Summer 2006: The Tourgasm Incident

Since my summer is coming to an end this weekend, and the first blog I posted today makes me feel like a total loser on multiple levels, I thought it would be a good time for a retrospective--everything from going to Roswell, New Mexico to having my shady suitemate steal my iPod charger. However, in fairness I will merely retell the best story from my summer: the day I met Dane Cook or as I like to call it, the Tourgasm Incident featuring my Pulitzer-winning cell phone photodocumenting.

Being a card-carrying member of (stand-up comedian for all you SuFi muggles) Dane Cook's email list, I won tickets for the L.A. episode of Tourgasm, the HBO series about his DC's tour. Not only that, but I was invited to bring a friend as well, and, being without a girlfriend, my boy Eddie V. who is an even bigger fan than I am was naturally my guest on the Dane Train.

I took the Tuesday afternoon off my internship at LPI to drive to Santa Anita Park & Racetrack in Arcadia which is near Pasadena. We were invited to arrive at 3:30. We arrived at 3 and were at the end of a huge line that stretched out of the racetrack and halfway across the mall next door's parking lot. Not only was it huge, but it didn't move for... I'm gonna say 4 (being the fail-safe point on the Road to Hyperbole) hours.






Here is my first commentary: there are few things as awkward as waiting in a line in the ridiculous heat of that July afternoon for four hours. You meet the annoying girls in front of you, find out where they're from, what they do, and an amusing anecdote or two. You meet the attractive girls behind you, find out where they're from, what they do, and how much they wish their boyfriends were there with them. Then you stand there, and you talk to Eddie for an hour, the conversation rapidly detiorating to the inane as the topic well runs dry. Then you go back to talking to the girls behind you a little bit. Then you talk to Eddie. At some point in the third hour, you just don't talk for half an hour. Then you go back to the girls in front of you for a bit so as not to seem unfriendly. Then you go back to the girls behind you, and you are making up stories about unicorns and pirates just so you can ignore the heat and avoid the awkwardness...

So then, after our four hour dehydration test, we finally got into the race track and they gave us different colored wristbands. They told us that Dane and his entourage were going to land in a helicopter and we were going to stand there and cheer. And everyone was down for it except it turned into another 1-2 hours of standing in the sun waiting.

However finally, DC and the DC posse show up, and we cheer, knowing that we're finally going to hear some jokes.

And we did hear jokes.






For 5 minutes from each of the four comedians.

Then the comedians go inside the building, and the director tells everyone to grab the free posters as we leave.

At least almost everyone was supposed to leave. Two wristbands colors (which I can't remember but neither of which were Eddie and me) were invited to stay. Naturally, this aggression would not stand, and I suggested to Eddie we lose the green bands and become phantoms amongst the stayers. Eddie didn't think it would work but said I was welcome to try while he went out to the car.

It worked. About 45 minutes after climbing over a hill to sneak into a group we were all put in a line to meet and greet Dane and the gang. Feeling like a bit of a BAMF for having stuck it to the system, I was lite-bragging to the girls in front of me a bit. We proceeded to wait a long time (but I was over keeping track of long times at this point) for the Tourgasm crew to come out, sit down, and begin signing autographs.




The girls in front of me both wanted kisses on the cheek from DC, so when it was my turn, he looked at me and said, "I'm not kissing you, buddy."

Nothing would have made the afternoon more worthwhile than to make Dane Cook laugh, so I stopped to think of something clever to say... "Your loss, Dane." "I'm really not that drunk yet anyway, Dane." "After waiting five hours, you better be slipping some tongue, Dane." But in my tired, dehydrated, semi-starstruck state, what ended up coming out was a disappointed, "I'll accept that," that sounded just feeble enough to be believably disappointed.

So... Dane Cook thinks I'm gay.

Which, who cares, but he thinks I want him to kiss me. At least he does in my paranoid, unfunny-when-burnt-out imagination. But he took a picture with me. And he signed my poster and the one for Eddie.



And then I got lost in the dark trying to get out of the race track and had to climb across the track itself through horseshit. But that's falling action so we won't get into it. But let's just say you couldn't pay me to go back in the Santa Anita Racetrack.

As an afterword, the next day, I received this email:

Dear Fans,
I wanted to take a moment thank everyone who came to the TOURGASM event yesterday at Santa Anita. I am so sorry for the way the event went down. In their valient effort to suprise me, my production team and HBO purposely kept meout of the loop about the details for the taping and as aresult neglected the most important people involved in allof this....MY FANS!. I would like to attempt to make thisup to you by setting up a special show at a date to be determined. If you are unable to attend, I hope you will accept a signed copy of my upcoming DVD of the final show to be released in the Fall.
With respect,
Dane Cook

Such was the most memorable day of my summer. Party on Fall 2006.