i oughtta be in pictures

In case anyone was wondering how Rhett's birthday party went, here it is:

Yeah, our get-togethers probably won't be as depraved as they used to be since we moved into this fancy-schmancy house.

A few days ago I actually saw an Arab LITERALLY controlling the gas prices at the gas station down the road. I cried (because I was really tired at the time).
In a strange twist of hope I witnessed a Toyota Prius pass me in the carpool lane a few minutes later. I cried again (because I was adjusting to my new eye drops).

Maria and I officially went out a couple of weekends ago and I got a picture of it. It's as official as I get anyway. She won the "Win Jon Asking You Out" prize on The Abel Hour. It was an awesome excuse to go to Ottavio's. Speaking of The Abel Hour, please please please please listen. We probably only have a couple of weeks left.
Lagoon happened again. It was so adequate I could barely believe it. We were able to go on everything we wanted to, unlike last year. Last year may have been a bit more exuberant, however. Oh well. The Spider is the way to go. We rode it twice pretty hard.

music for the miniscule masses

I was pretty depressed for no reason at all today. Sometimes I get that way when something is wrong, but I don't know what it is yet. I realized the problem when I checked my email. MODified Music, my favorite music store is going out of business. The owner sends out an email every week and the one he sent today dropped the bomb. Now I feel really guilty about taking all my used cds into Greywhale a couple of weeks ago. Anyway, it's very unfortunate because MODified specializes in 80s alternative, techno, industrial, goth -- you know, the stuff I listen to when YOU'RE not around. The bonus is that they are now selling their stock of music AT COST. If you want to pick something up, the store is located right next to the Pie.

In brighter news, while I was in Provo today, I noticed that KOHS is back on the air! KOHS is Orem High School's station and they are the awesomest station down there. It's a double bonus, because not only do they play commercial-free fairly decent music, but it's totally obvious that the djs receive absolutely NO on-air training. Yeah, the loss of KOHS is always the most depressing thing about summer and autumn's coolest redemption.

rhettacular rhettacular

Today is my super good friend Rhett's birthday! To commemorate the occasion I'm cutting, pasting and editing that song from The Simpsons that Bart and that one guy who thought he was Michael Jackson sang to Lisa for her birthday:

Rhe-ett, it's your birthday. God bless you this day. You gave me the gift of a little sister, and I'm proud of you today. Rhe-ett, it's your birthday. Happy birthday, Rhe-ett. Rhe-ett, it's your birthday. Happy birthday, Rhe-ett. I wish you love and good will. I wish you peace and joy. I wish you better than your heart desires, and your first kiss from a boy. Rhe-ett, it's your birthday. Happy birthday, Rhe-ett. Rhe-ett, it's your birthday. Happy birthday, Rhe-ett. Yeah!

So, not all of that made sense... especially since Rhett has already kissed a boy.

Rhett and I aren't really that similar on the surface, but after you get to know us it's actually scary how much we're the same. It's one of those things where something will happen and one of us will respond to a question the other had without him actually asking it and then the other one answering the train of thought the other had a half hour later.

It's one of those things where ten years from now I'll be on a secret mission to save the world and I'm running through the streets of London or Istanbul or something with this totally hot girl who gets mixed up in everything and then the evil mastermind finally corners us and he steps out of the shadows to monologue a little and... and... IT'S HIM! IT'S RHETT!

(kind of like Goldeneye or Sneakers)

He'll say something like, "So it's come to this. It could have been so different, Jon. You could have joined me. You could have had the world serve you instead of you serving the world. We were never that different, you and I. I always figured you'd be at my side in my moment of triumph."

After that he'll motion to his henchman to get into position so that we don't escape, and I'll know I'll have to think fast. He goes on, "Tis a pity. Now you'll be no better off than all the other poor fools who've tried to stop me."

