This reached a nadir when Ms. Young, some 85 minutes into the show, failed to defecate on cue, despite having given an advance interview advertising her ability to do so. She invited audience members to help her find ways of achieving her goal, and most obliged. They gave her cigarettes, Coca-Cola and practical advice about manipulation. They loosened her frock; she was wearing a full-length hooped dress with petticoat. They offered manual assistance. They encouraged her when she relocated to a chair after squatting over a bowl.

This went on for more than 10 minutes. Finally Ms. Young — claiming she must be nervous and admitting the show was running considerably over time — departed to complete her defecation in a restroom nearby. I was one of several (but too few) people who left at this point. I left partly because of the show’s sheer inefficiency. Principally, however, I felt that to remain would indicate that I shared the audience’s far-from-tacit consensus that Ms. Young deserved encouragement, and that this was fun or rewarding.

– Alastair Macauley, N.Y. Times.

Excuse me for waxing scatalogical, but what if the intention of Ann Liv Young’s performance-art piece (here reviewed by Macauley in hilarious fashion) was not to poop in front of a live audience, but to try and fail to poop in front of an audience? Maybe it was a massive failure, or maybe it was a bold meditation on performance anxiety, unmet expectations, and constipation.

I really need to get into performance art. It’s a great way to get people to praise you for behaving bizarrely.

I may have mentioned this here before (though I can’t find it if I have), but I launched a fake student-government campaign for my TV show in college that culminated in me and some friends unleashing thousands of bouncy balls in a crowded campus square while I shouted “Balls!” into a megaphone.

While we were doing it, a couple of grad-student types walked by and I heard one woman say, “must be some sort of performance art.”

Well, it wasn’t intended to be, ma’am. But if you want to call it that, I won’t disagree.