Care to Share

Now that most of my portable video games are exhausted, I’ve taken to finally catching up with my backpack-stored New Yorkers.

Sometimes, I just discover why I wasn’t inspired to read them in the first place, with articles on bullet-proof fashion-wear and extremely depressing things.

But at least I’ll usually glean a good cartoon, sitting on a blue subway-car bench. And snap a picture. And feel good about that.

Lately, I’ve had moments of needing that reassurance (surprised?).

As my vacation approaches, I gird myself with classes taken to bring myself to a sort of crescendo of experience before I leave for Paris, where all my classes and shows end a week or days before I leave and I am left with some sort of sense of finality, of completeness, of accomplishment if you will, before heading off to a foreign land.

This also means just putting myself out there. Going to see shows, doing more improv, seeing my friends. Trying to take opportunities, or just not be in my house. The usual, really.

But this sort of chain has been yielding fruit for me, as going out to ASSSSCATs at UCB led to going out to Chris Gethard Shows, led to going on a date, led somehow to being called a douchebag by comedian (and definite person I think is cool) Marc Maron.

To give some background, I was on a date with a nice young lady (whom, for once, I don’t wish to embarrass here), sitting at a bar having one of those long “we’re connecting!” talks over drinks I was drinking more quickly than she was, when a stand-up fresh from an open mic wandered out and heard me invoke the name of Marc Maron.

“Marc Maron?” the stand-up asked. “His podcast is great.”

And thus began the 15-minute long conversation that took place in front of my date, mostly not involving her, that looking back was both mortifying and somewhat unavoidable.

At least I can probably assume that she learned about Marc Maron and the WTF podcast that night, if also not to date comedy-nerd douchebags.

But the conversation ended strangely with the stand-up telling me he was actually moderating a panel that Marc Maron was going to be at tomorrow night and that he had free passes he had forgotten to give away and did I want them.

“Yeah, uh, sure.” I said, completely unbelieving that some dude I just met would give me tickets to see a sold-out Marc Maron panel.

But he asked me to tweet at him and lo-and-behold the next day I received a tweet-back saying that my tickets were reserved under my name with a plus-one.

Thus began the scurry to try to find someone to go with.

I should probably pause at this point and explain a little bit for those of you who don’t know about who Marc Maron is.

Maron is a comedian who came up with the class of Janeane Garofalo, David Cross, Todd Barry, Louis C.K. and more in the 90s mostly and was well-known back then both for his acerbic honesty on stage as his drug and alcohol problems. In that era he both won acclaim for being funny and some respect from his fellow comics and also managed to alienate nearly all of his friends with his self-destructive behavior. By the mid 2000s he had hit something of bottom having failed to land the big movie parts (a bit in “Almost Famous” was his break) or good TV gigs that contemporaries like David Cross or Dave Attell had landed (he did a few shows that were short-lived) and was unsure what to do with his life following a string of firings from liberal-talk radio Air America. It was around this time that, conscious or not, he started up a podcast called “WTF” which was possibly intended to be a show examining life’s “WTF moments” but ended up being both a series of intimate interviews with talented comedians (Cross and Barry were some early guests) and his own personal quest for redemption, talking frankly about his life and where he was in it, his feelings of despair and self-loathing and romantic unfulfillment. He would often start an interview by apologizing to his guest for any wrongs he had committed towards them, kind of a 12-step amend, since he was now sober. As the podcast continued, it became more and more influential as bigger names stepped up and people became more involved in the show. Suddenly Ben Stiller, Judd Apatow, Robin Williams, Louis C.K., many greats appeared and even solicited appearances on Marc’s podcast. It became a place where people went to see the truth, the back-room of comedy. What these opaque performers were like behind their masks interested us and Marc’s own struggle and frankness made us root for and identify with him. His was a no-bullshit zone in which his audience was his confidant and support, a dangerous, but typically stand-up comedian move. Here’s an article from the Times if anyone needs more info.

I got into the podcast through my ex, who was a big stand-up fan before I had even really gotten into stand-up, and through me it went virally to my father and my friends and it expanded through other channels until at least 30 percent of the people I knew listened to the show, those in or out of comedy. As someone who writes about himself and his life in sometimes awkward, sometimes funny, sometimes sad ways, it was obviously a good fit for me and I was and am a big fan of the podcast and Marc’s comedy.

