I read, not ten minutes ago, that Craig Ferguson, CraigyFerg, the man who's sidekicks have been Geoff Peterson, a gay skeleton, and a pantomime horse named Secretariat,
announced last night that he was retiring from his show.
The world has turned inside out.
I write at night. I write when the boy has gone to bed, and I usually stay up until 3 or 4 a.m., writing the four books (one finished, one mostly finished, third barely begun, last might just be a few explanatory lines that explain why the rest of the book would be blank pages due to reasons that, well, would be explained by those few explanatory lines) I have been working on for the past year.
If I wasn't too deep into my books, at 12:37 a.m. I would click on CBS, and find out what Mr. Ferguson had decided, as he does every night, what was in "It's a great day for America, everybody!"
I know he said he will not be leaving until December of this year, which is a fur piece down the road, in order for his crew to line up new work, but jinkies. No more "Tweets and Eeeeemails!" and the completely nutso intro's the tweets and emails were given.
No more Geoff Peterson doing his dead on imitation of Arnold Schwarzenegger (or anyone else, for that matter), and cracking up at something Ferg said, or did, and shaking his right arm (only recently given a left arm!) at Ferg.
No more Secretariat prancing and dancing (on the BRAND NEW STAGE SET that CBS gave Ferg less than a year ago) with the two ladies who used to be make-up artists (they might still be, who knows) who would costume themselves in everything from slinky, body-hugging dresses to Swiss Milk Maid outfits, complete with lederhosen, and do whatever the horse did.
No more Sec and Craig doing those whacky twisty moves from 50's and 60's dancing styles.
No more Ferg laughing so hard at something he thought, or said, or overheard, or read on the tweet or email printout or an errant quark he saw whiz past his eyes that only he could see, putting his head down on his desk and literally shaking with that laughter, and laughing along with him for no particular reason, but your gut hurt like you'd done endless crunches.
No more ripping up the blue info cards (about the celebrity he was about to interview) into shreds and tossing them into the non-existent wind.
No more tossing candy to his audience. No more little, put-upon man in headphones (the stage manager, I suppose), shaking his head at Craig's foul mouth (which was always covered by the flag of some nation, and the language covered up by an "Ooh la la!" or "Crikey!" or "Oy Gevalt!" or "Nada, senor!" or whatever it took to make the profanity legal on the FAA controlled airways.
He's been doing this job for nine years. I can't blame him for wanting to roll up the studio floor and saunter off to do something different.
But I can miss him. I'll miss you, CraigyFerg. I never sent an email, I never sent a tweet (I don't know how to tweet) but you made me laugh laugh laugh, and once or twice things happened in these United States that you talked about, with no audience in attendance, that made me cry.
I know you're going, but please, don't go too far. A comic you once knew said he never talked about "Wages and Ages"; I had an uncle who said, "Go away slowly, but come back quickly." Neither statement is remotely related, but I don't give an Ooh la la.
Sigh.