February 16, 2009-8:05 P.M.
Wow. The days are starting to blend together, even more than they used to.
I've been staying busy, and I'm starting to wonder whether or not "burn out" is better than "rust out." God knows, I've done them both.
I only wound up doing one show at Pare Restaurant back on Saturday the 7th, but it was a good one. I worked with Rochester comics Dan Maslyn and Annette Lorenzo. The room was full, and set up just fine for comedy. I pulled out all of the air in my lungs and did an hour and 5 in the closing spot....I don't know what I'll ever be able to do to placate my love of the stage....when I get up there, I can't stop! It's a sickness! Still, it was a fine show with a lot of nice comments afterward.
Sunday morning, I packed and headed off to Buena Vista University in Storm Lake, Iowa, for another installment in the college tour of Dash For Dollars, the comedy game show. I drove all day, starting around 10:30 in the morning, and managed to escape the death-trap that is Chicago, Illinois. I was sure I would wind up hitting major traffic there, but Loren, my assistant (ok, she's the voice programmed into my Tom-Tom GPS) re-routed me further south so I didn't have to deal with it. I got in to the hotel around 2:30 in the morning, but I picked up an hour because of the time change. I slept well after the 16 hour drive, as you could imagine.
The next morning, I was up super-early, and hit the continental breakfast (you gotta love waffles) and actually attempted to hit the work-out room, but the treadmill was busted. I always have a weird feeling using hotel excercise equipment these days, as my friend Tiny expired about a year ago doing exactly the same thing. The hotel desk clerk claimed that the machine had been repaired, but I found it unplugged and when I plugged it in, it only worked for a minute or two and then the power shut off, and I decided that I didn't need more of a hint to pack it in for the day.
I checked out of the hotel and headed over to the college, where I wound up spending the day. I did a lunch-time teaser event, handing out t-shirts and money to promote the evening event, and then killed time. I set up the equipment for the show, ate lunch, and went to the bank to get the proper increments of currency for the money booth. After the show, the students from the Student Activities Board treated me to dinner and even gave me some burgers to go, and I hit the road. The first thing I did was to gas up, because Iowa is a long, wide and unforgiving state, and there is nothing happening between the major cities. There was some sort of windstorm hitting the area, and I pumped gas as the corrugated steel canopy above me at the gas station shook like it was about to come loose. The winds howled at me all the way east, and around midnight, I decided I'd had enough. My destination was a Motel 6 (the preferred accomodations of the Ralph Tetta national comedy and game show tour) and I found one in Cedar Rapids. Imagine my surprise when at check-in, the desk clerk punched my driver's license information into the computer and then announced that I'd stayed at that particular property before. In fact, almost two years earlier to the day. I had to think about it, and talking to my mother on the phone the next day, I realized it was the tour that killed my old Toyota Corolla back in 2007.
Tuesday, I drove back the rest of the way and managed to get home before midnight. I listened to so much talk radio I actually overdosed and by the end of the drive, I was searching frantically for a music channel that was playing something that I not only like but wasn't sick of yet. I've spent years working in radio and there's not a lot of music I can say that for. Lately I've been digging the Bruce Springsteen sattelite radio channel, but I know the day is going to come when I tell the Boss to take his job and shove it. It's probably going to take a long time for that to happen, because I have a ridiculous fascination with Bruce. I also agree 100% with his politics, so maybe I'll stay in the union for a while...and as long as the new albums keep holding up, I should be alright.
Thursday, I hosted at The Comedy Club in Webster, bringing the first group of semi-finalists for their in-house comedy contest to the stage, and finishing up by introducing Kris Shaw, a comedy buddy of mine from Indianapolis, Indiana. They asked me to do five minutes to warm up, and of course, I went over. It takes me five minutes to remember my jokes, much less tell them. Two of the four contestants tied, and will move on to the finals, Dan Maslyn and Pat Duffy. I'm judging again this Thursday, and I'm looking forward to seeing who else will advance.
Saturday, Pamela and I packed up the car, dropped Harmony over to my mother-in-law's house, and headed to the Western Ohio town of Beaverdam, for an evening comedy show on Valentine's Day. The trip got started about 90 minutes later than I had hoped, as wrangling my wife and daughter into the car is only slightly less challenging than herding cats. After much Andy Capp and Flossy fighting in the car, we made it to the Comfort Inn and I started getting ready, pressing my clothes, shaving, and getting ready for the 9 PM show. We hadn't had dinner and were trying to figure out where we could eat in a timely fashion, what with it being Valentine's Day, a Saturday, and a small town with limited options. We wound up having to go to Lima, the next largest town over, and after seeing a mob scene at the chain restaurants around the mall, opted for a Captain D's meal, which pleased my "vegetarian wife who still eats seafood" to no end (the actual term is pesce-vegetarian, but I like to call her a "pesty vegetarian"). We arrived at the club with plenty of time to spare and were pleased to see that there was a full boat in attendance.
I was working with Scott Dunn, a former Rochester home-boy (actually he worked in Batavia) who now makes his home in Indiana and he's a regular caller to the Bob and Tom radio show, and a draw in the midwest. I did my 35 minutes with relish, and had so much fun with the accomodating crowd that I had to cut set-ups and did the last 10 minutes as punchlines only. It wasn't really that bad, but it seemed like it in my head. I wound up getting a phenomenal reaction overall, the owner was pleased, and I sold a boatload of CD's and DVD's after the show. It was great.
On the trip home, we were frought with pitfalls every step of the way. I stopped at a gas station in front of the hotel to repleshish the window wash fluid in the car, and the hood wouldn't close. We drove the first 100 miles with the hood rattling and looking like it would fly up in our faces at any moment. We finally pulled into a Wal-Mart in Fremont, Ohio and got an oil change, which the car probably needed anyway (my wife's car has no documentation in that respect....no window sticker, no receipts, and no memory of when the service was done last). Along with the oil change came the added service of the technician properly clicking the hood down into a fixed position. I guess we're good until we have to get under there again, hopefully it won't be too soon. Then, of course, driving through Cleveland, we hit two pockets of snowfall that looked like we were dead in the water, and then they dried up as quickly as they came. It was bizarre. We finally made it home, and I can't remember when I've been this tired. I took all day today to rest and recuperate, and luckily, I have no obligations until Friday, and it shouldn't be a bad excursion. I'm a little concerned, because next week, the college tour really starts revving up, as well as a weekend in Rhode Island. I'll also be performing for the first time in the states of Vermont and New Jersey, two close-by states to New York that have thus far eluded my grasp.
Hopefully the weather will cooperate, and it will be an uneventful tour. I'm just glad to be working, to be honest.
Thanks for reading, and be good now.
Ralph Tetta
Rochester, NY
Monday, February 16, 2009
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out (Bruce Springsteen)
February 6, 2009-9:35 P.M.
Helldrive 2009 is officially over. Actually, it's been over for almost a week now, but I had to get out from under some things here at home before I could even sit down and write about the experience.
Helldrive 2009 is just a cute nickname I gave a two-week tour that I just completed. I always used to say that once a year, I torture myself with a routing just to keep myself honest. Now, after 5 or 6 years of doing that, I've entrusted the task to others, to make sure it gets done with no screw-ups.
Helldrive 2009 started on Wednesday, January 21st. Ray Salah and I were tapped to be the judges for The Comedy Club's "Last Comic Sitting" contest (www.thecomedyclub.us) and it was an interesting night, to say the least. I spotted stolen material from every generation of comedian from Pat Cooper all the way up to some thinly concealed Jim Gaffigan. I spotted every one of them, including evergreen theft-pots David Brenner and Lenny Bruce. I guess the rationale is that these budding comic wanna-bes are the only ones who ever listened to these records and there's no way they're gonna get nabbed. Well, they all got nabbed and none of them won.
After the show, I dropped Ray off at his house and picked up Joel Lindley for an overnight drive to Huntington, West Virginia. I'll spare you the gory details other than we got there in time for Joel to be spirited off to a radio interview and I collapsed into my sleep-number bed at the Pullman Plaza. That night, after readjusting and napping, I began my slate of shows at the Huntington Funny Bone. All I can say is "wow." What a great room, great people, great staff, perfect sound and lights and stage. It was literally perfect as far as the stage being just the right size to stalk around, just the right height to be seen from everywhere in the room without rising too lofty, just everything was exactly as it should have been. I didn't have one show the whole week that I wanted back; every once in a while, I'll say something that I just shouldn't have said, and the whole show will go to shit. This week, I was like Rumpelstiltskin, weaving gold out of straw. The room really spoiled me for every other comedy club I've had the pleasure of playing.
The Funny Bone is in a downtown mall/entertainment complex, and they have a trade-out agreement with the movie theater. I got to see Clint Eastwood's "Gran Torino" and I have to say that it was just excellent. The movie wasn't entirely perfect, but it surely would have gotten a nine out of 10 from me if I were asked to rate it. If you're on the fence based on reviews you've seen or your own personal judgement of the trailers and previews, go see it and tell me I'm wrong that it was an excellent performance by Clint Eastwood. If you remember the movie "Heartbreak Ridge" that Eastwood did in the 80's, where he played Gunnery Sergeant Thomas Highway, this is like the continuing adventures of Gunny.
At the end of the weekend, namely Sunday night, Joel and I turned in our sets for the Sunday club-goers and bid farewell to snowy Huntington, piling into the car for the ride home. West Virginia was snowy and the roads were icy, winding and treacherous, but we made it home alive. I slept about two hours (!) and then got up, showered, and left again to hit the road. I picked up Ray and the van with the Dash For Dollars game show stuff in it and we headed towards Columbus, Ohio and Ohio Dominican University. Ray had even less sleep than I did, and opted to stay at the hotel and catch up with his shut-eye while I did the show. Running on adrenaline, caffeine and a sense of duty, I finished the show and returned to the hotel where I picked up Ray and we headed out for a late dinner. We found a family-style restaurant and some country cooking, and then returned to the hotel where I managed to fall asleep mid-sentence. I woke up at 5 in the morning with my stage clothes still on and my glasses askew.
The next morning, we headed off towards Chicago and managed to hit some of that horrible winter weather that was crushing the Midwest. We drove through Indianapolis, where they forgot what snowplows looked like, and pirouetted and sashayed all across the highway. By the time we reached Merrillville, Indiana, we bunked down for the night, figuring the next day would be easier as we were far enough north to be out of the storm. We got a good night's sleep and headed off early for Harold Washington College, which is located at the corner of Smack and Dab in downtown Chicago. To say that the city is congested is an understatement; parking is not only at a premium, it's expensive as hell. I wound up digging down for $50 (no lie) to park the van for the duration of my four hour work-day. The overhead train tracks wreaked havoc with my GPS and cell phone, and as hypnotizing as Chicago is from the skyline view you get when travelling west on the 90, I guess I wouldn't do very well living there with my sense of claustrophobia that I didn't even know I had.
