10:38pm

You're at a friend's apartment on a Friday night with two or three or four other people and you've finished dinner and you're on your second bottle of wine. Someone mentions Mark's party and a few replies are muttered (you're all aware, of course, that none of you are actually going to go). You realize you're picking furiously at something you'd never usually eat (onion-flavored chips, carrot cake). A laptop surfaces, either because someone wants to pull up the profile of a dude she went on a horrific date with ("No, he's actually cute... like, short though... oh, let me just show you") or because someone wants to play a song or a YouTube video or something.

Ten minutes later, everyone is crouched around the screen as Megan clicks through a Facebook album of a college acquaintance's vacation to Bermuda. You've already seen this album, embarrassingly, but you feign shock or disgust every ten pictures or so ("Again with that black top?!" "He really does look like Jesse Eisenberg, it's so weird!"). When the album's finished, Megan opens another one ("Oooh, it looks like she's wearing a bikini in this one, guys!"). You take out your iPhone even though you know you haven't gotten any texts... and then slide it back into your pocket. Someone mentions "Moneyball" and, though you've seen it, you remain silent as Megan's boyfriend delivers his somewhat inane critique.

on pete hornberger

On Monday night I was loitering by the 14th St. ACE subway stop, on the phone with my mom, when I looked up and saw Pete Hornberger fast approaching (his real name is Scott Adsit, but obviously I'm not going to be referring to him as that). He was walking pretty briskly, with an attractive, European-looking woman trailing close behind him. I'm not exactly sure what came over me (and, let's be clear, I'm by no means a major Pete fan or anything like that), but I literally just hung up on my mom mid-sentence and followed him down into the subway.

It dawned on me as I galloped down the stairs that this was totally bizarre, almost inexplicable, behavior on my part. He was clearly in a great hurry with this girlfriend/wife/female friend and it's not like I had any great intention in mind. I was not going to stop him and whip out some "30 Rock" joke. I was not going to get up in his face with my iPhone. It was as if he was a magnet - a disheveled, marginally famous magnet - and I simply had no choice in the matter. (I guess I would have to be a magnet, too, here, for this metaphor to work.)

I got to the bottom of the stairs just in time to see Pete and Mrs. Pete unsuccessfully attempt to swipe through the turnstile. (Mrs. Pete's card didn't have enough money on it.) Pete gawkily run-shuffled toward the MetroCard machine and the madcap nature of their scramble actually did remind me of a frantic "30 Rock" hallway scene.

I was just standing there, a few yards away from them, making no attempt to hide my gawking. It struck me that I was surprisingly interested in "Scott." Did he get recognized often? Did this significant other of his proudly tell people at her salon, "Oh, you know the bald guy who works with Liz Lemon? That's my man"? Did Scott and Pete dress the same? Were they equally as ornery? Is Scott on text messaging/buddy terms with Alec Baldwin or are they merely work colleagues?

I watched as, reloaded card in hand, Pete and Mrs. Pete raced back through the turnstile and down the stairs to wait for an uptown train. I moseyed on down to wait for my downtown train and looked across the way at the departing uptown ride. They were gone. I wondered if anyone in his subway car would recognize him.

When I got back above ground, I didn't really feel compelled to text anyone about my "celeb sighting." It sort of felt like I had just been on a whale watch and caught a momentary glimpse of a dolphin or eel or something. Not that I've ever been on a whale watch: I never really understood what you were meant to do if you saw one.

my own private itunes

I am fairly certain that I have not once answered the question "What kind of music are you into?" with anything that even resembles the truth.

Usually - not that this question comes up THAT often, but, you know, it comes up - I'll just mutter something like "Oh... I dunno... all different things" or "durrrrr, you know... Adele? And, uh, I've really been into the new... Bon Iver album?"

I'm not really sure why it's music that gets me all clammy and self-conscious. I've got no problem telling people I still watch "Gossip Girl" or that I saw "What's My Number?" on my birthday (though I did shamefully refer to it as "that Anna Faris movie" in one e-mail... as if it would somehow make it less "reprehensible" if I couldn't remember the actual title? I don't know what that was about). Anyway, yeah, for some reason music just brings out this weird insecurity complex in me (and, I think, in other people, too?). There is nothing that freezes me up like being asked to "control the radio" in a car of people I don't know that well. It doesn't matter what song comes on the station, I change it after a few seconds for fear of condoning a song I shouldn't be condoning.

But ever since the advent of this new, annoying Spotify synchronization thing on Facebook - which means I now see what like 25% of my friends are listening to at all times - I've started to realize most people's music tastes are not as "cool" as I'd always imagined them to be. I suppose it's been sort of comforting in a way? Even the most self-avowed music snob people - sure, they mostly have their Werewolf Sacrifice or M&@42 going on - but they also sneak in a LMFAO or Rihanna track every now and then! It's not that I thought that these people never listened to so-called guilty pleasure tracks on occasion, but having concrete proof of it streaming through my news feed every day has been oddly satisfying.

Of course, this doesn't mean I'll be sharing my music anytime soon. And when some dude I'm talking to at a party dismissively says something like "Ugh, this, really?" when "Teenage Dream" comes on, I'm sure I'll continue to perform one of those foot-shuffle/look-at-the-ground sequences instead of responding, "Oh, this song? It's actually the fifth-most played in my iTunes."