Good Day Sunshine

Good Day Sunshine                      4810  (850)

Monday, June 19, 2006-1:15 P.M

My schedule would KILL you dead!

I'm home after an 18-hour jaunt across the United States, starting out in Sioux City, Iowa and ending in my driveway in Rochester, New York, only 1120 miles away.  I rolled in at 4:00 in the morning, and was as awake and alert as I was when I got in the car 18 hours previous.

Thursday night was the gig in Brookings, South Dakota.  The hotel was overrun with American Legion conventioneers; I never saw so many war wounds in my life.  They were a pleasant bunch, partying it up and trading war stories, and I stayed in my hotel room as not to get trapped in conversation with one of them.  Old people are nice in small doses, but they are the LaBrea Tar Pits of conversation.  The show was well-attended, and I did well, entertaining the mostly college-aged folks with a slower-paced show than I usually put on.  I like moving around and giving off the energy, but the portable stage was sort of unstable and I didn't feel comfortable moving around on it for fear the two segments would slide apart and I would do a fat-man split right down to the ground.

Friday, I had a radio interview in Sioux City, so I had to get peddling early.  I stopped for gas in a small town called Dell Rapids, South Dakota, and upon heading into town, I saw a billboard that said, "We Dakotans reject Animal Rights Organizations...Fur, Fish, Game and Livestock are our Economy!"

Now, I'm no animal rights activist...I definitely eat more than my share of the meat category, but my first response to this billboard was "if you can't treat animals humanely, then do something else for a living."  My second response was to locate the PETA sticker that my wife lovingly applied to the inside of my back windshield, and to peel it off and throw it away, lest I get my ass kicked in Dell Rapids, South Dakota, where such an event would never make the papers.  I don't fight much, but I think in a one-on-one confrontation, I could probably hold my own, but I'm not taking on a whole village of rednecks.

Friday night it rained so much, Sioux City actually set a record for rainfall.  Manhole covers were floating away because storm drains were full, and several roads were impassable.  Also,the Harley biker convention that was in town had a big shindig that was scheduled for the downtown area, and that got rained out.   I thought for sure that the event would mean doomsday for our show, but we drew 150, and they were great.  I got paid before I even hit the stage, and I had as good a set as I possibly could.  There was an improv group that opened the show, along with our mc, Mandi Macy from the rock station in town.  By the time I hit the stage, I was ready to go.  I did some mild Bush-bashing, which actually evoked pretty good laughter, leading me to believe that Iowa isn't as red a state as I had been led to believe. 

Saturday, things had cleared up, to the pleasure of the bikers, who had day 2 of their little festival to look forward to, and our show died on the vine.  We had no improv troupe to warm up, just Mandi, who is cute as a button but did no time to get the crowd revved up, and my first 10-15 minutes on stage reflected that.  I plowed forward with my act, but they just weren't buying it, so I switched gears and did some quasi-mc stuff, talking to a bacherlorette party and dove-tailing some material into the conversation.  By the time I finished, I felt I had done well, but I wished I could get that first 15 minutes back.  Ken Muller, the booking agent who hired me, showed up to say hello, shook my hand, and then headed out before I could talk to him at all, which I felt was unfortunate.  I couldn't tell if he like my set or not, but he seemed pleasant, and ultimately, I'll know if he did or not by his response when I ask for work again.

This week I had the dubious pleasure of running over two turtles and a prairie dog, and when I say "run over," I mean I aimed my car so the wheels went around them.  I didn't kill anything, but I did run over the remains of a dead dear on route 90 in Ohio that had been liquified by a truck.  I didn't even see it until it was too late, and it's a horrible feeling.  Luckily, it piss rained all the way through Cleveland, so hopefully it washed any venison tartare off the vehicle that I may have picked up.

It rained like Biblical hard twice coming home, once in Indiana and then in Ohio.  I felt like God Himself was telling me that I wasn't going to get home, that I should just pull the car over, put some stakes in the ground and start homesteading the divider between I-90 eastbound and westbound.  I chewed the same piece of gum for almost 300 miles, and burned through a pack and a half of Extra Sugar-Free Peppermint, and today, my jaws are sore.  That'll teach me to chew gum for 18 hours.

This week is a quiet one at home, and I'm mc'ing at my home club, the Comix Cafe.  Also, I'm doing a pilot episode for a new radio program called "3 Things You Never Talk About" on Monday.  It's a panel-type program with comedians discussing the issues of the day.  There's nothing I like more than warming the air with my opinions about the issues of the day.  If you're in Rochester and want to attend, you can get information at www.3ThingsYouNeverTalkAbout.com. It'll be a nice break in the action, and while the pay for the week isn't going to be a living wage, my expenses will be low because I'm home.  I spent $277 on gas this past road trip, paying anywheres from $2.66 to $2.99 a gallon.  Even with all that figured in, it was still a profitable week, and I can add the bragging rights that I've added another state to my list of "states performed in"-South Dakota.  And for the record, that makes 33 states total.

Missing Father's Day was a bummer, but I got a couple of nice Father's Day gifts that were waiting for me when I got home, including a beautiful book from my mother-in-law called "Why A Daughter Needs A Dad."  Maybe I was just tenderized from the long ride home, or whatever, but my guard was down and I read it in one sitting and cried and cried.  This week, I'm going to spend some high-quality daddy time with Harmony, and hopefully the weather will be nice so we can go to the park and play on the slides and swings.  Harmony is my constant reminder why I do all of the driving, striving and working that I do, and she's worth every minute (Mommy Pamela is worth it, too!).  I finished this week's tour alone with 3010 miles at the wheel.  Beat THAT, pal!

Have a great week, and I hope the sun shines on you!

Ralph Tetta

Rochester, NY