My childhood memories of the library are warm and dear images of a younger me checking out “Choose Your Own Adventure” books by the armload and trying desperately to unravel the Dewey decimal system. In hopes to return to this similar state of nostalgic euphoria, I went to the library on 136th Street to get a card. I’d soon have an endless cache of media at my disposal.

I walked in, found the front desk, and slapped down my Virginia driver’s license and an old Netflix envelope as proof of address. “I believe this is sufficient documentation,” I said with an eager grin. It wasn’t until this moment that I took a look at the woman behind the desk. Had I taken stock of her sooner, I probably would’ve reevaluated my happy-go-lucky approach.

She was tall. Monster tall. And muscular. She had a look about her that said she was not only able to eat a human being, but that she had done so in the past. Her shirt was long-sleeved, I presume, to cover up prison tattoos. And she didn’t smile the entire time, probably to conceal her fangs.

“It’s not as easy as that to get a card here, Mr. Love,” she said. I don’t remember exactly how I replied, but my lip trembled and I imagined her tearing off my arm and slapping me in the face with it.

The process that followed was outrageous. There was the standard address form to fill out, of course. Piece of cake. But everything after that just seemed, well, unnecessary.

She swabbed my mouth with cotton for a DNA sample. She made me hold my breath for two full minutes underwater. She made me do jumping jacks while several trained gorillas whipped me with cats-o’-nine-tails. Then I had to wrestle a midget and pin him to the ground (not an easy proposition after being abused my man’s closest genetic relative). The midget was a dirty fighter, so I now have a nice dental impression on my leg where he bit me. I’m no expert, but it looks like he’s got an overbite.

After the blood test was complete and my fingerprints had been taken, after faxing my credit report to the library’s main branch and saying the alphabet backwards while hopping on a bed of hot coals on one foot, she produced a small box the size of a deck of cards. The gorillas traded their whips for violins and started playing sweet, sweet music.

“Get down on one knee,” she said. I knelt, no questions. I didn’t want to see what else she had up her sleeve.

She opened the box. A beam of light shot out of it and illuminated a majestic armada of doves circling inside the library. The doves turned into horses and galloped out the door and down 136th Street. It was so beautiful I almost forgot about my massive blood loss from being whipped. She reached into the box and retrieved the fruits of my labors - a New York City public library card.

The next time I want to reread To Kill a Mockingbird, I’ll probably just go to Barnes and Noble.

Mike looks out over the city that betrayed him.

Today went by smoothly and I was in an incredibly positive mood that stuck with me after work, even in the checkout line at the bookstore.

“Do you have your Borders Rewards Card, sir?”

“You bet your ass I do!”

It wasn’t all grins and exclamatories, however. Today we had to bid farewell to Mike, an intern who started here the same time that I did. You see, Mike made the mistake of graduating last semester. As such, he was unable to receive any sort of school credit for his internship, disqualifying him from working here. The situation came to a head today, and he had to leave.

Let this be a lesson to everyone. Stay in school.

from: Dylan Love
to: Loudoun County Information Technology <dit@loudoun.gov>
date: Tue, Sep 2, 2008 at 10:26 PM
subject: quick question

Dear Loudoun County IT:

Seriously?

-Dylan Love
www.thedylanlove.com

John brought it to my attention that my website has been deemed unfit for consumption by the Loudoun County Department of Information Technology, all while Broad Run High School features me on their website as a “successful alumnus.”

I was confused at first, but then I remembered that this site is full of HOT AMATEUR writing, INCREDIBLE GIRL-ON-GIRL dialogue, and ways to INSTANTLY INCREASE THE SIZE OF MY ego.

Who can blame them?

The first order of business this afternoon was to head to 72nd and Broadway to a tasty little hangout called Gray’s Papaya. It’s a quirky and unconventional place that specializes in fruit juices and hot dogs. Their “recession special” costs $3.50 and it’ll get you two hot dogs and any kind of juice you can imagine. As you might suspect, I have a special place in my heart for this fine, fine establishment.