Which is why the panel kinda sucked.

First there was a poor set-up.

I hadn’t listened to the guy offering me tickets so I didn’t realize when he tweeted me back that the show was the next night. I tried in vain to get the girl who I’d gone on a date with to come with me but understandably she was busy. My friend Bander who’d invited me to a different WTF event was also busy as was my improv buddy Sebastian. So I did what I thought was the right thing and invited my ex to come along, considering she’s the biggest Maron fan I knew and she gratefully accepted.

I was worried about some awkwardness there but there wasn’t much. We had sort of settled things the last time we’d seen each other and I had come to the realization that the person I missed was the one who loved me. a person who no longer exists. So it was just like seeing a friend, just a little more awkward.

Then we got there and sat down, I had a drink of wine from the free bar (always nice) and sat down to watch the “Maron”, the Denis Leary-produced pilot that Marc Maron was there to world-premiere to the onlooking audience of (I could only assume) rabid fans.

I saw him before the show standing outside the theater sizing up people as he has before every show I’ve seen him at.

“How’s the pilot?” I asked him.

“We’ll see.” He replied.

The pilot was… lacking in my opinion. Coming from a fan perspective, I wasn’t sure how a TV-version of Marc’s podcast would work considering that the whole show is premised on his “outsider” status looking in, talking to people more outwardly successful than him. The pilot seemed to be similar to “Louie”, Louis C.K.’s superb show on FX, with a similar typeface, a similar title and a similar single-camera shooting style, lit like a short film (It was directed by the 2010 Academy Award Winner for Best Short, an NYU alum). My main problem with it was that it seemed like what it was: a “sitcom-ed” version of Marc’s life, but the very nature of his life and podcast (as well as Louie’s show) is to eschew such bullshit. People don’t speak in epithets, people are messy, but in the sitcom Marc had made, he had written it (as he described on the panel) by hiring a sitcom writer and just taking him around his house and telling him stories from his life which the sitcom writer turned into sitcom dialogue. It’s not rewarding to see something you expect truth from and have it regurgitated in that form.

So when the Q+A came around I asked a question, as I’m always a question-asker at Q+As out of–curiosity? need for attention? need to connect with people? No matter, I asked my question, which was something along the lines of?

“Hi, so it seems like this clearly references Louie in some of it’s choices, the typeface, the title, the single-camera shooting style. I wondered, I know that in Louie, they made those aesthetic choices based on Louis C.K.’s style of rough-hewn comedy, an attempt to tacke uncomfortable truths in a messy aesthetic type of way, reflecting it. So I just wanted to know, what influenced your aesthetic decisions on this show?”

Which of course, Marc Maron, with his epic insecurities must have treated like “You’re ripping off Louie” and that’s what he replied to.

“Well, obviously that comment is meant to be provocative and you must feel very smart.” He started. “But let me just say this isn’t like Louie, you said single-camera and Louis is shot like a short film, we just have a similar title because WTF was a weird title, but other than that there aren’t any similarities.”

A smattering of applause.

“But no, this guy over here, it’s OK, it’s OK, I see myself in him. It’s fine.” He continued to laughter.

Another comedian asked another question, a softball, an obvious attempt to defuse the situation asking “How does it feel to go from wanting to kill yourself in your garage two year ago to being in front of a crowd laughing hysterically at your pilot?” to which Marc replied:

“It would be great but now I just feel bad about what I did to this guy over here [gesture at me] even though he’s obviously the douchebag in the situation.”

They cut the Q+A there, if I recall correctly.

Last night, I met someone who was also there and confirmed both the general responses, the strangeness of Marc’s lashing out of me but said that his tone toward the end was more conciliatory.

My ex was amused, though I apologized to her for putting her on the spot, sitting to next to me.

“No, it was awesome.” She said. “Marc Maron said he saw himself in you.”

Most of the crowd I felt glaring at me as I got up to go to the bathroom at the end of the show, or waited in the line to pee.

The funniest reaction came from an old film professor of mine from NYU who happened to have been sitting next to me who the second the panel ended said “Well Nick, pleasure seeing you” and fucking darted for the door as quickly as possible shoving her way past everyone else.

I saw Maron after the show as I walked out.

“I’m a big fan, actually.” I told him.

“I’m sure you are.” He replied.

“Well anyway.” I said.

“We cool?” He asked.