The evening's dinner was Cracker Barrel, and food never tasted so good. It was damn near 5 PM and neither Ray nor I had eaten a bite since the day before. I had catfish and a loaf of biscuits and Ray had some sort of roast beef platter. Then we hit the road, traveling back through Indianapolis where I cashed in my Speedway loyalty card points and purchased gasoline for $1.17 a gallon. We headed south towards Cincinnati and finally, the highway turned to crap and we grabbed the first hotel we found, a Comfort Inn. The next day, we piloted our way through Kentucky and into Tennessee and some ice-storm ravaged country, but the roads were cleaned and salted and I guess it varies from community to community whether or not they can afford such luxuries as salt and plows, but the roads stayed clean well towards our final destination. We ate a Golden Corral buffet dinner (I know all the sweet restaurants, eh?) and had a little floor-show as a party who arrived just before we were about to leave bitched out a floor manager and a kitchen manager over an entire section of the restaurant that hadn't been bussed.....there were dirty dishes everywhere, and 90% of the patrons had tipped their server and gone. The young lady who was working point on this party of ten or more diners seemed nice at first, helping the one waitress who was working the section bus the tables and mentioning nicely that she had waitress ed before and knew how hard it was. They quickly cleared about three tables and shoved them together so that the party could sit down, and then she went into full puma mode, seeking out someone with a supervisor's name tag that she could dress down in the middle of the place. I looked down and away, and left my server another buck.
We kept moving until around midnight, and I managed to find a Motel 6 that I'd stayed at last year in Newport, Tennessee. It was just dumb luck that I stopped at that exit for gas, and started to recognize everything from my visit last summer. This was the town that I saw the first available midnight showing of The Dark Knight, and camped out two days in between engagements for The Comedy Zone in Clarksville and Johnson City, Tennessee. The Motel 6 is super clean, and offers free internet, and that's unusual for Motel 6's, they usually try to get you to pay around $3.50 for a day's use (which isn't bad, to be honest). The next morning, we chewed up the last few hours and motored towards Salisbury, North Carolina, and Catawba College, for the last date of the Dash For Dollars tour. We set up and did a "teaser" for the show in the student cafeterias, and then hung out and killed time for a couple of hours until showtime. We did the show, packed up the van, and headed for home, once again hitting horrible weather in West Virginia. It seemed that the high elevations were getting horrible snow, and then we'd come down a hill and everything was clear again. I drove until the Pennsylvania border and then pulled into a rest area for a couple hour's sleep.
By the time I woke up, it was daylight, and off we headed again. We stopped for gas at a Sheetz and grabbed some breakfast and dog-legged it the rest of the way home, pulling in at maybe 1 o'clock or so. But it didn't end there, because Ray's driveway was full of snow and we had to shovel a spot to stow the van. I don't know what energy I was tapping because I cleared the space out in what felt like about five minutes. I transferred all of my luggage into my waiting Camry and headed home. Pam and Harmony had gone out for some children's event, story time or some such thing, I can't really remember and to be honest, when she told me what it was, I was a zombie. I tried to sleep, but that wasn't happening. I laid in bed until the alarm rang, twitching with caffeine, Red Bull and coffee, and several dark cola drinks. I showered and dressed and headed to my evening engagement, two shows at a restaurant called Patti's Pantry.
Patti's Pantry is located on Dewey Avenue in Rochester, just minutes from where I grew up. I did two 50-minute shows to a mostly middle-aged group, and had a great time doing it. There was an added bonus as a few of my friends came out to see me; the first show, Jon "Lumpy" Dubner, his wife, and a couple of friends surprised me. Jon was a mainstay at Yuk Yuk's, the first full-time comedy club that Rochester ever had. He was always and continues to be a good friend and a person who is filled with the stuff that good karma is made out of. He took some pictures with his digital camera and posted and tagged them on Facebook and with apologies from the source material, they were pretty good.
Second show, my good friend Mark Block came out. Mark is a former co-worker of mine in the Great Lakes Entertainment productions of Joey and Maria's Comedy Wedding, Joey and Maria's 25Th Anniversary, and the Soapranos. He is also my tax preparer, and the first and only person who has ever invited me to Passover supper. We had a good time hanging out backstage, which was really just a smaller dining room away from the main dining room, and while I wished I could have spent more time with him, I was coasting on fumes after 10 days of running myself like a dog and had to get home. I was telling my wife how things went, when apparently I fell asleep in the middle of a sentence and woke up at 5 in the morning with my stage clothes still on and my glasses askew.
All day Sunday I felt like hell, bones aching, dry mouth from all the caffeine, and of course, hating the snow and the cold which feels like it will never end. I drifted in and out from the Super Bowl, not really caring to watch Pittsburgh outgun the Cardinals. It was like watching a schoolyard bully push around a kid with asthma, only in this story, the kid with asthma actually put up a decent fight towards the end. At the end of it all, my team won......THE E-STREET BAND.
Yesterday, the cycle ended as it began, Ray and I judged another week of the competition at The Comedy Club, and today, I finished compiling paperwork for my health insurance. I feel like a great weight has been lifted off my shoulders, but the big machine starts up again on Saturday, where I do two shows in Rochester at PeRe (it's a club) and then hit the road to Buena Vista University in Storm Lake, Iowa. More of the same, but in a different order this time.
I hope the weather's good.
Ralph Tetta
Rochester, NY
Helldrive 2009 is officially over. Actually, it's been over for almost a week now, but I had to get out from under some things here at home before I could even sit down and write about the experience.
Helldrive 2009 is just a cute nickname I gave a two-week tour that I just completed. I always used to say that once a year, I torture myself with a routing just to keep myself honest. Now, after 5 or 6 years of doing that, I've entrusted the task to others, to make sure it gets done with no screw-ups.
Helldrive 2009 started on Wednesday, January 21st. Ray Salah and I were tapped to be the judges for The Comedy Club's "Last Comic Sitting" contest (www.thecomedyclub.us) and it was an interesting night, to say the least. I spotted stolen material from every generation of comedian from Pat Cooper all the way up to some thinly concealed Jim Gaffigan. I spotted every one of them, including evergreen theft-pots David Brenner and Lenny Bruce. I guess the rationale is that these budding comic wanna-bes are the only ones who ever listened to these records and there's no way they're gonna get nabbed. Well, they all got nabbed and none of them won.
After the show, I dropped Ray off at his house and picked up Joel Lindley for an overnight drive to Huntington, West Virginia. I'll spare you the gory details other than we got there in time for Joel to be spirited off to a radio interview and I collapsed into my sleep-number bed at the Pullman Plaza. That night, after readjusting and napping, I began my slate of shows at the Huntington Funny Bone. All I can say is "wow." What a great room, great people, great staff, perfect sound and lights and stage. It was literally perfect as far as the stage being just the right size to stalk around, just the right height to be seen from everywhere in the room without rising too lofty, just everything was exactly as it should have been. I didn't have one show the whole week that I wanted back; every once in a while, I'll say something that I just shouldn't have said, and the whole show will go to shit. This week, I was like Rumpelstiltskin, weaving gold out of straw. The room really spoiled me for every other comedy club I've had the pleasure of playing.
The Funny Bone is in a downtown mall/entertainment complex, and they have a trade-out agreement with the movie theater. I got to see Clint Eastwood's "Gran Torino" and I have to say that it was just excellent. The movie wasn't entirely perfect, but it surely would have gotten a nine out of 10 from me if I were asked to rate it. If you're on the fence based on reviews you've seen or your own personal judgement of the trailers and previews, go see it and tell me I'm wrong that it was an excellent performance by Clint Eastwood. If you remember the movie "Heartbreak Ridge" that Eastwood did in the 80's, where he played Gunnery Sergeant Thomas Highway, this is like the continuing adventures of Gunny.
At the end of the weekend, namely Sunday night, Joel and I turned in our sets for the Sunday club-goers and bid farewell to snowy Huntington, piling into the car for the ride home. West Virginia was snowy and the roads were icy, winding and treacherous, but we made it home alive. I slept about two hours (!) and then got up, showered, and left again to hit the road. I picked up Ray and the van with the Dash For Dollars game show stuff in it and we headed towards Columbus, Ohio and Ohio Dominican University. Ray had even less sleep than I did, and opted to stay at the hotel and catch up with his shut-eye while I did the show. Running on adrenaline, caffeine and a sense of duty, I finished the show and returned to the hotel where I picked up Ray and we headed out for a late dinner. We found a family-style restaurant and some country cooking, and then returned to the hotel where I managed to fall asleep mid-sentence. I woke up at 5 in the morning with my stage clothes still on and my glasses askew.
The next morning, we headed off towards Chicago and managed to hit some of that horrible winter weather that was crushing the Midwest. We drove through Indianapolis, where they forgot what snowplows looked like, and pirouetted and sashayed all across the highway. By the time we reached Merrillville, Indiana, we bunked down for the night, figuring the next day would be easier as we were far enough north to be out of the storm. We got a good night's sleep and headed off early for Harold Washington College, which is located at the corner of Smack and Dab in downtown Chicago. To say that the city is congested is an understatement; parking is not only at a premium, it's expensive as hell. I wound up digging down for $50 (no lie) to park the van for the duration of my four hour work-day. The overhead train tracks wreaked havoc with my GPS and cell phone, and as hypnotizing as Chicago is from the skyline view you get when travelling west on the 90, I guess I wouldn't do very well living there with my sense of claustrophobia that I didn't even know I had.
The evening's dinner was Cracker Barrel, and food never tasted so good. It was damn near 5 PM and neither Ray nor I had eaten a bite since the day before. I had catfish and a loaf of biscuits and Ray had some sort of roast beef platter. Then we hit the road, traveling back through Indianapolis where I cashed in my Speedway loyalty card points and purchased gasoline for $1.17 a gallon. We headed south towards Cincinnati and finally, the highway turned to crap and we grabbed the first hotel we found, a Comfort Inn. The next day, we piloted our way through Kentucky and into Tennessee and some ice-storm ravaged country, but the roads were cleaned and salted and I guess it varies from community to community whether or not they can afford such luxuries as salt and plows, but the roads stayed clean well towards our final destination. We ate a Golden Corral buffet dinner (I know all the sweet restaurants, eh?) and had a little floor-show as a party who arrived just before we were about to leave bitched out a floor manager and a kitchen manager over an entire section of the restaurant that hadn't been bussed.....there were dirty dishes everywhere, and 90% of the patrons had tipped their server and gone. The young lady who was working point on this party of ten or more diners seemed nice at first, helping the one waitress who was working the section bus the tables and mentioning nicely that she had waitress ed before and knew how hard it was. They quickly cleared about three tables and shoved them together so that the party could sit down, and then she went into full puma mode, seeking out someone with a supervisor's name tag that she could dress down in the middle of the place. I looked down and away, and left my server another buck.
