Title of Event: David Sedaris not only sells his book Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim but asks for money after talking about annoying women on airplanes who look...

uh...
amazingly like me.

When: Wednesday, June 8, 2005 7:00 PM But you have to be there before two to get a ticket.

Description: Bestselling author David Sedaris may have put his family under the microscope in his hilarious look at household outtakes, but you wouldn't know that from what he read.

He was tired of reading that book over and over. He's “I'm on a book tour” you know. So he read something about a cat that was amazingly funny and sounded like a conversation he heard while getting a canned tan. He got a canned tan because he asks people for money at his events. “I have a basket right here. I want you to put money in it.” And amazingly we did. Like lemmings jumping off a cliff, people walked up to him holding five or six books to sign and asked him if he would please accept this paltry $20.

Buy God! He's got an idea. Why didn't we all think of this? Why aren't we all just sharing stories about our flight to hell on the way from our expansive manse in France to the horribly repugnant USA and then asking for people to please help us get a tan. “It has spray nozzles like a car wash and you get browner as the day progresses. I just want to do it again, so you can put the money in here.”

Needless to say, I want to make people give me money like David Sedaris. I could sit in front of a group of people and tell them about the time I had standing in line waiting for Sid Harris or someone funny.

And I had to stand next to not one, not two but four, thirty-something's and I think they had their apartments inside the gym! But they weren't just fit, they were gracious. When Laura the Nazi clerk walked up with her belly sticking out of her probably expensive black polyester because it looked like a K-Mart t-shirt and she said “You all have to go stand in the sun for two hours and not move!”
These four, fit, flirty something's all looked like they would stand on their head with no sunscreen in the white hot heat just to hear dear gay Sid Hartha Harris ask for money.
They couldn't have been more gracious standing in the sun waiting for Godough.

I mean, in my head I was chanting where are all the fat old bitches? Where are all the fat old bitches? Yes, where have they gone. To the fricking gym? What happened to all the girls that like pizza and farting? But I was stuck with four beautiful peaceful women. Maybe their brains were boiled away in the heat? So I asked them what do you do? And weirdly they all turned out to be teachers.
They started talking on subjects intellectual, and I felt left behind in my fat bitchy dust. Maybe any day away from their students just naturally feels like a day of peace and good graces. Maybe they finally get time to think. Possibly that's why new thoughts like “Let's wait for five hours in a line!” seem fresh and fun. That's when Laura the clerk with Dunlaps disease (Her belly dun lap over her pants) thrust a mother and daughter at me and asked “What is your number!”

I felt like the kid in “With six you get eggroll” who chants “I'm eleven red A. I'm eleven red A.”

“I'm 196.” I said.
”You two go here,” she shoved and marched off to push more people around.
The daughter proceeded to endear me to her by eating a brownie and making it look as gross as possible. Thanks kid. I do not want to eat a brownie for a long time now. Then she endeared herself further by stomping on a newspaper cover and smashing brownie bits into Brad Pitts face.
Her mother said “She has Brad Pitt issues.”
”I like Jennifer too, kid.” I told her.

But then, another clerk in the show-my-belly-contest announced for the twentieth time that the line was going to move inside “very soon.” Gees and it only took five hours of waiting. This was so going to be so worth it. But first, they had to broadcast no photos of any type no cameras, videos or sound equipment and please shut off your cell phones. The fabulous four flipped open their cell phones to tell their adorable counter parts that they were “On their way in. It's so exciting!” before they dutifully shut them off completely.
”You'll have to give me your camera.” Laurie the goose stepping store clerk said when she spied my huge black Olympus sticking out of my bag.
”David Sedaris doesn't want publicity on the web? My site gets 33,000 people visiting it. Are you sure he doesn't want me to take his picture?”
”You'll have to give me your camera” she said and put out her hand.
”Sure as long as you sign a release that says the store will be responsible to the tune of $2500 dollars. Then I'll give it to you and hope you break it. I might even trip you.”
”Oh we'll sign! I'll come back for it!”
Her other job is a highway patrol cop.

So we shuffled our way into the building. If there had been music, it would have been played by my son's grade school band. My God I can still hear that awful rendition of some German piece they did. Something by someone named Muldow. We thought the band leader said “The Moldy Cow.” And believe me, you could hear that cow molding. It would have been perfect music for David's line progression.

Eventually they did learn how to play their instruments and we did enjoy my son's final performance in grade school. Just as we were sure we'd enjoy David Sid Harris when he finally did come out of hiding to speak. No pictures, no video, no remembering.
I had to hand over my batteries for my camera. The teachers were so relieved when I did. They were afraid they were going to have to send me to detention.
Then David arrived and lit up a cigarette.

Uh, isn't that illegal in California ? Aren't you supposed to be fined if you smoke in a crowded place indoors with 400 or so people?
He blew smoke and told us that people shit in Target's dressing rooms.

Hold the phone is Michael Jackson's brother at the Mike? Is David aware that, that didn't sound amusing? It sort of sounded like “Let's see how much we can ef with the fans heads. How far will they go?”
He took another drag on his cigarette and stomped it out in his ashtray marked, “I'm too young to die!”
Which got me to wondering. If he thinks he's so young, why no pictures? Afraid of the truth or is he in the middle of a bad hair day crisis? And why do all Gay guys insist on being David and not Dave or Davy?

