Friday night’s show was fun. They had a couple guest sets and the guys that book the room (Sean Lesser and Jed Fearon) split the feature spot.. and I think a few of ‘em went long so I really didn’t have to do very much time at all. I did most of the stuff I’d normally do in a feature-length set & it went over pretty well.
They do not offer a hotel room to comics, though.. and although I knew that, I hadn’t made any arrangements for myself. Not much of a “planner”. I ended up driving around scouting out wifi spots using MacStumbler until I found a nice place to camp out. About a mile away there is a big church up on a hill, surrounded by woods. I got a strong, open signal up there so I parked and screwed around on the net & played games until I crashed out.
People keep telling me that’s weird.. but I don’t get it. I sleep in the back seat of my Jeep all the time. It’s comfy, and if it’s nice weather out like it was this weekend.. it’s pretty hard to beat for free. I woke up around 6:30 or 7 a.m. and saw a car parked closer to the church entrance. The driver was talking to a woman walking her dog.. so I figured it was time for Creepy McHomeless to get movin’. I just climbed into my front seat, fired up the car and drove to the closest Carribu Coffee house.
Saturday, I went to coffee shops, thrift stores, yard sales.. I hung out in the little 5 points area for a while and talked to communists for a few hours. They always seem to wear wacky hats, the communists. Very strange. Some of them wear the Fidel Castro style hats.. others wear barets.. but they almost always have a strange looking hat on. I don’t know what it is about socialism that makes them want to do this and I didn’t ask. I bumped into them by accident – a communist runs a “Revolution Books” booth and I was browsing around looking for a good book about The Black Panther Party. They had some stuff about the Panthers (and a historical connection with them, it turns out), but not really a big comprehensive thing like I’m looking for. The guy there made for interesting conversation, but I’m just not a commie. I love talking about radical, violent revolutions.. and the people willing to organize them.. I’m just not looking to join one, you know? I like hearing stories about the Amish, too.. but I’m not going to help raise a barn and churn butter. Fuck that.
I went to a pizza shop down there and ordered a small Cuban (“not a man, just a pizza please”) to continue the theme for the day. Then I sat in Piedmont Park and wrote and thought about why Communism just wouldn’t work here in the US. Those guys REALLY believe in the middle class. They depend on those worker-bee guys who are always getting fucked over to rise up and organize and overthrow the upper class.. and I’m sorry but I just don’t see it happening. The fact is, the average guy is.. average. He’s not super smart or super dumb, he’s average. The average guy does average guy stuff and that’s all he wants for himself. Sure, he’d love to win the lottery and live like a king, but who doesn’t? It’s the dream that never happens that keeps the average guy content with his average life.
Then, I’d look up and marvel at how many people walk around in public shirtless. There will be no revolution. Idiocracy is more likely.
I had more time during that night’s show, so I did some different material and changed it up a little from what I’d normally do. It worked out & was even better than the friday show. I think I did about 37 minutes.
In the audience, there was a guy (and his wife) that I knew in Chicago when I was a kid, but hadn’t seen or talked to in over 20 years.. that was really cool. I hung around and talked to them for about an hour after the show before driving back home to Nashville.
It was fun. What’d you do?