Well, that was awesome.
My surprise date was a threesome with Kevin Smith.

Not in the dirty way. Shame on you. No, just an awesome evening of all-access passes: wandering through the backstage and onstage of Roy Thompson Hall, eating Kevin Smith’s catering, shaking his hand, saying hello, meeting his wife Jen, watching his daughter Harley slowly demolish and then finally outright annihilate our stash of Timbits, and of course, taking our gorgeous main floor front and centre seats to watch him perform four hours of side-splitting comedy onstage. What a nice fellow. What a lovely entourage of stage folks and videographers. What a great night.

On our first date, Justin and I sat in what is now “our” basement, palms sweaty and hearts palpitating, watching “An Evening With Kevin Smith” on TV and awaiting that mutual moment of bravery when we would get to smooching. When Kevin started talking about how excited he was on his first date with his wife-to-be, the tension between us reached the bursting point, and there came our first kiss. So you can imagine what strong positive associations we both have with Kevin Smith now, and this was a great evening that just brought us full circle.

An awesome moment was when a guy at one of the audience question microphones asked Kevin if he’d ever consider opening one of his ‘Secret Stash’ comic book stores in Canada, so that they could save on the costly shipping for his merchandise. Justin and I just looked at one another with that “Jesus, the Snail carries *so much* Jay & Silent Bob stuff – comics, toys, Bluntman & Chronic action figures; has this kid never made a trip to Queen Street?” look (we can manage almost a full conversation with just significant eye contact now; it’s rather impressive).

And then!

Kevin looked at the kid like he’d crawled out from under a rock and said something along the lines of, “Why the hell would I open a comic store here in Toronto, when you’ve got the Silver Snail? Everything you need is right there, man. It’s an awesome store.” Squee! Happy. Three thousand loyal Kevin Smith fans heard his accolade. We were touched and amazed. I doubt that part will go on the DVD, but he did do an interview with Justin on Wednesday, and he and Jason Mewes hung out and interviewed customers in the Snail, so that will be on there in the “extras” section, and according to the videographers, JVL and I *dominate* the audience-shots, because of our good positioning in terms of seating and lighting. Can’t wait to see it!

The only brief moment of having the wind taken out of my sails came this morning, when my Manager, humming with expectation of romantic tales of wine and roses, asked me what I ended up doing on my suprise date. When I told her, her face went utterly blank, as though I had begun speaking in a foreign tongue, and she said, “Kevin Smith? Who is he?” Ouch.

For anyone else who is asking that question, here is, in small part, a piece of the answer:
Kevin’s Resume
Kevin’s Comic Shop
Kevin’s Overwhelming Obsession With Degrassi