David Sedaris ★ Steven Barclay Agency

Rob and I went to see one of our favorite authors, David Sedaris, in Santa Barbara on Saturday. I had bought the tickets for a performance by David Sedaris and Sarah Vowell as a Christmas present. I'd been searching for tickets to see David Sedaris for some time because I just love his readings on This American Life, so this seemed as though it would be a really fun thing for us to share. Rob and I rarely plan events for ourselves, so we were both pretty excited about this night out.

We had a blast.

We went to dinner at our favorite restaurant in Santa Barbara, The Paradise Cafe, which has the best hamburger around. It's oak grilled and you can get it medium and it's juicy and fantastic. I had a burger and Rob had a porterhouse steak. We made fun of the rich people -- well made fun of and envied them. There was the requisite perfectly groomed older woman whose hunched-over frailty was in direct contrast to her smooth, flawless face.

Plastic surgery in real life tends to look weird. The surgeons have it down so that there's nothing wrong with what you're seeing, but somehow up front and personal there's something jarring about a face that's seen a lot of surgery. It's too plastic, waxy and not quite real. I guess they call it plastic surgery for a reason.

There was the lady dressed in a thousand shades of green with green sunglasses. We named her The Riddler. It ended up she was going to the David Sedaris thing too and we spotted her taking her seat. I'm always taken aback by the money that's evident in Santa Barbara. I grew up around enough rich people to be able to spot the signs. Truly rich people don't tend to be all gaudy and gauche. They are understated. Their clothes look almost too casual and sloppy. But if you look closely, the haircuts are expensive and the accessories are for the rich only.

We finished our meal, which was leisurely because we got there with plenty of time and headed to the theater. The Arlington Theatre in Santa Barbara is built to resemble a Spanish courtyard, complete with adobe building fronts and a fake starry sky with painted trees. This was a good thing because it's also huge and you couldn't see the speakers. I mean you could see them all teeney up at the mike, but you couldn't make out facial features or anything.

David Sedaris started first by doing a really sarcastic piece on honesty in his stories. This is in response to an article by Alex Heard in The New Republic, an expose that reveals that Sedaris may sometimes exaggerate for comic effect. The article was roundly ridiculed by many in the literary world, including the Web site Gawker. They cite the example of Sedaris claiming he was sent to speech therapy because he was gay when, in fact, it was because he had a lisp. As it was pointed out by commentators, lisp = gay in South Carolina and in the 1950s.

Of course, something like this is way too much of a gimme for the satirist, who probably wrote Heard a thank you note, and if he hasn't he should. Sedaris' piece on honesty in his works was inspired. He ended up pondering why he should be called to task when such lies and prevarications -- like, say, weapons of mass destruction and imminent threats to the U.S., lies that have resulted in untold deaths -- are treated as "typos."

I had a great time, well, except for a couple of little things. Like the fact that my seat SUCKED and Rob wouldn't switch with me. The guy next to me had atomic breath. It was so bad it hit me like a supernuclear blast every time he laughed. This is a good way to establish a Pavlovian response. Every time Sedaris or Vowell -- who is also great -- would say something funny, I would cringe -- waiting for the wall of stink to envelop me. It was the kind of stink where you take your fingers to your nose and smell, a la Molly Shannon, to block out the other smell.

I kept trying to scootch away, but I couldn't see the stage below because there was a girl smack dab in my line of sight and she couldn't sit still. She'd go right, so I'd go left, so she'd shift left, so I'd go right and she'd go right, ad naseum. I was going to smack her. It's not as though there was much to see -- literary readings aren't exactly visual feasts -- but I at least wanted the option. No one was sitting in front of Rob, but he wouldn't switch. I probably shouldn't have told him about the bad breath.

Sedaris did some new material from early this year. It was pretty good, not as good as his lie riff, but it was good. Sarah Vowell likes to do satiric history humor. That sounds a lot more esoteric and nonfunny than it is. But she's good. She's got a real knack for the comic pop, so her bit about a cartographer from the 1800s who was hysterically unimpressed by the pioneering explorations he was undertaking, was really funny.

They did questions and answers but the venue was too big and it was awkward. We could have stayed for the book signing and meeting of the author after, but there were a ton of people there and Rob and I aren't stand in line for a rote meeting and signature kinds of people.

I always wonder why we don't do more of this kind of thing when we have so much fun every time we go out. Oh yeah, I forgot. We're lazy.