My Boring-Ass Life (Revised Edition): The Uncomfortably Candid Diary of Kevin Smith (41 page)

So I call the doctor’s office and set up an appointment for the day after the birthday. With thirty-five looming, it’s probably a good idea to start taking better care of myself.

I do some online work for a while, then fall asleep watching TiVo (or, “the ‘Vo”, as we affectionately call it in our house).

Tuesday 2 August 2005 @ 10:28 p.m.

The Birthday. Thirty-five. At least halfway to the grave. More than likely? More than halfway. Today is the last year that I can count myself part of the cherished key demographic of eighteen to thirty-five year-old males. From here on in, statistically, and as far as marketing goes, nobody will care about my opinion.

I’m woken up by the Quinnster who drags me out of bed, to be greeted by a massive birthday hug and kiss from Jenny. The pair of them plant a homemade paper crown on my head and pull me upstairs, where an awesome family breakfast awaits, courtesy of Jen, Harley, Gail, Byron, Mewes and Jimmy. We’ve got Italian sausages and biscuits, three birthday cakes that spell out “Dad”, milk, OJ, eggs — the works. But before I’m allowed to feed, the group insists I open the gifts that are littered around the table.

Byron and Gail give me four new chairs for the poker table.

Jimmy writes me a poem about Harley.

Mewes and the absent Chay give me a new shooter (jersey).

Harley gives me a homemade card, as well as two massive, custom-framed gorgeous pieces of watercolor she did while in Arts Umbrella Camp back in Vancouver: one depicting the Vancouver skyline, the other depicting a guitar.

Jen gives me a shitload of History Channel/Biography DVDs, which I’ve found myself more interested in than watching movies, lately. She also gives me two new pillows and a bronze sculpture of a heart with wings that we immediately put on the mantle in our bedroom. She also tells me there’s one more present, which we have to pick up tonight, around six, nearby.

We all chow down then dig into the cake, chit-chatting for a while before moving to the pool area to smoke out on the deck.

Downstairs, I find more gifts. From my brother: a
Mad
compilation (I was a massive
Mad
fan as a kid), an art of
Star Wars
book, and a gift certificate waiting for me at Laser Blazer. From my mom: a $200 gift certificate for the iTunes store. From Judy and my cousin Johnny (aka, Cohee Lundin): a big box of Kobe Beef steaks. From Ming (also born on 2 August): another iTunes gift certificate, as well as one to Whole Foods.

I push all the booty from the bed and lay down to check email while Schwalbach rocks her laptop on the couch. I’ve got an appointment for a pedicure (my feet are looking pretty ragged) and a facial at noon, and as it’s 11:45 a.m., there’s not much time for the sex Schwalbach has so generously offered on this fine birthday morning. Uncharacteristically, I say I’ll settle for a blowjob instead, and the wife obliges, making me cum in under four minutes. I shower and head out to my spa appointments.

Afterwards, I come home and lay down on the bed, rocking some Ultimate Bet while digging into some of the History Channel/Biography DVDs. Around six, Jen tells me to get dressed so we can pick up the big birthday gift.

We get in the Hate Tank and head down the hill. Jen explains that the gift was made by a fan who was giving her a discount if I came in to take a picture with him when she picked it up. We pull into the Hollywood and Highland complex and park downstairs. I’m trying to figure out what in this place she could have possibly gotten me.

We cross the complex, passing store after store, and I’m no closer to figuring it out. As we reach the staircase that leads to the Highland side, I start thinking: “Are we going to Lucky Strike?” Lucky Strike is the high-end bowling alley I’ve never been too, nestled within the Hollywood and Highland mall. As if hearing my unspoken query, Jen offers, “I had a bowling ball made for you.”

I register surprise, but inside, I’m thinking, “Good Christ — seven years together, and this woman still never knows what to get me. A bowling ball? Outside of Canadian six pin, when was the last time her and I ever went bowling?”

As my mind’s racing to figure out what kind of bowling ball Jen would have had custom-made for me, we enter Lucky Strike, where I spy Malcolm, nursing a beer. Then, I see Mos. Then Mewes. Then Bryan and Harley. And suddenly, it’s all clear...

That sweet-ass wife of mine — the one who’d already gone above and beyond with the Birthday Blowjob — is throwing me a Surprise Birthday Party.

In attendance: me, Jen, Harley, Byron, Gail, Jimmy, Mewes, Mos, Chay, Cookie, Malcolm, Cubby, Bry, Lynch, Andre, Trish, Catherine, John Gordon, Lisa and Greg and little baby Sky, Phil Benson, Donald, Joey, and McGuiness.

