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Having survived the gauntlet of last week's Television Critics Association events where he introduced his network's lineup of exciting career-reclamation projects and rejuvenated franchises from which a few more starfucking dollars might be squeezed, newly appointed NBC ambassador to Fun Nation Ben Silverman was ready for a little break before getting back to the hard work of teaching the Peacock how to get its party on. Slate's Kim Masters writes that Silverman hopped a jet to Europe immediately after his TCA responsibilities were finished to enjoy a little Ben-time with some pals:

After making his bow, Silverman took off for a European vacation. Never let it be said that he doesn't respect his elders. His agenda included visiting Norman Lear in Majorca, as well as Stephen Cannell (The A-Team and Rockford Files). Sometime during his sojourn, Silverman is also hooking up with b.f.f. Ryan Seacrest.

Yes, we said Ryan Seacrest.

Silverman raised eyebrows recently among some at NBC when he brought Seacrest into a marketing meeting. (Seacrest, you might recall, has a multimillion dollar deal at E!, not to mention a few other bits of business that have nothing to do with NBC.) We asked Silverman about Seacrest's visit last week, and he said it was just for fun. But he said Seacrest is one of his best friends and mentioned the planned vacation.

Even though we're sure that Silverman has nothing to fear from his best E! buddy, perhaps he should think twice before inviting the seemingly nonthreatening wingman into his work life; should word get back to fickle boss Jeff Zucker that there's a younger, more ambitious, and more impressively tanned producing talent making waves in the network office, Silverman could one day saunter into one of his mid-afternoon wake-up meetings to discover Seacrest sounding his famous NBC chimes, then have to listen as his supposed friend awkwardly explains, "Oh, hey, the gang said you might be sleeping off a pretty nasty hangover, so they thought I could drop by and give some notes on what we're going to do about the Tuesday 9 pm timeslot. Hope you don't mind. "