Guys, I just - there's something very important on my mind here, and I need to get it off my chest. A few of you have heard this rant before, namely Mal, because we work together fourteen hours a day and I have been known to talk for twelve of them straight, but she can tune out because like I said, this is really important, and I think it's an issue that should be brought to everyone's attention:

Eggplant.

The eggplant is a noble vegetable. There's so much you can do with it. Makes a nice side dish all on its own, is a great addition to any vegetarian lasagna - or even the meat ones, if you want to get a little crazy, perfect if you toss on a little seasoning and throw it on the grill, or even cut it into chunks and use it for kebabs. Some people do that with tri-tip; personally, I'm partial to chicken. When prepared properly, it's incredibly tasty and lives up to its nobility.

But you cannot help eggplant live up to its nobility unless you salt it first to draw out the excess water. You just can't do it. It's simple, people. It's a ten second step that yields results, it takes away the boring, bland, watery taste and instead leaves you with all the delights that God intended when he first engineered the eggplant. You would think that with all the restaurants in Los Angeles, people would know that.

Unfortunately, I cannot call anyone out on this at said restaurants because otherwise I'll get the reputation for being "that annoying ass douchebag actor". I do not want a reputation as a douchebag, so you know what I do? I suffer in silence.

And it is suffering. It IS, damn it. I worked in a restaurant in high school. I graduated high school and went to work on the line full time. I read Bon Appetit. I read Food and Wine. I used to spend all my money on cookbooks. I went on acting auditions because when you grow up in L.A., it's something you sort of start doing.

Get one lousy part on one TV show and suddenly nobody trusts your palate anymore.

I kid, I kid. Freaks & Geeks was my big break, and even if it got canceled about, you know, fourteen minutes into the first airing of the pilot, it was a great experience and it proved I had some comedic chops. When it became clear the show was not going to season two, I started going on auditions again, and well....when you get a shot at impressing Lorne Michaels, you pretty much don't turn it down. Particularly not when he looks at you with his dead shark's eyes and says, flatly, "Okay. The kid's funny. He stays."

New York, man, that's about as different as you get from L.A. Well, maybe not as different, I mean, it's closer than Bumblefuck Iowa, but moving out there was a little bit of a culture shock. And SNL is hardcore, that place is comedy boot camp. For five years, I had a bite size studio apartment but 30 Rock was my home. I may or may not have slept on the couch in the office two or ninety times. Who knows? Who keeps track of those things? I came up on SNL. That's where I lost both my cook's hands and my virginity. (You know who you are.)

After five years, though, when my contract was up, I started feeling like maybe being a Prime Time Player wouldn't be the worst thing in the world. I opted not to renew and decided to come back to L.A. to be near my family - and as luck would have it, that, my friends, was when they were casting How I Met Your Mother and were apparently in need of a six three gangly giant with terrible hair and a wry, charming, guileless grin that defines him as the thinking woman's sex symbol. (Those would be the words of Entertainment Weekly. Not me. My words would be more like, the thinking woman's "I bet I can get a free drink out of him and then ditch him for his hotter friend" symbol.)

Thus concludes my journey towards playing one half of the most adorable married couple on TV. When Mal came in to read for Robin, the producers asked her to switch to Lily, and since I'd already been cast, brought me in to see if they could see a little somethin'-somethin' going on there. We read the scene where I propose, and all of a sudden this crazy woman is running and jumping on top of me. I was supposed to fall over. Instead, I caught her, she hung onto me with her Brazilian jiujitsu thighs of death, and I asked the casting director, "Oh, hey, shit. I was supposed to fall over. Are you going to take my part away now?" And thus our friendship and coworkership was sealed.

We don't get the highest ratings, but hell, we've made it three seasons, we're coming back for a fourth, and we're having a damn good time on the way. Life's looking pretty good right now.

Apart from that whole eggplant situation. Seriously, what the fuck?

played by zachary levi
aim good will rickey
credits are here