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John Hodgman
Monday, October 30 · 7:00 pm
BookPeople
600 North Lamar, Austin

The "SXSW Tech Book Tour: InterAct with Authors" is an ongoing series that focuses on new, technology-related titles relevant to the digital creatives who attend SXSW Interactive. The next installment of the SXSW Tech Book Tour features "The Area of My Expertise" by "Daily Show" correspondent John Hodgman.

Be sure to attend the October 30 reading to see the always-witty Hodgman live and in person. Need more incentive? One lucky person attending this reading will win a FREE registration to the 2007 SXSW Interactive Festival -- a value of $350. Photo by Elizabeth Conn.

Mash Note to John Hodgman
by Lya Guerra, SXSW Staff

A crush has many functions. Or, let's say two. Like traveling to a foreign place, a crush can extract you from the familiar. It gives you the objectivity of distance which, in turn, can allow you to see many things about yourself. I'll refer to this as the good side of a crush. The second function, or the bad side, is to yield a sustainable harvest of self-doubt. In other words, one function turns you onto or into yourself while the second function gently turns you against yourself. At least, that's the case if you're me. Show me about me, then make me doubt me, and I'm yours.

John Hodgman has done just that.

[More:]

I first heard his voice in early 2001, before I broke it off with my boyfriend and moved from the gorgeous and unforgiving Arizona desert to the bubble of sweetness that is Austin, Texas, before this country and the world were irrevocably changed. It was afternoon and I was in my bedroom listening to the radio. I had been a frequent listener of This American Life and could do a killer imitation of Ira Glass, but that day I heard a new voice. A slow, sober, deliberate voice. Not a voice that originated from a grinning mouth or smiling face, not even a glint in the eye. No, this voice conveyed insight and truth with the seriousness of a stone statue, a very smart stone statue.

Like many public radio devotees, I'm an avid listener because I don't watch TV and I'm a slow reader. Word on the street is that John Hodgman has become somewhat of household persona as of late. Currently he's been seen on Comedy Central's The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and he's in some amusing commercials for Apple. I haven't seen them. I could Google his image or dig up said commercials online, but my infatuation is pure, and based in words, his words, and the feeling that his words are true.

The piece I heard that day was Invisible Man V. Hawkman, and it was one of the most funny and sad radio essays I've ever heard. By posing the "fun" and seemingly innocuous question, "which power would you rather have, the power of invisibility or that of flight," to various friends and strangers, Hodgman takes you into the fun, past the fun, and into the land of human frailty. He reveals our dreams and fears and hopes and hopelessness, which of course is the reveal behind anything funny. But it's a curtain so few seem to be able to pull so effectively, with wit and reverberation. And because I'm one part admirer to two parts narcissist, I fall for those who can show me the creases in my own fabric. So my crush with the stranger John Hodgman began.

This feeling was catapulted forward again this weekend when I heard an interview with Mr. Hodgman on an NPR show, at which time he said that his only reason for posing that question of flight versus invisibility to so many was only to see if they knew the correct answer, which for me is the more regrettable choice of invisibility. Making me unsure of his initial intention and my own desire to fly, my crush was only heightened.

His book, The Areas of My Expertise, has also recently stirred all these emotions yet again. Through careful and perhaps obsessive examination, his book has shown me I have even more in common with Rasputin than previously thought, as we are/were both cat people. I have learned that the style of snowball I used as a little girl had an actual name, "the come-back-here" and is described as such: "a snowball that is tethered to a thin leather strap or string so that it may be retrieved and used again." Though with this knowledge, comes the fear of backlash against so many children who employ the leather and ice combo to survive the journey to and from school.

Of course, the self discoveries this book offers are taut with the kind of nuanced complexities that spark internal confusion and angst which make any infatuation worthwhile. An instance of this is Hodgman's take on the nature of the squirrel, and the nature of the squirrel in relation to the human, and what that nature means to the future of this country. I am truly grateful to this sober sage for the warning in regards to the looming specter of the American Black Squirrel and the peril they may have in store. But I'm not at all sure if he's being completely forthcoming, or if he's employing a kind of reverse psychology, as it is widely known that the appearance of the black squirrel on this continent has been known for some time to mark the return of the ancient and holy black squirrel known as Bunbuku. Perhaps he's trying to elevate hope and perseverance through tried and true scare tactics. Either way, he's got me thinking.

As for the areas of my own expertise, which range from my uncanny knack for knowing the relative ripeness of exotic fruits to being able to decipher egg shell white from off-white on any painted interior, crushes on uniquely intelligent and talented strangers is by far my strong suit. With that in mind, I ask you to rely on my finely honed skills and squirrel-like intuition, and check out both John Hodgman and his very important book.

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