We kept moving until around midnight, and I managed to find a Motel 6 that I'd stayed at last year in Newport, Tennessee. It was just dumb luck that I stopped at that exit for gas, and started to recognize everything from my visit last summer. This was the town that I saw the first available midnight showing of The Dark Knight, and camped out two days in between engagements for The Comedy Zone in Clarksville and Johnson City, Tennessee. The Motel 6 is super clean, and offers free internet, and that's unusual for Motel 6's, they usually try to get you to pay around $3.50 for a day's use (which isn't bad, to be honest). The next morning, we chewed up the last few hours and motored towards Salisbury, North Carolina, and Catawba College, for the last date of the Dash For Dollars tour. We set up and did a "teaser" for the show in the student cafeterias, and then hung out and killed time for a couple of hours until showtime. We did the show, packed up the van, and headed for home, once again hitting horrible weather in West Virginia. It seemed that the high elevations were getting horrible snow, and then we'd come down a hill and everything was clear again. I drove until the Pennsylvania border and then pulled into a rest area for a couple hour's sleep.
By the time I woke up, it was daylight, and off we headed again. We stopped for gas at a Sheetz and grabbed some breakfast and dog-legged it the rest of the way home, pulling in at maybe 1 o'clock or so. But it didn't end there, because Ray's driveway was full of snow and we had to shovel a spot to stow the van. I don't know what energy I was tapping because I cleared the space out in what felt like about five minutes. I transferred all of my luggage into my waiting Camry and headed home. Pam and Harmony had gone out for some children's event, story time or some such thing, I can't really remember and to be honest, when she told me what it was, I was a zombie. I tried to sleep, but that wasn't happening. I laid in bed until the alarm rang, twitching with caffeine, Red Bull and coffee, and several dark cola drinks. I showered and dressed and headed to my evening engagement, two shows at a restaurant called Patti's Pantry.
Patti's Pantry is located on Dewey Avenue in Rochester, just minutes from where I grew up. I did two 50-minute shows to a mostly middle-aged group, and had a great time doing it. There was an added bonus as a few of my friends came out to see me; the first show, Jon "Lumpy" Dubner, his wife, and a couple of friends surprised me. Jon was a mainstay at Yuk Yuk's, the first full-time comedy club that Rochester ever had. He was always and continues to be a good friend and a person who is filled with the stuff that good karma is made out of. He took some pictures with his digital camera and posted and tagged them on Facebook and with apologies from the source material, they were pretty good.
Second show, my good friend Mark Block came out. Mark is a former co-worker of mine in the Great Lakes Entertainment productions of Joey and Maria's Comedy Wedding, Joey and Maria's 25Th Anniversary, and the Soapranos. He is also my tax preparer, and the first and only person who has ever invited me to Passover supper. We had a good time hanging out backstage, which was really just a smaller dining room away from the main dining room, and while I wished I could have spent more time with him, I was coasting on fumes after 10 days of running myself like a dog and had to get home. I was telling my wife how things went, when apparently I fell asleep in the middle of a sentence and woke up at 5 in the morning with my stage clothes still on and my glasses askew.
All day Sunday I felt like hell, bones aching, dry mouth from all the caffeine, and of course, hating the snow and the cold which feels like it will never end. I drifted in and out from the Super Bowl, not really caring to watch Pittsburgh outgun the Cardinals. It was like watching a schoolyard bully push around a kid with asthma, only in this story, the kid with asthma actually put up a decent fight towards the end. At the end of it all, my team won......THE E-STREET BAND.
Yesterday, the cycle ended as it began, Ray and I judged another week of the competition at The Comedy Club, and today, I finished compiling paperwork for my health insurance. I feel like a great weight has been lifted off my shoulders, but the big machine starts up again on Saturday, where I do two shows in Rochester at PeRe (it's a club) and then hit the road to Buena Vista University in Storm Lake, Iowa. More of the same, but in a different order this time.
I hope the weather's good.
Ralph Tetta
Rochester, NY
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Beautiful Day (U2)
Happy Inauguration Day! It's a wonderful day, if for only the idea that power in our nation's government passes peaceably from one man's hands to another's without bloodshed. There are certainly a lot of countries in the world today that cannot make that boast.
Harmony was under the weather today, so we kept her out of school and watched the inauguration ceremony on television. She's only four years old, so much of the broadcast was lost on her, but years from now, I'm sure she'll be happy to announce that she watched the events unfold live.
I am officially sick to death of Winter. The cold weather never used to bother me, and as a matter of fact, I used to enjoy it, but lately travel has become difficult and the impact of the cold on my health and the health of my family has greatly undermined our quality of life.
On Friday the 9th, I was booked to perform a showcase in Grand Rapids, Michigan for the Smith Agency, and the agents who peddle my gameshow "Dash For Dollars" to colleges around the country. They wanted to see my regular standup act and what I bring to the table. The show was in a small bar/restaurant that was filled to capacity and this was despite a winter snowstorm gripping the state of Michigan. The next day, the plan was to drive home back to Rochester and enjoy the weekend with my family; no dice. The storm that was torturing Detroit was blowing snow up around the Port Huron, Michigan area, and put me at a standstill before I could cross over to Canada and cut across Ontario back to Upstate New York. I wound up at a small motor lodge in Port Huron thanks to my trusty TomTom GPS device that is able to locate hotels and points of interest. The going rate for hotels that night was around $115, and I just didn't feel like spending that kind of money. Instead, I found a motor lodge that was letting rooms go for only $35, although they were a little short on services.
For one, they had no wireless internet. For that matter, they had no phones, so I couldn't even dial up if I wanted to. The two rooms that were available, a double and a king suite, were the same price, so I told the desk clerk I would take the double. He said, "Would you like to see the room first?" I figured an offer like that wouldn't be tendered for no particular reason, so I took the key and headed over to room #7.
Room #7 was not better than I assumed it would be. The furniture was ramshackle at best, the bathroom a monument to neglect and a bad grout job. The deal-breaker, though, of this budget-conscious choice was the smell of the room. I could only describe it as thinking that the last renter was a man who couldn't stop peeing while he was cleaning a fish.
I returned to the desk and asked to see the king suite, and moments later, headed over to unit #4. Happily, the room didn't smell unpleasant; rather, there had been some sort of room deodorizer applied that made it smell kind of nice. The furniture wasn't any better and the bathroom was only slightly better, and I decided that this was what I was going to get for $35.
I checked in, drove down the road to a small mini-mart and grabbed some food and bottled water, and spent the rest of the evening watching football and movies on cable. The next morning, the roads were plowed and I headed east. The roads weren't entirely clear, but I had at least a fighting chance to get home in one piece. The day before, somewhere along the way between Lansing and Flint, Michigan, I avoided a 17-car pile-up created by slick roads and cars following each other without the proper space between them.
After a few days at home, the frigid, sub-zero weather set in. I was scheduled to perform at Immaculata University in Exton, Pennsylvania, the first morning of the worst of the cold snap. I picked up my comedy buddy Ray Salah and we headed south to the Philadelphia area, stopping on the New York State Thruway to replenish the window-wash fluid. An examination of the wipers also showed that they were not in the best repair, and a stop at Target rectified that. The college was a small one, with only around 850 students, but they had a good attendance at the evening show, and the drive back was relatively painless. Ray accompanied me to another gig last week, an engagement at the Dunkirk, NY Loyal Order of Moose, with Buffalo comedians Nick Siracuse and Blaine Kelly. At first, Ray was exceedingly grumpy, but after having the time to pal around with old comedy buddies, he loosened up and enjoyed the evening. On stage, I told some real-life stories of our adventures together, which were precipitated on Ray's distinct cackle being acknowledged from the stage by both Nick and Blaine earlier in the show. The crowd had "got to know" Ray only from what we had said about him on stage, and I felt that the groundwork was laid to tell the stories, which went over well. On the drive back home, which was snowy, dangerous and long, we laughed about how well the bits had gone, even though I'd never told those stories on stage before.
This week, it's a week-long engagement at the Funnybone in Huntington, West Virginia, and then a week of college shows, culminating in a Saturday show back in Rochester for my buddy, Danny Liberto. I'm happy to be busy, because at least it's keeping my mind off of how cold I am and how much I can't wait for winter to be over.
Stay warm and be good, and make sure that when you've driving, you give the car in front of you at least one delineation (car length) for every 10 miles of speed you're travelling.
Peace!
Ralph Tetta
Rochester, NY
Harmony was under the weather today, so we kept her out of school and watched the inauguration ceremony on television. She's only four years old, so much of the broadcast was lost on her, but years from now, I'm sure she'll be happy to announce that she watched the events unfold live.
I am officially sick to death of Winter. The cold weather never used to bother me, and as a matter of fact, I used to enjoy it, but lately travel has become difficult and the impact of the cold on my health and the health of my family has greatly undermined our quality of life.
On Friday the 9th, I was booked to perform a showcase in Grand Rapids, Michigan for the Smith Agency, and the agents who peddle my gameshow "Dash For Dollars" to colleges around the country. They wanted to see my regular standup act and what I bring to the table. The show was in a small bar/restaurant that was filled to capacity and this was despite a winter snowstorm gripping the state of Michigan. The next day, the plan was to drive home back to Rochester and enjoy the weekend with my family; no dice. The storm that was torturing Detroit was blowing snow up around the Port Huron, Michigan area, and put me at a standstill before I could cross over to Canada and cut across Ontario back to Upstate New York. I wound up at a small motor lodge in Port Huron thanks to my trusty TomTom GPS device that is able to locate hotels and points of interest. The going rate for hotels that night was around $115, and I just didn't feel like spending that kind of money. Instead, I found a motor lodge that was letting rooms go for only $35, although they were a little short on services.
For one, they had no wireless internet. For that matter, they had no phones, so I couldn't even dial up if I wanted to. The two rooms that were available, a double and a king suite, were the same price, so I told the desk clerk I would take the double. He said, "Would you like to see the room first?" I figured an offer like that wouldn't be tendered for no particular reason, so I took the key and headed over to room #7.
Room #7 was not better than I assumed it would be. The furniture was ramshackle at best, the bathroom a monument to neglect and a bad grout job. The deal-breaker, though, of this budget-conscious choice was the smell of the room. I could only describe it as thinking that the last renter was a man who couldn't stop peeing while he was cleaning a fish.
