Have any of you guys seen last week’s episode of “The Following?”  Maybe not, because I suspect I am the only one watching this cool show.  (I’ve read that it is “on the bubble,” and Cracked.com has practically campaigned for its cancellation.)

Anyway, if you’ve seen it, Ryan Hardy and co. track a serial killer to a palatial “home” in “Purchase, NY.”

I was there.  I worked there for a night.  That “home” is actually a period mansion that is rented out for high-brow catered events.  (I’ve forgotten its name.)  It’s in Nassau County, not Purchase.  When I was working for a hospital in NY as a grant writer in my 20’s, office staff also doubled as volunteers for fundraising events; we held a big one right there.  Ryan Hardy goes stalking through the same cobblestone driveway where I took my cigarette breaks.  Six degrees of Kevin Bacon indeed.

It was a fun night.  There was a special room that was restricted — VIP access only, I guess.  Only donors and board members were supposed be in the semi-private parlor.  I wandered in quite accidentally, and people just reacted as though I were an (extremely young) donor.  So I just pulled a Frank Abagnale, Jr. and ran with it.  Someone handed me a brandy and a nice cigar, and I just reclined on an immensely comfortable brown leather chair.  (When in Rome.)  It was weird seeing other employees and administrators being gently kept behind the velvet ropes.  I kept smiling and raising a glass to them as they passed.  One vice president was visibly confused at my inclusion there.

So the moral of the story is that if you adopt false pretenses, you get a fancy cigar.  Or something.  I dunno.