An evening with The Oatmeal

Saturday night I made my way for the first time to Changing Hands Bookstore in Tempe to check out Matthew Inman, a.k.a. The Oatmeal. Mathew was in town to promote his new book 5 Very Good Reasons to Punch a Dolphin in the Mouth (and Other Useful Guides) and meet some very enthusiastic fans. I've been of fan of his work for quite some time, thanks to a friend of mine who forwarded me one of his comics How Twilight Works (contains colorful language).

If you love irreverent humor about Canadians, farts, Pterodactyls, the occasional Twilight bashing (sorry Twilight fans), or if you are not easily offended, you might love The Oatmeal. I know I do. 

Matthew started the night out by giving a brief but humorous presentation about how he got into the business of comics, and might I add: he's easy on the eyes.

Aside from being adorable, he is a web designer and online marketer who was becoming increasingly frustrated working for "the man" instead of himself. He started a dating website called Mingle2, which he eventually sold to another dating website. Initially while promoting Mingle2, Matthew ended up creating a series of funny and absurd questionnaires, as well as ZombieHarmony-a dating site for zombies. Both were used as creative ways to get people to the Mingle2 site. He mentioned an interesting fact: ZombieHarmony got more page views than eEHarmony! Check it out, it's hilarious!

The quizzes, fake dating sites and his proficiency with Adobe Fireworks led him to create the outrageously funny Oatmeal site, to which, I am an unabashedly proud subscriber. 

I've only ever been to one book signing in my life (Barbara Kingsolver-The Poisonwood Bible), so I get nervous when  I meet someone I have been a fan of; someone seemingly "famous". 

I nervously texted my friend Cindy as I got closer in line, wondering "what the heck do I say to this guy?" "You are AWESOME" sounds a bit juvenile, and I didn't want to embarrass myself and come off as a squeely 13-year old (and there were a couple of 13-year old-ish girls ahead of me who proclaimed to the Oat that he was "cool beans"). Should I say something sarcastic? Ask him what he reads? Impress him with my quick wit and sense of humor? Ask him a question he has been asked 123332243 times before? So here is how my actual conversation went: 


Me: Hi there!
Oatmeal: Hi how are you?
Me: Ha..ha! GREAT! [handing him my books] This one's for me and I have one for my friend Cindy who couldn't make it tonight.
Oatmeal: [silently scribing his name and ours into said books]
Me: So...how do you like Tempe?
Oatmeal: I love it actually, I love the sunshine. I went running this morning and was amazed by now nice it is. Do you guys just live in sunshine all the time? Does it ever rain here?


GASP! He asked ME a question. 


Me: [inane rambling] Yeah, but only in the summer time and it gets humid and only rains for like 10 minutes and then it stops and sometimes it does in the winter....but if you come back in the summer it is HOTTER THAN HELL.
Oatmeal: I bet it is miserable! [handing me books back]
Me: Uh...okay, uh....COOL! THANKS! [big goofy smile]


I left after that riveting conversation....ABOUT THE WEATHER. Sigh.....oh well. It went better than the time I met Los Lobos and all I could think of to say to David Hidalgo (who is, by the way, BRILLIANT, a LITERAL POET) was...(queue the crickets)...NOTHING. Or the time I meet Big Head Todd and the Monsters after a show in Reno and proclaimed.."YOU GUYS ARE SO AWESOME, I HAVE ALL OF YOUR ALBUMS!!"


Can't wait to redeem myself for the next book signing/band meeting!