I returned to the desk and asked to see the king suite, and moments later, headed over to unit #4. Happily, the room didn't smell unpleasant; rather, there had been some sort of room deodorizer applied that made it smell kind of nice. The furniture wasn't any better and the bathroom was only slightly better, and I decided that this was what I was going to get for $35.
I checked in, drove down the road to a small mini-mart and grabbed some food and bottled water, and spent the rest of the evening watching football and movies on cable. The next morning, the roads were plowed and I headed east. The roads weren't entirely clear, but I had at least a fighting chance to get home in one piece. The day before, somewhere along the way between Lansing and Flint, Michigan, I avoided a 17-car pile-up created by slick roads and cars following each other without the proper space between them.
After a few days at home, the frigid, sub-zero weather set in. I was scheduled to perform at Immaculata University in Exton, Pennsylvania, the first morning of the worst of the cold snap. I picked up my comedy buddy Ray Salah and we headed south to the Philadelphia area, stopping on the New York State Thruway to replenish the window-wash fluid. An examination of the wipers also showed that they were not in the best repair, and a stop at Target rectified that. The college was a small one, with only around 850 students, but they had a good attendance at the evening show, and the drive back was relatively painless. Ray accompanied me to another gig last week, an engagement at the Dunkirk, NY Loyal Order of Moose, with Buffalo comedians Nick Siracuse and Blaine Kelly. At first, Ray was exceedingly grumpy, but after having the time to pal around with old comedy buddies, he loosened up and enjoyed the evening. On stage, I told some real-life stories of our adventures together, which were precipitated on Ray's distinct cackle being acknowledged from the stage by both Nick and Blaine earlier in the show. The crowd had "got to know" Ray only from what we had said about him on stage, and I felt that the groundwork was laid to tell the stories, which went over well. On the drive back home, which was snowy, dangerous and long, we laughed about how well the bits had gone, even though I'd never told those stories on stage before.
This week, it's a week-long engagement at the Funnybone in Huntington, West Virginia, and then a week of college shows, culminating in a Saturday show back in Rochester for my buddy, Danny Liberto. I'm happy to be busy, because at least it's keeping my mind off of how cold I am and how much I can't wait for winter to be over.
Stay warm and be good, and make sure that when you've driving, you give the car in front of you at least one delineation (car length) for every 10 miles of speed you're travelling.
Peace!
Ralph Tetta
Rochester, NY
Friday, January 2, 2009
Gettin' Better (Tesla)
Friday, January 2, 2009-11:30 P.M.
Good evening, and welcome to the first Tetta blog of 2009. When last you left me, I was being discharged from the hospital after having a blood clot in my left leg treated.
The last few weeks, in addition to the holidays, have been about the work of healing up and getting better while still working to support my family. I had to miss the Smith Agency Christmas Party, which I was very much looking forward to, because it was just too long a drive to safely make. I wound up doing short jaunts to the Mountainview Inn in Greensburg, Pennsylvania and the Funny Farm in Gloversville, New York, to maintain some income and semblance of normality. I have to invest in some supportive hosiery for my legs to tolerate longer road trips...I'd heard of such garments, but never worn them or even to this date, seen them. That's on my list of "things to do" for this week."
I was aware of a big-ass snowstorm heading towards Western New York the day before the Greensburg date, and had made arrangements to drive down early, thus missing the storm, but couldn't take advantage of their offer to check into the hotel a day early because I had a mandatory blood-draw the next day. I'm on a blood thinner called Coumadin (generic equivalent Warfarin) and it's completely hit-or-miss when they prescribe the medication because everyone's blood is different and you can't just go by height and weight. Too weak a dose, and blood clots could reoccur. Too strong a dose, and your blood becomes thin enough that a small cut will keep bleeding until you die. They want to see a coagulation rate between 2 and 3. My previous draw had shown a level of 3.2, so I was told to back off the medication. As I drove through the storm on Friday morning, I was contacted and told my level had rocketed to 4.8, definitely going in the wrong direction, and was told to discontinue the medication and then pick up again in half-doses. I had gotten to the lab Friday morning when they opened at 9:00 A.M., gave them the blood they required and drove off into the storm.
The drive from Rochester to Buffalo and then southwest to the Pennsylvania border usually takes about two hours. On Friday, it took a full 4 1/2 hours to make the trip, and the trip was fraught with terror. Ice kept building up on my windshield, and I had to do that scam where you grab the windshield wiper out your driver's side window and thwap! it across the windshield to break off the ice. In doing so, I snagged a fingernail and tore it, and went nuts trying to find a pair of nail clippers (that I always have with me). I found them in my travel bag and gave myself an emergency manicure, and when I put everything back, I buried my cell phone and then went nuts, thinking it had fallen out of my pocket at the Kwik-Fill. When I finally arrived in Greensburg, I was tired, shaky, unshaven, but on time with two hours to spare. The weather in Greensburg when I arrived was 54 degrees and raining.
The gig was cool, and even though it was a small crowd. I worked with "Big Al" Goodwin, and we got along nicely, talking shop and finally putting a human being together with the headshot I'd seen on comedy club walls across the country. After the show, I had to move my room because the room they gave me had no heat, and even though it was a beautiful old historic hotel with amazing fixtures, it was just too cold to be comfortable. They were able to move me with no problems, and I spent the night, hoping the New York State Thruway would be cleared off the next morning.
On Saturday, I hit the road as early as possible, which was 10:30 after showering and packing. The drive was clear and the snow started falling again when I pulled into Rochester. I gassed up and got home, taking 45 minutes to change clothes and begin the drive to Gloversville, NY. On the way, I picked up Steve Natarelli, a Rochester area comic, and we headed to the Funny Farm. We got there about 40 minutes before showtime after speeding in the snow on the back roads of Wayne County and finally joining some of the holiday traffic on the Thruway. The show was sparsely attended due to a Christmas Party cancellation, but we had fun and the comics on the bill did their job. My middle act was John Briggs, a "smart" comic from the Capital District, and some of the other comics from the area hosted and did guest spots. I got Steve a spot and he did very well. When I hit the stage, I'd just let it fly based on being in the car all damn day, and it was fun and funny. Opener Jon Hausmann sent me the following letter:
Granted it's a sample of THREE appearances, but last night was easily your best night there, in spite of the single-digit audience. Maybe you should strive to be exhausted and disoriented ALL the time. Same was true of Briggs. I've now seen him so many times - he was 'ON' last night. Don't know why.
I emceed there last week - audience was about 80 people (including, surprise to me - my BOSS'S BOSS) - and they were DEAD. Not the comics' fault - they audience was just catatonic. The only reactions Headliner Greg Aidala was able to get from them was by swearing liberally at them. Seemed to work - didn't even need punch lines, just channel Redd Foxx and they laughed. Seemed like a DEF Comedy Jam show I watched once in which my wife and I looked at each other and said "What the hell are they LAUGHING at?".
Anyway- you did good last night, not that it matters to Sylvia, but at least you gave 100% to those that came. I liked your bit about "knocking on doors", although in Gloversville after 2 or 3 doors they'd probably run you right out of the trailer park. - Jon
I like the Funny Farm, but it seems every time I go there, it's a holiday, or Mother's Day, or some such crowd-killing circumstance. Maybe it's just the luck of the draw, but Sylvia and Rich are fine hosts, and it's a gig, so we run with it.
Christmas weekend, it was a triumphant return to Rochester and the new comedy club in Webster, NY called "The Comedy Club" (http://www.thecomedyclub.us/) and a feature spot with Rochester's own Joel Lindley. We had a very funny guy named Patrick Dodd do a spot on the Friday early show, and even though he's from Rochester (and brought about 50 friends and family members with him), I'd never seen him work as he got into comedy only after moving to Atlanta. He rocked the room, and it was a great show.
Saturday night, it was a "Comix Cafe reunion show" at the late show. It wasn't a true reunion because the club had quite a bit of turnover in the 10 years they were open, so it was mostly the new incarnation of the staff, many of which currently work at the Webster club. They were good 'n' hammered by showtime, and it caused a little disturbance in the showroom from their table talk, but it was nice to see a lot of the old faces again.
The rest of the week was sponsored by Danny Liberto of the Comedy Company, as I did a spot at his open mic at the Otter Lodge in Brighton, and then headlined his show at the Raddison hotel in Corning, NY the next evening with D-Lo Danny Brown in support. The open mic was packed, and I mean packed, and during the first comic's set (a guest spot by Rochester's own Sky Sands), local comic Billy T. Anglin and I hauled chairs out of the back room to accommodate the couple of dozen people who found themselves standing. It was a great audience to work in front of, and it was only the shear number of comics that caused some folks to have to leave early. The gig in Corning was fun, although it was less like comedy and more like work. Pamela made the 90-minute ride with me and upon entering the showroom, I knew it would be tough as the hotel had already put noisemakers on the tables (the ENEMY of New Year's Eve comedy shows)-anyone with any NYE savvy knows that you don't hand those out until after the show's over. I taped, but it was a highly distracted audience, and not a show that I would want to save. At one point, I addressed a table in the back that were talking to each other the way you'd talk to people at a rock concert; loud and with no consideration of the people around you. After asking them if there was a problem, quite a few table basically told them to shut the fuck up, and then I spent a few minutes berating the drunkest of the table. I'd worked the room for Danny before and always had a great time, but these folks were not focused in any way for comedy, so we just got the money and then enjoyed New Year's Eve. Danny and D-Low chose to head back to Rochester, and Pamela and I sought out a Denny's (the only food available that time of the night), and celebrated by over-tipping the waitress for pancakes and a club sandwich.
Today it was back to the business of maintaining my health, and an early-morning blood draw showed my blood with a coagulation rate of 2.6, pretty much perfect. I met with my doctor later in the day, and he was pleased with the results. He took me off of three of the medications I'm on, including Januvia, which was costing me around $260 a month. I'm happy to be out from under any medications, including that costly little fucker. I just have to keep doing what I'm doing in terms of diet, and step up my exercise, which shouldn't be all that hard, although my left foot still has some swelling and that's made me just a little tentative about taking up the treadmill again. I just have to be creative and figure out how to work some upper body into the mix so that I'm not depending on just my legs to help me work up a sweat. The tour begins again with a club appearance in Grand Rapids, Michigan next Friday, and then the college tour starts up again with a "Dash For Dollars" show in Pennsylvania, and then I picked up a week at the Funny Bone in Huntington, West Virginia, courtesy of my pal, Joel Lindley. See kids, it's all networking in this business.
So belated holiday greetings to anyone I might have missed this season, we got our Christmas cards out on the fly because of my stay in the hospital, and didn't mean to stand anyone up. The good news is that I'm still here, still strong, and looking forward to being around for a long time.
