That Smell

That Smell                                                                        1742

Saturday, September 17, 2005-4:58 P.M.

Good afternoon, and hello from McLean, Virginia (not Reston as earlier reported), home of the fabulous Wiseacres Comedy Club in the Best Western Tysons Westpark Hotel.  Last night's show was lots of fun, with headliner Randolph T. and opener Clay Miles joining me for the festivities.

The crowd was a little bit of a slow starter, but after beating them into submission with my never-say-die attitude (and letting Dark Ralph out of his cage), they were won over.  After the show, a bunch of local guys congregated across the street at one of the watering holes, and we let some people who were at the show fawn over us a little bit before letting the conversation relapse into relentless shop talk (as most comics do when they get together; gossip like washer-women).

After closing time, we got booted and took up the conversation in the parking lot for another 40 minutes, and finally, we went back to the hotel and our respective cars and overnight lodgings.  The bad thing about talking in the parking lot was there was an odor of cooking cinnamon buns wafting through the parking lot, and it was driving me crazy trying to figure out what store it was coming from.  I have a weakness for all foods, but cinnamon buns are something special for a sugar 'n' starch addict.  If I was in New Orleans during the looting, I would've looted a Cinnabon store just for the cinnmon buns.

After winding down from the show, I finally got to sleep around 4 A.M., and at 5 A.M., my clock radio alarm went off!  I swear, it's a conspiracy, because I stay in hotels every week, and this ALWAYS happens.  I think the housekeepers set the alarms for early in the morning so patrons will get up, get an early start and get out so they can clean the rooms quick and go home early.....anyway, it wound up waking me up for the next three hours that I couldn't go back to sleep, so I trolled the internet and watched horrible late night cable TV (Dick Clark's Uncensored Bloopers....what was I thinking?) until I could finally get to sleep.

I overslept and almost missed my lunch date with Randolph and Sean, one of the other comics here in the D.C. area.  We hit the Chinese buffet (where else?) and did some mall walking, and to be honest, after 5 hours of sleep, I need a nap.

So that's what I'm gonna do.  I'll give you the two-show report tomorrow.

Signing off from our nation's capitol (or right across the Virginia state line from the nation's capitol),

Ralph Tetta

Rochester, NY