But hot dogs and fruit juice? Call me weird if you disagree, but the two don’t conventionally go hand in hand. I can imagine a place that sells hot dogs and hamburgers. I can imagine a place that sells fruit juices and organic produce items. But before visiting Gray’s Papaya, I had never seen hot dogs and papaya juice mentioned in the same sentence before. It’s like a place that sells eye patches and car batteries.

My friend Mike, ex-Letterman intern extraordinaire turned mailroom superhero, was having a combination housewarming and Labor Day party today. He had just recently moved to Brooklyn, so I grabbed the L Train to DeKalb and wandered around until his address grabbed me and shook me by my collar. “Here, you dummy! HERE!” it shouted.

Inside I was pleased to meet another fine soul named Dylan, one of Mike’s friends from Minnesota. We immediately had to determine who would be Dylan #1 and Dylan #2.

HIM: How old are you?

ME: I’m a 22-year old Dylan.

HIM: Well, I’m a 26-year old Dylan.

ME: Tell me, Older Dylan, does it get any easier?

Not only do we share the same first name, but both our middle names are Thomas.

He lives just two blocks away from me in the city.

I asked him the first instrument he ever learned to play. He started piano at age six. So did I.

I asked him his parents’ names. His mom is Darcy. Mine is Debbie. They…sound similar.

He asked me about siblings. I told him I have a younger sister. “I’ve got a younger brother,” he said, slightly disappointed. “But he’s very effeminate.”

There were plenty more of these tiny and wild coincidences. Oh yeah, we’re both tall, funny, and incredibly attractive.

It’s gotten to the point now where I have some administrative things to do this weekend. General upkeep and the like. The two big glaring items on my list were to do my laundry and to get my hair cut. Operating on the assumption that I can only accomplish one meaningful thing per day, I had to choose between the two this morning. Which would it be? Would I lug a heavy bag of smelly clothes down the street to the laundromat? Or would I take a subway to Midtown to sit in a comfy chair while wearing a goofy smock and have someone pamper my hair?

There were six people running the barber shop, all of them from the same Russian family. Only one spoke English, the eldest daughter, so she was running around translating for everyone.

(Note to self: learn how to say “Oh my God! You cut off my ear!” in Russian.)

Fellow intern Ben and I were soon off to see Sonic Youth play in Brooklyn. There was a problem to be solved beforehand - we had no tickets. I hopped on Craigslist and had it taken care of in ten minutes. I’m an internet champ.

We were meeting two different people before the show to buy their extra tickets. We met the first guy at a bar near the concert. The exchange was over and done with in 30 seconds.

I called the next person we were to meet for a ticket and her beautiful Australian-accented “Hello?” nearly knocked me off my feet. She was waiting for us right outside the show. We were still a decent ten minutes away, so we hurried right up. Pretty Australian girls shouldn’t have to wait on scrawny white boys. Once we got the ticket from her I thought about asking her on a date to Outback Steakhouse but thought better of it.

Ben and I walked through security where we were felt up by big scary men much stronger than both of us. There we were - McCarren Park Pool, a huge bombed-out swimming pool that has since been adapted into a music venue. It was quite a sight. Four million hip kids standing on the floor of an empty pool, swaying to the rhythmic feedback of Sonic Youth. Kim Gordon danced like a loony on stage while Thurston Moore gave his guitar a supreme punishing. It was intense.

They played two encores before I went home tired and pleased, both with the music as well as my snappy Russian haircut.

The summer in between my sophomore and junior year of high school, I bought The Best of Triumph the Insult Comic Dog on DVD. I didn’t know it at the time, but it would end up being a fairly important purchase. Tracing a line backwards through my life, that DVD is probably what really got me interested in jokes.

I can even narrow it down more specifically than that. There’s a moment on the DVD when Triumph is interviewing people waiting in line for the premiere of Star Wars: Attack of the Clones. After bashing all the “nerds” and “dorks,” he interviewed a guy who was dressed as Darth Vader, asking him about the elaborate set of colored buttons on his chest. It went something like this:

Triumph: “What does this button do?”

Darth Vader: “It controls the oxygen flow to my mask.”

Triumph: “And which one of these buttons calls your mom to come pick you up?”

