Alternative Comic Sighting

I had a really crappy Friday. It was rainy, and I forgot my coat, and I didn't have an umbrella, and it was just generally a stressful day at the office. There was all this badge ruckus that I won't get into that was completely stealing my thunder, energy, and innocence.

So I got on the E train, right outside the office, and decided to ride down to 42nd at which point I'd transfer to the N. Exciting, right? So I'm sitting there, exhausted and on the verge of a nervous breakdown because I can't stop thinking about work stuff, when I decide that seats on the train at 5:00 should be coveted. So I sat there until 14th street, and figured I'd just walk over to the N train (wherever it was). "It can't be that far," I thought.

I get out of the train station and realize that I'm in Chelsea, and that the N train is all the way next to the Virgin Megastore, which is extremely far away (especially when it's raining and you don't have a coat or umbrella). I started walking, and listened to Spoon while I watched people scurry through the rain as though it was made of acid.

Thank God my iPod was charged. I finally made it to the Subway, got on, and who should walk on right after me but Michael Showalter, of "Wet Hot American Summer!" I've seen that movie probably, seriously, 30 times. There was a period in college where my roommates and I would watch it every day after class (sometimes twice in a row). I know every line, I've watched the director's commentary often enough to recite along with the film, I've watched it with the extra fart noises on.

Now, granted, I'm still in a terrible mood, but for a little while I was distracted by Michael Showalter, who was innocuously reading the New York Times, which I thought was impressive because I never read the New York Times. He was wearing a pretty nondescript raincoat, and a long five o' clock shadow. I didn't want to bug him, especially not on a Subway, but just seeing him was enough to settle the waves of work-related nausea that were slowing moving their through my stomach, chest, and brain. I was distracted, and that's all that mattered.

He got off at Atlantic/Pacific, which makes sense. If he got off any later he'd see less awesome (because I live after Atlantic/Pacific on the N, and there's nothing cool there).

Anyway, that was pretty great. By this point I'd worked myself up into a stress-induced cold and spent the rest of the night watching "The Soup," and eating Cheez-Its; but seeing Michael Showalter was pretty great.