At that moment he will turn to his henchman and cross his thumb twice over his throat making a "shk shk" sound as he does so. Instantly, I'll push the barrel containing a homeless kerosene fire toward him while at the same time flipping the lit piece of wood sticking off the edge of it behind me, making sure to duck and push the hot girl's body beneath my own, so as not to be hit by the fiery piece of timber. As the kerosene fire engulfs part of Rhett, the torch will hit the henchman in the face as he lets out a Wilhelm scream. I'll grab the beautiful girl by the wrist and Rhett will douse himself quickly and re-compose himself brandishing his sleek pearl-handled pistol. We'll be halfway down the other end of the alley weaving between boxes by the time he fires his fourth shot.

"You may have gotten away, but it's too late for everyone else," he'll say as he cackles.

As we round the corner and duck into an opium den, the beautiful girl will grab my face with both hands yell, "There's no time! Who is he?! What are we up against?!"

We'll be huddled together out to hide and out of fear and while our bodies are heaving in unison from shortness of breath caused by running and adrenaline I'd loudly whisper, "It can't be... It... can't... be... It's HIM! He knows me too well! Whatever we do, HE'LL ALWAYS BE ONE STEP AHEAD!"

Yeah, that's pretty much where I see us ten years from now. Of course since he's the one who loves Independence Day and also gravitates toward hundreds of beautiful women... the roles will probably be reversed.

Anyway, we're having cake and stuff at our new house in Salt Lake. Come by. Wish Rhett happy birthday.

week end, weak now

The week started with my learning of my Grandmother's passing. You could probably tell from the last post that she hasn't been quite as vivacious as she used to be. She turned 95 in March, so she has the excuse.

The middle of the week consisted of doing lots of moving. I have way too much stuff. I hate being the last one out of a house. It's like being at a restaurant with friends and everybody leaves with their take-home boxes, but you still have to bus the table and do the dishes. Unfortunately I'm wicked nostalgic so, throwing stuff out is out of the question. Everyone who helped out was very patient. I promise to be patient with you next time I weasel out of helping you move. Everything's in now though. Please come by and arrange stuff for us. We may be a little tighter with room this time.

Work blows. I can't complain. I really do like my job, since part of my time there is devoted to doing my radio show. Doing other people's radio shows can be lameus magnus. We began doing two more this week. That means that somehow I need to engineer and edit sounds for these people in between no time at all because I have to sit there and listen to them talk all day. By Friday afternoon I had a pretty pounding headache as a result of moving, work and a change of sleeping habits. Maybe I also didn't eat too well. That tends to happen quite often.

Grandma's funeral was today. It's nice to have it on a Saturday, but I would have loved to skip a day of work for the occasion. With all the other things going on, I didn't think I'd have time to be emotional. We've kind of been planning on Grandma moving on with her existence for some time now anyway. I also really don't like looking at dead people, even when I know them well. I lost it when my brother Andy gave his tribute, though. He read what we all said about her and she deserved the accolades. We should have scheduled things differently, because right after that my brothers and I had to sing and we were all pitifully teary.

I'm now trapped in Provo with family until late tonight or maybe tomorrow. I need to keep getting moved in, but the funeral's over and it's really nice to relax. Tonight the midnight movie at the Tower is Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. Everyone knows it's my seventh favorite movie. It's pretty fitting for today. It's about overcoming age and exhaustion. It's also about loyalty and sacrifice. I've said this all before people. If you can get to the Tower Theatre tonight by midnight, watch the movie. Allow me to quote Admiral Kirk's words about my grandmother:

We are gathered here today to pay final respects to our honored dead. But it should be noted that this death takes place in the shadow of new life, the sunrise of a new world; a world that our beloved comrade gave her life to protect and nourish. She did not feel this sacrifice a vain or empty one, and we will not debate her profound wisdom at these proceedings. Of my friend, I can only say this: of all the souls I have encountered in my travels, hers was the most... human.

I found out that 20 years ago she provided me and the rest of the grandkids with a pretty nice inheritance. Nice. I hope I'm that nice when I'm 75 (or even 95).

bye grandma

It's sad that it's not that sad. It's more sad that it was so sad last year when I realized I didn't have much time left with you, but so much of you was already gone. I should've had that conversation sooner. Sorry. We'll have that conversation soon. Keep God company.

i wanna pop! i wannaaaaaanswer!

