Long ago, when I first started the project, I asked my friends from far and wide to help me come up with ideas of new things to do. The less mature amongst them submitted the predictable pitches, most of which involved me fellating some celebrity figure or another. But an old friend, Therese Perkins, submitted something I found to be actually fairly intriguing. She suggested this:

Do your own rendition of the song “singin’ in the rain”. I’m talking, swirling umbrella, dancing on light poles, splashing through puddles…the works.

As I was leaving the Rite-Aid this evening, wondering what I was going to do, these words flashed in my mind. Because this particular Rite-Aid is almost across the street from the Department of Public Lighting, and so has a row of dozens of light poles, of varying design, in its parking lot. And because it happened to be pouring. And because I hadn’t done my new thing today.

So rite-aid bag in hand, I went to the lightposts, and swung around on them, singing, “I’m singing in the rain! I’m singing in the rain! What a glorious feeling, I’m happy again!” Not knowing any more of the song, I repeated this verse three or four times.

It wasn’t, honestly, a glorious feeling, and I wasn’t happy again. I was wet. And I’m sorry, Therese, I didn’t do my homework so I didn’t splash in any puddles or even have an umbrella with me. And I thought it might be a tad embarassing, but in a downpour, everybody is face-down, running to their cars, so i don’t think anybody else in that parking lot even noticed me.

So thanks, Therese. I’m pretty sure you suggested this just so you could imagine me, cranky in a downpour, swinging around light posts. I’m happy to make your dream come true.

My stepfather was in the Air Force, so I was a kid who moved around a lot; I never really stayed in any one place for more than a few years. So I never really had many life-long friends - I’d hang out with some people for a little bit and then one of us would move on. Sometimes I wonder what happened to those people. Some of them, like my high school buddy, Jules Pitt, are un-google-able, since he shares his name with a character in a Quentin Tarantino film. Others, like my middle-school friend Tian from when I lived in Belgium, just seemed to be nowhere to be found.

But that was before Facebook! Somehow Tian tracked me down, and today I was happy to have my all new thing be to connect with somebody I hadn’t talked to in literally half a lifetime. It’s weird to know the same dude who you nervously gossipped about girls with is now married with two kids. Weirder still that his two younger brothers, who would constantly annoy us, are also married. And here I am, single and 32, winding down some project where I keep trying new things.

It’s great to be back in touch with Tian, with whom I wrote (but not recorded) my first rap song, just a few days after I recorded my hip hop debut. Before I learned to stop worrying and love Da Bomb, Tian and I wrote a song together. called “The No Rap Rap” which, paradoxically, was a rap about how much we didn’t like rap. I was 14 at the time, but i can still remember the line, “I’m out front, Tian’s behind, his hot keyboard will blow your mind.” I was a real poet.

I may not be grown-up enough to have a wife and kids, or even grown up enough to stop goofing around with hip hop songs and trapeze lessons and blogs. But I’m old enough to recognize the value of reconnecting with a friend, so (to quote another hip-hop great) today has been a good day.

Today I did an all new thing by accident - I spent the day without my cell phone.

I remember in the 90s, watching dudes walk around with their cell phones that looked like huge lego bricks with antennae attached. I would scoff at them, and say, those douches! They are so douchey! What is up with those douches, anyway? Why are they so douchey?

Then, I became one. Now, for a day, I left my iPhone at home. It felt oddly unsettling - not unlike the dream where you realize you have forgotten to wear pants. I kept patting my pants pocket to find it empty. I kept wondering who was trying to reach me. I imagined Ed MacMahon hanging up a phone somewhere, saying, “We can’t give this guy the publishers clearing house million. Let’s move on to the next name on the list.” Then he’d say, “Heyo!” because every time I imagine Ed MacMahon he says “Heyo!” It happens often.

In the end, it wasn’t so bad. I did get in an argument with a friend, who was shocked and worried that she couldn’t reach me immediately. And there were messages waiting for me that I wouldn’t let myself check until midnight, which caused me no undue amount of stress. But somehow, our caveman ancestors made it without a cell phone. As did our founding fathers and the leaders of our civil rights movement. Even a young guy named Opus, in 1997, wandered the big world without a cell phone. If that handsome young devil can make it, so can I.

