How Did I Make the 2009 Hot Blogger Calendar? I Had the Audacity to Dream.

Back in 1987, when my friend Jeb Brack and I shared a dorm room at Duke, we'd spend many a late night talking about our future...when not working on our cinematic masterpiece Carl, about a teddy bear that accidentally gets accepted to college, joins a fraternity, goes on a drinking binge resulting in campus-wide mayhem only to eventually flunk out, find out that since he isn't technically alive he can't kill himself and ultimately runs away to Madagascar to pretend to be a ringtailed lemur (oddly enough, the film never got past the planning stages).

One night--perhaps around 3 AM--when we were each lying in our separate beds, having quoted as many Bosom Buddies episodes as possible (this was before The Simpsons, which no doubt would have comprised the entirety of our conversations), I mentioned a long-held, cherished dream of mine.

CES: One day, Jeb....maybe not tomorrow but one day...I'm going to appear in a Hot Blogger Calendar.
JEB: What's a "blogger"?
CES: That's someone who in the future will write a blog.
JEB: What's a "blog"?
CES: I think it will be like a journal or diary, only there will be no lock or special hiding place and every person in the world will have access to your every thought every minute of the day.
JEB: Dear God, why would anyone want to expose themselves like that?
CES: I think in the future the importance of privacy will lag far behind the need for a sense of community.
JEB: So everyone will be blabbing about everything all the time?! Where on earth is THAT going to happen?!?
CES: I think on the Internet.
JEB: You mean Usenet?
CES: No, it's more like a web of devices that connect to provide information over numerous lines of some sort.
JEB: Ohhhhhhh, you mean like that new-fangled "fax machine" we've been hearing rumors about.
CES: I guess, but instead of reading it off of a piece of paper you read it off a screen.
JEB: Television or movie?
CES: Not sure. I think maybe one of those Dick Tracy two-way wrist communicators.
JEB: And are you going to keep a...what do you call it...a "vlog"?
CES: Blog. "Vlog" doesn't make any sense. Yeah, I think so, At first I'll write something almost every day. Then every so often. Then I'll go several weeks without writing anything due to a prolonged illness and instead I'll just put up videos of my future girlfriend pretending to be the female candidate for Vice-President of the United States.
JEB: You're going to date someone who looks like Geraldine Ferraro?!?
CES: No, I mean--
JEB: Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, yeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaahhhhhh....
CES: Uh, Jeb, you all--
JEB: Oh, that's it. THAT'S IT!

At this point I realized Jeb was no longer interested in my odd ramblings and had gone back to making out with the foreign exchange student he slept with on and off junior year.

But all that late-night dreaming and prognosticating has finally paid off as yours truly is now Mr. January in the 2009 Hot Blogger Calendar! Yes, now you can start next year off right with me, staring right back at you with my trademark smoldering "I can't smile on camera or make true eye contact" gaze.

Now to be completely honest, I wasn't initially scheduled to appear in the calendar. After a hotly contested Internet poll I actually came in #13, meaning I was initially out of the running (there being only 12 months and all). But when Wil Wheaton--yes, that Wil Wheaton--was unable to participate I was called in to fill his spot.

That's right--I'm now second in command to Wesley Crusher.

Actually, I was very happy Wil failed to make it because the shoot was great fun, made even more so by the calendar's two creators Jane Porricelli and Sarah Morgan. I can't show you me strutting my stuff--such as my stuff is--as Mr. January (that's for paying customers and my girlfriend when I owe her money) but I can share a photo of me that although didn't make the inside does appear on the calendar's hot, hot, hot cover:



Plus, you can find plenty of more behind-the-scenes photos of the calendar shoot at both Jane's and Sarah's Flickr sets. And if getting to start 2009 with me isn't enough of a lure, did I mention that Josh--Mr. Comics Curmudgeon himself--appears in his boxers? Yeah, now I can hear your wallets opening.

If you want to buy a calendar (there is both an all-men's and all-women's version), then purchase your copy here today! Jane and Sarah are great people and it would be ever so swell if they made a little profit in addition to all the memories they made for us. Plus, Sarah said I look like a "pretty, pretty princess" so how can you pass that up?

The 2009 Hot Blogger Calender--Get Yours Today!