Today at work, this guy Steve asked me if I had seen The World Series of Pop Culture on VH-1. He then told me that next year he, I and his buddy Antonio should definitely do it. A few months ago the three of us journeyed to Las Vegas together (the trip was somewhat chronicled in my entry called malja' mIqta') and chatted about movies the entire time. We also poked fun at how stereotypically Star Trek geeky some of our co-workers were, while we quoted some obscure Star Trek references ourselves (keep in mind this is the same trip where I bought a tribble and a Klingon dictionary). Steve and Antonio are pretty die-hard movie buffs (as well as die-hard filmmakers), so it's quite an honor to be (possibly jokingly) invited to be on the team (probably because their other friends aren't as geeky).

The fact is, The World Series of Pop Culture pays out $250,000. Kind of low end for game shows these days, but not chump change by any means (and you don't even have to eat any live stink spiders or anything). I've spoken with friends and roommates about this too. Just yesterday, on The Abel Hour I spoke with pop culturist extraordanaire, Scott Johnson, about it.

The World Series of Pop Culture might be something I have to be a part of.

Tonight I decided to see how well I'd do. I tuned in to the semi-final bout between two teams called Velvet Rope Revolution and Boeghy Bunch. I'm not going to say that I did well, but I will say that I did better than either team in the freaking finals of the freaking World Series of Pop Culture.

Round 1- high school movies

I swept this category. The first three answers were "Jeff Spiccoli," "In Your Eyes," and "Chet" (feel free in the comments section of this post to give me the questions). One of the teams missed the Clueless term for the actor family used as an adjective to describe a hot guy (my correct answer: "Baldwin"). The next question amazed me: "What is the dangerous ski course Lane Meyer skis on one ski in the movie Better Off Dead?" That question stumped both teams! The answer of course is "the K-12." Everyone I associate with knows that.

End of round 1.
Both semi-finalist teams in The World Series of Pop Culture: 3
Me, lying on my parents' couch: 5

Round 2- Seinfeld

The correct answers to the first five questions were: "Cosmo," "Soup Nazi," "Junior Mint," "Dolores" and "Jon Voight." Provide the questions please (most people I respect shouldn't have a hard time). The question that stumped the girl from Velvet Rope Revolution asked about the name of Jerry's favorite yellow shirt (my correct answer: "Golden Boy")

End of round 2.
Both teams: 8
Me: 11

Round 3- movies in a nutshell

In this round they gave a synopsis of a movie and the contestants named which movie was described. The first five answers were: "Throw Momma from the Train," "Fatal Attraction," "Bend it Like Beckham," "Soul Man" and "Harry and the Hendersons." The one I missed was at the very end and it was for the movie called Gotcha! Personally, I feel the flick was far more obscure than the rest of the bunch. Gotcha! only received 1,782 votes on imdb.com (compared with 19,839 votes for Bend it Like Beckham). Soul Man, I suppose is in nearly the same level of obscurity at 1,835 votes, but Gotcha! is still the most obscure one. I guess I'm being a little bit technical because this was the only question in the game that I actually missed. I don't feel too bad, though, because the contestant missed it too.

End of round 3.
Both teams: 13
Me: 16

Round 4- alternative music

Answers we all got: "Talking Heads," "Morrissey," "Rock Lobster," "London Calling." The question both teams missed was: "What single-word Depeche Mode album contains the singles "Personal Jesus" and "Enjoy the Silence?" Yes, you heard me right. BOTH teams missed this question. I just re-bought this cd a few days ago. I was going to actually write a blog entry on doing just that (perhaps I will later). The answer, of course, is Violator.

End of round 4.
Both teams: 17
Me: 21

Round 5- animated tv

Correct answers: "Chef," "Scrappy-doo," "The Great Pumpkin," "propane" and "Malibu Stacy" (which had the funniest question of the night with "What Simpsons doll had as one of its catchphrases 'Let's buy make-up so the boys will like us!'") The question the guy from Boeghy Bunch missed was "What band's name does Beavis sport on his t-shirt?" The guy guessed AC/DC, giving the Velvet Rope Revolution contestant a chance to steal. He guessed Metallica because he knew that Beavis and Butthead sported those two bands, but he couldn't recall which was which and the other contestant eliminated the alternate for him. Could I recall Beavis' shirt without the elimination? Yes.