“Sure, of course.” I said and shook his hand and left.

I felt fine about it all and obviously even for its length the version I give you is abridged. I knew it was more about Marc and his insecurities than about me, which my friends confirmed.

But still I went home and felt a little bad, until I had someone to talk to.

Also, that first date just cancelled on me.

That’s Karma, Marc Maron.

You got it.

***

There are many shameful things I share here on the pages of this blog:

Stuff about my sex life, addiction issues, feelings of inadequacy, terrible things I do to people, my private relationships.

But I have to say there are few things I have more trepidation about sharing than my occasional Magic: The Gathering relapses.

In fact, it was pretty much the only thing for years that I lied to my parents about, going to the store and playing with my friends when I was supposed to be at high-school newspaper (called “The Polygon”) meetings.

I just want to take this moment to say, ironically at my school newspaper, I was the “People” editor. Enough said.

Anyway, I quit Magic a few years ago, but no one ever quits Magic, like other things I’m sure and every now and then I’m lured in again, to play a card game and exorcise all of the adrenaline and competitiveness that I never got out (nor will ever get out) through sports.

It was nice that the “Magicians” at the store I’d never been to in Williamsburg (Twenty-Sided Store) noticed that I had lost weight as they in their infinite lacks-of-finesse would always tell me when I looked fatter.

Aside: Opening up a gaming store in hipster Williamsburg=smartest idea ever. What do you think all those douchebags who make iPhone apps and work for Tumblr used to do in high school and college? Settlers of Catan, motherfucker.

“Gay” was the thing Chadd Harbold told me when I told him where I was before getting brunch with him and I felt that to be, in spirit, a pretty accurate reaction.

What can I say? It’s enjoyable, it hearkens back to what fun parts of my youth there are, it’s a nice way to let off steam when I get so involved in the other nerdy community I’m in of improv comedy.

I don’t do it all the time. But it was pre-release event and it was a Saturday morning and I thought it would just be fun to go.

Dangerous I know and dangerous to admit! I posted on here a while ago a whole article/bonanza about a woman outing and dumping and dissing a date she’d been on because he was someone who was a Magic virtuoso, someone I looked up to when I was a kid.

What can I say except that person sucked who dissed Jon Finkel and the internet all agreed, that I am who I am and don’t try to hide that very often, that sometimes I do things that might be counter-productive or not in my best interest. Sometimes I might go to a smelly, crowded gaming store, sit in a crowd of people who seem like stereotypes (I as well) and sweat it out through 3-4 hours of competitive “spell-casting”.

But some people snort Adderall and I find that much fucking weirder.

So, there I am. I did ok. I played in two events going 3-0 and 1-2, somewhat even. I felt good and reconnected people I hadn’t seen in years.

I played Magic for a day.

And as much as I would seek to self-deprecate through that statement, if you don’t like that, fuck you.

***

I’ll never get over that my best friend Frank is in such goddam good shape when he used to be the chubby kid back in middle school. It’s just one of those things that will make me eternally insecure.

We hung out in Park Slope going to a new meatball shop (not worth mentioning) and just walking while I drank a huge bottle of Raspberry-flavored seltzer down the Park Slope avenues.

I called him on one of his excited mentions now that we were both looking ok (I still am constantly worried about my weight, despite not owning a scale) of going to some place that was dangerously named “Ample Creamery”.

Frank for his part was phobic. As a personal trainer, if he is seen at any point walking near his gym, he can be conscripted to hang out doing what’s called a “floor shift”, having to walk around the gym pitching packages of training sessions to customers.

So we took a round-about route that Frank complained about that was actually just a straight L that led us right there, much to Frank’s Brooklyn-native consternation.

“What, who cares if  I live here?” Frank said. “Doesn’t mean I need to know how to get places.”

“You said this was way out of the way.” I told him.

“Meh!” Frank exclaimed in his usual exclamation of indifferent defiance.

And it was settled.

When we got to the Ample Creamery, we were given an ice-crema tour by samples from a nice attendant through crazy flavors involving everything from gummy bears to jam and Frank got a cone full of breakfast cereals and cereal-milk flavored ice-cream while I opted for a 70% dark chocolate scoop.

The ice cream was rich and gelato-like and enough that I shamefully ate all of it, though such things are not forbidden to me even on my weight worrying.

“Sleepy.” I told Frank.

