PLEASE STAND BY

friday 12:18am november fifteenth two thousand two

this morning started out very tired. couldn't fall asleep last night, and I've been feeling on the verge of sick for the last few days. so I got up, stumbled over to the computer, did a quick work thing, took a shower, ate oatmeal, and trudged back to the computer with much coffee.

a little while later, I had a very important appointment. I had to call the late show with david letterman, in the hopes of getting in to see today's tapings of two episodes featuring musical guest pearl jam.

so I called. over and over and over again. and then a funny thing happened: the phone rang. I got through. I told the man my name, and he said he had a late show trivia question to ask me. I've always been a letterman fan, but I really haven't watched it in a while. so I braced myself for some bizarre, difficult question.

"who is rupert jee?"

I sighed with relief. I told him that rupert is the owner of the hello deli, next door to the theater. I passed the test. I was in. my number was 27 on the standby list.

now, "tired" had overwhelmingly been replaced with "excited."

so a little after 2:00, I left the office and ventured into midtown. I waited around for a while, as a crowd gathered. I thought "well, they tape two shows on thursdays, so I have double the chance. right?"

WRONG!

a man came around and announced that anyone with numbers over 45 would definitely not get in. about ten minutes later, he came back to say that there would be no standby tickets. and-- that was it. everyone just kind of looked at each other for a little bit, not knowing what to do next. slowly, the crowd dispursed.

so it was around this point when "excited" got kicked in the nuts by "tired," who was pissed at having been replaced earlier.

I went to the hello deli, bought a water from rupert, and headed back to brooklyn.

so that's about it. I came back here, drank some coffee, did some work, got a chicken parm hero, fell asleep, woke up, moved back to the computer and did some more work.

this story sucked.