End of round 5.
Both teams: 22
Me: 27

The last round actually ended in a tie between the two contestants. They went into a tie-breaking round that consisted of naming off as many celebrities from Dancing With the Stars as possible. I must admit that I didn't do well. The only one I could immediately think of was John O'hurley and that was only because I associated it with his dancing on Seinfeld. Both contestants on the show got four apiece, so in the tie-breaker they would have skewered me (of course it wouldn't have come to a tie-break if I were playing).

I began watching the next game of semi-finals. The first round was 80s movies I think and it was very profitable for me. I got two questions right that stumped both teams. The answers were "Marty Moose" (once again, guess the question) and "'Chopsticks' & 'Heart and Soul'" (this one is a little bit trickier). I would've finished watching it, but the first episode of Futurama was on the other channel. Enjoying pop culture is way more fun than watching other people get stumped by it.

pioneer weekend update

So it seems that we got that place I was showing you earlier. It's going to be a little pricier, so until we get a new roommate and our bearings, I won't be buying a new car incredibly soon. I know I shouldn't anyway. I'm totally being irresponsible.

Actually, speaking of roommates, I might need one. This one kid (over 30) may move in with us, but maybe not. We need a dependable, industrious, non-annoying guy. So now for the next question: Who should live with us?

I cleaned my room yesterday. Turns out I have hard wood floors. It was pretty hammered after I looted through it looking for stuff for the yard sale.

Friday was Lady in the Water. Meh. I actually enjoyed watching it, but it's not quite as fun of a hindsight M. Night as his usually tend to be.

Saturday was An Inconvenient Truth. I must admit that if I ran with a slightly different crowd, I'm sure I'd be a really annoying environmentalist. Al Gore is really hilarious when you get to know him. He was on Futurama a couple of times and even used a clip from it during his presentation on how we're all gonna die from global warming. What really cracked me up were the shots of him being all pained and introspective. It made me take the movie less seriously, but more enjoyable. What really leant the movie credence was the fact that Dre and I walked out of the theater and it was like 85 degrees at 11:30 p.m.

Tomorrow Laura and I and possibly Kaila are going to trek to the Imax to see Superman in 3-D. Why aren't more movies in 3-D? I remember one time when I was a kid and channel 20 or 14 or 13 showed an old 3-D flick called The Mask (not the Jim Carrey one) and we had to go pick up 3-D glasses at 7-11. There was one part where there were spiders right in front of my face. Freaky! Good stuff anyway. It'll be nice to finally read the Superman reviews. I have this thing where I tend not to read movie reviews of movies I plan on seeing, because they usually give more away than I want them to. Abel wrote a review that I'm dying to read. I also need to finish his book that he pretty much only has one copy of that I've been hoarding for two months.

Speaking of Abel, I nearly forgot that I'll be alone doing the radio show on Tuesday and Wednesday. Tuesday's show will probably be about adoption and Wednesday's show will probably be a pop culture show with a pop culturist. Call into the show. We can talk about anything you want. Remember it's at 11 a.m. and the number is 1-800-331-4301.

Oh yeah. Also go to www.theabelhour.com. That's our new site dedicated just to the show. Point out grammatical and spelling errors. You can also click on the listen live link to listen if you don't get AM 1400 K-STAR (most people don't).

Should I go to the parade tomorrow? It's right at the bottom of my hill.

Oh, I forgot to mention that about a month ago, I turned in three dollar bills to the change machine at the carwash and of the 12 quarters I got back, 4 of them were 1965 coins! Weird, huh? Fine, maybe it's old news. If I remember right, it corresponded with 6/6/06.

should i live here?

