Jill Abramson? Who's that?

Noooo, Ira! Ira Glass is the love of my life that just doesn't know it yet, so when he does something embarrassing, I get intense second-hand embarrassment. It doesn't happen often, but it happened in full-swing today, when Glass was asked about the recent dismissal of Jill Abramson from the New York Times and he said, "Who dat?"

Glass was interviewed by New York Magazine's Daily Intelligencer at the Peabody Awards, where he was representing his monumental and beloved radio program This American Life. In a conversation about past employment and whether or not he had ever been fired (he hasn't), Glass admitted that he had no idea who Abramson even was. And guess what else? He doesn't care, so na-na-boo-boo.

"Honestly, like, I'm a superfan of the New York Times, but I know nothing about how they put it together and I really don't care," Glass said. It sounds flippant and kind of cocky, but he's probably a more accurate sample of Times readers than the coverage you've been seeing all over the internet. The difference is, though, is that Glass himself is a media giant, and though his medium is radio, not print, it's a little embarrassing that he doesn't know who the former editor of the Times is.

This doesn't make me love Glass any less, but it does make him a little more human to me. Sure, I have such a romantic version of Ira Glass as the Knower of All and Teller of Stories, but it turns out at the end of the day, he's just another (albeit hyper-talented) fellow that gets overwhelmed with his personal projects and sometimes can't fully participate in the news of the world around him. And that's okay. And we're all gonna be okay as long as we live in a world where even Ira Glass doesn't know something that he should.