Summer colds are such a ripoff. At least when you’re sick in the wintertime you can enjoy being under a blanket and watching TV indoors. When I’m sick in the summer everyone else is having the most idyllic day of their life — the whole world is tossing a frisbee in slow motion while a death march plays in my head.

Ever since I’ve moved to New York, I’ve gotten more colds. And more of those colds have mutated into full-blown sinus infections. Last winter I coughed so hard I thought I cracked a rib.

I used to wonder why I got so sick all the time, and figured it had something to do with touching all those handrails on the subway all day long. Take a look at this guy I saw on the N train this morning — I think I’m right:

He rode the subway all the way from Atlantic/Pacific to Canal Street with his nose smushed against the railing, pausing only to give it a deep picking. I don’t know if I’m grossed out for that guy, or because of that guy.

From now on, I’m commuting in a HAZMAT suit.

I’m incredibly excited about the show that we’re putting on at Union Hall next weekend — for any number of reasons, really. But one of the most exciting things for me about this variety extravaganza is that we’re featuring what promises to be an incredibly strange burlesque act from Mat Fraser and Julie Atlas Muz.

Here’s a little about Mat, from his Wikipedia page:

Fraser was born with phocomelia of both arms, due to his mother being prescribed thalidomide during her pregnancy. As a live artist he was a member of the performance art group The DHSS in the early 1990s. He was included in Manuel Vason’s book “Exposures” and has performed at numerous internationally renowned venues. He received considerable critical acclaim for his one-man show “Seal Boy”. In 1999 he worked with the Hydra Collective on an event known as “Wrong Bodies” at the Institute of Contemporary Arts. As an actor he has performed with the “Graeae Theatre Company”, Europe’s leading disabled theatre company. He is the creator and main performer in a new play called Thalidomide!! A Musical. He also co-hosts the BBC’s Ouch! Podcast.

Fraser has appeared on television both as a presenter and as an actor, in a number of productions including Metrosexuality and Every Time You Look at Me. He is also a martial artist having studied hapkido, taekwondo, Karate.

The following video is a trailer for his movie “Kung Fu Flid,” also known as “Unarmed and Dangerous.” Bear in mind that it’s incredibly gory and the language is likely not safe for work:

This video shows more extensive clips from the film, too. And brother, the language would make a porn star blush. It gets really intense at 1:52:
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Samantha Bee

Originally uploaded by Thoroughly Good

I had to hustle home and meet the cable guy last Friday, which had me out and racing through the sun on Columbus Circle at about one o’clock. Whenever it’s beautiful out and I’m wearing a three-piece suit (which is often) I’m hit with two conflicting emotions:

1) Get out of the cursed sunshine before you rehydrate the last set of sweatstains you left this thing
2) My God, what have you BECOME?

So as I’m hustling between pockets of shade, fast, but not so fast as to break a sweat, I see this woman. And I just kind of stop and stare. She looks so, so familiar. I can’t figure out if I know her from college radio, or she worked at a bar I used to go to all the time in Richmond, or we’ve been in the same show before, or what. I’m running the facial recognition software in my head at a million miles an hour, but it’s not fast enough. Because she sees me staring a little, and does the polite little sidle that any smart woman in New York does when some creep is just staring at her with sweat beading up on his forehead.

Then it hits me. It’s Samantha Bee from The Daily Show.

So I went up to her and said “Hey, sorry about that. I was staring for a little there because I thought I recognized you from college somewhere, and then realized that I know your face from TV. And I actually really like your work.” I do, too.

My mom and I watch the Daily Show together whenever we can, and we laugh hard at Samantha Bee’s stuff.

She said “Oh, that’s really sweet, thanks! Hey, do you want to be in a bit for the show?”

Duh.

So there’s a chance – a slim chance – that I’ll be in a montage of man-on-the-street interviews on the Daily Show tonight.

I find that if I keep my dreams small enough, they can come true a lot more often.

**UPDATE**
I watched last night – didn’t make the cut. So it goes.

David William — also known as D.Billy here — designed this cool poster to promote our show on August 28th. He included an image I made at my desk by cramming two plastic toys into a half-eaten peach:

Share it far and wide if you like …
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This is the Jersey City Pimp:

I saw him on the PATH Train a few weeks ago. I don’t see him that often, but he’s not like, white buffalo rare. A JC Pimp sighting brings you goodluck, but it’s rapidly expended: you get the privilege of seeing him. That’s good enough. I have no idea what this guy’s name is, or what he does, or how he afoords those suits that make him look like Flavor Flav starring in a remake of “The Mask.” But he’s probably not a real pimp, like that other guy in Jersey City.

People in Jersey City try to photograph him, and they track sightings on the JC List. I saw him on the train once, wearing a floor-length faux-raccoon fur coat and a fedora covered in matching fur. I asked him if I could take his picture, and he waved me off, muttering “no pictures, no pictures.”

It’s fascinating to me, that someone could want to draw so much attention to themselves in one way — and so little in another. He’s not exactly trying to blend in.