We checked out this house tonight (officially yesterday i guess). It's a bit much, so we'll need someone else to live with us. The girls totally dug it though and that's pretty important to me. What do you think? Could you live here? Apparently, the cabinets are super nice or something. Also notice that the bedroom has two separate entrances. It also doesn't come with all the junk seen in the photos. It's on Center Street and 5th North (just a couple of blocks away from where I'm at now).

massacre on west capitol

So, this youtube thing is pretty cool. Here's our Halloween movie from last year. If you know me, you've probably already seen it.

watch me crash

This is my first attempt at getting this youtube thing working.

apt to change

Have I mentioned that we need to be out of our house by the 1st of August? I guess not. It's very sad, because it's been a wonderful house with wonderful memories and wonderfully cheap rent. Clint and Joe have apparently found places, so Rhett and I need to get crackin.' Please please tell us if you find anything in a two bedroom variety, close to downtown, large and under $1000.

We checked this place out today. Not gonna get it. It's about $400 off, but I found it to be pretty cool.

your love is like brad medicine

Special props to Brad Newbold for actually taking the plunge. Good job Chelsea, at getting him committed.

boats are fun

I'm getting a little bit better at wakeboarding. The perks to go to the lake are getting more apparent. By the end of the summer, I plan on clearing the wake by any means necessary. Btw, this photo is now my desktop wallpaper.

hardly a seller's market

In case anyone was wondering, I earned about $50 at the yard sale. Now some guy has all my ties.

chapter 13

Just in case you're wondering -- God exists. And fortunately, he loves us very much. I'm writing it down because, for some reason it can be very easy to forget.

selling ii!

Sorry I haven't mentioned it yet, but my house is having a ginormous yard sale Saturday morning at 9:00 am. Come by and buy stuff. We'll have cookies, lemonade and free dvds to people who spend more than ten bucks. Hey! You can even come by and sell some stuff. We'll totally cater. I've got some people already using this event to sell their gear. I'll probably wind up with more things than I started.

517 N. West Capitol Street (50 W.) in Salt Lake City.

broadway debut. D-E-B-U-T, debut.

I meant to mention this a month ago. Sorry.

The first Broadway play I ever went to was The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. It was also the first Broadway play I ever acted in.

I asked Sally what people wear to Broadway shows. She told me that some people really dress up for them, but that tons of people go in jeans and t-shirts. It's probably because tourists running around with their one change of clothes don't really have the same conveniences as locals and these broadway shows rely on tourists so they make them pretty casual. I wore jeans and my "WANTED" t-shirt.

When Kristi and I first got to the show, we were accosted by a woman with a clipboard who asked us if we'd like to be in it. We both enthusiastically said yes, despite the advice of Sally that we speak to two separate people about it with the logic being that they wouldn't take two people from the same group (they only have four audience members participate in the play itself). The woman asked us weird questions like whether or not we were up on current events and then told us to wait in line for someone else to interview us. The girl who interviewed us asked if I was a good speller and I responded that I actually won a spelling bee in 7th grade (true by the way). She then asked if Kristi and I would mind being split up. I responded by saying "If you pick one of us... pick me." For some reason this completely tickled her. 15 minutes later the girl announced the four "winners." I was first on the list. I'm pretty sure it was because of my selfish attitude.

The other three people were a middle-aged woman tourist, a middle-aged man and a teenager in a bosomy prom dress. They took the four of us to the lighting booth and ran over the ground rules and gave us very limited edition pins to prove we were part of the experience. We weren't supposed to try to act, but it was very important that, when spelling words, we ask for a definition and to use the word in a sentence.

The seats that Kristi and I won through Tim at the lottery were really the best seats in the whole auditorium (which was dressed up perfectly like a middle school gym). Even if I wasn't actually in the play, I practically would have been anyway. The seats we had were on a kiddie bench a foot away from the spelling microphone. The announcer called my name as a late entry and the cast members playing the kid spellers took me and the other audience contestants to the risers on the stage.

During a flashback sequence many of the characters acted as one of the kid's parents, brothers, cousins, etc. They stood up on the risers as the kid sang about them. He mentioned one person and a few of the cast members nudged me to stand up. After I did, the kid singing slowly shook his head as if I wasn't supposed to stand. The joke was simple humiliation at my expense, but at least the audience laughed.