“Man up,” He replied as we walked out of the store. “Crunch time.”

And I was reminded why Frank looks so much goddam better than I do.

***

AMPLE CREAMERY

Dark Chocolate Single Scoop- $4

Corner of Vanderbilt Aves and St. Marks Pl. Brooklyn, NY

Q to 7th Ave. 23 to Grand Army Plaza.

 

 

 

 

 

Hurricane-in

I survived the hurricane.

That’s what I felt like I should start with.

The hurricane, for those of you who were in it, was relatively mild as far as us New York City-ers were concerned. I heard coastal towns and Long Island were hit harder, but we were mostly left with I think 5 felled trees in Manhattan and a couple of days spent in various forms of intoxicated partying.

The strangest thing of all of it were the subways being closed down, something that has never happened in my 24-year history of living in New York City (maybe 21 years because I probably wouldn’t have remembered for the first 3).

I walked around on Saturday before the storm, when things were still closed and Sunday, when stores opened in SoHo (my neighborhood) at around 5pm. It was a hoot to see boutique owners driving in and parking to try to reap the benefits of low-lying non-subway-taking European tourists, mostly amazed they hadn’t been killed.

For me the hardest part wasn’t subsisting. That was something of a joke. The bodega across the street from me stayed over, it would seem, 24/7 even during the hurricane and I know they had their best day ever that Saturday morning as the line snaked around the narrow aisles and people grabbed cheese and packaged meat.

I, for one, was set with Indian curries I had stocked in my refrigerator from a late night excursion Friday night, where I decided, what the fuck, might as well buy something, as I left my friend Alex Hilhorst’s going-away party early to lug curries home, round 11:3opm.

No, the toughest part, as indicated by some of my tweets and Facebook updates, was the loneliness for me of being trapped in my house for 48 hours.

The pat of SoHo I live in is great for me, before West Broadway with all the stores and crazy tourists, on a block with trees and a park and 5 restaurants and a laundromat and an aforementioned bodega.

But the bad part about living there is that, well, no one else does. Which is usually fine, because I’m located conveniently near almost ever subway, except when the subways aren’t running.

As Rob Malone headed over on the last train to Katie Rotondi’s house and Andrew Parrish headed out to PA, I was stuck there in my apartment, with ample Netflix, a DVD collection, a new video game and the electricity never even went out (like it did for my boss who got stranded for 3 days in Vieques when Hurricane Irene hit there).

But the thing is, I’m a social person. Even more than that, I am someone who is not agoraphobic, but rather hates being trapped in my house. I’ve broached the subject before, but not recently, so for those unaware, a reminder:

When I was in middle school and high school, I didn’t have many friends. I mostly slunk around the school in a leather jacket (in the high school days) not talking to people, carrying a backpack with all my books in it, because I didn’t want to deal with the jeers of the locker room. Just trying to survive the hellishness of adolescence.

When I went home for the weekend was arguably even worse, because just as other people were going over to each other’s houses or hanging out, I was at home, calling people up. And if no one wanted to do anything, as no one so often did, I was there at home by myself all weekend, just feeling bad and beating myself up for no one wanting to spend time with me. Sitting in my house, in my room, became time for brooding, time for accepting that no one cared for you, that you were a freak, that you were unloveable.

When I came to college, after surviving that, I met people who seemed to dig me in the social reset of freshman year, I opened up, started talking to people and in the freak-fest of NYU-Film, I managed to seem cool just by virtue of my seeming unrestrained social non-graces, a loquaciousness born our of the ignorance of how to act around people and made tolerable by earnestness and the humor I had acquired from Woody Allen movies and my punny parents.

From then on and to this day, when I sit in my house alone, with nothing to do, nowhere to go, for an unrestricted or long period of time, I feel that same pressure, that same brooding sneaking up on me. The sense that no one wants to see me. That I have no friends. That I’m alone with my self-hatred.

Of course, nowadays, this is disconnected from reality. I have many friends, some of whom, like Rob and Katie, even video-chatted with me those nights giving me at least some virtual company. But I was companion-less and the talk of “babies being born 9 months after a storm” or just someone to cuddle with, gave a new dimension to that feeling, a new loneliness.

It may not seem like much, but 48 hours in your own mind, brooding, can be a long time to not like yourself.

***

But of course, I did survive the hurricane, as I said earlier.

