Please, dear god, let me never end up in one of David Sedaris's diary entries. And if this has happened and he ever reads it to an audience, let me never, ever find out about it.

I am grateful as all hell that the man doesn't read anything written about him online, and should anyone by some chance ever mention this to him, I curse their genitals to stop working properly. Just saying.

Anyhoo: two years ago exactly, I previously saw David Sedaris in town. Today was another one of those days. After finishing up dinner early, we got there at around 6:10 p.m. for a 7 p.m. show. We looked around to see where the line was for him signing books before the show (he generally does it before and after) and didn't see it, so we walked up to the idle volunteers and asked.
"He's supposed to come out shortly, we don't know when. But it'll be right over here. You'd be first in line." Well, THAT's something that's never happened before. I hadn't gone to the bathroom at the restaurant we had dinner at--it's one of those "tiny one stall, have to get a key, the bathroom is on the other side of the entire building" sort of joints--so I was all, do I have time to go before he shows up? They were all, "no idea," so I figured I'd give a shot...and then I saw him approaching as I did. Never mind!

What all of this boils down to is, Jackie and I were first in line and dear god, I was not prepared for this.

I mentioned before in the last entry that talking to him is....awkward. I hit it off with almost everyone I talk to most of the time, but there's the occasional person I fall flat with. I honestly have NO IDEA where I fall with this guy on the rare occasions I speak to him, I just hope to god he forgets who I am from every couple of years so I don't end up in the journal entries as being infamously terrible. If it wasn't for Jackie wanting to do it so bad, I wouldn't try to get an autograph because it's just so weird and I don't know what to say and I feel like anything I say goes terribly wrong. Except for last time when I complimented him on the gun essay, which went well. So I was hopeful on that level.

On the other hand, I had no idea what the fuck to say and I was second in line. I couldn't comment on anything he'd said during the show right now, could I? I was debating commenting on his book club (he recommends a book every tour and sells it along with his own, this time's is "This Is The Story Of A Happy Marriage," which I recently got but haven't read yet. "Uh, maybe I should ask how it is? Even though he'll like, say during the show?" I was thinking.

In the end, it went worse than that.

He was wearing a different sort of outfit than usual--he usually seems to be going for tweedy brown English-ish sport coats and instead he had on this funky denim jacket with a little flower on it. It was different, and kind of reminded me of the sort of weird things I've picked up at thrift stores unexpectedly. I say this because I have to explain what happened next.

I decided to go with complimenting the jacket. In addition to finding out that black people like the jacket (disclaimer: I'm not black, but I briefly started to wonder if I was after that :P), he asked me how much I thought it cost.

Fuck if I know how much men's clothes cost, okay? I wish he'd asked Jackie that question because she's the one that buys suits all the time. I was all, "uh...$20 at a thrift store?"

Nope. $1700 in Japan. "They dyed it seventeen times." And while he's autographing the book he's drawing a cartoon of the jacket and writing down that number for me. Followed by "You have deeply offended me."

So there's that, and I don't know what to make of that particular experience, other than it certainly is a disturbing/interesting/still making me snicker sort of story, all right.. Or any other experience I've had talking to the man, for that matter. It must be terrifying to actually have to professionally interview the guy.

As for the rest of the show:
* Did you know he has a radio show in England? I did not. He read a piece from it, called "Little Guy," I believe, that was about (a) how come when he googles for things he gets "clean" results while his sister Amy, googling the same shit, gets dirty answers? (good question), and (b) talking about how back when he used to read things about himself, people came up with cutesy little terms to describe him like "Lilliputian." And also mentioning how someone told him Paul Newman was a tiny little man you couldn't find with a microscope--at 5'9. Oh, Hollywood.

* There is a sequel piece to Now We Are Five, about the family gathering at the beach house--now called the Sea Section-- and discussing the toxicology report about Tiffany's suicide. I thought he said this piece was online already (with a third to come), but I can't find it.

* There was an essay--I forget the title of it now but I know I read it online sometime--about him asking Hugh how many dudes he slept with previously. It reminded me of the scene in Four Weddings and a Funeral where Andie MacDowell is counting every dude and the location ("against a fence, don't try it").

* There were diary entries--I think he mentioned the time when a kid asked him to write something totally disturbing and horrifying in an autograph for his mom and he wrote something about the kid's teeth leaving marks on his dick. (You see what I mean on getting a book autographed here....) And then said something like, "That's when I learned that instead of totally disturbing and horrifying, he meant mildly strange...." I forget the exact phrasing of this.

* Told a shockingly bad joke that he supposedly did in front of an old folks' group, when the response to "Tell me something I don't know" is "I can fit my fist up your grandmother's ass." Shockingly, it didn't get a laugh. Um, with the old people, that is. Here it certainly did.

* As previously mentioned, he plugged the Ann Patchett book, saying one particular essay in it was the best one he'd ever read about writing. (Uh...the title of it involved the word car?)

* During the Q&A, someone asked him who his favorite family member was like to write about and he said Lisa because Lisa always has really weird stories happen to her--I get the impression that she's kind of a buttmonkey in real life and gets insulted a lot and she's not necessarily getting that? One time some lady at Starbucks chewed the other employees out for badmouthing her, apparently. He also updated us all on the Rooster, who no longer swears as much due to having a kid. He has also become addicted to using a juicer and no longer eats solid food. Instead of "the Rooster," he's now "the Juicer." The Juicer is coming to England for Christmas and wanted to bring his juicer, but it won't work there. David has the impression that The Juicer wants him to buy a juicer just for the occasion. He looks forward to the stories that will come from this one...

I have to say, the guy's delivery of pretty much anything is priceless. I think that's why he's such a hit at times--I was laughing till crying at the tones and all that. Still admire the guy, still want his career....but hoo boy, he's one of the few people I am straight up intimidated to talk to. FOR GOOD REASON, APPARENTLY!

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