sleep and ice tour, leg one

Wednesday, jun. 21, 2006   |   0 comments

So I’ve been back from the exhausting and chilling first leg of the book tour for over a week now, and I’m still not fully recovered. That was a very, very tough week: I am so afraid of public speaking! It makes me blotchy and sweaty, it fills my gut with perpetual feelings of “doom + self-blame” a la the first climb on a terrible roller-coaster (the Vomitron, maybe, or the Regretinator). And then there’s the nausea and light-headedness and insomnia and hot flashes.

Knowing this about myself, I booked myself a wildly expensive hotel room in DC, just so I would be as pampered as humanly possible before embarking on my first reading — and it was so, so worth it.

The Pantone-crazy rooms of the Hotel Helix.

Here’s why the hotel was so spectack: The very day after Jill and I drove home from Yosemite (which was so fun — gushing waterfalls! buffet chocolate pudding! rainbows! the ear of a fine friend! — possibly the only things capable of getting my mind off the looming public speakings), I flew out on the red-eye to DC. My flight landed at 7am, but my hotel check-in wasn’t until 3pm, so me and my hot pink travel neck pillow (which arguably could pass for a very, very fashion-forward space scarf) curled up in the baggage claim area for a few hours, but by 10 I’d had enough of the airport announcements, so I got in a cab a (hi, bye Washington Monument!) and went to the hotel, and? They let me into my room five hours early! I napped the living spit out of the next two hours.

The crazy Helix surf-themed beds, hang ten! (Or, in my case, hang $260 per night.)

Then I crammed some french toast in my french toast hole, drank coffee and coffee and coffee, and practiced my routine, which consists of huge, poster-sized printouts of select sleep poses (which Brian and Marco made for me while I was in Yosemite!) plus a crazy folding metal business-easel thing plus a telescoping pointer with built-in laser AND pen (the trifecta). Then I actively panicked for awhile, then I put on a skirt and some blister-shoes and panic-walked six sweaty blocks over to Olsson’s Books and Records, then I got up there and pointed at some things, then I signed some people’s books (harrowing), then I walked home, ordered one beer and a hamburger from room service, wrote up my Tour Dispatch, and watched The Whole Nine Yards until my brains melted.

The next morning, the awesome Michael Jay McClure (who surprise-attended my reading the night before, which made me so happy!) came and fetched me. After pausing a moment to admire my insane orange and green and pop-cultured hotel room (with two thick animal print robes), he whirl-walked me around DC for three seconds, then we gobbled lunch, then we cabbed to the train station. Go, go, go!

Once I arrived in New York, I went directly to Paul’s apartment and practiced for the next reading. So boring! Oh except then we went out for pickles and birthday cake, that part was good.

Then on Wednesday morning Paul and I splashed our way through the pouring rain to the subway (me, riding with my head between my knees as an anti-panic-faint measure), to Coliseum Books, the in-case-of-rain venue for the Bryant Park reading.

Here I am, groping my way through the Coliseum Books/Bryant Park reading in NYC.

The reading was a little damp and rushed, but ultimately okay. I think? Afterward, some more people asked me to sign their books (!), then at like 3pm, my nerves finally mellowed enough for me to eat, and Paul and I went to some Italian-y place and I ate and ate and ate. The next day, I worked on my Power Point for the upcoming LA show, grabbed some beer and pretzels and dinner and cupcakes with Todd, then returned home to Paul’s for another four hours of Power Pointing. At 7am the next morning I took Super Shuttle to the airport, got on a JetBlue jet, and flew to LA. (See? Not much fun, this trip: just an endless stream of churning worry and bile and Power Point.)

