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We'd mostly forgotten about Toby Young, the British writer who managed to turn his coffee break at Vanity Fair into a cottage industry replete with book, movie deal, and status as the go-to commentator whenever Graydon Carter so much as burps the wrong way.

Then we were confronted by Young in the pages of Times two weeks ago, in an arts piece by Sarah Lyall about the one-man stage version of his book, How to Lose Friends and Alienate People, running at London's Arts Theatre until January 8th. Finally, Young gets the role he was literally born to play: himself.

Armed with this information, we decided the check out old Toby's website, which appears to have undergone an impressive redesign sometime in the recent past.

One thing you can say for the guy, he's got a pretty good, self-deprecating sense of humor. (Or, um, 'humour.') You have to love a guy who runs a blurb from Martin Armis that reads "Fuck off." And then there's the cartoon which, while crudely drawn, has a good punch line ("Toby Young? So you're the Toby Young you write so much about"). Best of all is his call for feedback ("Do you hate Toby Young? Click Here"). Basically, you can't make fun of the guy since he's already done it for you: His site comes pre-satirized for your protection (to quote the old Bill Maher chestnut).

But what really gave us a chuckle was the photo of Young striking his best "Alas, poor Yorik" pose. It sort of reminded us of a sculpture our friend's dad had in his study when we were kids, so we did one of those 'ironic juxtaposition' things the young people seem to like so much these days.

The best part? This entire post—with chimp graphic—will appear on Young's site before Monday.

A Professional Failure Faces Certain Doom: Success [NYT]
Arts Theatre
TobyYoung.co.uk
Darwin Ape [Austin Sculpture]