Then he did read a very amusing fable about a cat getting its hair done by a baboon. It didn't sound like a fable. It sounded like he changed the species to protect his ass from being whipped by the baboon and the cat.
I loved it. Then he smoked some more and asked for more money, then he told us a story about his plane ride. Why did I think he was staring right at me as he said it? It included a woman who well, I could have been her. Loud, annoying, self-serving, “And then she pulled her hair back into a pony tail.” Yep, sounds like me.

All told he spoke for about twenty minutes. I waited five hours and paid over $130 dollars for his books, so I could listen to him speak for 20-30 minutes tops? And he talked about shit for a good portion of those minutes. And he talked about giving him money. Then he sat down and had a smoke and signed well, a lot of books which I'm sure he made at least 15% off of each because he was “I'm on a book tour.”

Now I do have to say, he was exceedingly gracious in his signing. He talked to each person and said their name to them. It sort of came out sounding like “Hello, insert name here. How are you, insert name here? OH THANK YOU FOR THAT MONEY, Insert Name HERE.”
But meanwhile, all of us were waiting “Number 51 through 60 please come forward” still more time without food or drink. And being fat, I was thinking about food. And then thank God some people left and I sat down next to a fat old bitch like myself. She had eyes that looked like they had been crying even when she was sitting still just minding her own business. She turned to me and said, “Those people over there were behind me. Way behind me. Their number wasn't called. What are they doing up there?”
”Maybe they traded like we did.”
I had given her my second ticket because Glenn didn't come and after standing all that time in line, the lady and I both were tired and wanted to get our books signed. My 196 beat her 243.
”Well, I could see one of them trading a ticket but not all three!” She started fidgeting in her seat like she was going to run up and tackle them and wrestle them back to their official space in the line. “Someone should tell on them!” she shouted. “Those people are not going sequentially!”
”They're probably taking pictures too!” I said, but I moved to the left a little while she continued to rant and point. She had added an adjective to her description. She wasn't just a fat old bitch. She was a fat old crazy bitch.

No one did anything. And those line jumping miscreants got their books signed. David kept thanking people for giving him money for two more hours while we waited “Numbers 101 through 110 can now get in line,” to get in line to have our books autographed by the David Sidarsi!

Now, at this point it was almost nine O'clock. I couldn't get Glenn on his cell for a ride home and I was tired. All of the things I wanted to ask Davi Crockett started getting fuzzy.
”Hey David, you saved my ass traveling across country with my daughter. That piece you did about going to the nudest colony kept us laughing for hours! I was wondering if you would please do the California writers a favor and come to one of their conferences. There's one in October this year in Victorville and one in Salinas also next year. Could you come and speak? And could you sign my books with no name? I'm giving them away except this one sign it to Renee and this one – can you write – I couldn't have written this without your help. And will you take a check? I'll write one for fifty.”

At a quarter to nine, that turned into this.
”Do you take checks, David?”
”No. Well, Who should I sign this too?”

Pause.

” …What is-your-name?” he asked when he heard my mind static.
”Uh, Carol.” I said staring into space as I stuck my last $5 bucks in pile of cash in his basket.
”WELL THANK YOU, CAROL, FOR THAT MONEY!” he said. Then he whispered to the clerk “Gees, people are so cheap. They aren't sticking money in.”
”What?” I said.
”And do you go to many of these book signings, Ca-rol?”
”No.” In my head I was thinking uh, I just know a lot of writers. I just had a conference. I'm a writer. I like you. Tired. Need water. Food.
”And who would you like me to sign this too, Carol?”
”uh, Carol?” Here's where I paused and stared blankly and tried to remember something in my sunburned, dehydrated brain. Wasn't I going to ask him something?
I suddenly felt like Ralphie when he gets to see Santa David.
”And what would you like me to put in this book, Caaaroooolll?”
While the people in the line were saying “Hurry it up there kid. It's getting late!”
Oh, wait, wait! I don't want them signed to me ! They are for giving away to people! What am I doing? “WAIT!” I shouted. “Can you put - I couldn't have written this without your help? Uh, NO WAIT! THAT's FOR RENEE! Sign it for Renee!”
“And who should I put this one to, Ca-rol?” he asked.
He said my name as if it was some kind of curse. And then I asked him about coming to one of our CWC conferences and he drew a little devil head in my book as he listened. ”No I don't do that unless I get money. My agent takes care of all that.”
”Can you give me his name or contact info?” I asked.
And then he said something that just made me stop in my tracks.
”Here's his name. He's on the web. I think. I wouldn't know. I've never looked at the internet. ”
When he said “at the Internet” he spoke the words for impact and stared directly into my eyes as if to say, “You evil devil internet girl.” It was like he heard me bragging before about taking his picture for my site.

So I left. I didn't stay and adore the smoking David. I figured he had enough interesting fans to fry and I belong to the evil internet.

And how can I write this about such a famous author? Well, he'll never see it because David Sedaris doesn't look at the internet. He likes to meet people in person, with his basket.

That's it from LaLaLand

Email Carol Wood at Carol@hazelst.com