Rainn Wilson is asking me to hang on a minute. He's picking up a coffee from a "great Seattle institution" called Starbucks. "Not sure if you've heard of it," he quips to me over the phone from suburban Los Angeles where he now lives. I tell him I have.

Thursday night, Wilson is coming on home to Seattle to host a night of comedy and music called Rainn Wilson & Friends, featuring the likes of another "hardcore Seattle" actor Joel McHale (who was on Almost Live!), Chris Ballew, Rachael (of Lake Street Dive) and Vilray, Michael Franti, and more. This hootenanny is to benefit the Mona Foundation, an Eastside non-profit that partners with grassroots initiatives to improve access to education across the globe.

Wilson is One of King County's Very Own, growing up in Lake Forest Park and graduating from the University of Washington with a bachelor's degree in drama. He's a Seahawks fan. His most famous character, Dwight Schrute from The Office, could conceivably live in Ballard. He orders a venti decaf americano with steamed almond milk because he quit caffeine nine years but still loves the taste of coffee. Like us all.

The actor and founder of Soul Pancake (remember Kid President!?!) appreciates Mona Foundation's approach to education access.

"They have a really simple formula: they scour the world for effective educational initiatives and they help those schools develop a five- and a ten-year plan and they raise money to help them achieve that plan," he explains. "I firmly believe, from what I've learned over the last 10 years, that the best way to help people is to help them get an education so that they can help themselves."

In terms of what audiences can expect to encounter tomorrow night, Wilson will not be performing any standup—he professes he's not so great at it. "I have tried it before. In fact, one of the times that I did this show, there's that old standup act I used to do, which was, I talked about how I was institutionalized for a bipolar disorder."

Note: he wasn't.

"I read some of these jokes and I surely think that more than half the audience believes me that these are jokes that I wrote while I was institutionalized," he says. "But, I won't be doing that. It's kind of distasteful."

Agreed. He does tell me he's a terrific MC, though.

Toward the end of our conversation, I ask him the question that I've been keeping inside all these years: Does anyone ever recognize him from Juno?! Rollo the Grocery Store Clerk!? Has he gotten his due for speaking forth Diablo Cody's manic, smart, and improbable dialogue into the world, specifically the phrase "Your Eggo is preggo"!?!? It's—to me—an iconic two minutes of cinema. I know he gets a lot of attention for Dwight—as he should—but what about Rollo?

"Honestly, that never really happens," he laughs. "Sometimes people will compliment me and say, 'Also, I loved you in Juno,' but thanks for giving a nice shout out and a tip of the hat to Rollo, the convenience store clerk."

Anytime, Rainn, anytime. You can still geet your tickets here. And, in the meantime, let's all go back to the simpler times of 2007, even if just for a couple of minutes: