Lazy Tuesday: A Timeline of Thoughts and Events

1:32pm
Read on Twitter (via @AAKnopf) there’s a Bret Easton Ellis talk tonight at B&N.  Think, that’s cool.

2:02
Text Madison Moore:

…BEE isd at Barnes and nobles tonight. I mite go.

2:02:57
Madison says:

um what do u mean u mite!!!!!!!!!!!

2:04 – 2:06
Tell him crowds of people gathered around a single fixture freak me out. Ask him if he wants to go. Tells me he’s in Dartmouth, which catches me as a surprise, but shouldn’t cause he has told me that almost eight times now; 3 times via text, 1 time via email, 2 times in-person. Think about him wearing sequins at an academic conference. Laugh out loud. Dude’s absurd.

2:47
On the subway, trying to decide whether or not to go. Decide to go because I have nothing else to do, why not? But ultimately really decide to go because I figure I could write something on it. Then change my mind thinking I don’t really have the wherewithal to write anything on it. Decide to just write the article right now on my Blackberry. I’m on the E, going uptown to my bank, going to cash some checks.

3:02
Get off subway at Lexington 53. Walk past a man in a suit who is just shy of being a midget, around 4’11. Wonder if the government legally designates midgets.

3:45
Walk out of bank. Head to 6th ave. Going to see my buddy, [name retracted].

3:52
Notice a tennis court in the middle of Rockefeller Center for Wimbledon. Think it’s weird, snap a photo of it:

4:00
Hang out with [retracted] and we laugh, and catch up. Little bit of gossip, little bit of business. Tell him I got suck in Union City the other night by myself.

4:09
Bill Clegg: Wanna party? Wonder why Bill Clegg’s publicity photo makes him look like a model.   Think: Why dosen’t it make him look like a crack addict, a hot mess? Wonder why Clegg is getting so much press. Wonder if he has another book in him. Wonder what happened to the dude who wrote A Million Little Pieces. Think he might have published a new book.    Hope Bill Clegg is on Oprah soon.   Wonder if Oprah is even still on the air.   Heard she was retiring.   Wish Obama would have picked Oprah as his running mate. Wonder why there have been no News in Color updates lately. Wonder if Joe Biden would make a good dinner guest.  Judge Judy is on TV right now.

4:10
Snap this photo of the window washers outside. Do some work.

4:50
Someone pops their head in, and says:

Hey, where you been?

4:50
I respond awkwardly:

Been dead for the past three months. You know. Underground.

4:50
To which he says:

What, you a vampire now?

4:50:
I’m dumbfounded by this question and don’t know what to say, until I jumble:

What. Wait. Yes. Well, I’ve always been… What? I mean, anyway: How are things?

4:55
Get back to work.

5:55
Reading some Tweets. Realize (via @flavorpill) “Yoga on the Great Lawn” is today and that I’m right next to Central Park. Decide to check it out before BEE. Think how it would be like killing two birds with one stone. I’d get to cover two things in one article.

6:00
Leave the building. Have bad taste in my mouth. Walk to central park.

6:13
Get to the park. Walk halfway there. Realize I don’t want to walk all the way to the great lawn. Snap a shot of people exercising on grass. Figure I got the gist of it. Head for the subway.

6:46
Arrive at Barnes and Noble. Check some Tweets. @MarieJoelle Twitpic suggests to me I might not have got the gist:

6:51
Join the mob of people 300+ for the BEE event. Crowd kind of freaks me out.

6:53
Kids next to me are saying Imperial Bedrooms has a “menacing atmosphere.” Wonder if my review of the book was as annoying as their conversation is. Figure it is, get depressed.

6:55
The kids behind me are talking about how Glamorma is contrived. Look up the word “contrived.” Feel like people who use the word contrived, or even know what it means, must live contrived lives.

6:58
Notice a pretty girl holding a copy of American Psycho. Wonder if she’s for sale. Don’t ask her, even though she would probably find it endearing in some demented way.

6:59
Notice a girl in a striped shirt with a notepad. Tell her to get a Blackberry or iPhone so she can take notes digitally. She laughs, I smirk.  Then type while watching her write something in her notebook.

7:01
“Rio” by Duran Duran is playing. Seems to me “How to Save a Life” by The Fray should be playing.  I wonder how all these people ended up here tonight, wonder why they’re all here.

7:04
Ask this handsome, put together dude:

Why are you here?

7:05
He answers:

I like his books, I like reading his books.

7:05 – 7:07

–– Oh. That’s a great answer. Do you go to NYU?
–– No.
–– Oh? That’s great news.
–– Yeah. Are you a fan?
–– Not really. But yeah I am a fan. Are you a fan?
–– I’m not going sit around and wait to get his autograph. I just live down the street and came to check it out.
–– Yeah.

Then silence, until I say:

You look like a character from one of his books.

7:08

He says:

So do you.

7:09
The event starts. People clap. I type this.

7:09
Bret says a lot of people are here.  He then begins to read the first “chapter” from Imperial Bedrooms.

7:14
Looking at the back of heads.

7:18
The Q&A begins.

7:24
Q&A drones on. He’s just repeating all the same answers from the Vice interview.

7:25
Someone just used the word “misinterpret.”

7:26
Wonder what BEE looks like right now. Bet he looks boring.

7:27
Take a photo of aforementioned heads:

7:27
Kid who looks like a Bret Easton Ellis character is looking bored, playing with his iPhone. Bet he is browsing the web.

7:28
Bret is telling a funny story. The crowd is laughing.

7:32
A smart kid asks Bret:

What is the worst thing you’ve ever done?

7:32
Bret says:

Answering that question would be the worst thing I’ve ever done.

7:33
Wondering about what time the sun will set tonight.

7:33
Getting tired of standing. Want to get some food.

7:34
Trying to remember how I ended up here.

7:35
You begin to wonder why you came… – The Fray, “How to Save a Life”

7:36
Want to brush my teeth.

7:37
Really want to get out of here.

7:37:
Move closer to the guy I was talking to before, the one who looks like me, and ask:

Do you want to go to Chiptole?

7:37
He says:

Okay

7:39
On the escalator. Going to Chipotle.