My dad, like me, gets wanderlust and we went a couple times out to get some coffee, looking around for a place that was open on Saturday and Sunday, at my request entirely (my dad doesn’t even drink coffee).

It felt good to go on a quest for some food, to be out in the world, even though it felt so strange to see New York City dormant and mostly closed, the diners and coffee shops we went to, flooded (with people) and only getting busier.

And my life after?

Well, I’m still the same, seeing my friends a bit more.

My buddy Chadd Harbold just wrapped his first feature and Is aw him yesterday for lunch (though I ditched him when we were supposed to see Our Idiot Brother, which, I rightly predicted, sucked)

I went back on my dating website, encouraged by my friend Ilya, who had some success there and, having moved to New Haven for Yale, now had none of the problems of meeting people that we used to share, other than being awkward Jews, which we still both are.

Life is back to normal in this post-hurricane world.

I had a long-haired cabby rant at me yesterday about how Rick Perry would make a great president and he hadn’t slept for 48 hours (probably normal for a cabbie) before spouting a bunch of stuff about his workout regimen and “the fucking ragheads”.

I’m back to reading scripts and trying to perform enough that I can tell people I’m an improv performer at least instead of just an improv student.

It’s my life.

I’m not sure if I have anything more to say about it than that.

There’s some other stuff going on with an improv-possible-rape confession and the coolest Magic: The Gathering player in the world getting unfairly dissed (the former of which enough has been said and the latter which is an ongoing travesty) which would probably be interesting to talk about.

But right now, there’s a whole-grain sandwich calling my name.

And a chance to get out of my house.

***

Just as sometimes I like to quest for great restaurants to witness their greatness, sometimes I like to go to places that look like they conceivably cannot be good, to try to be surprised.

The best example of this category, in my mind, are restaurants that are attached to hotel chains.

Simply put, there is no incentive for these places to be good. They need only be adequate and non-offensive in the extreme.

They are there for the tuckered-out New York City tourist who is sore because he thought he could walk down to Ground Zero and back but, wow, that’s really a lot of walking!

So there, instead of another adventure, is the hotel restaurant, a place that caters to his laziness.

After all, if you weren’t exhausted or bewildered by New York City, why would you ever go to the restaurant attached to your hotel, in one of the finest bastions of dining in the world?

So, the hotel restaurant can’t be crazy or super-adventurous or any “weird” cuisine like Indian (“Is that like Chinese food, honey?”) but has to be something that a family can eat, something that has non-spicy options.

Something that serves french fries.

But even based off these necessary restrictions, I’ve been amazed by what I’ve found.

A place attached to a Marriot Express near me was an improbable Japanese/Mexican non-fusion restaurant! And the guacamole was delicious!

And this place I went to, attached to a Hilton near the Holland Tunnel, was great.

I had been recommended to a little Italian place by my boss, whose recommendation had been cut short by his sleepy script partner, who wanted to get the draft finished so he could finally catch Zs.

But I had forgotten I had a TWO HOUR (apparently) conference call and the Italian place didn’t have any whole-wheat pastas and only one chicken dish, in a day I was already near-suicide over my consumption of a white-naan sandwich (FOR SHAME!!!).

So I headed across the street to Pelea Mexicana, seeing a dish it looked like I could eat.

The place was deserted at 6pm and I had a booth all to myself. I spread out my things.

I got three different kinds of salsa to taste, all distinct and spicy. The corn chips (of which I had few) were warm.

My chicken breast came, finely bone-in, served on a delicious bed of fantastic garlic-sautéed spinach,, which was flavored by the jus and the wonderful pepper-tomato salsa the dish was cooked in.

It was under 20 bucks, they dealt with my sign language due to my conference call and I got to relax.

And now, when friends come in and ask me for advice, I can direct them to that Mexican joint attached to the Hilton near the Holland Tunnel.

And look at their faces.

And grin.

***

PELEA MEXICANA

Guajillo Chicken w/Chips+Salsa, Rice+Beans- $18.00

6th Avenue below Canal St.

ACE to Canal St.

 

Day Jobs

When Amanda McCormick offered me a one-day job that paid about twice what I usually get paid in a week, I jumped.

And by jumped I mean I got the email, waited a few days, got a text from Amanda, asked for more information and then eventually said I was interested, waited for another text and then finally said yes.

Apparently this “strategy” worked because somewhere along the way my pricetag got bumped up (through no fault of my own), to which I replied a one-word email (“cool”) and then proceeded to ask Amanda if there was a catch:

“One,” she said. “You have to wear a suit.”

“Done.” I replied.

Now, to anyone reading these passages, the fact that I even got this job might seem fairly parodic.

I showed none of the verve I usually do during a job hunt (“I check Mandy more often than I check my email.” I told a friend recently), I responded in non-sequitur exchanges and I even said “cool” in an email to a potential employer instead of the more formal “that sounds like an exciting opportunity”.

“cool”!

To be fair, I had some history with Amanda, I used to be one of her writers for the Film Society of Lincoln Center blog, an unpaid, but worthwhile gig I ignominiously screwed up through a mixture of neglect and perennial lateness with articles. And while she had passed along a compliment to me that the people from the Human Rights Watch Film Festival were “specifically impressed” with my coverage and mentioned me by name, the last time I was supposed to write anything for her was a piece on “Neil Young Trunk Show” that I got wasted at on the complimentary Stella Artois (this is the high-society Film Society we’re talkin’ bout here) and spent the next day too hungover to write about the film, which promptly finished its screening run, thus negating any benefit to my article.

But Amanda was a tenacious one. She liked me and had stuck by me, even retweeting some web-vids I was in using her much followed FilmLinc account and taking me out to lunches at Shake Shack and the Julliard cafeteria.

She even came out to a karaoke reunion I had planned for the New Music Mondays crowd I used to hang out with at Planet Rose.

“Dude, she’s a babe.” Ro-beardo Malone had told me upon meeting her. “She DTF?” (The definition, unmentionable even on these pages, for those who don’t know.)

“Dude, that’s her boyfriend there next to her.” I replied.

There indeed, next to her, was a hipster-y looking fellow who Amanda had introduced as her boyfriend who apparently had some sort of job involving artisanally-brewed beer.

“Dude,” Rob concluded, with a grand beard-stroking. “That doesn’t change the question.”

To be fair to Amanda, I think I did a good job.

The event was a fancy gala for Michael Douglas, a fund-raiser/show-off to show that Film Society was associated with important people. The job was just camera operating, standing by a stationary HDV camera, the most difficult part of which was panning to try to catch up with Danny DeVito, apparently a good friend of Michael Douglas, who I was informed “does not do podiums”.

“It’s a height thing.”

I white balanced, I recorded to a few different decks. I even corrected the event planning people, using my nifty walkie-headset, who almost introduced Milos Forman as “My-Losh”.

All in all, it was a good solid day of work, with nice people and not a lot to do. There was even free beer and a make your own sundae bar after the show, though for some reason they had neither vanilla nor chocolate for your sundae (“Wild Raspberry, Peach or Pistachio.” I was told with a disapproving glance.)

The only downside of the whole thing, really, was the food. I had dropped by the Time Warner Center earlier in the day on my lunch break to try to seek asylum from the food desert of the Upper West Side. I ended up in the arms of Landmarc, a midprice restaurant at the center, which produced for me one of the word grilled chicken sandwiches I’ve ever eaten.

“Does it come with french fries?” I asked the bartender, my server, who was mostly ignoring me for a southern couple he was chatting up.

“It comes with a salad.” He told me.

“A good salad?” I asked.

“Terrible.” He replied and went back to chatting with the southerners.

The salad ended up being fine (endive, etc) but the sandwich itself was a mess, laden with gooey roasted red peppers and caramelized onions that were too gloppy to allow an actual bite out of them and smoked mozzarella that clashed with the onions and peppers. The chicken itself was fine, but bland without any of its accoutrements and I almost felt tempted to either ask for ketchup or leave and get chinese food. I ended up doing neither though and finished my sandwich and headed back.

Later on, when I did get Chinese food, from Ollie’s, it was also gloppy and heavy and I couldn’t even finish half of it as I went back from my dinner break just as about as disgusted.

The only saving grace, foodwise, of that day was a little gem I spotted at Bouchon Bakery on my way out notably called a “”Fugheddaboutit”.

Needing to get the taste of overcooked onion out of my mouth, Bouchon Bakery, next door to Landmarc, seemed a good bet.

What originally caught my eye was a cartwheel-shaped cream-filled cookie called a “TKO” which, after inquiring, I found out stood for Thomas Keller Oreo, though who Thomas Keller is I couldn’t tell you.