They don't tell us how to spell the words we're given. That's part of the sponteneity. Some audience contestants get easier words, some get harder words, but they find a way to eliminate all of us by the end of the show. About four people into the spelling bee, my name was called to spell. As I walked up to the microphone, the announcer announced, "Jon Madsen is president of his school's sideburns club."

"Jon, your word is 'jihad.'"

I realized that's probably why they asked if I was up on current events. It's sort of a stretch, but I don't remember any of the other words having anything remotely to do with stuff like that. "Could I have that in a sentence please?"

"Timmy, here comes a jihad; so get behind this western wall."

"Jihad. J-I-H-A-D. Jihad."

"Correct!"

It was super nice to get the applause.

Shortly before my next word was a musical number. The other contestants told the three of us audience participaters to hold their hands and jump up and down for it, but they somehow managed to give us each others' hands so it was just the audience members jumping around like idiots.

When I went up for my second word the announcer said, "When Jon left his house this morning he told his mother, 'I'm wearing jeans and a t-shirt today. I'm going to a spelling bee, not a Broadway play."

"Jon, your word is "*zoo zoo*"

Hmm. Never heard that word before. I forget what the definition and sentence were. "Z-U-Z-U?"

"I'm sorry. Z-U-U-Z-U-U."

The character playing the paroled prisoner doing community service by comforting eliminated spellers gave me a huge hug and a juicebox. Yeah, it was a real juicebox. I got lots of applause when I went to sit down. I don't think I'm a natural on stage, but people naturally like me, so there.

The prom girl was the last of us to go out. She was announced with "Sheila has been suspended 15 times over the school's dress code."

I very much recommend the play next time you're in New York. Very funny. Very fun. And it touched me man.

Later in the day I was wearing my pin in the subway and this guy came up to me and congratulated me. He asked about spelling bees being televised and I mentioned that, yes, I had seen spelling bees on ESPN before. He then asked when I'd be on. The whole time this guy thought I was a middle school student competing in one of those nationally televised spelling bees. I decided to let him and me enjoy that fantasy.

By the way, I looked up zuuzuu. It's totally not even a word.

don't you find it ironic that the man who represents truth, justice and the american way is literally an illegal alien?

just sayin.'

happy end of days!

Way back in like 1992, my weird friend Brent came up to me and told me that "something" was going to happen that day. He said that years earlier he earmarked the date in question and predicted that something would happen. Nothing happened, but I thought hey, what a good idea and decided to do it myself. I picked the day June 6th, 1996. After I wrote it out, I realized that the date was incredibly close to the mark of the beast, 666. I then realized that the year of armageddon would only be ten years away from the date I picked which just happens to be tomorrow -- 06/06/06.

Hollywood is really capitalizing on this. They're opening the remake of The Omen tomorrow. What other movie has ever opened on a Tuesday? Anyway, I was on top of the end of days before they were.

If the world ends tomorrow, I just want everyone to know that it's been a real good run. Everyone close to me, remember that I thought very fondly of you. You know who you are. Stay strong my people!

If the world doesn't end tomorrow, remember you can now hear me on the radio every day at 11 a.m. on 1400 am (if you're in Utah county) or you can listen live at www.freecapitalist.com.

serendipity now!

New York City continued...

Serendipity:

1. The faculty of making fortunate discoveries by accident.
2. A very trendy food and dessert cafe in New York City made famous by the movie of the same name.

So in a strange bit of coincidence, I went on vacation to New York the same weekend that my best girl pals Laura and Maria went. They had actually planned to go for months and months, so to an outsider, it would appear that I merely followed them there. The truth is, my other girlfriend Kristi demanded that I go to New York with her that weekend to see Sally without any clue that I would have another couple of girls on the side. So spending time with Laura and Maria wasn't necessarily on my agenda, but they suggested that we meet up at Serendipity on Sunday night. Apparently, Serendipity is a very popular tourist spot in New York and is famous for their frozen hot chocolate (or as I like to call it, chocolate milk).

