tumblrs better than pumprs
well life's a train that goes from february on day by day but it's making a stop...
end of an era.
highly reccommended soundtrack to this post before we go any further:
mp3: The Bolshoi - TV Man
mp3: Midnight Juggernauts - Tombstone
mp3: Rufus Wainwright - April Fools
or at least just load these in a background tab: tv man, tombstone
ok then, on we go.
at 2…7? yeah. (wait, howoldami..27 years old. 28 this year. okay.) 27 years old and often times i still feel like a child. earlier tonight i opened a bottle of wine by pushing the cork into the bottle. i still feel inept at being an adult; i still wonder if certain things will ever change.
and then there are certain events that make me feel like a chapter on my adolescence is closed shut, whether i like it or not. events both sad and happy. events like these such as, grandparents dying. 10 year high school reunion (that i will not be attending unless adam fulfills his role as the romy and/or michelle to my romy and/or michelle). full-time desk jobs. a black president. finally seeing the presidential candidate you voted for take office. actual dates! being adultish is scary. tonight marks another such event in the chapter book of time.
yes this post is about conan o’brien.
but it’s really about so much more. on the shallow end of it, all Late Night with Conan O’Brien ever signified was time. time in my life. 1993-2009. on the surface, nothing more. it doesn’t matter that i was a fan or for that matter ever watched it at all. but something that was with me so infallably throughout my formative years coming to a close, or at least a very significant change, is a time for reflection on time itself. and it gets me down.
the two tapings i did attend were probably quite honestly up there as most epic days of my life. this is mostly due in part to spending these moments with best friends. those days were epic regardless, so conan just happened to share in some of my life’s most favourite times. and i still consider that aisle seat in the first long row to be “mine.”
rufus wainwright in his network tv debut, aka, my 1st taping of conan, the day erin and i stood in the standby line @ 30 rock @ 7am and then killed time til 4pm. we went to the basement mall in the depths of 30 rock and painted our nails different colours in a drug store. we bought liz phair’s new album and listened to it on our respective discmans in bryant park. then we rocked it out at conan. maybe that was the best day of my life. i’m not sure. but i remember every detail down to the orange wool sweater i wore. (even if it is august, 7am is cold)
(ticket from second and final taping attendance, sigh)
i babysat for the couple across the street in the fall of 1993, watching tv in their basement, watching that new oddball conan. i would watch conan at night in my high school years, sacrificing sleep - but let’s face it, i’m a hardened insomniac, so maybe that’s why i became a fan in the first place. biting my pillow so i didn’t wake&piss off my parents, secretly watching tv when i was supposed to be asleep, instead watching inanties like andy richter testing matresses and laughing so hard i couldn’t breathe. there’s a soft spot in my heart for these times.
the conan o’brien newsgroup in itself is enough for a fountain of memories. memories of the 90’s, memories of friends, memories of enemies. fun times. flame baiting todd barry. (cause for recent joint strolls down memory lane, even the icky ones)
as much as i’ve drifted from the show in the past few years (let’s face it, it hasn’t been anywhere near as amazing as it used to be), tonight is a night most probably for reflection and tears.
i will be honest, at first was livid when i found out conan’s replacement was jimmy fallon, but he has won me over with his nightly videos on http://www.latenightwithjimmyfallon.com/. his show will be awesome.
while the final episode of Late Night with Conan was taping, fallon tweeted:
and i guess that’s where i must end.
instead i’ll leave with the archive.org version of my conan “website”… this was pre-blogs&twitters, kids. this is what we nerds did. also, the cookies. never forget the cookies
late night with conan o’brien is the greatest television program out of all current television programs being taped on planet earth. i’m really sorry if you don’t agree, but them’s the breaks. it’s a fact. i’ve been to 2 tapings. i’ve spent collectively about $100 in merchandise (for myself, family and friends). i’ve been taping comedy segments and random interviews on a regular basis since february 1997. i’ve been watching as a fan since mid-‘96. my first taping was august 19, 1998. guests were al roker, darrell hammond, and rufus wainwright. we didn’t go for any of the guests in particular, just got stand by tickets in the morning. i’d never heard of rufus before that day, but now i’m a fan. (2 months later i saw him open for my favourite band, sloan.) my second taping was again, not for the guests. the date was july 13, 1999; the guests were jim bruer, harry hamlin, and some old rockabilly guy - ronny dawson. but this time i got a seat towards the front, on the aisle. hoo hoo… below is my erm, artist’s rendering of it. yeah, that’ll work..
[2009 edit - this rendering ruled, unfortch it was hosted on geocities. R.I.P., that corner of the internet.. though i bet it’s on my old mac..]
the purple x’s are vaguely around where 2 of the guys from the band everclear sat. i’m not a fan, but i felt like sharing that tidbit. {g} where conan’s standing {mike sweeney (the warm-up comic) also stood there. his backside was in my face, so to avoid looking at it, i looked down and noticed he was in gray sock feet. no shoes. heh.} is where he stood when he came into the audience before the taping started. …i could see his microphone equipment which was clipped to the back of his pants; as it was right in my face. there was a little label on it that read “CONAN”. i don’t know why i found that funny. oh, and the real people are my friends, jordan, erin and matt.
peace, conan. make los angeles cool. see you on the flipside.
'd
by 