Ralph Tetta
Rochester, NY
P.S. Not bragging, but I just did the books for 2008, and I actually showed growth over 2007, and that's even with a drastically reduced income from the sale of souvenir merchandise. I guess I'm in show business for at least another year. Peace, y'all!
Good evening, and welcome to the first Tetta blog of 2009. When last you left me, I was being discharged from the hospital after having a blood clot in my left leg treated.
The last few weeks, in addition to the holidays, have been about the work of healing up and getting better while still working to support my family. I had to miss the Smith Agency Christmas Party, which I was very much looking forward to, because it was just too long a drive to safely make. I wound up doing short jaunts to the Mountainview Inn in Greensburg, Pennsylvania and the Funny Farm in Gloversville, New York, to maintain some income and semblance of normality. I have to invest in some supportive hosiery for my legs to tolerate longer road trips...I'd heard of such garments, but never worn them or even to this date, seen them. That's on my list of "things to do" for this week."
I was aware of a big-ass snowstorm heading towards Western New York the day before the Greensburg date, and had made arrangements to drive down early, thus missing the storm, but couldn't take advantage of their offer to check into the hotel a day early because I had a mandatory blood-draw the next day. I'm on a blood thinner called Coumadin (generic equivalent Warfarin) and it's completely hit-or-miss when they prescribe the medication because everyone's blood is different and you can't just go by height and weight. Too weak a dose, and blood clots could reoccur. Too strong a dose, and your blood becomes thin enough that a small cut will keep bleeding until you die. They want to see a coagulation rate between 2 and 3. My previous draw had shown a level of 3.2, so I was told to back off the medication. As I drove through the storm on Friday morning, I was contacted and told my level had rocketed to 4.8, definitely going in the wrong direction, and was told to discontinue the medication and then pick up again in half-doses. I had gotten to the lab Friday morning when they opened at 9:00 A.M., gave them the blood they required and drove off into the storm.
The drive from Rochester to Buffalo and then southwest to the Pennsylvania border usually takes about two hours. On Friday, it took a full 4 1/2 hours to make the trip, and the trip was fraught with terror. Ice kept building up on my windshield, and I had to do that scam where you grab the windshield wiper out your driver's side window and thwap! it across the windshield to break off the ice. In doing so, I snagged a fingernail and tore it, and went nuts trying to find a pair of nail clippers (that I always have with me). I found them in my travel bag and gave myself an emergency manicure, and when I put everything back, I buried my cell phone and then went nuts, thinking it had fallen out of my pocket at the Kwik-Fill. When I finally arrived in Greensburg, I was tired, shaky, unshaven, but on time with two hours to spare. The weather in Greensburg when I arrived was 54 degrees and raining.
The gig was cool, and even though it was a small crowd. I worked with "Big Al" Goodwin, and we got along nicely, talking shop and finally putting a human being together with the headshot I'd seen on comedy club walls across the country. After the show, I had to move my room because the room they gave me had no heat, and even though it was a beautiful old historic hotel with amazing fixtures, it was just too cold to be comfortable. They were able to move me with no problems, and I spent the night, hoping the New York State Thruway would be cleared off the next morning.
On Saturday, I hit the road as early as possible, which was 10:30 after showering and packing. The drive was clear and the snow started falling again when I pulled into Rochester. I gassed up and got home, taking 45 minutes to change clothes and begin the drive to Gloversville, NY. On the way, I picked up Steve Natarelli, a Rochester area comic, and we headed to the Funny Farm. We got there about 40 minutes before showtime after speeding in the snow on the back roads of Wayne County and finally joining some of the holiday traffic on the Thruway. The show was sparsely attended due to a Christmas Party cancellation, but we had fun and the comics on the bill did their job. My middle act was John Briggs, a "smart" comic from the Capital District, and some of the other comics from the area hosted and did guest spots. I got Steve a spot and he did very well. When I hit the stage, I'd just let it fly based on being in the car all damn day, and it was fun and funny. Opener Jon Hausmann sent me the following letter:
Granted it's a sample of THREE appearances, but last night was easily your best night there, in spite of the single-digit audience. Maybe you should strive to be exhausted and disoriented ALL the time. Same was true of Briggs. I've now seen him so many times - he was 'ON' last night. Don't know why.
I emceed there last week - audience was about 80 people (including, surprise to me - my BOSS'S BOSS) - and they were DEAD. Not the comics' fault - they audience was just catatonic. The only reactions Headliner Greg Aidala was able to get from them was by swearing liberally at them. Seemed to work - didn't even need punch lines, just channel Redd Foxx and they laughed. Seemed like a DEF Comedy Jam show I watched once in which my wife and I looked at each other and said "What the hell are they LAUGHING at?".
Anyway- you did good last night, not that it matters to Sylvia, but at least you gave 100% to those that came. I liked your bit about "knocking on doors", although in Gloversville after 2 or 3 doors they'd probably run you right out of the trailer park. - Jon
I like the Funny Farm, but it seems every time I go there, it's a holiday, or Mother's Day, or some such crowd-killing circumstance. Maybe it's just the luck of the draw, but Sylvia and Rich are fine hosts, and it's a gig, so we run with it.
Christmas weekend, it was a triumphant return to Rochester and the new comedy club in Webster, NY called "The Comedy Club" (http://www.thecomedyclub.us/) and a feature spot with Rochester's own Joel Lindley. We had a very funny guy named Patrick Dodd do a spot on the Friday early show, and even though he's from Rochester (and brought about 50 friends and family members with him), I'd never seen him work as he got into comedy only after moving to Atlanta. He rocked the room, and it was a great show.
Saturday night, it was a "Comix Cafe reunion show" at the late show. It wasn't a true reunion because the club had quite a bit of turnover in the 10 years they were open, so it was mostly the new incarnation of the staff, many of which currently work at the Webster club. They were good 'n' hammered by showtime, and it caused a little disturbance in the showroom from their table talk, but it was nice to see a lot of the old faces again.
The rest of the week was sponsored by Danny Liberto of the Comedy Company, as I did a spot at his open mic at the Otter Lodge in Brighton, and then headlined his show at the Raddison hotel in Corning, NY the next evening with D-Lo Danny Brown in support. The open mic was packed, and I mean packed, and during the first comic's set (a guest spot by Rochester's own Sky Sands), local comic Billy T. Anglin and I hauled chairs out of the back room to accommodate the couple of dozen people who found themselves standing. It was a great audience to work in front of, and it was only the shear number of comics that caused some folks to have to leave early. The gig in Corning was fun, although it was less like comedy and more like work. Pamela made the 90-minute ride with me and upon entering the showroom, I knew it would be tough as the hotel had already put noisemakers on the tables (the ENEMY of New Year's Eve comedy shows)-anyone with any NYE savvy knows that you don't hand those out until after the show's over. I taped, but it was a highly distracted audience, and not a show that I would want to save. At one point, I addressed a table in the back that were talking to each other the way you'd talk to people at a rock concert; loud and with no consideration of the people around you. After asking them if there was a problem, quite a few table basically told them to shut the fuck up, and then I spent a few minutes berating the drunkest of the table. I'd worked the room for Danny before and always had a great time, but these folks were not focused in any way for comedy, so we just got the money and then enjoyed New Year's Eve. Danny and D-Low chose to head back to Rochester, and Pamela and I sought out a Denny's (the only food available that time of the night), and celebrated by over-tipping the waitress for pancakes and a club sandwich.
Today it was back to the business of maintaining my health, and an early-morning blood draw showed my blood with a coagulation rate of 2.6, pretty much perfect. I met with my doctor later in the day, and he was pleased with the results. He took me off of three of the medications I'm on, including Januvia, which was costing me around $260 a month. I'm happy to be out from under any medications, including that costly little fucker. I just have to keep doing what I'm doing in terms of diet, and step up my exercise, which shouldn't be all that hard, although my left foot still has some swelling and that's made me just a little tentative about taking up the treadmill again. I just have to be creative and figure out how to work some upper body into the mix so that I'm not depending on just my legs to help me work up a sweat. The tour begins again with a club appearance in Grand Rapids, Michigan next Friday, and then the college tour starts up again with a "Dash For Dollars" show in Pennsylvania, and then I picked up a week at the Funny Bone in Huntington, West Virginia, courtesy of my pal, Joel Lindley. See kids, it's all networking in this business.
So belated holiday greetings to anyone I might have missed this season, we got our Christmas cards out on the fly because of my stay in the hospital, and didn't mean to stand anyone up. The good news is that I'm still here, still strong, and looking forward to being around for a long time.
Ralph Tetta
Rochester, NY
P.S. Not bragging, but I just did the books for 2008, and I actually showed growth over 2007, and that's even with a drastically reduced income from the sale of souvenir merchandise. I guess I'm in show business for at least another year. Peace, y'all!
Thursday, December 18, 2008
Hotel Illness (The Black Crowes)
Thursday, December 18, 2008-11:30 A.M.
What if you were about to die but didn't know it? Just didn't have a clue?
That's where I was last week, on Tuesday night. I was hanging out at Danny Liberto's open mic at the Otter Lodge and hanging around with friends, doing some comedy, having a whiskey and living my life. And I had a swollen foot.
It was no big deal. It didn't hurt. I'd had some leg problems going back to Halloween, but I was getting around. I thought it was fallen arches. I had fallen arches before, and you recover. You do the stretching exercises, put some arch supports in your shoes, and away you go.
I'm diabetic, so foot care is always right in the forefront. My wife said "You need to get that looked at." I needed to make an appointment to see my doctor anyway, as I had prescriptions that he didn't want to renew until he saw me again. I got one that very morning.
When I arrived, he looked at the foot, and after I described my month-long leg pain, he decided that I was in danger of having a blood clot. I was sent hustling over to the ultrasound department at Rochester General Hospital, where I was born 42 years ago, and the ultrasound showed that indeed, I had a blood clot in my left leg that was restricting blood flow and causing my left foot to swell.
Blood clots are tricky things, I've learned. They float up and down the leg, sometimes they get stuck, and sometimes they go right to the lungs and give you what's called a pulmonary embolism. That's a bad thing. The lungs actually protect clots from going to the brain, but sometimes they do, and that's called a stroke.
I was admitted immediately.
My wife joined me, and before I knew it, I was in a wheelchair and going through hospital admissions. The woman who checked me in, Luda, was an older lady and very nice. After talking for a while, she recognized me. She had come to a show at the Comix Cafe (my old home club) on a Sunday night, they sat in the front, and I picked on her husband. After looking at the photographs on her office wall, the whole night came back to me; it was a Sunday, they sat to the left of the stage, so my right looking out to the audience, and her husband had his chair turned away, which is why I gave him grief to begin with. I thought, "what are the odds?" Well, I was in my hometown, where I've worked steadily for ten years or more, so I guess the odds were pretty good.