Anyway, on Friday Kristi, Sally, Sally's boyfriend Tim and I decided to go to the lottery for a broadway show. For those of you who don't know, many broadway shows have a mini-lottery an hour or so before the show to award winners with a chance to purchase cheap tickets for that day's sold-out show. Many locals do it, because they can try to win and if they don't they can just go home and try again later. Tourists don't have that option. If you want to see Wicked you need to book the show months in advance for about 100 bucks (or in our case $225). Odds of winning the lottery aren't incredibly good. They pick ten people out of about 60. That's why it's a good idea to bring all your friends so that they can have their names in as well and whoever wants to see the show the most gets the ticket if someone wins. It's a nice thing to do. Tim won. According to Sally, he always wins. She thinks the lottery girl likes him. I guess that's not much of a coincidence.

The tickets Tim won for Kristi and me was for a play called The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. For this particular play, they choose four members of the audience to participate on stage in the Spelling Bee. Guess the first person they chose was. Hint: it wasn't Kristi. Another hint: it was me. I'll probably go into excruciating detail about the experience in my next entry.

Have you ever watched Letterman or some other talk show and the celebrity talks about how he or she just happened to run into another celebrity on the street one day? Maybe I notice this more than everyone else, but I tend to think that it's strange that celebrities just happen to run into each other, especially when they live in giant cities with populations that triple the population of Utah. Anyway, on Saturday we bumped into Tate Donovan at Central Park. He was jogging. He looked okay. A bit out of breath. If I had myself together I would have told him how appalling I thought it was that his character was written out of The O.C.

In another strange coincidence, Laura, Maria and I bumped into Lucy Liu whilst eating at a British food place called Tea and Sympathy. I thought it particularly odd at the time that we decided to even eat at a British place.

On Sunday, we took a stroll around Sally's place in Harlem. I think that's where we found the Duke Ellington statue. Sally thought it was funny because the sculpture of Ellington is actually held up by sculptures of naked women. Naturally I wanted a picture and the guy who took the picture below said that he was visiting from California because his father is the sculptor of that particular work.
I've mentioned before that Nellie McKay was a huge reason for me to go to New York. This is despite the fact that seeing her broadway musical wouldn't be in the group's plans. Fortunately for me, plans fall through and I found myself alone in the city with little else to do but see Threepenny Opera all by myself. I went to the box office and, under Sally's advice, asked them for a student discount ticket. Fortunately, I still carry my BYU i.d. with me all the time for just such circumstances. They told me that since I was just buying one, they'd waive the fact that I needed to utilize the student discount a half hour before the show. When I showed up for the show, I was surprised that my seat was row C, seat 111 -- pretty much front and center. The picture below was taken from my seat while I was waiting for the show to start. Nearly the best seat in the house. Minutes after taking my seat, a woman came and sat next to me and exclaimed how glad she was that she just turned in her extra seat to the ticket office a couple of hours earlier and that it was fortunate for her that I was the one who picked it up. Apparently, the ticket office told her it was unlikely that a single would grab the seat so soon before the show. Lucky her. Lucky me.On the way back from getting my Threepenny Opera tickets, I bumped into a flier distributor who yelled something extremely interesting. According to him, my very favorite comedian, Jim Gaffigan was in town playing near the Hello Deli. Alas, it turns out I missed him by a day. Still quite a coincidence, nonetheless.

Long before I came to New York I sadly resigned myself to the fact that I would probably never be able to see Nellie McKay in a live concert. She would never come out to Utah and If I happened to visit the east coast, she probably wouldn't play at that time. Besides, I figured she retired from performing since she's now a broadway actress instead of a jazz singer. So in passing, Sally told me she noticed that Nellie McKay would actually be performing in a pub downtown for 20 bucks. I immediately phoned Maria and she immediately told Laura and within minutes I was on the phone with the good people at Joe's Pub buying Nellie McKay concert tickets. I then told Kristi and Sally that I would be leaving them for an evening. The Nellie concert actually fell on the same day that Laura and Maria wanted to meet me at that famous Serendipity restaurant. We did try to go before the show. They told us to come back and check in an hour and a half. When we came back, they told us to check back in an hour. We never got in.

Serendipity just wasn't meant to happen on this particular trip to New York.