When I got to LA, I rented a car, drove to a cafe for a few hours of whispered practicing (luckily LA is full of actors whisper-practicing in cafes, so I totally fit right on in), then I headed over to Hollywood to stutter my way through a run-through for the sold-out (!) McSweeney’s Presents: The World Explained show. The lineup: shivering, panicked me + Davy Rothbart (creator of Found Magazine) + Starlee Kine (of This American Life) + Joshua Davis (author of The Underdog: How I Survived the World’s Most Outlandish Competitions) + Bill Hader (from Saturday Night Live) + host Andy Richter + music by Grant-Lee Phillips and the the Pretty Babies, together we all dogged and ponied up in the name of raising funds for 826LA.

At midnight, I drove home to the Octeau’s, my home away from home, and slept for three hours. At 4:30, the panic prodded me awake, and I spent the next few hours frantically fiddling with my presentation, up until the point the three little Octeaus woke up and sprang into action:

Playing “Luggage” at the chateau Octeau before leaving to go to the horror show.

Then at 3pm, after a very, very dark hour trying to figure out how to operate the Octeau’s devilish printer (big swears and tears), I headed over to the venue for disastrous final run-through, where I basically just read my notes without looking up once. Found Davy was all, I really dig your “scientist persona,” with the notes and the wooden delivery, so awesome! And I was all, but…that wasn’t…oh god.

A small message found backstage, one of two photos I managed to take before I had to leave to go weep quietly in the rental car for the hour just before the show.

Here is my other photo: it’s Eli Horowitz, still glowing from when Zooey Deschanel cupped his right pectoral (I SAW).

Then Andy Richter took to the stage, and the show began! And I drank one very tall glass of everyone-backstage-prescribed wine.

Andy, it turns out, is hilarious and Michigan-cute and bogglingly nice and also he wears sandals. So that happened, then he introduced me, and I walked out there! And started talking in a surprise all-new Evany voice (according to post-show reports, it was very “husky librarian karoake”). The next eleven minutes were tota
lly crazy, and I really don’t remember much of what I did or said. But according to the LA Times: “Following Richter, Evany Thomas, a contributor to McSweeney’s and author of a new, mostly tongue-in-cheek book called The Secret Language of Sleep, dissected couples’ sleeping positions — Classic Spoons, the Seatbelt — to lots of amusement.” Lots of amusement! Also: Carrie Fisher was there? The woman who wrote the book I once sat in a London bookstore for eight solid hours and read cover to cover? And then went ahead and bought it anyway? Holy crapping god. Just reading that little tidbit got me all retroactively nervous and star struck and sick in my mouth, and pants.

Here I am, in full blackout, talking to three hundred people about my acne and cuddle parties and puppies. The photo is a little out of focus (the slideshow aspect made things too dark for photos), but it’s actually a super-accurate embodiment of the experience, from my point of view.

Then it was over, and I wandered off stage and collapsed (after Andy Richter hugged me) in total exhaustion, and then just lay there on the floor in a corner behind the stage, watching the rest of the show backwards through the back of the projection screen.

Between each presentation, Grant-Lee Phillips’s gang, plus Zooey Deschanel and Samantha Shelton, all sang thematic songs. Like after my thing, they sang “Lay, Lady, Lay,” and after Starlee’s, they sang “Crazy” (her presentation was about how to find the right therapist), etc. It was sweet and lively and really made the show extra awesome.

Marco took lots and lots of pics of Zooey, for some reason?

After the show, I staggered over to the post-event VIP party (!?) to squeeze my many great friends who all turned out for the show. (Kristin and Pat and Jill and Marco all drove down, down, all the way down from the bay area!)

Wow, somebody loves blazers! (Evany + Stee + Pam love blazers.)

Pam is BLOWN AWAY by my Fran Drescher mouth.

The famous Tom Mott (a brand-new father! CONGRATULATIONS TOM AND MOUKI, and LITTLE EVE and LITTLE JOHN!) and I ponder life, love. (Turns out: wildly near-sighted people with glasses perched atop their heads = deep, mole-faced thinkers.)

Me, China, Jenny, and my wine.

Sophia, Becky, and Evany squint out some smiles and secretly long for bed (that’s what I was doing, at least).

