Almond describes the entire painful-for-him, laughfest-for-us disaster in vivid, itchy detail.
Like many of us, Almond has a love-hate relationship with celebrities. He opens his collection with a series of letters to Oprah Winfrey, the first of which pre-emptively rejects her potential selection of "(Not That You Asked)" for her book club. After speaking with his publisher, and considering that Oprah's selection could make him obscenely wealthy, Almond follows up with a letter of apology, telling Oprah that his previous letter "was my way of rejecting you before you could reject me. Pretty third-grade on my part." After eight more increasingly groveling missives to his "homegirl" Oprah, all unanswered, Almond has one final ploy: "it occurred to me last night, in the midst of re-reading 'The Gospel According to Oprah,' that a gesture of trust was needed to seal the bond between us. So here she is. . ." Almond ships Oprah his infant daughter.
Almond will do almost anything for attention, and his willingness to explore this fact is among his most endearing, laugh-inducing qualities. He's contacted by a VH1 reality show called "Totally Obsessed" that wants to film his obsession with candy (he wrote a book called "Candyfreak"). A film crew arrives, taking over Almond's apartment and micromanaging his entire existence: "the most effective way to take over a country was not to bomb them at all," writes Almond, "but to send reality TV crews." He follows every instruction of the show's producer like a trained monkey, even speaking erotically to candy bars on cue, but when she demands that he "roll around in candy," Almond refuses. Later, he faces the ultimate indignity when his segment gets axed.
