In person, Fabolous looks much younger than he is. What can I tell you? I have a quirky fascination with rappers, especially the ones who've been shot.

Fab has all that, plus a pesky rumor that he had something to do with stealing a Lamborghini (it wasn't in the parking lot; I looked) and, juiciest of all, that they had recently confiscated five hundred pounds of marijuana from his tour bus.

Who does that? Who rides around in America with five hundred pounds of weed in their car? I mean besides Paula Deen. Fab said he didn't have anything to do with all that. Wasn't even in the tour bus, which was, no surprise here, coming back from the NBA All-Star Game. He's a good boy. OK, not really.

I mean you don't get shot up outside a nice Manhattan restaurant unless something's up. You can only play that wrong place/wrong time card so many times.

Looking at Fab sleeping so peacefully, he looked like a child, not a bad-boy East Coast gangsta rapper who uses exceedingly naughty words on occasion. For effect, of course. See, when people like me and Fab cuss, it's art. Are we clear on that now?

I was wondering how to ask the now dead-asleep Fab for his autograph or perhaps if he would pose for a cell phone picture with me, but I knew better. Even though they were completely distracted with making perfect swirlies of b.u.t.ter and syrup on top of their pancakes, Fab's bodyguards were big agile guys who would happily snap my arm like a Frito if I put a camera in his face. No doubt.

As I was ruminating on all this, a production a.s.sistant stuck her head in the green room and told me it was time for my segment. Which, since you ask, went a lot better than the orangutan one. The host was perky, smart, and had actually read my book, which almost never happens. Meanwhile, I was hoping that Fab and Co. were watching on the monitor in the green room and thinking that I might not be a complete loser. As the interview was winding down, I started to ask the host if I could "give a shout-out to my homeboy Fabolous waiting in the green room," but thought that might be a bit much.

I tried to hang around for a while afterward, but my driver was antsy to get to the next stop. And although I was being driven in a pretty sweet Lexus SUV, it just wasn't the same as having a bad-boy entourage of forward-facing Escalades.

"I want bodyguards and an entourage like Fabolous!" I pouted to the driver that morning.

"Who?" he asked. Oh, gawd. Could he be any more white and middle-aged male?

"Duhhhhh. The guy with all the cars back there. And the entourage. I mean, no offense, but all I got is you."

"So what's so bad about me?"

"Nothing, really," I said, sounding churlish even to my own ears. "But let's just say that I don't think Fabolous ever has to ride around with a hundred pounds of dog food in the back seat."

From the studio, we headed to a breakfast place, since the cruller was long gone, having been sweated away with the excitement of seeing a celebrity.

I picked at my Greek omelet and home fries and felt a little better thinking about how Fab's entourage wasn't eating anything nearly as nice as I was, so maybe things weren't so dreary after all.

So, in honor of Fabolous, who has no idea I am even alive, much less in awe of sorta meeting him, I have written a rap song.

ODE TO FABOLOUS ...

I saw U in the A.M.

It was sorta surreal

Hangin' with your homeboys

d.a.m.n! They love a fast-food meal

CHORUS.

You say your pops was lousy

The dude walked out on you

If I could bust him in the jaw

I'd do it, yeah, it's true

Yeah, I rock the Talbotwear

Boucle jacket look so hot

Judge not this book from cover, though

You don't know me from squat

I'm old enough to be your moms

But that don't mean I'm dead

Cuz cool is ageless, word it is

And smarts is in your head

CHORUS.

You say your pops was lousy

The dude walked out on you

If I could bust him in the jaw

That's just what I'd do.

Copyright 2010 Talbot's Pet.i.te Gun Party Records.

10.

Loonies Litter Landscape of (snicker) The Learning Channel Octomom's all over the TV again, and y'all have no idea how hard I've tried to avoid screaming, "You crazy b.i.t.c.h!" out loud every single time I see her give an interview.

The pups are a year old as I write this, bless their tiny, still-developing hearts. I wish them lives of sunshine and rainbows and unlimited really good-quality ice cream, not the gummy cheap stuff, because, let's face it, that nutty broodmare of a mama they got is likely to try again.

I know, I know. It's none of our business if she wants to keep that clown car of a uterus of hers on go. Right you are. So why does she make me crazy?

Hmmmmm. OK, I got it! It's because she's still yakking about becoming a counselor.

OK, she's got fourteen kids, no job, and no husband, but she's going to counsel others? This is like getting relationship advice from Chris Brown; in other words, a colossally bad idea.

Could it only have been a year ago that we were introduced to Miz Thang and her sad family? Remember how her daddy crowed that a job had just opened up for him in Iraq so he wouldn't be around to help out?

I feel ya, dude. You have to be pretty desperate to flee sunny California for Iraq voluntarily. But I'm guessing he'd eat sand-and-mustard sandwiches for months rather than hang out in that loony bin.

And poor Octomom's mother is probably not far behind her husband. She's probably browsing the help-wanted ads in the Kabul Penny Saver right about now.

Remember, she said she was "upset" when she learned that there were eight buns in the oven and they'd all be living with her in a three-bedroom house.

Upset?

No. Upset is when you do that thing where you're brushing your teeth and all of a sudden the brush goes up your nostril for no good reason. This is, well, bigger than upset.

Truth is, I struggle with this whole subject a little because it's tacky to poke fun at people who are, and I will use the clinical psychiatric term here, crazier'n a sprayed roach. It's the same way I feel guilty looking at those "People of Walmart" photos that you see on the Internet. It's not cool to make fun of pitiful people. You really think anyone who wasn't bats.h.i.t crazy would walk out of the house in a camouflage mankini and a Confederate flag ball cap to go buy some new furnace filters? No, he's cray-cray.

The only joy I got out of Octomom's weird saga was how much it probably p.i.s.sed off Kate Gosselin. Don't you know she was freaking out about the possibility that Octoloon was going to inherit her show?

("At least Jon and I were married. I mean, excuse my language, but criminy!") TLC loves freaky-big families. Low TV moment of the TLC week: When Jim Bob Duggar, daddy of nineteen and counting, advised his young bridegroom son that "s.e.x is a lot like Legos." I was hoping his bride-to-be would get wind of that and run like her clothes were on fire but, no. Like Legos? What does that even mean?

So while I'm uncomfortable snickering at people photographed while looking tacky at Walmart, I'm fine with berating those who set themselves up for publicity.