We bowl, drink, eat, and smoke for two hours, before it’s time to go, as Lucky Strike doesn’t allow little kids in after seven.

We take the party up to the house, where ten of us gather round the bar and start a Hold ’em game, while Mos, Bry, Joey and the recently arrived Zack shoot pool. At first I’m on fire, tripling up my buy-in. But slowly, as the night progresses, I donk out of everything, including the twenty bucks in chips Jen gives me. My problem in poker (as in eating): I don’t know when to simply walk away.

Everyone clears out by midnight, and Jen and I retire to the bedroom, where we fall asleep watching TiVo’ed
Simpsons
. It was an excellent way to cross into midlife.

Wednesday 3 August 2005 @ 10:29 p.m.

I wake up, shit and shower, then check email for a bit before heading over to Burbank.

I get to Next Wave and bury myself in the editing room with Mike and JM Kenny to cut some time out of
Evening With Kevin Smith 2: Evening Harder
, so we can make it an even four hours instead of the four and change it stands at now. The only real casualty is the long-ass
Degrassi
story, which will still be on the Toronto disc, as an Easter Egg, rather than in the body of the Q&A. Mike’s done an excellent job in putting the cut together, so there’s very little fat to trim. While we cut, I order some corned beef hash and egg whites from Jerry’s, as well as pizza bread sticks. As this is the final day of eating for a while, I’m gonna enjoy this shit.

Col/TriStar Home Video’s Mike Stradford comes by as I’m leaving, and we bullshit about the San Diego Con, the DVD, and other stuff.

Mike was the brainchild behind
Evening With Kevin Smith
. Back when I was in LA getting ready to shoot
Strike Back
, I did a Q&A gig at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences — about the closest I’ll ever get to the Oscar stage. Mike, who I’d met while doing the
Dogma
DVD, attended and after the show, asked me if I ever thought about taping one of these gigs to put out as a video release. The chat steamrolled from there into Col/TriStar putting up a modest budget (around $200,000) to shoot me speaking at five college gigs I’d had lined-up, post-
Strike Back
. The DVD was conceived as the first in a series of directors doing Q&As that Col/TriStar was gonna do, but apparently few directors are spotlight whores like me, so they never did another one.
Evening With
sold so well, though, that Mike got another one greenlit and, rather than do it on the college circuit again, we decided to make
Evening Harder
an international affair: shooting a pair of Q&As I did in Toronto and London.

I say g’bye to Mike, then head over to the doctor’s office, for my Optifast appointment.

I fill out all the paperwork, then sit down with my counselor, Leslie, to discuss the program. Since I’ve been through it already, the consultation is pretty quick, bringing us to the part of the process where they go over all my medical particulars. First, there’s a body-fat test, in which electrical pulses are sent through your body, gauging how much of you is lean and how much is fat. I’m expecting a ninety-eight percent fat reading, but it turns out to be thirty-eight percent, which the doctor feels is encouraging, as it means there’s muscle under all that flab. The target body fat percentage we’re now going for is seventeen percent.

The next test is for Metabolic Rate — how many calories I burn in a day, completely at rest (i.e. without exercise). You stick a tube in your mouth and breath into it normally for five minutes, and a machine calculates the estimates. My measured resting metabolic rate is 3,038 calories a day (almost 600 less than the caloric makeup of a pound — roughly 3,600, I’m told). The average resting metabolic rate for someone my age, sex, height and weight is 2,690, so the doctor’s happy, as I’m burning calories (doing absolutely nothing, mind you) thirteen percent faster than the average.

That’s all the positive stuff. I’ve been saving this next piece of data for the dramatic effect...

The weigh-in: when the scale comes to rest on a number, it’s 319.

Yes, I know. Good fucking God is right. However, if there was any silver lining to that cloud it’s that I was almost sure I was up to 350. Small consolation, I know, but it kept me from sticking a gun in my mouth at the time.

So, armed with enough shake mix for the next two weeks, my mission is clear: drop the pounds, lest they have to open a wall to get me out of my house in the near future.

I realize sharing this info positions me for nothing but ridicule from the portion of the online community that doesn’t like me to begin with, but I figure if I’m gonna get serious about dropping the weight, it’s best to just put all this on Front Street, as they say — haters be damned. I weigh 319 pounds. In six months from now, I intend to weigh far less than that (my goal is 230 to 250).

