The good thing about the new Depression is that I’ve been in one for the past five years, so I’m used to it. Nice to have company.

Boom times are the worst in New York. I’d still like to slug this T-shirted guy at the Cub Room in Soho back in 1999 who told me all about his Internet start-up with 200 employees.

So nice being at Mr. Chow the other night and seeing it only half-full—no rapper or Internet guys, no Julian Schnabel and “Olatz” at that table by the bar, not even a Kelly Osbourne–caliber celeb. Just a few investment bankers, a table of five fat dudes gorging in silence, and my group. Best time I ever had there.

If a plane landing on water isn’t a good excuse to have fun, I don’t know what is.

I remember being on Nantucket in ’79 and this extra man dude Fred Von Miers knocking on the door and announcing, “It is I!”

I could really use my 30s back.

 Only one word for Captain Chesley B. Sullenberger III: Stud.

The real problem with Tropic Thunder is it’s too “clever” by half. Why not just do a spoof of a Vietnam movie, period? And I resent all the hype about how Robert Downey Jr. being in blackface was a big controversy and envelope-pushing and only he could get away with it ’cause he’s one of our finest living actors. Yawn.

9

I don’t trust 95 percent of my Facebook friends. Bunch of cocksuckers.

Being born in the mid-to-late 1930s woulda been pretty sweet. The country’s prosperous by the time you’re in high school. Too young for Korea, too old for Vietnam.

I always thought a plane being able to do that was a myth, like Santa Claus. Have you seen the video of the terrorist hijackers in Ethiopia trying it? Not pretty. The evildoer dips the wing into the water and it’s, see ya plane, see ya terrorists, see ya nice people on board.

I think I whacked it to Kate Nelligan from Eye of the Needle. May have whacked to the book version, too.

 Reminds me of that warm, knowing look the Glenn Close character sends across the room in The Big Chill. Agree, agree, loathsome movie about loathsome people, but her character’s so boneable. I’ll watch it again two more times before I croak.

Before the Civil War, what was the most dangerous place in America? Scroll down for the answer.

Kansas.

15

What the hell happened to my 30s? New Year’s Eve 2000 feels like a few weeks ago. And the thing about blowing off steam at 40 is, yes, you get your balls back, but if you’re like me, you tend to overdo it and you can’t feel your genitals for three days so what’s the point in getting your balls back metaphorically? Really need to reread The Hardness Factor and stick with it. I really should have slammed on the brakes by 2006.

This is a bad symbolic day for the evildoers. Shows how badass we are: Guy landed a plane in the water right by the West Side Highway, in same flight path as those planes.

17

Trying to think if anything’s ever happened in my lifetime that everyone agreed was a miracle. 

18

There’s that nice scene in Cat People with Annette O’Toole in the pool: Big round yabbos with big red succulent nipples. Michael McKean gets to bone her.

What are the odds of an experienced pilot like this guy landing in the water like that? One out of 30 times? Hundred? Five hundred? Like how many times in a row could this guy get it right? Side note: Figure I could probably watch Office Space two, three times a year, for the rest of my life.

I’m sorry but I am thrilled and feeling patriotic about the miracle—if that’s O.K. with you. Apparently not!

21
Maybe a Brit in World War II could have done something that heroic and cool. Not now. France? Ha. Also, what timing: Five days before a new prez? We’re obviously living in God’s country. Don’t think the evildoers don’t know that. Bad day for the terrorists. Case closed.

 I was six, seven blocks away when the miracle occurred. Lots of other coincidences I won’t get into, but I’m afraid this is the closest thing to a religious experience I may ever have so I’m milking it. Unless you count the first time I did acid, at the Omega fest back in ’87. Nothing big, the usual stuff, thought I was God

23

What would have happened if he’d “landed” a few miles out in the ocean without ferries anywhere to help. Again, how did it happen? Miracle.

24

Lindsay Lohan’s so cute in Freaky Friday. Anyone watching it? Side note: Eva Mendes smiled at me last night. Not bragging, just sayin’.

25

Met her at Bungalow 8. Doesn’t really count, I know. Maybe if I talk to her next time. I was too scared. Trop belle pour moi.

He really put that on his Facebook “update” that he was on the same flight last week?

Broccoli is a very tasty vegetable. Doesn’t smell bad. When was the last time you tried it? Same year Annie Hall beat Star Wars and you cried?

But why tell everyone on Facebook? I bet if he’d been on the actual flight he’d be all over the news now, stealing the spotlight from Cap’n Sully, bumming everyone out, ruining everything. Oh wait, that’s what I’d do.

