I guess you should know this about me:
When I was a kid, I was obsessed with Late Night with David Letterman.
It began in the summer of 1986 when I asked my dad what was on after Johnny Carson.
It was like asking what planet came after Pluto.
The vast unknown.
My dad liked Letterman so he let me stay up to watch it.
I was eleven.
And was immediately hooked.
I watched Dave drop turkeys off of the five-story tower in New Rochelle, goof and flirt with Riquette and her international beauty secrets, make fun of GE, and banter with Paul Shaffer about how the show wasn't going very well and how cranky he was as a host.
I enjoyed the first segment comedy pieces the most.
Dumb Ads, Small Town News, Supermarket Finds, Dave's Record Collection, New Gift Items, The Super Slo-Mo Experiments.
I taped these segments every night on our then-new VCR.
When the new school year started, my parents miraculously still let me stay up to watch the show.
As long as I kept my grades up.
And so I did.
That year I dressed like David Letterman for Halloween.
I couldn't get my hair like his, but who could.
I taped pictures of Dave to my school desk.
The margins of my notes were crammed with doodles of Dave and Paul.
I wrote letters to 30 Rockefeller Plaza - Room 1410W, hoping they'd be read on Viewer Mail.
They never were.
But I swear that one of my letters was actually shown on the show.
In the fall of 1986, I mailed a letter to Late Night.
As a gag, I taped it up heavily, like a mummy.
This would get their attention, I thought.
That Thursday during Viewer Mail, Dave visited with Flunky, the Late Night Viewer Mail Clown.
Flunky was writer Jeff Martin, chain-smoking in a purple and yellow onesy and full clown make-up, pre-dating Krusty by a few years.
Dave asked Flunky how to get a letter read on the show.
Flunky suggested including a nude Polaroid.
Then he said he was looking for a letter that was easy to open.
He held up an envelope covered in tape.
"This one's all taped up. Forget it."
I was very certain that that was the letter I had sent them that week.
I could go on and on about my peculiar preteen devotion to David Letterman.
So I will.
In 1987 my Mom scored a giant Philco TV box from Fretter.
We covered it in dark brown wood grain contact paper.
This became my David Letterman desk.
I set it up in my room with two patio chairs.
I took down the curtains behind the desk.
Instead of a fake skyline of New York behind a fake set of windows, my backdrop was a real suburban townhome community behind a real window.
I kept the Late Night set in my room until one creepy night.
The phone rang.
It was a guy from Denver who said he was conducting a survey.
If I answered his questions I would get $50.
I was still eleven, and $50 sounded great.
His questions started off routine.
Age, height, weight.
Then he began asking me more personal questions.
Questions about erections.
It was weird, but I was focused on that $50.
$50 could get another set piece for my David Letterman village.
So I moved the phone call to my room.
"Who are you talking to?" my parents asked.
"It's a survey," I quipped as I galloped upstairs with dollar signs in my eyes.
I sat in the host chair overlooking the communal backyard, and continued answering questions about erections with the man from Denver.
He asked me how big my erections got.
I didn't know yet.
I hadn't started measuring.
$50.
He asked me if I played with myself.
I actually hadn't started doing that either.
I watched Late Night.
That's what I did.
He asked me to put my thumb in my mouth and talk.
So I tried that out.
$50, $50.
It felt weird.
He wanted me to talk some more.
I took my thumb out of my mouth and talked like it was still in there.
"Wha' 'bou' da fiffy dowwuhs?" I asked.
My dad picked up the downstairs phone.
"Who are you talking to?" he demanded.
The man from "Denver" hung up.
There would be no $50.
I felt beyond stupid.
My parents raced upstairs to find me sitting ashamed in my David Letterman chair.
They immediately hung the curtains back up.
I kept telling them it was for $50.
I felt beyond stupid.
There was nothing else that could be done.
I don't remember who was the guest or what the comedy segment was that night on Late Night.
I felt beyond stupid.
Hmm.
I'd rather not end on that humiliating and admittedly uncomfortable read.
So let's keep going.
I wasn't going to let some successful pedophile ruin my Late Night fun.
So a few weeks later, I moved the Letterman set down to our unfinished basement.
It was roomier there, like a real set.
My friend Matt had a video camera.
On institute days we made our own Letterman shows.
I was Dave.
Matt was an off-camera Paul and played our guest Marv Albert.
We shot suction cup darts at the camera.
We made a confetti cannon using a blow dryer and a poster tube.
We threw things out of his second story bedroom window.
Inspired by the Sky-Cam, Thrill-Cam and Monkey-Cam, we created the Skate-Cam, Bike-Cam, Oven-Cam, Record Player-Cam (which went up to 78), Fridge-Cam, and the gross and misguided Spit-Cam.
I will say, this is probably one of the happiest times in my life.
Soon I would be 12.
And then 13.
And then it would all be over.
I don't know if it's cool to watch an old grainy VHS tape of Kamarr the Discount Magician when I'm 35 and unemployed.
But at least nobody got orally auto-raped over the phone.
That I know of.
Here's some more Letterman fun:
Verdict: Win
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