But when I saw these little things, that reminded of milk-chocolate Mallomars, I inquired about them.

“Would you buy one if you were me?” I asked the clerk with a meaningful stare.

“Yes.” She told me quickly.

And like former president George W. Bush once described, through her eyes, I saw her chocolate-eating soul.

“One please.” I requested.

It ended up being not a Mallomar, but a mini Rice-Krispie treat, coated in caramel, milk chocolate and a little sea-salt on top.

And boy, it was delicious.

‘

And that picture doesn’t even do it justice.

Fugheddaboutit.

Or don’t.

***

“You know you’re wearing a Magic t-shirt while playing Magic Online.”

“Out of shirts.” I replied briefly, without turning to look from the screen.

Matt Chao had come by, on invitation I had offered 7 hours before and had brought along Kent Hu, my old friend and occasional seeing-a-play-mate.

And now I was forcing them to watch me play Magic Online.

I had been addicted to the online card game for about 1-2 months between my stint at Colbert and my intern gig that led to my current job. Magic had the comfort of being familiar, something that I sought solace in in the past, and also a good way to exercise frustration with its elements of competition, winning and losing.

Now, shamefully, sadly, I had sunk back into it as my despair with my current job seemed to expand rapidly.

I had almost given up on communicating with my bosses, who seemed alternately to ignore me when I was asking critical questions about the film, only to return my calls not to address the pressing, but to do personal favors for them, like fixing their email, or printers, or checkbooks.They also had a habit of disappearing for days and days to foreign countries or film festivals, or other places that seemed to be rubbed in my face.

Even on my days off, on weekends or days I’m on other jobs, they hound me with similar personal demands, now wanting to talk to me, only when it’s not the time I am paid for. I’ve taken to various coping methods, strategic ignorance, impassioned emails, successive phone calls, but it still wore away at me.

The sad thing though as I sat in my apartment playing Magic with two ABCs (American-Born-Chinese, a Matt Chao-preferred term) sitting on my bed, the sad part was, in a way, I was doing the best out of all of them.

Kent got paid more, but worked in a mailroom, at an organization where his career was at the whim of mercurial agents and he lived at home with his family, trying to pay back suddenly due student loans.

Matt had been interning for PBS for over two years now, a position he had fought to get, and whose hard work and modesty had somehow convinced his bosses that he would never have to be promoted because he would never leave and thus had him passed over for paying jobs again and again.

We all sat around and griped as I tried to finish my Magic matches. Kent talked enviously about someone who had gone from grunt-work to a multi-Oscar winning cast for their newly-greenlit feature in a matter of weeks. Matt talked about the doc he was working on and the producer who offered to try to get him a position before Matt felt too bad to ask. I, for my part, lost my games of Magic eventually and we went out to get food.

In the weeks past, I’ve contacted people I’ve interviewed with. People I’ve worked with. I’ve applied to jobs on Mandy and Craigslist. I’ve sent gifts and said hi. I even ran into Bethenny Frankel of all people on the sidewalk, whom I interviewed with to be her on-air/off-air reality-show assistant. Her husband had recognized me from across the street, as I stumbled around the sidewalk with a hangover and too many pimples. She told me my interview made the show and that I had come off well and asked for my card, which I gave her, as well as a recommendation on where to eat on the Lower East Side. I even found out that she hired the guy I thought she did for the show: an intense, short, gay Jew I met as I was getting my bag, who told me he had worked for Scott Rudin. She told me he was good on TV, but she wish she had hired me. It was nice, I guess. But it wasn’t a job.

As always, I’m left wondering what to do. Today, one of my interns told me she was going to work on a feature for 20 days for a low-rate. When she told me how much, I swallowed and didn’t mention the fact that even though it was a low rate, she’d be getting paid more than me. I told her to ask the bosses, after to checking to make sure she was still on board on the film. Later, I got yelled at for not “talking her out of” paying work, when she was getting paid nothing with no reimbursements, for a job she worked at for several months with my level of experience.

“This is why I don’t tell you things.” My boss informed me.

After that, panning to follow Danny DeVito on a locked-off tripod, seemed like zen.

***

BOUCHON BAKERY

Fugheddaboutit- approximately $4.00 with tax included

Broadway bet. 59th and 60th Sts,

ABCD1 to 59th St- Columbus Circle