And that was it! I pretty much slept the whole next day, in between marveling over how old and frail I now am, then on Monday Jill, Marco, and I drove home by way of Anderson’s split pea soup, the end!

And they all lived Happea-ly ever after.

come cup my bottom in person!

Tuesday, may. 30, 2006   |   0 comments

In about seven minutes, I’m leaving for a week in Yosemite! But before I leave, I wanted to get your pumps primed for some events that I’ll be participating in sometime within the next two weeks! Are you going to be in:

Washington DC on June 5th?

NYC on June 7th?

LA on June 10th?

Then come on down and watch me writhe and sweat my way through my deep, deep fear of public speaking, holy spit! Check the appearances HQ for all the precise the wheres and whens.

going in for the jill

Monday, may. 29, 2006   |   0 comments

The weekend before last, Jill — the one and only doctor of fine shoes, frosted cakes, feathered dresses, and academic fields too numerous to numerate — turned forty! and to celebrate the great occasion, we had a feisty little party! There was a deep, deep well of drinks (all supplied by party-makers Liz and Heidi); plus many, many cheeses (hand-selected by princess of taste Stephanie). Marbles and Piggy* wore fluffy flowers on their collars, and the rest of us did our best to keep up with our sky-high heels, fancy dresses, and many lipsticks. There was also a karaoke machine, whoops?

We decorated the kitchen and back room with a criss-cross of wire hung with an assortment of photos of Jill snapped over the many different blonde, brunette, blonde-brunette, short, short-short, and long-long phases of her life; a theme echoed by Natalie’s delicious home-baked brownies and blondies.

And we decorated the front room, AKA the Rump Roastery, with a mass of tinsel flagging, which I ordered from the weird and wildly un-PC Oriental Trading Company. When the order arrived, it also featured five (five!) different Oriental Trading catalogs stuffed full of many insane things: the inflatable assortment of realistic dogs? Perfect for this year’s Westminster Dog Show party. Felt Zoo Animal Sucker Covers? Worthy of a theme party of their very own!

Look, it’s 2am in Jill’s eyes, and the party’s JUST GETTING STARTED!

And there were also cupcakes in four shades of pink (only three of which are pictured here due to the fact that someone, me, ate all the light ones in a ferocious display of unbridled selfrestraint).

* Full disclosure: Piggy’s name is actually Daisy, but I’m lobbying hard to change it because, a) Piggy is clearly her real name, I can feel it! And, b) Daisy is just too uninspired a name for such an awesome dog, plus it’s the name the pound gave her, and thus clearly is weighed down with all sorts of bad past-life connotations. So…viva la Piggy! Right?

hey, honeycomb

Wednesday, may. 17, 2006   |   0 comments

Did that guy just ask for spare change, for viagra, for his honeycomb wand?

rewind and fast-forward

Friday, may. 12, 2006   |   0 comments

Thinking back on high school, I regret that I wasn’t one of the truly weird kids (though I’m sure you could find some fellow Tam High alums who thought I was plenty weird). With all the free time and unformed possibility of that awkward age of fourteen-fifteen-sixteen, I just wish I’d let myself indulge in obsessions more. Like the kids who saved up to buy a stunt dummy to use in the action sequences of their homemade movies, or who taught themselves how to juggle and ride unicyles, or who decided to learn how to read lips and ordered a book on the topic through Scholastic (like I did) and then sat down and actually did the work and really learned how to read lips (like I didn’t). What they were doing was just so much more fantastic than trying to beef up the college resume or trying to score a solid fake ID or trying on clothes or whatever it was that I was so busy doing.

And then I think: what if ten years from now I look back on this here floaty time of my life — so loosely packed with little islands of freelance surrounded by oceans of fun travels and meals with friends — and I feel the exact same regret? But then I get absorbed in baking a batch of terrible tasteless dust cookies (those Chocolate Lulus are a total dud), or I spend half an hour running around the house in a rousing game of string-tug-jump with the animals, and all concerns about future regrets recede into the happiness of my puttering.