-TV-movie-making, Porn n’ Chicken, premiered this past Sunday.

1b. Frankly, it sucked.

2. However, if you’re a regular reader of this site, and you missed that premiere, you’ll probably want to catch the replays this weekend (Friday @ 11:00p, Sat @ 11:30p).

3. That’s because the movie is about me.

3b. And I don’t mean that in some vague, figurative sense. I mean I sold my life rights to Comedy Central for the film.

3c. Along with three fellow Yalies, I founded PnC, and served as a member of the elusive ‘Tri-Colored’ Council.

4.. The truth of PnC is, by and large, much funnier than the fiction.

4b. Therefore, I highly reccomend that diligent readers attempt to gain access to ongoing PnC events.

5. To assist in that quest, I will now disclose some heretofore closely guarded secrets of the brotherhood.

5b. First, the Logo, to assist in locating the week’s secret meeting place:

5c. Second, the password exchange, to secure entrance:

Chicken 1: We are Unconcerned but not Indifferent.

Chicken 2: For five dollars I will give you the Reach Around.

5d. Nota Bene: As in Eyes Wide Shut, there is no second password.

6. Porn n’ Chicken is Yale

|    
October 16, 2002

a moment of wallowing self pity

My original plan for the evening involved attending a party at the acclaimed Osteria del Circo, sponsored by the equally acclaimed Ikon Model Management. Such parties are always a good time, as they not only feature really hot girls, but also allow me to hone my Napoleonic charm in the most difficult of environments. (Me: 5’6″; models: 5’10”; phone numbers: Inexplicably, yes.)

Instead, however, I’ll be lying at home, drunk off Nyquil and sipping chicken soup. I managed to get myself sick over the weekend, and have spent all day at work too hoarse to use the phone and brain too full of snot to send productive emails. (Which may, in retrospect, explain my fascination with the ads cited in the prior post). None the less, I have an exceedingly quick metabolism, so I suspect that by tomorrow things will be looking up. And yes, mom, I took some Echinacea.

|   
April 8, 2002

the tropical recap

While I had intended to pull together a travelogue for my trip to the Bahamas, I returned to work this morning to find more than 1200 emails waiting for me. Therefore, I’m instead falling back on these dozen short observations, which I jotted down on yesterday’s flight back to JFK:

1. Kalik, the Bahamian local beer, tastes like a bitter, watered down version of Bud Light. The can proclaims it’s “export quality” – perhaps I’m just shopping at the wrong liquor stores, but I’m pretty sure I haven’t seen that exported Kalik here in New York City.

2. The bikini is, without a doubt, one of the 20th century’s great inventions.

3. Diving with groups of first time scuba-divers is absolutely hysterical. Everywhere you turn, one is floating up towards the surface, dragging along the bottom, or swimming off into the blue. Divemasters are apparently exceedingly grateful for any assistance in corralling such divers.

4. Getting cornrows is a big thing for tourists in the Bahamas. Girls everywhere had dropped $100 to have their hair tightly braided by old, fat Bahamian women on the beach. Note to future visitors: White girls in cornrows bespeak a world of missing teeth and trailer parks that is probably best avoided.

5. I went on the Booze Cruise, and I’m willing to admit it.

6. Crystal Palace, the Bahamas’ largest casino, while tanner and less geriatric than much of Vegas, wouldn’t even hold its own a few blocks off the strip. The place is less than a fifth the size of Foxwoods.

7. Watching spring-breakers from a Texas sorority interact with spring-breakers from an Ohio sorority is oddly fascinating. I felt sort of like Jane Goodall watching two tribes of gorillas squaring off over territory and mating rights.

Note to guys looking for vacation destinations: female-to-male ratio on Nassau’s Cable Beach was approximately 2-to-1.

8. Adrienne, if you’re reading this, I really will call you.

9. Conch chowder is mm-mm good.

10. Other than that, the food blew and was vastly overpriced. It was, however, served rather quickly, seemingly at odds with the otherwise blissfully slow pace of Bahamian life.

11. Masculinity be damned. I like pina coladas.

12. Our hotel didn’t have a hot tub, necessitating frequent trips to the next-door Marriott for the crucial tropical vacation cycle: beach – ocean – pool – hot tub – drink – repeat.

Nassau, in short: Without a doubt, worth the trip, but probably not the repeat trip. My heart is with the Pacific, and Hawaii is where I’d rather be.

|   
March 22, 2002

hit me baby one more time

Special note to any readers intending to dislocate their shoulder: Don’t. It hurts like a bitch.

While training Brazilian Jiu Jitsu (or, as my mother refers to it, “beat ’em up”) last night, I managed to pop my shoulder out of the socket. Not high on my list of life experiences worth repeating. Which brings up a question that several readers (and my mother) have asked on multiple occasions: Why in God’s name do you do full-contact martial arts? What are you, nuts? (Short answer: well, obviously.)

The problem, really, is that most people see mixed martial arts or “no holds barred” competition as much more dangerous / exotic / groundbreaking / whatever than it really is. In truth, it’s essentially just a combination of three popular existing Olympic sports: boxing, judo and wrestling. The phrase “no holds barred” is itself a misnomer, as an extensive set of rules does exist, similar to those of the three constituent sports. In fact, in the sport’s ten year history, the percentage of tournament bouts leading to serious injury has been lower than the percentage in boxing or judo matches.

None the less, I don’t want to sugar coat it. The sport is basically two guys trying to beat the crap out of each other until one gives up. So why would I possibly do it? Two main reasons:

Zen calm. As noted by Nobel laureate Konrad Lorenz, any animal that has friendship also has intraspecies aggression, and the instinctual and insuppressible need to discharge that aggression. While many people ‘vent’ through activities like weight lifting, creative writing, or competitive macram

|   
March 12, 2002

CH3CH2OH

“It has been my experience that people who have no vices have very few virtues.”
–Abraham Lincoln

Yes, thats it. I only drink to become a better person. I’m building virtues, so this hangover is entirely worth it.

|   
March 10, 2002