Last night was the first live chat for my sitcom writers mailing list and we went kinda late. I started the list with Dan, a fellow sitcom aspirant, about two months ago and it's taken off like a rocket. We have upwards of 100 members now, some of them actual industry professionals. I'm rather proud of it. At one point last night I put my arm around Dan, indicated the 20 or 30 people we'd brought together, and said, "Look, Dan. Our children."

The list is quite a success, and so is my Sitcom Format 101 web page. Between the two of them I've got the Internet market cornered for sitcom writing information. You might say I'm a success in all things sitcom...except being hired to write them. Damn it.

Who attended the chat? I saw Ray, Mysti, Tracie, John, Curtis, MJ, Lisa, Ron, Flo... I feel like the woman from Romper Room (who, incidentally, I thought was a pretty hot babe when I was a wee lad) with the Magic Mirror. Let's just say there were a lot of people there. We met at Jerry's Famous Deli in Studio City, a restaurant that desperately wants to be a New York style deli, but is a little too California and not enough Brooklyn to make the jump. They're listed on the stock exchange, fer Chrissakes. The only thing they have at all in common with a real deli is their inflated prices, and theirs are inflated to the blow-out point. I had a bagel with lox, cream cheese and onion with a cream soda -- it cost me $15. Ridiculous. Oops. I just remembered I had a cup of coffee too. I probably didn't kick in enough for the check; I should have dropped a twenty. Jerry's isn't Katz's, but it made a good meeting place, so what the hell.

I told Beth to expect me home by 10:00, but that tick of the clock came and went with me parked in a booth, gabbing my head off. I met some nice people, did some networking, and generally enjoyed being in the company of a couple dozen people inflicted with the same brand of insanity I suffer from. At 11:30 I finally announced that I was leaving, and I was actually on the road at about midnight. Then, when I got home I was too tired to bang my head against the keyboard to entertain you -- but not too tired to fire up the Dish of the Gods and surf that for a couple of hours. I finally got to sleep around 3:00.