End of an Era

Most people know by now that Conan O'Brien is taking over for Jay Leno at the Tonight Show in June. It seemed like a long way off when NBC announced it back in 2004, but the year is now here, and tonight is Conan's last Late Night show. Based on some of the comments I've seen on articles about Conan this week, it seems you either love him or hate him. I fully admit my sense of humor can be silly and childish (Shaun always says how easy it is to make me laugh), but I love pretty much everything Conan does. I started watching Late Night in college because that was the only time in my life where I was guaranteed to be awake for the whole show - and I got hooked. When I moved on to the real world, I knew that I shouldn't be staying up that late if I had to get up at 6 or 7 the next morning for work, but all too often I did (as did Shaun...we're night owls...it's a problem) . We've seen so many hilarious moments: Triumph the Insult Comic Dog making fun of Star Wars fanatics, Conan going to Finland and visiting their (female) president that he looks like, the Walker Texas Ranger lever, Barack Obama suggesting Conan as his running mate back in 2006 before he was even officially running... I'll stop for your sake.

We're especially sentimental about the end of Late Night with Conan because we had an awesome experience going to a taping of the show back in June. We were on our honeymoon for Shaun's actual birthday, and I wanted to do something separate and special to celebrate when we got back - so I surprised him with Conan tickets for the following week. We took the train into NYC, made our way to 30 Rock, and got a decent enough spot in line that we had seats in the third row on the aisle! And when Conan came out to chat and warm up the crowd before the taping started, by some luck he ended up picking Shaun to go down and say hi to the drummer (James Wormworth, who was filling in for Max Weinberg at the time), and Shaun got some souvenir drumsticks. On his way back from the stage, Conan stopped him and wanted to compare height - he joked, "You're taller than I am, and I'm 6'9" with the hair." (Not really, lol - Shaun is about 6'8".) Our faces hurt from laughing before the show even started. The rest of it was a blast too - Mike Myers was the first guest, and he ran up and down the aisle before and after the interview, so we both reached to high-five him as he sprinted by. The whole experience was just so much fun!

So, we're a little sad to see Conan leaving Late Night and New York - although it'd be nice to visit California eventually, so maybe we can plan a Tonight Show taping. It's probably a good thing for us that he'll be on an hour earlier starting in June! He might have to change up his quirky style a bit, but he's just so naturally funny that it's hard to imagine someone watching him and not laughing. That's just my biased opinion though! It's going to be weird without Conan for a few months...but on those nights when we're up too late, I suppose we'll give Jimmy Fallon a shot. If you're a night owl too, what are your favorite late night shows? (Or if you're not a night owl, how dumb do you think we are depriving ourselves of sleep?!)