Yes we can!
Well guys, it looks like all that hope finally paid off: “Safe Laughs,” my two-year-old article about comedy traffic school, runs in the August 31 issue of the New Yorker! On newsstands tomorrow! I still can’t believe it—I really thought I would go to the grave with the story of Mr. Traffic on my chest, like Dr. Watson with the mystery of the Giant Rat of Sumatra.
As soon as I have a bit more time I will post some of the editorial outtakes (they cut out a whole character—Mr. Traffic’s Swedenborgian foil, Dr. Driving). In the meantime, I leave you with two brand new get-rich schemes:
- Elegy Traffic School, conducted in odes
- Comedy Psychoanalysis, specializing in hysterical cases
How is it that I’m not a millionaire yet??
Tags: civic duty, hope, money, non-publications, poetry, publications, w00t!
August 27th, 2009 at 10:58 am
The New Yorker came at lunch today, and, to my surprise, another gem! The way you positioned the story was marvelous, and the wit flowed so easily into one of your wonderfully crazy takes on contemporary society. And the usual zingers — “traffic-school stardom”, “an exceedingly car-rich urban sprawl and one of the world’s largest populations of out-of-work-actors”. I can’t wait till you post the editorial ‘outtakes’ — sounds like they cut half the plot. Good go!!
August 28th, 2009 at 9:26 pm
You were “heading north from Los Angeles on I-14 …” — ahem, even this Northern Californian knows it’s SR-14. But who cares? What an enjoyable article — the mental image of the young Mr. Traffic getting to meet the Pope did it for me. And what did *your* fortune cookie say?
August 31st, 2009 at 10:20 am
thank you for the kind comments! and the clarifications about I vs SR!
unfortunately, i got one of those social-aphoristic fortunes that starts, “he who…,” at which point i immediately stopped paying attention (since it wasn’t about me).