I was wheeled into a room on the fourth floor, into the area they call 4200. I was in a shared room with another patient, a gentleman named Rick who was recovering from back surgery. Rick had a lot of visitors, and long story short, his daughter Lisa recognized my voice from behind the curtain that separated us as we had worked together in the research department of WCMF radio about 15 years ago. We laughed and caught up, and that was two episodes of being recognized in the short span of just an hour or two.
I was due to start treatment Wednesday night with an intravenous drip of a drug called Heparin, which is a blood thinner. The young lady, whose name escapes me, had to put the IV into my left arm, and apparently I have rhino skin or something, because she had a hell of a time getting the needle through my dermis, and then the vein kept "jumping" or "rolling" and she couldn't get the IV in.
I've never been good with medical procedures and I hate needles (I'd be the lousiest junkie ever...."Does heroin come in a pill?") and while the nurse dug and dug into my arm, I started going into traumatic shock. I know, because I've gone into shock before...the symptoms are basic. First, there's the feeling of nausea. Next, there's the cold sweat. Finally, shortness of breath takes over. The nurse removed the needle and they elevated my legs and instructed me to breathe. That's how worked-over I was, they had to remind me to breathe. If you have to be reminded to breath, some hellacious shit is happening to you.
Once I was back to normal, she tried again, and this attempt was far more successful. I ate dinner and sent my wife home with a list of some personal items I would need for my hospital stay; a book I'm reading ("Anansi Boys" by Neil Gaiman), a sudoku book, underwear (to help maintain some sense of modesty under the hospital's gowns, who are designed for no one's comfort or pleasure) and personal items. I chatted with Rick through the curtain, as he was on some sort of steroids and was having trouble falling asleep. I had my own problems; I'd never been hospitalized before, much less for a "deep vein thrombosis," and a description of it as "going in through the groin area" did nothing for my customer confidence. They brought me water in a Styrofoam cup, and after I drank the water, I nervously inscribed the cup with a ballpoint pen, writing down my wife and daughter's names, a quote from Winston Churchill's "we shall fight them in the fields, we shall defend our island" speech, song lyrics, and joke that I wrote for Mitch Hedberg that he died before he could consider using. I was scheduled for my procedure at 8:00 A.M., and drifted off to sleep around midnight.
The next morning, a barrage of nurses, doctors, food service workers and the like started invading the room, quashing any thoughts I had of sleeping in. They woke me at 7 A.M., an hour before my procedure. Well, like in show business, very little in the hospital starts on time. I went to the procedure about quarter to twelve, only shy of four hours later from the scheduled time. I didn't mind, because any delay of a needle in my groin was fine with me.
I was rolled down to the room where such procedures are done, and they flopped me onto an operating table, face down. I joked around with the team that was working on me, and to my surprise, they did not have to go into my groin, but rather, through the back of my knee and down near my ankle. I'm not going to pretend to be any sort of medical professional, but basically, the procedure was to blast the clot with anticoagulant and then soak the pieces with anticoagulant, hoping to dissolve them. Long story short, the procedure went so well, instead of sending me to intensive care for monitoring (the original plan), I was sent back to the recovery room in 4200. The only problem was that they had given away my bed. I wound up in a private room, where I spent the next four and half days.
Pamela came to visit me, bringing me all the things I would need for my stay, including my laptop. The hospital had wireless Internet (thank God) and daily newspaper delivery to the rooms on request. Honestly, it was like being in a hotel they way they took care of me. I met a great number of people, all who were exceptional in their care of me, including Kristina, Brandi, Robert, Julie, Jessica S., Mallory, Sarah and Alex. Everyone was amazing, and no one ever left my room without asking me if there was anything I needed or that they could get for me.
I sleep with a CPAP machine because I have sleep apnea, and someone from Respiratory Services showed up every day to make sure that things were working properly. Someone from Nutrition came and went over the daily menu with me, and explained to me that if there was something on the menu I didn't like, that I could call and get something switched around, and if I was still hungry, there was room service available until 8:00 P.M. I decided that their menu (customized to my diabetic profile) was nutritionally balanced enough that I didn't want to mess with it, and never took them up on their room service offer. Pam brought me some Combos pretzel snacks at my request, because the one rap on hospital food that I have is everything is very soft and there's no variation in texture. I guess if my client base had an average age somewhere between 65 and deceased, I'd slop out the creamed corn, too.
I was released on Tuesday afternoon after the Coumadin I was receiving hit the proper level, and I was excited to be going home. All day on Tuesday and Wednesday, I was weak as a kitten, my muscles protesting due to their inactivity for almost a week. I think I'll be back to full fighting strength this weekend, when I have two gigs close to home, but I had to cancel my Western Canada trip for January that I was very much looking forward to, because I have to go to a blood lab twice a week as they monitor my anticoagulants and make sure that the concentration is therapeutic enough to make a difference, but not so effective that I bleed to death when I nick myself shaving.
I have a feeling it's going to be a long, cold winter as I adjust to this new wrinkle in my health profile, but I'm glad to be alive and I've started catching up on lost time, putting up Christmas cards here at the apartment, fishing the small artificial tree down from the attic, and getting ready to enjoy the holiday season.
Thanks to everyone who checked in on me while I was languishing in the hospital, to everyone on my health care staff (don't forget to come and see me at the Comedy Club in Webster [www.thecomedyclub.us] on December 26th and 27th), and I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday season!
Ralph Tetta
Rochester, NY
What if you were about to die but didn't know it? Just didn't have a clue?
That's where I was last week, on Tuesday night. I was hanging out at Danny Liberto's open mic at the Otter Lodge and hanging around with friends, doing some comedy, having a whiskey and living my life. And I had a swollen foot.
It was no big deal. It didn't hurt. I'd had some leg problems going back to Halloween, but I was getting around. I thought it was fallen arches. I had fallen arches before, and you recover. You do the stretching exercises, put some arch supports in your shoes, and away you go.
I'm diabetic, so foot care is always right in the forefront. My wife said "You need to get that looked at." I needed to make an appointment to see my doctor anyway, as I had prescriptions that he didn't want to renew until he saw me again. I got one that very morning.
When I arrived, he looked at the foot, and after I described my month-long leg pain, he decided that I was in danger of having a blood clot. I was sent hustling over to the ultrasound department at Rochester General Hospital, where I was born 42 years ago, and the ultrasound showed that indeed, I had a blood clot in my left leg that was restricting blood flow and causing my left foot to swell.
Blood clots are tricky things, I've learned. They float up and down the leg, sometimes they get stuck, and sometimes they go right to the lungs and give you what's called a pulmonary embolism. That's a bad thing. The lungs actually protect clots from going to the brain, but sometimes they do, and that's called a stroke.
I was admitted immediately.
My wife joined me, and before I knew it, I was in a wheelchair and going through hospital admissions. The woman who checked me in, Luda, was an older lady and very nice. After talking for a while, she recognized me. She had come to a show at the Comix Cafe (my old home club) on a Sunday night, they sat in the front, and I picked on her husband. After looking at the photographs on her office wall, the whole night came back to me; it was a Sunday, they sat to the left of the stage, so my right looking out to the audience, and her husband had his chair turned away, which is why I gave him grief to begin with. I thought, "what are the odds?" Well, I was in my hometown, where I've worked steadily for ten years or more, so I guess the odds were pretty good.
I was wheeled into a room on the fourth floor, into the area they call 4200. I was in a shared room with another patient, a gentleman named Rick who was recovering from back surgery. Rick had a lot of visitors, and long story short, his daughter Lisa recognized my voice from behind the curtain that separated us as we had worked together in the research department of WCMF radio about 15 years ago. We laughed and caught up, and that was two episodes of being recognized in the short span of just an hour or two.
I was due to start treatment Wednesday night with an intravenous drip of a drug called Heparin, which is a blood thinner. The young lady, whose name escapes me, had to put the IV into my left arm, and apparently I have rhino skin or something, because she had a hell of a time getting the needle through my dermis, and then the vein kept "jumping" or "rolling" and she couldn't get the IV in.
I've never been good with medical procedures and I hate needles (I'd be the lousiest junkie ever...."Does heroin come in a pill?") and while the nurse dug and dug into my arm, I started going into traumatic shock. I know, because I've gone into shock before...the symptoms are basic. First, there's the feeling of nausea. Next, there's the cold sweat. Finally, shortness of breath takes over. The nurse removed the needle and they elevated my legs and instructed me to breathe. That's how worked-over I was, they had to remind me to breathe. If you have to be reminded to breath, some hellacious shit is happening to you.
Once I was back to normal, she tried again, and this attempt was far more successful. I ate dinner and sent my wife home with a list of some personal items I would need for my hospital stay; a book I'm reading ("Anansi Boys" by Neil Gaiman), a sudoku book, underwear (to help maintain some sense of modesty under the hospital's gowns, who are designed for no one's comfort or pleasure) and personal items. I chatted with Rick through the curtain, as he was on some sort of steroids and was having trouble falling asleep. I had my own problems; I'd never been hospitalized before, much less for a "deep vein thrombosis," and a description of it as "going in through the groin area" did nothing for my customer confidence. They brought me water in a Styrofoam cup, and after I drank the water, I nervously inscribed the cup with a ballpoint pen, writing down my wife and daughter's names, a quote from Winston Churchill's "we shall fight them in the fields, we shall defend our island" speech, song lyrics, and joke that I wrote for Mitch Hedberg that he died before he could consider using. I was scheduled for my procedure at 8:00 A.M., and drifted off to sleep around midnight.
The next morning, a barrage of nurses, doctors, food service workers and the like started invading the room, quashing any thoughts I had of sleeping in. They woke me at 7 A.M., an hour before my procedure. Well, like in show business, very little in the hospital starts on time. I went to the procedure about quarter to twelve, only shy of four hours later from the scheduled time. I didn't mind, because any delay of a needle in my groin was fine with me.
I was rolled down to the room where such procedures are done, and they flopped me onto an operating table, face down. I joked around with the team that was working on me, and to my surprise, they did not have to go into my groin, but rather, through the back of my knee and down near my ankle. I'm not going to pretend to be any sort of medical professional, but basically, the procedure was to blast the clot with anticoagulant and then soak the pieces with anticoagulant, hoping to dissolve them. Long story short, the procedure went so well, instead of sending me to intensive care for monitoring (the original plan), I was sent back to the recovery room in 4200. The only problem was that they had given away my bed. I wound up in a private room, where I spent the next four and half days.
