gaga, yule, locanda verde, ira glass, my own private insanity

a really macho, rugged hot man sat next to me on the train. i peek over at his iphone and see he's watching the lady gaga "bad romance" video. i chuckle to myself, but not too much because, i mean, HELLO, that video is bananas and amazing and YES. but 10 minutes later, still watching. 30 minutes later, we're all the way downtown and he's STILL watching. so either he was gay and i didn't know it OR he's straight and going to audition to be one of her back up dancers (do straight male dancers even exist?) or something. because the only video i've watched on repeat for hours at a time is the single ladies video. because i thought that learning the moves to that would make my life better. and it TOTALLY DID, you guys!

 

achatz cooking for liebrandt. awesome.

colin met me for the trufflepalooza dinner at locanda verde tonight. we didn't have a resy and i wouldn't let the hosts sneak one in for me but we got seats at the bar within minutes of arriving. 3 truffle-filled courses for $50. two choices per course meant colin and i tried all of them. barely boiled egg over oyster mushrooms and polenta, lots of white truffle shavings on top. kobe beef tartare, fried quail egg, lots of white truffle shavings on top. veal with garganelli with lots of truffle...you get the idea. dessert was a truffle gelato and a truffled cake with ricotta that i'd die for. we couldn't stop groaning and moaning and mmmmming over this dinner. it was DIVINE. gorgeous luke brought over our apps and i could feel all the blood rising to my face. CURSES for inconvenient blushing! i think ken friedman was in the house by the time we left. erika had invited me to some private john mayer concert something or other and i'd thought about skipping dinner but 1.) i heart locanda and 2.) i'm not the hugest john mayer fan so i passed. she texted later saying the line was long and that it wasn't as exclusive as it was made out to be and that she didn't even wait in line to get in so i definitely made the right choice. i'm still tasting truffle two hours later. it's like cigar smoke. i'm thinking i'll still be tasting it after i brush my teeth even...

 

have lots of bits written about kenya. sat down with a bottle of this, lit some candles, threw an heated herb-smelly wrap over my shoulders and hunkered down. photos have been culled and cropped. now just to have some time with blogger to upload them. soon!

 

i also put a load of christmas music on my iphone. i'm sorry you guys, but christmas music is just the best. and i'm reconnecting with michael buble who has that new album out that i just downloaded and also has a really good christmas album. he sells out MSG in minutes now which is silly and i'm not going to spend $150 or sit way the hell up to enjoy him live considering how i saw him at so many small venues as far back as 2003. (and that one time that i maybe, possibly, slept with one of his trumpet players. trumpets! i can't help it!) so anyway, i've got some bing on there, and some nat, and mariah carey's "all i want for christmas" is really the bees knees. me and the gays listen to that shit all year around, that's how GOOD it is.

 

so on the way the kenya, our layover was in amsterdam. on the flight on the way to amsterdam i had what i'll say is NOT one of my finer moments. i'm boarding the plane. flight attendant tells me what aisle to take. i turn the corner and i hear a voice. a very distinctly familiar voice. i whip around and think "that guy looks like ira glass!" which is exciting because, he's pretty hot for an older dude. but when you see famous people you don't ever really think it's THE person. at least i don't. then a second later i piece together that the voice also sounded like ira glass. that's about when i start to hyperventilate. i look back again, but i'm still supposed to be walking forwards to my seat so i'm awkwardly moving and pretty much staring in shock at him. NOT GRACEFUL. i sit. he walks by. getting flushed, i look at rebecca and blurt out, "ira glass is on the plane!" she nods, "i wear glasses on the plane too!" she says, looking a tad confused. "no! ira. glass. I-R-A." "who's that?" "the host of this american life!" "i don't know what that is." colin sits down next to rebecca. "ira glass is on the plane!" i say to him. "you wear glasses on the plane?" he responds, and he's really confused because he knows i don't wear glasses. UGH! then i'm all, "where's ted?" because i know ted knows what TAL is. so i tell him and he's like, "oh. that's nice." ted's on the phone with his boyfriend and he says, "ira glass is on the plane....he's the host of this american life...it's a radio show on NPR..." dead silence. in short, ira glass is not really a celebrity to the vast majority of people in this country. but that's my thing. freaking out in inconvenient circumstances over people nobody gives a crap about. i've met dozens of a-list actors. i didn't care. but give me a talented chef? or david remnick? i'm a moron.

 

i go to talk to ted and david who have bulkhead seats and see ira sitting 6 rows or so back. i tell ted and david that i have to go talk to him but that i can't sound like an idiot or, even worse, totally insane. i start hand writing a blog post that i'd titled something like, "things i would have told ira glass had i had the balls to approach him" and had an itemized list. that he was in my top 10 of people i'd marry if they weren't already married. that he was maybe top 5, but still behind jon stewart and david remnick. (YES. i said this. to myself, for all of you, initially.) that having something land on TAL was a life dream. that i had a lot of things drafted but none of them seemed perfect. i talked about each of them, briefly. i can't remember if i wrote anything else. i did remember that i withheld telling him i'd been listening from my chicago suburb since i was 16. because i think that might have made him feel old. and then that was it. watched some movies. napped. ted and ira were both standing by the bathroom. ted thought about bringing him over and waking me up to meet him. he also thought about having ira pose by the sleeping me and taking a photo because this would have been REALLY funny for him and basically death-inducingly mortifying for me. which is why he ended up not saying anything to ira and letting him pee in peace. thank GOD.

 

we're about to land. i tell rebecca i've written ira a note that i've really written to myself. she insists i tear the pages out and she says she'll deliver. i'm not sure why i listened. because note passing? very 6th grade, no? and nobody really needs to revisit that. ugh ugh ugh. but off she hops, she comes back quickly saying that he was soooo lovely and that i really should have talked to him. (of course!) and that he seemed flattered/surprised to have a fan on the plane. when really i'm sure he was weirded out being accosted and then having tiny papers shoved in his face. a tiny fan letter. it's psycho.

 

i can't stop shaking my head at myself. i missed a perfectly good opportunity to have a decent conversation with someone whose work i greatly admire because i'm socially inept around good-looking older jewish men.  and so now, if i ever do send anything along. or decide to send lots and lots of things along to TAL and if something ever gets looked at twice or thrice, i'm now, forever "that grown adult who was too afraid to talk to ira glass and had her adult friend bring him a note on an airplane from JFK to AMS"

 

it's depressing. it makes me want to bury myself in some compost cookies and cornflake milk. sometimes i wonder how i have so many friends or how i have ANY friends at all. i'm such a head case. a truffle filled head case, though, which is kind of dreamy and pleasing actually.

james bond themed birthday party tomorrow. i don't even know what the hell that means. probably will end up with a mini skirt and over the knee boots and who knows what else. all i know is that the weather is too cold for such things but i don't think bond girls went around wearing sneakers and sweaters which is all i feel like putting on these days.