First in a series of two essays today on Louis C.K. Next: Super-Stud in Divorceland. READ MORE

As I’ve been watching the NBA playoffs this spring, I’ve reached an unhappy milestone: I’m now old enough to dread learning the birthdates of professional athletes. READ MORE

One and only one episode of "ALF" survives in my memory: the full moon is coming and ALF, knowing that he’s about to transform into a monster, asks to be locked in a cage in the kitchen. He’s going to beg to get out, he warns the Tanners, he’ll weep and shout and make extravagant promises, but they must ignore him no matter what. READ MORE

Seven or eight years ago, when I wasn’t yet old enough to feel embarrassed about it, I saw Conor Oberst play at a bar downtown. Before he went onstage—a stage that was really just a foot-high platform with a stool—he sat drinking in a booth with some friends. Having been drinking myself, I made my way to his table, where I stood as if I were a waiter, and, realizing too late that I ought never to have come over at all, I sputtered some combination of the words love and music and so much. He gave me a much friendlier look than I deserved, signed a scrap of paper for me, and turned away, mortified on my account. READ MORE