I head back to the house and pick up Jen, filling her in on the info (minus the actual weight number). I drop her off at the Mondrian Hotel, where her friend Dana is celebrating a birthday at the restaurant Asia de Cuba, then head down to Pico to hit Laser Blazer.

I pick up the new DVDs, then try to kill some time while I wait to pick up Jen. I figure since I’m already tipping the scales, and since my eating habits change drastically in the a.m., I might as well enjoy myself tonight. And enjoying myself means I hit Baskin Robbins for a scoop of peanut butter and chocolate on a sugar cone.

I shoot back up to Asia de Cuba, pick up Jen, and then we head out for the last restaurant meal we’ll share in a while. We decide to make it good and roll up on The Ivy, where they always hook me up, with or without a reservation. It’s pretty packed for 9:30 p.m., but the host jumps us in front of a bunch of people (tipping insanely well has its privileges), and we gorge — Jen on lobster pasta, and me on the Gumbo Ya-Ya and a bowl of spaghetti.

We head home, get into our woobs, and lounge in bed for awhile, before
flirting ourselves into an uncharacteristic round of late-night fucking, during which I even further uncharacteristically take the top — an almost dangerous proposition, considering the weight info I now know.

Post-nookie, we watch a TiVo’ed
Law & Order
to which we fall asleep.

Thursday 4 August 2005 @ 10:31 p.m.

I wake up, shit while playing Tetris, then head to the office fridge for the first shake of the day. It goes down smooth; tastes good, even. Ask me if I feel the same way in two months.

I do online stuff most of the day then chill with Jen ‘til it’s time to hit the airport. Chay drops Mewes and I off, and we check in, bound for Chicago for the
Wizard
World comicon.

During the flight, I watch not only
Gray’s Anatomy
and half of
X-Men 2
, but also the dude next to me eat his in-flight meal. I wanna dry-gulch him and take his bread, but practice civil restraint instead.

We land at O’Hare around 11 p.m., then take the five-minute drive to the Hyatt in Rosemont, where the convention takes place. We find Bry and Malcolm already checked into the two floor suite that’ll be our home ‘til Sunday and bullshit with them for a while. Then, Bryan and Malcolm go to bed, and Mewes and I launch Ultimate Bet and play Sit & Gos ‘til five in the morning.

I head up to my bedroom and order a wake-up call for seven o’clock, then grab two hours of sleep.

Friday 5 August 2005 @ 10:31 p.m.

I wake up at 7 a.m., shower, and with two hours of sleep under my belt, I head over to Mancow radio show with Bry, to promote the
Wizard
Con.

I do the show from 8 a.m. ‘til 10:30 a.m., alongside Sam ‘Flash Gordon’ Jones, Catherine ‘Daisy Duke’ Bach, Gareb ‘
Wizard
Publisher’ Shamus, and the voice of Space Ghost. I’ve been on Mancow probably five times (four in the studio) and always enjoy it. He’s a funny guy, and what’s more, he’s a huge
Mallrats
fan.

We shoot back to the hotel, where Bryan heads over to work the Graphitti/Stash West booth on the Con floor, and I go back to sleep.

Wake up around three to Malcolm’s call, telling me Gail needs to talk to me about changing my flights around. I call Gail, go over the flights to Jersey on Sunday, and ask to talk to Jen, only to learn she’s out shopping with Harley. With two hours to kill before I have to do anything at the Con, I jump onto Ultimate Bet and sign up for a Sit & Go tournament at a table for ten. I’m chip leader for a while, but ultimately come in second.

I head downstairs, where I find Mewes watching
Unleashed
. He passes on heading back to the Con, asking me to call him when it’s time for the post-show poker tournament.

By the elevators, I run into my man Mike Oeming, the artist on the
Bluntman and Chronic
graphic novel. We chit-chat for a minute or two before I head over to the Con, where I meet up with Malcolm and head to the Marvel Knights panel. At Axel’s behest, I pop in to announce the completion of
Spidey/Black Cat
, make some jokes, then head over to the Secret Stash West/Graphitti Designs booth, where I talk to Bry, Malcolm, Chappy and Gina. I tag a ton of merch at the booth until the Con folks shut the hall down for the night.

From there, I head to the big room at the Con for the
Wizard
Fan Awards, where I present Best Ongoing Series. Afterwards, I walk back to the hotel to chill with Bry, Malcolm, and Mewes for an hour, before we head over to Morton’s Steak House to pop in on the Marvel dinner.