OK, so I had plans Tuesday night to attend Bill Lobdell’s appearance at the Newport Beach library to discuss his new book, “Losing My Religion.” Basically, I was just gonna post something on it, but it turned out to be one of those crazy, super busy days that are becoming all-too-common.

Anyway, I was attempting to shovel the last of my tasks into the out basket when Mona called. She was planning to attend as well and offered to pick me up. Sounded good to me.

Why take two cars when you can go in one? That scene in “Swingers” when they all take separate cars down the street always cracked me up. It’s so California. Anyway, by the time we got there — about 10 minutes late — the room was filled to capacity and they wouldn’t let anyone else in. I told the gatekeeper I’m with the Pilot and that I had a seat reserved, but she acted like it was the gold line at Studio 54. “But I’m Andy Warhol,” I felt like saying. Like Andy would grovel, right?

Surprisingly, I just blew it off. I’ve got legendary stories I can bore you with about my insisting on admittance. There was the time a girlfriend wanted to see the band Live, which was a sold-out show, so I finagled an interview with the opening act Weezer (they had just put out their debut record). The Geffen flack put me on the list, but Geffen was pretty notorious for promising that and not following through so I asked her if there was someone I could ask for as a back-up. She told me to ask for the road manager. So, of course, my name was not on the list and this really thick woman bouncer (think Roseanne Barr, but all muscle) frowned at me like I was the Blues Brothers in that fancy restaurant scene. That incensed me so I dug in and kept arguing, looking for the road manager. My girlfriend at the time said, “Forget it, let’s just go home.” No, I told her. They did the wrong thing. They just ticked me off. Eventually, someone tipped me to go around to the side of the concert hall where the tour buses were so I caught up to Weezer’s road manager there. The band was genuinely upset that we’d missed their set and asked if we wanted to still see the rest of the show. But of course, I thought. The whole point was to see the main act anyway. But I didn’t tell them that. Let me tell you, by the way, Rivers Cuomo is about the nicest guy and he says, “Follow me.” So we did. When we got to that nasty bouncer she was about to put her hand up to stop me and Rivers says, “They’re with me.” You should have seen the look on her face. It was worth every minute of those two hours!

But I’m way too old for that nonsense now. Besides, I’ll see Bill next Tuesday at a party for his book. There’s no way I can get locked out of that — Mona’s handling the reservations!

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