This stuck with me for a long time. I recognized the ability and incredible talent required to create a moment like that one. Whoever voiced Triumph was, to me, comedy’s equivalent of a heavyweight boxing champion. This faceless jokester just had a little help from a foul-mouthed cigar-smoking puppet.

Still enamored with the seemingly effortless hilarity of Triumph, I dug around and found out that he is voiced by Robert Smigel. Ever since then, I’ve always kept my ear to the ground for whatever he’s worked on, and it’s usually great. He’s definitely a guy I credit with piquing my interest in comedy so long ago.

I met him today.

Things are coming right along and progress is being made. No more do I agonize over missing my subway stop - I know exactly which one it is. No more do I worry about having to call someone by name before I know it - I’ve learned nearly every name. And no more do I dread using the bathroom - I’ve found the most private one in all of Rockefeller Center.

I’ve never been the kind of guy to give the cold shoulder to anyone, but it happened yesterday. By accident, I swear. I was running around passing out some scripts. My eyes were down at the list of names of people meant to receive them, and my head was all over the place trying to remember if the makeup room is across from wardrobe, next to the sound effects booth, or on a different floor entirely.

While I’m poring over my list of names, I see a large freakish blur strolls past me out of the corner of my eye. I simultaneously hear something that might kind of sound like, “Hey, how’s it going?” but it also might be the combined din of the people in the hallway. I decide to ignore it. As I turn around, I see the back of an impossibly tall person.

“Is that a human or a large talking bird?” I thought.

The giant turns his head back towards me. It’s Conan. At this point it all sinks in - he had walked by, said, “Hey, how’s it going?” and walked on while I completely ignored him.

I started thinking about my options. He’s far down the hall from me at this point, and still walking away. Do I shout at the necessary volume, “Fine. How about you?” Or do I run after him, tap him on the shoulder while he’s walking, and say it?

He disappeared around the corner before I had a plan. I had just given him the cold shoulder, and I’m sure it completely ruined his day.

It felt like the first day of school. There I was, the youthful idealist, ready to get my hands dirty with another experience in unpaid employment.

The guy I work immediately under is named Todd. He explained how he came to work there: “I was working for Food Network at the time doing awful production assistant stuff, like taking out the trash. The HR guys here called me up to offer me a job, so I kicked over my trashcan and accepted.”

The work consists of a lot of photocopying. I’m proud to say that I’m something of a Zen photocopy master after my time at the Late Show. The photocopier there was full of demons and evil. This new one has its quirks, but it’s nothing I can’t unravel. I’m the Xerox Whisperer.

During a more major paper jam, I reached my delicate pianist’s fingers into the hollow depths of the machine to extract a problematic piece of paper.

“Look at that!” I exclaimed. “I’ve got some nimble fingers! I’d do great in a sweat shop.”

One of the more senior members of the staff overheard my comment. “You’re new here, aren’t you? What makes you think this isn’t a sweat shop?”

Once the photocopies are done, they need to be distributed, so I spent a good part of my day lost in the labyrinthian spaces surrounding the studio, ferrying scripts from person to person.

We sat in the studio during rehearsal. The air was a familiar temperature (freezing) while the man himself came out to deliver some jokes. I remembered the words I had shared with Todd beforehand:

“What do I do during rehearsal?” I asked.

“Just sit and listen to the jokes.”

“And laugh at what I think is funny?”

“No. Laugh at everything.”

My lunch was a hefty smattering of Chinese food. High quantity, low cost. Another intern sat next to me and munched happily on a single Fig Newton.

“Looks like a rather wholesome meal there,” I said.

“Well, I had a pretzel, too.”

We sit in the control room during the show, simply as an extra set of hands to do whatever needs doing. Everyone answers the phone by saying the name of the studio, so I heard the following several dozen times:

(phone rings, someone picks it up)

“6-A?”

I kept laughing to myself because every now and then it sounded like someone answered the phone by saying “SEX-AY!”

I’ll count this first working day as a success. I didn’t set anything on fire and I didn’t kill anyone accidentally (or on purpose).