Carpet Treatment, Red Variety

I’ve been talking about the Oscars a lot lately — namely, that I want to attend them one of these years — and something my friend Dyana said reminded me of this post (from my previous blog), which is not about the Oscars, but the Golden Globes. Anyway, thinking of it made me laugh, and I thought you might enjoy reading it.

Thoughts on the Golden Globes

C’est tragique.

If you didn’t know me during high school, here’s what you missed.

Rad Bauhaus shirt, huh? In case you can’t tell, my hair was buzzed down to about a quarter inch, save the bangs. (Also: this was the same year I requested that my then-boyfriend administer a tattoo of my own design, using a homemade tattoo gun he’d gotten from some classmate of his who’d been in jail or something? It was a very small tattoo, as it turned out, because a guitar string makes for kind of an oversized needle.)

Here, a bunch of my kooky peers and I show off our respective senses of fashion.  I was really into the band London After Midnight then. Also: I got that lacy top at JC Penney. Yeah, you kids get all your schmattas at Hot Topic now, but us? Huh. We had to ask our parents to drive us into Hermosa Beach to the one store in the South Bay that carried what we wanted to wear. That, or get creative with the old lady department at Penney’s. We knew what hard work was, then…

Did I mention I liked London After Midnight? I sure liked them. You can tell, right? Man, I loved those leggings, too. It still makes me happy to see them in this photo. Incidentally, those six-eye Docs I’m wearing there? I’m not sure if you can see the scuffs and scratches on them, but it took me the better part of an entire lunch period to kick that new-leather look off of them on the asphalt steps by the photo room, where I used to hang out (in case the teacher I was smitten with decided to walk by on the way to his classroom).

Alright, look, I’ve said enough.

A Wee Bit O’ Silliness

First off, Craig Ferguson does not photograph well. (And I realize that many people will disagree here, but I’m firm on that*.) So I’m using this still from the movie The Big Tease, in which he plays a gay hairdresser from Scotland (of all places), because I find the outfit hilarious. Right. Moving on, yesterday was the second time I’d gone to see a taping of his show. (Something that almost never occurs to me, the whole studio-audience thing. I’ve lived in LA most of my life and sort of forget that that’s something to do? And a free something to do, at that? Wacky.) So I’d been there before, obviously, and had heard the various litanies from the crew about not talking during the show (like I’d ever be that jerk, right?) and not bringing your phone into the studio and whatnot.

Only at some point, Ferguson looked in my direction and asked a question relating to Twitter. Now, look–I knew he wasn’t speaking to me. He was speaking to the person behind the camera which was facing him and to his left a bit. Coincidentally, I was facing him and to his left a bit more, albeit a good thirty feet away. But (and this will become rather evident in short order) I’ve become so accustomed to being the de facto Twitter person in several of my circles, that apparently I will now answer any question about Twitter that happens to be posed to anyone within my earshot.

Which is to say: Ferguson queried, “What is the deal with Twitter, is it 140 words? Numbers? What is it?” and I casually answered from my perch in the audience, “Characters.” I had an elbow propped on the arm of my chair, and my fingers propping up the side of my jaw. (Muy muy casual.)

He looked up at me. “What is it?”

“Characters,” I said.

“Ohhhh, you’re sooooo smaaaarrrrrrrt,” he said in his brogue. “CHARACTERS.” And he made the word American-nasally and propped his jaw up with his fingers. And hilarity ensued. (Also: some blushing.)

And then the segment ended and some music came on, giving the audience a much-needed clapping-along break. (I don’t know what that’s about.) But Ferguson motioned for the music to be turned off. Then he addressed me again.

“Thanks for that,” he said, smiling, “But when that guy [pointing toward the warm-up comedian] says there’s no talking, he means it.”

I apologized, and the comedian guy jokingly threatened to call security, and Craig told him to lay off. And he shook his finger at me, going “CHARACTERS!” Then he looked back at me and said, “Ohhh, but you liked it when I did this!”

And now I have to back up a bit. During the segment where he reads emails from viewers, there had been a bit on doing birdcalls. You know, that whole putting-your-hands-together-and-blowing-into-the-space-between-your-thumbs bit? Well, he did that, sort of talked the audience through it, and at some point he started giggling, as it began to look a bit… naughty. Naturally, he talked that up. And hilarity ensued. And you can see it here.  (If you’d rather not watch the whole clip, start it at about 4:40.)

Okay. So when he said “…you liked it when I did this!” he put his hands together and brought them to his mouth again, then raised his eyebrows at me. I burst out laughing and immediately turned quite purple.

“I KNOW!” He nodded grimly and pointed at me again.

[That last bit, thankfully, was off-camera. But if you'd like to see that crazy Scot mocking me on national television, by all means, watch the show tonight. Zooey Deschanel is one of the guests, and she's every bit as witty and adorable as she is in her films. (Craig thought so, too, as evidenced by his own deep, deep blushing while they bantered.)]

Tune in next time, when I accidentally accuse my boss’ boss, a man, of having a uterus.**

*Not that he photographs badly. But photos don’t do the man justice. There, I’ve said it: I’m a raging fangirl for a man who makes a living imitating Michael Caine and making hand puppets talk.

**I really did that one time. It was even awesomer than it sounds.

Master of the house, keeper of the zoo

I think that, possibly, it makes me a little bit sad that, after the boy puts on a Santa hat and says, “Who am I? Who am I? WHO AM I?” and I belt out, operatically, “I’M JEAN VALJEEEEAAAAAAAAAN!” (complete with hand motions), neither the boy nor his father so much as blink.

Sad? Or smug? I’m not quite sure, to be honest.