My Fair Lazy: One Reality Television Addict's Attempt to Discover if Not Being a Dumb Ass Is the New Black, or a Culture-Up Manifesto by Jen Lancaster Page A

and Pigface, all of whom are famous for their groundbreaking work on the industrial music scene. Chris wrote a genuine life-of-an-alternative-rock-star memoir, which he read from at the event.
    Jolene had to point Chris out to me at first because I was expecting a mohawked/dreadlocked/guy-linered thrash rocker all done up in leather and skinny jeans and anarchy patches. What I didn’t expect was an affable fellow with a haircut that could pass muster at any investment bank. He was clad in a green wool sweater and regular old loose-fit jeans and looked exactly like someone you’d ping for advice about whether organic heirloom tomatoes were in season if he was shopping beside you at Whole Foods. Seeing him messed with my preconceptions—I didn’t know you could be punk rock without looking punk rock.
    I decided to ask Chris to sign a book for Fletch because he was in some of his all-time-favorite bands and Fletch has such respect for him. In fact, he credits Chris’s music for his own Renaissance. 91 Last summer, Fletch was drowning in job stress and drinking more than he should to compensate, and he wasn’t happy with his overall physical and mental state. Although he enjoyed working out, he’d yet to make it a habit. One morning, he woke up early and decided that instead of rolling over and going back to sleep, he’d get up and go to the gym. He’d put on his iPod and crank RevCo, and that would inspire him to push harder every time he hit the gym.
    Now he gets up at four a.m. almost every day to lift weights before work. His dedication to his new lifestyle is an inspiration. He’s energized, he’s happy, and he’s lost a good twenty pounds. He looks and feels better now than he did in college. Cocktails are for special occasions because otherwise they mess up his workout schedule. I’m superproud of him and I only resent him a tiny bit for not starting the summer before when I was working on Such a Pretty Fat . 92
    Anyway, when it was my turn to get the book signed, I recognized the gravity of the situation and my nervous-talking thing took hold and my mouth hip-checked my decorum into the wall.
    “Ohmigod, hi, Chris, hi!” I exclaimed, thrusting a copy of his book at him. “Can you make this out to Fletch? That’s my husband and I want this for him because he spends every morning at the gym with you! You’ve, like, totally turned his life around and he’s all healthy now because of your music, which frankly is a bit shouty for me, but that’s neither here nor there. Point is that every day at the ass crack of dawn he’s up and he’s got you on his iPod and he’s working away and . . .” And I kind of went on like this for another few minutes. I’d relay the entire conversation, but my shame at what happened next is making me blank out on the details.
    Apparently while I was busy babbling—possibly 93 spitting—at some point in my superspeedy diatribe I gave Chris the idea that Fletch was not listening to his music while huffing away all punk rock by lifting heavy iron bars but instead that his music was spurring Fletch on in spin class.
    Chris signed Fletch’s book wishing him the best of luck and to “Keep spinning.” And Chris is a rock star, so I didn’t want to correct him and tell him, “No, no, you got it wrong,” so now Fletch’s idol thinks he takes spin class and most likely walked away from our encounter wondering how the hell one spins to Pigface.
    And then—then!—I asked to get a picture together and he sweetly obliged each of the fifteen times I demanded because the shots wouldn’t save because I’d filled up my BlackBerry’s memory by taking too damn many photos of my new dining room table, which I then inadvertently admitted out loud and Jolene had to take the photo with her camera because I was really starting to make him nervous.
    To recap, Fletch’s icon believes: (a) he spins and (b) he’s married to an idiot with a predilection for fast-talking and table