O.K., Eva was smiling in my general direction, but I think it was intended for me. This happened once with an Olsen twin. Got smiled at then second-guessed it for months because there were a lot of people around. Update: David Gergen on CNN says the miracle on the Hudson is a metaphor for Obama’s message, everyone working together or some nonsense. John King and Anderson Cooper and Soledad and him are all trying to out-nonsense each other.

I could use a pair of adult size floaties. Why not?

I might have mentioned the Lohan thing so I could work in the Eva Mendes smile at me to impress you all.

Should I start doing daily Facebook updates? Fear that my balls will fall off once and for all. 

.Is it true that Cap’n Sully won’t do the talk shows, the late-night dopes? How cool is that?

Might have been too harsh on the Facebook update guy who said he was on the flight a week ago. Really no big deal. Should I apologize to him even though he doesn’t know I bad-mouthed him real bad? Fucking Facebook.

35

Not sure that was Eva Mendes who smiled at me. Well whoever she was, she was a real super yummy knockout just like her so it still counts.

When will Hollywood have the balls to do a funny flick about an Al Qaeda–type group who just can’t get it together, Keystone Kops/Abbott & Costello/Three Stooges style? A Dumb & Dumber type comedy yet so devastating it might even inflame that region a tad for a brief spell? How many times did I have to hear that, circa 2003: Oh no, now we’re gonna make ’em mad! We’re makin ’em mad! We made ’em mad! They’re mad at us now! Very simple fact, dopes, is that they’ve hated us since before we were born and guess what, we’re winning and Dubya gets mad credit just like Reagan with the Cold War. Suck it. Bite me.

So I’m starting a new club called Friday Night with George. All my Facebook friends, you guys, and anyone else will meet me at Dusk on 24^th street from 9 p.m. to 11:45 p.m., then at midnight we’ll get into cabs on Seventh Avenue and convoy down to the Patriot on Chambers, congregate upstairs, stay there until 2:45 a.m., and that’s it. You’re free to go to Rose Bar or Beatrice. I’m still banned from Beatrice but I’m working it out with the owner, who says the ban will be lifted if I show up in a full clown suit, clown makeup, clown nose, clown shoes and so on. It looks like I’ll have to stay in the suit all night, not just for one or two drinks which was the original deal. I think this is going to be pretty humiliating. If I do it, I’ll have to make sure I “own” it, and I’m not sure I can pull it off.

Just made a deal with the fiancée: If she stops whistling all the time, I’ll stop with the smelly sounds. She pulled an Irish exit the other night at the University Club. Just up and left. Mighta had something to do with this woman asking if we’d ever had sex, because we have separate bedrooms. And so I said, “Actually, I’ve fucked her many more times than any other woman, including that one right there at the next table.” Shortly after that, fiancée left.

Face it, Robert Downey’s always playing himself and he hasn’t been good since Less Than Zero. Nope, Chaplin sucked. All right, he’s pretty good.

I don’t think Caroline Kennedy should be disqualified because she has a speech impediment or partied too much in the ’80s or whatever. I mean, I say “like” and “you know” all the time. Plus, she grew up around this stuff, it’s in her genes, she’s a Kennedy. Also she’s a woman, better than any old white male. Main thing is she’s a Democrat, her heart is in the right place. Of course we can all agree on that, right? If not, can we agree that Anne Hathaway looks like a rodent in Page Six mag? A mouse with a mouth the size of a giant grouper. 

I don’t know how one enters the young socialite sweepstakes, but I guess if you’ve got a good quality nose, cheekbones, hair, your eyes are blue, and you don’t eat a lot and your daddy pays for your $4,800 a month one-bedroom and you go to parties four nights a week minimum, but don’t overdo it with the white stuff, don’t get a reputation as “crazy” or “pushy” and don’t have much to say, no real character, but you’re “nice,” then you’re on the right track. But if you got, say, a big Aaron Neville mole on your face, then you’re out, even if you can sing.

Guess no one cares about the miracle on the Hudson anymore. It’s over. Now it’s time to focus on the inauguration (that how you spell it? Yeah, got it right) and for everything else to start sucking again.

Actually I don’t know anything about Aaron Neville except that mole.

 I remember the time I was sitting in the living room in East Hampton and the socialite woman staying with us just pulled off her bikini top and there they were—huge and gravity-defying, right in front of me, like 10 feet away, for like 23 seconds. Just stared. Thought she was trying to turn me on so I started hanging out near her room a lot.

Isn’t is great that Cap’n Sully has no interest in going on the Today show to talk to Matt Lauer? I’m hoping he keeps turning down the TV offers, would be the most radical thing anyone’s done since Jesus fed all those people with the loaves.

I once asked an old timer who was coughing on the bench next to me if he had any advice. He snarled, “Find out for yourself!”

She wasn’t trying to turn me on after all, just fixing her top.

ggurley@observer.com