Voting, yesterday, was a surprisingly emotional experience for me. For somebody who’s almost professionally detached, who makes his money making fun of the the system, I sometimes forget that the process is really empowering. We don’t run the elections in this country with anything even approaching fairness or evenness, and yet, it’s still a pretty amazing process.

Watching the election results roll in on Wolf Blitzer’s Big Room of Technology was an enthralling experience for me, and in some ways I’m glad a clear decision wasn’t made on either side - this means more and more voters will get a chance to weight in. But knowing the campaign would continue on, I made my All New Thing today to donate money to a candidate. I don’t like the fact that running for president requires a huge amount of money, but one candidate has been getting that money not from political action committees but from individual donors. Considering how unusual that is, I decided to donate myself.

I’m not gonna get all Oprah or Chuck Norris on you by telling you who to vote for, but goddamn it, if you don’t vote I’m gonna come to your house and give you a roundhouse to the neck. For America.

Today’s new thing was actually a new thing for a friend of mine: Grant. Grant is a devil-may-care sort of guy, always quick with a ribald joke, and often can be found singing a tune or two from the Drive By Truckers or 70s era Elton John - whether you like it or not. But he’s also unusually shy at times - for example, when it comes to Karaoke. I’ve been out with him a few times, and he just shrugs and waves away the microphone when you try to get him to partake. Which is why I’m happy to have had my new thing be convince Grant Wheeler to sing Karaoke. At our friend Ben’s birthday at a private room in Koreatown, plied by my pleading, and many alcoholic beverages, Grant finally took the mic and rocked out.

Today, I got up on the wrong side of the bed.

I mean this quite literally; I made a point of waking up and getting out on the opposite side of the bed than I normally do. The side I normally get up on faces my bathroom, where I go and pee and start my day. The side I do not get up on faces my windows and is covered with half-read books. I got up and stubbed my toe on Zadie Smiths’ On Beauty.

To be honest, I thought it would be a simple New Thing to do. And it was. But there was something quite… off all day. I don’t know it was psychosomatic, or some sort of bad hoodoo caused by a disruption in the bed/time continuum, but I wandered through my day at work like the victim of some very localized gas leak. Even now, as I type, I feel like my fingers are on the wrong keys, even though it’s very clear they’re not.

Only one thing to do in a situation like this. Get back in bed and try again tomorrow, on the right side. Let’s hope it works.

–opus

As you may know from reading back, I’ve been on a bit of an agent search to find somebody new to represent me for my writing skills on television and beyond. I needed somebody with the clarity, vision, and bravery to take 10% of my paycheck, and I’m happy to say that today I finally found those people. After talking to many different Big Fancy Agencies, I decided to sign with Paradigm as my all new thing. It may not mean a lot to the people who read this site, but hopefully, it’ll mean a lot to my future.

This was actually a tough one for me - yesterday apple released the new software for iPhone, and I, being a card-carrying nerd of the 7th degree, could not wait to download and install it. But I had already done my Taco Tuesday, and so I had to save this New Thing. To be honest, I only lasted until slightly past midnight.

My friend Rich had been inviting me to his game night for ages, but for various reasons (mostly All New Year related) I always had to decline. But today I wanted something nice, easy, and fun, and since I hadn’t been before, a game party was just perfect. And yes, it may not be fun to read about, but it was fun to go to.

My mother got me what is probably the most extravagant purchase for Christmas - a 400 Disc DVD changer. 400 discs? Yup. I don’t have that many discs, but if I did have that many discs, I could accompany them all in this behemoth. It’s actaully really great - I can put what I’ve got in the machine and put the boxes in the closet and clear up some much-needed shelf space for my overflowing book collection.

So today I spent the day loading discs into this new DVD player and then typing in their information so I could find them at a future date. Exciting! After yesterdays pin-poking, I needed something a little chill.