A couple of years back, I spent an afternoon being interviewed and photographed for the back page of Time Out New York magazine (where they run a regular interview feature). It was only after I’d taken time away from my work and obligations and all this was over that they informed me that oh, by the way, we were only doing this as a standby, filler in case something else falls through at some point. Which, had it been explained to me beforehand, would have been reason enough for me to decline the whole thing — my time may not be valuable to magazines looking for filler, but it is extraordinarily precious to me.
It never ran, of course — an interview with me about current events has a limited shelf life, and 9/11 kind of knocked it right off the shelf entirely.
So, hey Time Out New York…you guys kind of owe me one. And I’m trying to promote a book here, and not just any damn book, a career-to-date retrospective. So whaddya say we settle the debt…?