Pamela came to visit me, bringing me all the things I would need for my stay, including my laptop. The hospital had wireless Internet (thank God) and daily newspaper delivery to the rooms on request. Honestly, it was like being in a hotel they way they took care of me. I met a great number of people, all who were exceptional in their care of me, including Kristina, Brandi, Robert, Julie, Jessica S., Mallory, Sarah and Alex. Everyone was amazing, and no one ever left my room without asking me if there was anything I needed or that they could get for me.
I sleep with a CPAP machine because I have sleep apnea, and someone from Respiratory Services showed up every day to make sure that things were working properly. Someone from Nutrition came and went over the daily menu with me, and explained to me that if there was something on the menu I didn't like, that I could call and get something switched around, and if I was still hungry, there was room service available until 8:00 P.M. I decided that their menu (customized to my diabetic profile) was nutritionally balanced enough that I didn't want to mess with it, and never took them up on their room service offer. Pam brought me some Combos pretzel snacks at my request, because the one rap on hospital food that I have is everything is very soft and there's no variation in texture. I guess if my client base had an average age somewhere between 65 and deceased, I'd slop out the creamed corn, too.
I was released on Tuesday afternoon after the Coumadin I was receiving hit the proper level, and I was excited to be going home. All day on Tuesday and Wednesday, I was weak as a kitten, my muscles protesting due to their inactivity for almost a week. I think I'll be back to full fighting strength this weekend, when I have two gigs close to home, but I had to cancel my Western Canada trip for January that I was very much looking forward to, because I have to go to a blood lab twice a week as they monitor my anticoagulants and make sure that the concentration is therapeutic enough to make a difference, but not so effective that I bleed to death when I nick myself shaving.
I have a feeling it's going to be a long, cold winter as I adjust to this new wrinkle in my health profile, but I'm glad to be alive and I've started catching up on lost time, putting up Christmas cards here at the apartment, fishing the small artificial tree down from the attic, and getting ready to enjoy the holiday season.
Thanks to everyone who checked in on me while I was languishing in the hospital, to everyone on my health care staff (don't forget to come and see me at the Comedy Club in Webster [www.thecomedyclub.us] on December 26th and 27th), and I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday season!
Ralph Tetta
Rochester, NY
Monday, December 8, 2008
White Christmas (Crash Test Dummies)
Monday, December 8, 2008-4:00 P.M.
Wow, it feels like life is a little back to normal.
I'm home from visiting my mother in Florida, and the three days were just full of phone calls, doctor's appointments, trips to the hardware store, and a lot of love, helping my mother mend after her horrific car accident.
Frankly, the details of the accident were grim. The accident occurred at night, and she was struck by two separate vehicles, both on her driver's side door, the first spinning her around so the second could strike her again. I don't know the details, but as I understand it, both vehicles were going at least 55 mph (mom's Jeep Cherokee going much slower as it entered the highway), the impact gave her a concussion, knocked her wig off of her head, knocked her glasses off of her face, and she lost a lot of blood before being taken by helicopter to Orlando Regional Medical Center.
Today, she wears an arm sling to help relieve the pressure on her crushed clavicle (near the collarbone) and she features no other signs of being in an accident at all except for some stitches on the left side of her head, a few inches above the temple.
According to my sister, who had time to investigate the wrecked remains of the Jeep, the floor compartment on the driver's side of the vehicle was crushed to within eight inches in width, and yet Mom has no leg injuries.
My sister went immediately to Florida from her home in North Carolina to be with mom, and when she left, I arrived and stayed for a few days. My brother Christopher relieved me, and stayed until today, when my sister arrives and he'll go back to Syracuse. I'm on the next stay, whenever that may be.
We lost our father almost two years ago. I guess that fresh scar moved us all a little quicker to rush to Mom's side. I was just there a month ago, cooling my heels on a few days off from my college tour, and taking advantage of the rent-free guest room. We always have a good visit, and this was my third time visiting Mom this year. Having the gypsy job that I do offers me more flexibility to make such excursions, and now that I'm in my 40's, I treasure the time with family so much more than I used to when I was a young buck trying to make a name for myself, and now I'm just trying to make a buck, having discovered that my name has limited value.
Mom's name is Linda. But to a generation of comedians working in Rochester, she was always "Mom." When I started doing open mics at Yuk Yuk's in the Olde Rochesterville section of town, mom used to tag along, and to my horror, sit in the front row at open mic night. Then she would talk to every comic that addressed her from the stage, completely obliterating any credibility I would have as a performer. When you're a comic, you're supposed to be this hip, swinging smart-ass, not the guy who's mom is sitting in the front row! But the truth be told, I wasn't hip, I didn't swing, and I was more smart than smart-ass, which doesn't always translate to laughs. I protested, but Mom kept coming out to shows, until she was a staple, a household name among the comics. I just had to get used to it.
My mom loved comedy. For mother's day, I used to give my poor, tired father a break and take Mom to the Yuk Yuk's in Niagara Falls, a 90 minute drive, and we'd see the comedians there on a Sunday night. She loved those shows, and I enjoyed using my connections as a Yuk Yuk's comic to talk my way into the comps.
A bunch of us "new jacks" formed an improv troupe, The Inner Loop. We started doing improv comedy on our own night at Yuk Yuk's, by that time the club had gone independent and was named "Hiccup's." Mom didn't attend many of our shows, but sometimes accompanied us on out-of-town gigs (there weren't many of them) as her schedule allowed. We had posters made up to promote our shows, and after one show, we all autographed one of them and gave it to Mom, and she still has the thing, along with one of our group headshots....we changed personnel so many times, I can't tell you what version of the group it was, but the headshot is framed and sitting on her dresser.
The group has long since been scattered to the four winds (our one long-standing gig, the First Night celebration in Binghamton, NY passed us over this year, probably because they'd had us four years in a row and needed some variety) but they live forever at my mom's house, on the dresser and on the wall.
Well, as the situation would turn out, Mom has let some of her finances get away from her in the past couple of years, and my sister and brother and I have used much of the time with her to "untangle the Christmas lights." I wonder sometimes, if this non-fatal (yet scary, violent and jarring) car accident wasn't God intervening and saying to the three of us "your mother needs help, get down to Florida!" I believe in God and believe that when terrible things happen to people, they happen for a distinct reason. It's like the story of Lazarus in the Bible; Lazarus was sick and everyone called Jesus to go and help his friend, but Jesus dilly-dallied for a few days and when he got there, Lazarus was dead. Jesus then performed on of the miracles, raising Lazarus from the dead, as if to say "your request of me is so small; you ask me to heal the sick, when I am willing and able to raise the dead for you." Jesus let a terrible thing happen to reaffirm his love (and power) to the people that trusted him. I guess God could have just reached my brother and sister and I in a different way, but this car accident was his way of ringing the bell. It certainly got our attention, and we've all gone to visit and started the heavy lifting of getting mom back on track. (The story of Lazarus is in John 11:1-45 if you're interested in reading the story).
So, I made it back to Rochester in time to fulfill my weekend obligations, a Friday morning appointment and a Friday night show in Pennellville, NY with Steve Natarelli and Annette Lorenzo that was just smashing. We were working at Monirae's in Pennellville, which is just outside of Syracuse, NY. It was a bitter cold night, but we had a good crowd and they turned out to be a lively bunch. I was headlining and early in my set, addressed a heckler that wound up being the owner. I went deep into him, prompting one of the servers to ask me to stop talking about her parents having sex...the two servers were the owners' daughters, and that lead to a whole other line of comedy. I had a great time, sold a good number of souvenir CD's after the show, and look forward to my next booking with Danny Liberto and The Comedy Company (http://www.noclowns.com/), a New Year's Eve show in Corning, New York.
Saturday, I was the entertainment for a holiday office party for Hospitality Restaurant Group, the owners and operators of the Taco Bell/Pizza Hut/Kentucky Fried Chicken Restaurants in Upstate New York. I had a great time, even with a small sound system problem (the people in the back couldn't hear me) that was corrected by Johnny-on-the-spot DJ Steven Turner. I had requested a long, corded microphone because I do some bits with the microphone cord, but the room was set up the long way, so the cordless mic that Steven provided was more appropriate. I set them up with some "canned" material, and then went into the stuff they really liked....going through the audience and improvising material with them. Without going into too much detail, it was a great experience, the big boss seemed delighted. Anyhow, Steven was the guy who recommended me to the group in the first place, having seen me do my thing at another event, and turnabout is fair play, so if you're interested in a top-notch DJ, a real craftsman who doesn't just come in and spin tunes but someone who really controls the mood and tempo of an event, Steven Turner at Turner Music Productions is your guy. The website is http://www.tmpdj.com/ or call him at 585-663-3948. His website features audio samples of his work as well as an avalanche of testimonial letters from happy clients.
I took Sunday off to decompress and slept like I never slept before. My mother-in-law was watching my daughter and my wife was off at a craft show, so I was able to sleep into the afternoon. After being non-stop go for ten days, I needed the break. I resisted the temptation to watch the Buffalo Bills play their game in Toronto (that I *knew* they were going to lose) and instead, picked my daughter up and took her shopping and out to lunch and spent some good "daddy" time with her. I figure after being away from home so much, she deserved my undivided attention, and we had a good time. We even went to Taco Bell and had a nice lunch....Harmony's a sucker for the beans!
This week, it's a long week off to try and get the house back in order, and Saturday I'm working a Christmas party up in the North Country of New York...in the town of Massena, where I've played a few times before in my 20-year career. I don't know the name of the group or the showtime or any of the details because I'm waiting on the itinerary from the booker, but it's a full week away and I'm not gonna sweat it until Thursday....that leaves only one more business day to reasonably get in touch with the booker, who is also a comic, and they will probably be on the road and hard to reach after Thursday.
So in the meantime, it's drag out the tree, put up the garland, light the candles, do the dishes, all that good holiday stuff, and start getting into the spirit of the season!
Here's hoping that you don't have to be prodded by a catastrophe to visit your loved ones, or reach out and contact them. Cherish them while you have them, especially this time of year.
Ralph Tetta
Rochester, NY
Wow, it feels like life is a little back to normal.
I'm home from visiting my mother in Florida, and the three days were just full of phone calls, doctor's appointments, trips to the hardware store, and a lot of love, helping my mother mend after her horrific car accident.
Frankly, the details of the accident were grim. The accident occurred at night, and she was struck by two separate vehicles, both on her driver's side door, the first spinning her around so the second could strike her again. I don't know the details, but as I understand it, both vehicles were going at least 55 mph (mom's Jeep Cherokee going much slower as it entered the highway), the impact gave her a concussion, knocked her wig off of her head, knocked her glasses off of her face, and she lost a lot of blood before being taken by helicopter to Orlando Regional Medical Center.
