I’m often referred to by friends as the “Trainer to the Stars.” I’m not quite sure what that means. I’m not sure how it started, but I’m guessing it started from what we call here in L.A. “Star Fuckers.” They’re people who hang on to celebrities. The general feeling I get is, if you say you’re a “Trainer to the Stars” enough, people might believe it. There’s a story going around L.A. about a guy who wanted to get laid. He figured out that when he mentioned to women he was a waiter, they would flee as fast as they could. So to get himself some, he started calling himself a “producer.” He called himself a producer so much, he ended up becoming a producer. I guess you can take that story for what it’s worth. I don’t know the truth. This is a crazy town, and anything is possible. But I digress. I bring this up because the fact of the matter is I do work with celebrities. Oddly enough, the ones who are not celebrities are also in the business. They’re mainly producers, directors and writers. This morning I was training a client who has one of the biggest television editing companies in L.A. Beside being a good client of mine, he and his wife are also my best friends. To put it simply, when I found out I had cancer, they knew about it before my parents knew. This morning while training Bill, he was bragging about this show that his company edits. He said it’s become a big hit on NBC. It’s called “The Sing Off.” I said it must be new since I hadn’t heard of it. Bill told me it’s been on for two seasons, and it’s the hottest show in its time slot for many years. Bill played a bit of the show. It looked like an episode of Glee, minus Jane Lynch. It was rolled into an American Idol type format. I told you that to tell you this. When I was a kid, I could tell you everything on television, on what night and what time. Like most American kids in the 70s and 80s, nighttime television was the end all and be all. Some of my favorites were “All in the Family,” “Happy Days,” “Dallas” and even the NFL showcase game “Monday Night Football.” I told you that to tell you this. The only time my television comes on nowadays is when I’m sitting on my spinner putting in a couple hours. Sometimes it doesn’t even happen then. If I can download a book on to my iPod, that becomes my spinning entertainment. The question becomes, “What are we doing instead?” Well, from what I can tell just from talking to people, we’re doing something less healthy…spending time on the computer. If you’re reading this, you’re guilty. But please, by all means, don’t stop reading. The fact is we’ve taken one bad habit and changed it to one that’s worse. Why? At least with television, we generally watch with other people. Using the computer is a solo sport. We now have less communication.
