"You're sitting in Barbra Streisand's seat," said the limo driver.

I was on my way to LAX to fly back to New York after a whirlwind day and a half out west. Needless to say I nearly smacked my head against the roof of the car, I was so excited. But more on that later.

I'd come to LA to present a field piece for The Tonight Show. The piece was a look at preparations for the Democratic National Convention in Denver. I wore a stunning blue jacket from Paul Stuart. Blue for the Democrats. In September I'll be presenting a similar piece about preparations for the RNC and I'll be wearing the same linen jacket in red. (I have still another model in yellow which I'll wear if I end up doing a piece on an Independent candidate.) Below is the full piece. It's a little grainy here. (For a clearer, but shortened version, click here instead):

I love doing The Tonight Show. The writer/producer with whom I work, Anthony Caleca, is hysterically funny and a great guy. And the legend himself, Jay, is animated by his love of performing. (Rarer than you may think among comics.) Jay is happy, hardworking and good to the people who work for him. He gives me presents – and I like presents.

My only complaint is the heinous Hilton hotel I'm put up in, in Universal City. Hiltons are usually nice but this one is, quite simply, a house of horrors...Entering the lobby one is immediately assaulted by the weapons-grade stench of the permanent all-you-can seafood buffet. The first time I stayed there I actually partook of a few king crab legs. I soon paid the price, vomiting hot blood everywhere. (On my last trip I saw Dan Rather in the lobby. Even he, a man whose immunity system was fortified through exposure to Agent Orange while covering the Vietnam War, looked queasy.) It's a miserable place and should be burned to the ground.

**

After my Tonight Show appearance, I went to Tom Green's house to tape his soon-to-be-huge web show, Tom Green Live. (You can check out the interview here.)

I have always been a fan of Tom Green's. I met him fleetingly backstage at The Daily Show in 1999. Not long before, he'd burst on the scene – his brand of humor outrageously funny but never cruel. Chatting with him then he struck me as startlingly modest for someone so famous for crossing so many boundaries.

Tom is once again ahead of the curve, unafraid to try something new. His show is broadcast live every night at 8pm ET, then archived. But as opposed to "innovative" programs like The Nightly News (simulcast on the web – gee whiz!) or the overhyped and overrated CNN/YouTube debate, Tom's show really uses wireless technology: Callers appeared via Skype and webcams, interacting with us live and unfiltered. It's a massive juggling act for Tom (and Victor, his one technician) since people were also calling in by phone and emailing questions. All the while Tom was playing clips pulled from the web - and playing the consummate host.

The show is funny and oddball. But the big surprise is how intimate it is. Even sweet at times, though never syrupy. Three boys (brothers?) "skyped" from what looked like their bedroom in Pittsburgh to ask me about the work I've done in radio. One girl from Baltimore wanted advice on what to study in college. A lovely wan girl from Australia had nothing to say, just wanted to talk. She was utterly charming.

The best late night talk shows have always been intimate, of course. Insomniacs kept awake by the flicker of Tom Snyder interviewing Ayn Rand, couples choked up over Johnny Carson's heart-to-heart with a dying Michael Landon. The best hosts aren't just in our living rooms; they're in our beds. (Okay that sounds weird. It's a "family bed." No sex.)

And the web is the most intimate medium. It's where we find out we're not alone. It's where we share our secrets. In a word, it's perfect for a talk show. So rather than playing the ugly stepsister to television, it turns out it's more suited to the intimacy we crave from talk shows!

Another plus: In this era of torturously over-prepared talk show guests (think Teri Hatcher telling some "zany" story about driving on the 405 to Jimmy Kimmel), Tom's show bucks convention and conducts no pre-interviews. Just as we didn't know what the girl from Australia would say, Tom didn't know what I was going to say during our hour together. (FYI – Most late-night show bookers grill their guests harder than suspects at GITMO on what they're going to say on camera, thereby sucking any bit of spontaneity from the actual interviews.) Tom's interviews have pauses, false starts, even some dead ends. Thank God!

Bravo, Tom. Your quirky, funny, techno-savvy talk show also turns out to be the most human.

P.S. Tom has a Ms. Pac-Man machine in his house. I love Ms. Pac-Man. That she actually outdid her husband in terms of entertainment (Pac-Man was her husband, right? Or was he her father?) is seldom mentioned. This of course was no mean feat. If Hillary Clinton were shrewder she'd market herself as the Ms. Pac-Man candidate, the message being, "If you liked my husband, you'll like me even more."

**

Which takes me back to Streisand and my drive to LAX.

I have long loved Streisand. To dislike her for her politics, her pushiness, or for her bad judgment (um, The Mirror Has Two Faces) is to ignore a very simple fact: God sings through her. There's no point debating this. (Yes, occasionally God sings like Loretta Lynn and Waylon Jennings.)



Above: The Streisand seat, where moments before I sat. Next to it you can see my blue linen Paul Stuart jacket, worn last night on The Tonight Show. My foot is in the foreground.

The driver, whose identify I will protect, had nothing but nice things to say about her. (He's driven her many times.) But he did tell me one thing which I must share with the world:

On one drive to the airport, two assistants and her husband James Brolin in tow, Streisand had a request for the other three: how about a sing-a-long? Right then and there, in the back of the limo, the four proceeded to sing. And what did they sing?

Oh I'd like to be an Oscar Mayer Wiener
That is what I truly want to be ...

Fans of Streisand's know – or think they know – that she never sings in private. Well obviously that's not entirely true!

On hearing this news, I went into a reverie, imagining the scene. The song proceeds slowly, sweet as honey, through the end of the first chorus:

Cause if I were an Oscar Mayer Wiener
Everyone would be in love with me...

Then comes the final chorus as Streisand breaks free, her glorious voice swelling:

Oh I'm glad I'm not an Oscar Mayer Wie-nah.
That is what I'd never want to be...

At this point the other three passengers have dropped back, singing simple oohs and aahs. (I'm not paying a nickel to hear James Brolin sing about wieners.)

Then on cue the limo's sunroof slides open. (In the fantasy it's not a limo. It's a Wienermobile... with a sunroof.)


Above: In my fantasy, Streisand bestrides the Wienermobile.

Streisand stands up through it (a la the end of Don't Rain on My Parade when she's on that tugboat in New York's Harbor), arms stretched out over Airport Blvd., for the big finish:

Cause if I were an Oscar Mayer Weeeiii ... Naaaaahhhh...
There would ... soon ... be ... nothing ... left ... of ... MEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!

For everyone waiting to check their bags curbside, it's a revelatory moment, as Streisand aboard her Wienermobile arrives on that final breathtaking note. Airport security is so mesmerized, they don't even ask her to remove her shoes as she's whisked through the metal detectors on to her plane.

Okay, thanks for letting me get that out of my system.

(Oh, and before anyone asks, Streisand would never sing the Oscar Mayer B-O-L-O-G-N-A number. That's much more suited to an Ella scat.)