Today, she wears an arm sling to help relieve the pressure on her crushed clavicle (near the collarbone) and she features no other signs of being in an accident at all except for some stitches on the left side of her head, a few inches above the temple.
According to my sister, who had time to investigate the wrecked remains of the Jeep, the floor compartment on the driver's side of the vehicle was crushed to within eight inches in width, and yet Mom has no leg injuries.
My sister went immediately to Florida from her home in North Carolina to be with mom, and when she left, I arrived and stayed for a few days. My brother Christopher relieved me, and stayed until today, when my sister arrives and he'll go back to Syracuse. I'm on the next stay, whenever that may be.
We lost our father almost two years ago. I guess that fresh scar moved us all a little quicker to rush to Mom's side. I was just there a month ago, cooling my heels on a few days off from my college tour, and taking advantage of the rent-free guest room. We always have a good visit, and this was my third time visiting Mom this year. Having the gypsy job that I do offers me more flexibility to make such excursions, and now that I'm in my 40's, I treasure the time with family so much more than I used to when I was a young buck trying to make a name for myself, and now I'm just trying to make a buck, having discovered that my name has limited value.
Mom's name is Linda. But to a generation of comedians working in Rochester, she was always "Mom." When I started doing open mics at Yuk Yuk's in the Olde Rochesterville section of town, mom used to tag along, and to my horror, sit in the front row at open mic night. Then she would talk to every comic that addressed her from the stage, completely obliterating any credibility I would have as a performer. When you're a comic, you're supposed to be this hip, swinging smart-ass, not the guy who's mom is sitting in the front row! But the truth be told, I wasn't hip, I didn't swing, and I was more smart than smart-ass, which doesn't always translate to laughs. I protested, but Mom kept coming out to shows, until she was a staple, a household name among the comics. I just had to get used to it.
My mom loved comedy. For mother's day, I used to give my poor, tired father a break and take Mom to the Yuk Yuk's in Niagara Falls, a 90 minute drive, and we'd see the comedians there on a Sunday night. She loved those shows, and I enjoyed using my connections as a Yuk Yuk's comic to talk my way into the comps.
A bunch of us "new jacks" formed an improv troupe, The Inner Loop. We started doing improv comedy on our own night at Yuk Yuk's, by that time the club had gone independent and was named "Hiccup's." Mom didn't attend many of our shows, but sometimes accompanied us on out-of-town gigs (there weren't many of them) as her schedule allowed. We had posters made up to promote our shows, and after one show, we all autographed one of them and gave it to Mom, and she still has the thing, along with one of our group headshots....we changed personnel so many times, I can't tell you what version of the group it was, but the headshot is framed and sitting on her dresser.
The group has long since been scattered to the four winds (our one long-standing gig, the First Night celebration in Binghamton, NY passed us over this year, probably because they'd had us four years in a row and needed some variety) but they live forever at my mom's house, on the dresser and on the wall.
Well, as the situation would turn out, Mom has let some of her finances get away from her in the past couple of years, and my sister and brother and I have used much of the time with her to "untangle the Christmas lights." I wonder sometimes, if this non-fatal (yet scary, violent and jarring) car accident wasn't God intervening and saying to the three of us "your mother needs help, get down to Florida!" I believe in God and believe that when terrible things happen to people, they happen for a distinct reason. It's like the story of Lazarus in the Bible; Lazarus was sick and everyone called Jesus to go and help his friend, but Jesus dilly-dallied for a few days and when he got there, Lazarus was dead. Jesus then performed on of the miracles, raising Lazarus from the dead, as if to say "your request of me is so small; you ask me to heal the sick, when I am willing and able to raise the dead for you." Jesus let a terrible thing happen to reaffirm his love (and power) to the people that trusted him. I guess God could have just reached my brother and sister and I in a different way, but this car accident was his way of ringing the bell. It certainly got our attention, and we've all gone to visit and started the heavy lifting of getting mom back on track. (The story of Lazarus is in John 11:1-45 if you're interested in reading the story).
So, I made it back to Rochester in time to fulfill my weekend obligations, a Friday morning appointment and a Friday night show in Pennellville, NY with Steve Natarelli and Annette Lorenzo that was just smashing. We were working at Monirae's in Pennellville, which is just outside of Syracuse, NY. It was a bitter cold night, but we had a good crowd and they turned out to be a lively bunch. I was headlining and early in my set, addressed a heckler that wound up being the owner. I went deep into him, prompting one of the servers to ask me to stop talking about her parents having sex...the two servers were the owners' daughters, and that lead to a whole other line of comedy. I had a great time, sold a good number of souvenir CD's after the show, and look forward to my next booking with Danny Liberto and The Comedy Company (http://www.noclowns.com/), a New Year's Eve show in Corning, New York.
Saturday, I was the entertainment for a holiday office party for Hospitality Restaurant Group, the owners and operators of the Taco Bell/Pizza Hut/Kentucky Fried Chicken Restaurants in Upstate New York. I had a great time, even with a small sound system problem (the people in the back couldn't hear me) that was corrected by Johnny-on-the-spot DJ Steven Turner. I had requested a long, corded microphone because I do some bits with the microphone cord, but the room was set up the long way, so the cordless mic that Steven provided was more appropriate. I set them up with some "canned" material, and then went into the stuff they really liked....going through the audience and improvising material with them. Without going into too much detail, it was a great experience, the big boss seemed delighted. Anyhow, Steven was the guy who recommended me to the group in the first place, having seen me do my thing at another event, and turnabout is fair play, so if you're interested in a top-notch DJ, a real craftsman who doesn't just come in and spin tunes but someone who really controls the mood and tempo of an event, Steven Turner at Turner Music Productions is your guy. The website is http://www.tmpdj.com/ or call him at 585-663-3948. His website features audio samples of his work as well as an avalanche of testimonial letters from happy clients.
I took Sunday off to decompress and slept like I never slept before. My mother-in-law was watching my daughter and my wife was off at a craft show, so I was able to sleep into the afternoon. After being non-stop go for ten days, I needed the break. I resisted the temptation to watch the Buffalo Bills play their game in Toronto (that I *knew* they were going to lose) and instead, picked my daughter up and took her shopping and out to lunch and spent some good "daddy" time with her. I figure after being away from home so much, she deserved my undivided attention, and we had a good time. We even went to Taco Bell and had a nice lunch....Harmony's a sucker for the beans!
This week, it's a long week off to try and get the house back in order, and Saturday I'm working a Christmas party up in the North Country of New York...in the town of Massena, where I've played a few times before in my 20-year career. I don't know the name of the group or the showtime or any of the details because I'm waiting on the itinerary from the booker, but it's a full week away and I'm not gonna sweat it until Thursday....that leaves only one more business day to reasonably get in touch with the booker, who is also a comic, and they will probably be on the road and hard to reach after Thursday.
So in the meantime, it's drag out the tree, put up the garland, light the candles, do the dishes, all that good holiday stuff, and start getting into the spirit of the season!
Here's hoping that you don't have to be prodded by a catastrophe to visit your loved ones, or reach out and contact them. Cherish them while you have them, especially this time of year.
Ralph Tetta
Rochester, NY
Monday, December 1, 2008
A Quick One While He's Away (The Who)
Monday, December 1, 2008-2:00 P.M.
Just a weekend wrap-up while the girls are gone.
I got home o.k. last night, even though it rain/snowed all the way home from Toronto. Border was an afterthought, the guard looked at my passport, asked me two questions and back home in New York I went. The exchange rate was terrible on Canadian money....on Wednesday, I cashed $50 U.S. and got $52.25 CDN for it. Last night, Sunday, I cashed $553 CDN and got a $440 U.S. and some change. I haven't done the math yet, but I think either the rate changed or duty-free had their way with me.
Great shows this week, even the last one. Absolute Comedy is extremely supportive of their loyal locals (don't perform at a stage too close to them, though, or it's off to the Gulag...). I met and/or shared the stage with some very funny people this week; Eric Clifford, Dan Bruzzi, Doug Brown, Curtis Blakely, Elaine (ED) Dandy, Brendan McKeigan, Ryan Maglonob, Perry Perlmutar, Dred Lee, and Steven Sharpe. We had decent attendance, although some shows they pulled the curtain to cordon off the back section, which made the room nice 'n' cozy. My favorite moment of the week-talking to two older ladies who were waiting for their salad, and then leaving the stage to go back to the kitchen to try and help. Just another example of thinking on the balls of my feet, which I love (although sometimes more than the audience does).
So now I have one day to prepare before I fly down to Florida. I've gone through my prescription of antibiotics so hopefully this upper respiratory infection that's been kicking my ass all month is a thing of the past. Then after a few days with Mom, it's fly back home and get to work again, one public show and one private show. This non-stop-go stuff is starting to catch up with me and I guess burnout is better than rust-out (the opposite of burnout....didn't know that, didja?) but I'd rather have a steady diet of just enough stress.
So cheers to all, and I'll write again soon.
Ralph Tetta
Rochester, NY
Just a weekend wrap-up while the girls are gone.
I got home o.k. last night, even though it rain/snowed all the way home from Toronto. Border was an afterthought, the guard looked at my passport, asked me two questions and back home in New York I went. The exchange rate was terrible on Canadian money....on Wednesday, I cashed $50 U.S. and got $52.25 CDN for it. Last night, Sunday, I cashed $553 CDN and got a $440 U.S. and some change. I haven't done the math yet, but I think either the rate changed or duty-free had their way with me.
Great shows this week, even the last one. Absolute Comedy is extremely supportive of their loyal locals (don't perform at a stage too close to them, though, or it's off to the Gulag...). I met and/or shared the stage with some very funny people this week; Eric Clifford, Dan Bruzzi, Doug Brown, Curtis Blakely, Elaine (ED) Dandy, Brendan McKeigan, Ryan Maglonob, Perry Perlmutar, Dred Lee, and Steven Sharpe. We had decent attendance, although some shows they pulled the curtain to cordon off the back section, which made the room nice 'n' cozy. My favorite moment of the week-talking to two older ladies who were waiting for their salad, and then leaving the stage to go back to the kitchen to try and help. Just another example of thinking on the balls of my feet, which I love (although sometimes more than the audience does).
So now I have one day to prepare before I fly down to Florida. I've gone through my prescription of antibiotics so hopefully this upper respiratory infection that's been kicking my ass all month is a thing of the past. Then after a few days with Mom, it's fly back home and get to work again, one public show and one private show. This non-stop-go stuff is starting to catch up with me and I guess burnout is better than rust-out (the opposite of burnout....didn't know that, didja?) but I'd rather have a steady diet of just enough stress.
So cheers to all, and I'll write again soon.
Ralph Tetta
Rochester, NY
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