going to call his brother Paul to possibly fix my wood floor.
Let us know how the Rooster does on your floor!
he is probably very busy so I may talk to others if he can’t work on it soon. I’ve seen his van around town.
David used to be my brother-in-law’s mother’s apartment cleaner in NYC back before he quit his day job. She would tell my BIL how amusing her cleaner was, and how he should come by on cleaning day to meet him, but he declined.
The second volume of his diaries is coming this fall - woohoo!
I went to a reading by him at a local bookstore and got a couple of his books signed.
Bumped.
Sedaris spoke in Cleveland last night and of course I went. He was great. He talked about his new gig as the resident curmudgeon on CBS Sunday Morning, for which he can write no more than two pages’ worth of material for each broadcast (one of the pieces he read last night was a good bit longer than that, and he said it started out at two pages “but then it got away from me”). He remembered seeing Andy Rooney on 60 Minutes back when he was a kid and thinking, “That could be me! I want to be doing that someday. And now here I am, America’s grump.”
He talked about writing for The New Yorker, too, and how he sometimes has to fight the editors. Once they insisted he remove the phrase “jism-streaked harlot” in referring to a woman in a fancy restaurant whom he saw have a waiter put bacon on a plate and then put the plate on the floor for her dog. On the other hand, they let him use the word “cunt” in the punchline for a joke when they agreed there was no better (or funnier) word to use. “So it’s kind of a give-and-take situation,” he said.
A diary excerpt he read: he was once at the airport when two little girls ran onto the elevator with him. Their mother, struggling with their luggage and not able to get there in time, called out to the girls, “Go to the third floor - the third floor! - and I’ll meet you there.” Just as the elevator doors were closing, he said to her, “They’re my girls now.”
Funny and terrible: pure Sedaris.
I’m a huge Sedaris fan (David and Amy… and the Rooster, I guess).
But I can’t get my wife to come see him live. “I don’t want to watch someone read their book.” I have no comeback for that, it’s exactly what he does… brilliantly. I went to Douglas Adams and Tom Robbins* by myself for the same reason.
(Robbins read his first chapter from an upcoming book, Still Life With Woodpecker. When he was done, and we’d all finished laughing, he said “I’m so glad you liked that. The book’s at the printer, with that chapter cut out. I’m glad someone got to hear it.”)
He was my best friend in school. We don’t keep in as close touch these days, but he always leaves me a couple of tickets when he’s in town.
“There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which can not fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance-that principle is contempt prior to investigation.”
–HERBERT SPENCER (or so it is said)
Of course, you know your wife best, don’t use this if it might cause excess dysharmony.
Thanks, but I’ll pick other battles with her. Mostly because I really don’t care if she wants to come or not (hey, cheaper if she doesn’t).
And, hey, she did come to see Jerry Seinfeld with me, and that was a great show. Especially when he heckled a pushy fan, which was so perfect that I wonder if it was staged…
That’s amazing.
Lucky you!
I heard that whole bit on the car radio, and I was laughing so hard I thought I was going to crash the car.
I finally went to see him live a number of years ago at the Pasadena Civic Auditorium. Other than it not being an ideal venue (too many people and uncomfortable seating), I still had a great time. I’m still pissed though that my sister rushed me out instead of letting me get a signed book. Next time I go alone, or she gets an Uber home.
Et voilà… “Jesus Shaves”:
Just came across his father’s obit from last year:
https://www.dignitymemorial.com/obituaries/raleigh-nc/louis-sedaris-10203936
Several of the comments below mention learning about Lou Sedaris, and even almost coming to know him, through his son’s stories.
That reminds me of this story about him from when I saw David speak (paraphrased):
David brags to his father the first time one of his books made the NYT Best Seller List.
Lou: “Well that doesn’t mean it was good; it just meas a lot of people bought it.”
David: “But why would people buy it if it wasn’t good?”
Lou: “They could have been misled.”
David then told the audience that if his father were there he would have been delighted by how big of a laugh that story got.
A review of Sedaris’s latest book:
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/30/books/review/david-sedaris-happy-go-lucky.html?
No gourmet he: David Sedaris’s Grub Street Diet
Sedaris is the guest for the latest episode of Conan O’Brien’s podcast, Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend.
Amusing and worth a listen.
mmm