Dear Journal,

This week iTunes gave me my very own celebrity playlist which is very exciting because it gave me the opportunity to impress my girlfriend. Now don't get me wrong, Journal, I know my girlfriend loves me for the right reasons but every once in a while when we're watching "Bret Michael's Rock of Love" I see this subtle look in her eye that if she had the chance to run off with the wig-wearing former lead singer of Poison, she might just take that offer. Now I don't mean any disrespect to the man who wrote the lyrics "Every Rose Has Its Thorn...Yea it does" but I feel a little threatened by him, so in subtle ways I try to impress my girlfriend, but it always seems to backfire.

Often when I'm on tour I'll call her and tell her about the big crowds of people who showed up at my show, but then when she shows up to one of my shows it's always the one where we're competing with the world series or a local wing eating contest and the crowd is smaller than she expected. And I always have to explain, "This happens to a lot of guys."

So this Fall when my CD came out, I hatched a plan to get my own celebrity playlist on iTunes and to further impress her I'd mention her in the playlist. It'd be like my very own Bret Michaels moment. It'd my very own, "Yea it does." I knew it would be an uphill battle, as I'm not a household name, so the word "celebrity" is very subjective. For example I'm no Ruben Stoddard or even Clay Aiken or even that Asian guy they always put in the clip reels. But a lot of people buy my CDs, so I figured I'd have a chance.

I was very excited when I got the call from my record label that I could do a celebrity playlist. I spent a week putting together my dream mix of comedy and music tracks with descriptions of what I liked about each - the kind of stuff that if I were a regular person would be mundane but since I'm a celebrity is COMPLETELY FASCINATING.

Well, I sent it in and told my girlfriend the news and she gave me that look like she gives Bret Michaels each time he asks a part-time stripper the poignant question: "Will you stay here and rock my world?"

The point is, I felt fantastic.

"There's plenty of women out there that you want to be friendswith. And there's a lot of women out there you want to have sex with.But if you can find one that you can be friends and have sex with,henceforth, rock of love."

- Bret Michaels, explaining why he made the show "Rock of Love"

"I am an awkward, childish man. Henceforth, my secret public journal."
- Mike Birbiglia, explaining the blog you get emailed to you

Then I got a call from my record label. They said that iTunes had reconsidered and they didn't think I was enough of a celebrity to have a celebrity play-list. And I was like "I know. That's why I asked first before I wrote it. Do you think if I were an actual celebrity, I'd have time to write a celebrity playlist? No way! I'd be eating chocolate hot dogs in Dubai!"

Well, a few months went by and I saw my chance to impress my girlfriend once again. I was headlining the Trump Plaza in Atlantic City. This would be perfect. Maybe if I did well enough she'd think of me like bad wig wearing Donald Trump himself. Why do all these celebrities have bad wigs?

When we arrived, there was a reception for me. It was for local press and there were appetizers and shrimp cocktail. And the organizer got up to a podium and said, "We're very excited to kick off our comedy series with Mike Birbiglia. We're trying to do something a little different than the other casinos in town. Some of the other casinos are booking the top tier comedians. But what were doing is having the middle tier comedians. Not the low tier, but not the top tier comedians. The sort of middle tier. And now let me bring to the podium, Mike Birbiglia." I approached the podium and didn't know quite what to say, so I said, "You know when I was a small child I dreamed that one day if I worked hard enough I could become a middle tier comedian. Frankly, I'm overwhelmed. Well, I'm underwhelmed. Um, I'm medium-whelmed."

Well, this month after 8 months of deliberation and the release of my DVD "What I Should Have Said Was Nothing," iTunes decided to publish my celebrity playlist. I'm thinking about buying a wig to celebrate. But I'm not counting my chickens, because maybe after they read this they'll take my playlist down because, after all, they're iTunes and I am a middle-tier comedian.

And that concludes this week's Secret Public Journal.