Road Gig

Last night was totally unexpected.

Renee and I were walking down Steinway St with the Wasklewiczs when I got a call from the incomparable Jen Adams.

"Hey! What you up to tonight?"
"I have people with me and I need to drive them to the airport at like 7."
"Fuck."
"What's going on?"
"Ed Murray and I have a gig in Connecticut tonight and we don't have a car. If you can drive I'll give you a spot."
"I can pick you up at 7:30."
"It's at 9. And it's 75 miles away."
"Fuck."

I figures that was the end of it. Man, it would have been great to do a show on the road. We had thai with Dave and Heather and I actually liked it. That should have been a sign. I found the aforementioned Marvel Legends and we went back home for them to pack. Jen called again.

"Fucking rental car comapny. I am so screwed. Can you pick us up?"
"I'm on my way."
"I'll tell the club we'll be late."

As I may have mentioned before, I hate driving. I am convinced everyone on the road is trying to kill themselves and they all want to use my silver Beetle to do it(Jen asked me if I was Jewish. No, just paranoid). But comedy has had a habit of making me to do things I'm scared of. Self-promote. Bark. And drive out of state.

I dropped Dave and Heather at LaGuardia (wish they could come back once a month) and Ed and Jen took their places. We drove two hours up to Hamden and everything I hoped about a long car ride with comics came true. We shared our life stories, views on comedy and insights on each other's material.

We pulled up to the Side Street Grill actually on time. The place gave us three seismic burgers and a round of drinks as soon as we walked in. I asked Jen which order we'd go up.

"I dunno. You wanna open and emcee?"

Jen hosts her own mic every week. Ed hosted the night I auditioned for "The World". I'd never hosted. Then again, I've never eaten thai food or driven to Connecticut on my own either.

"Sure."

There were about thirty people in the audienceand everyone listened. I did ten minutes and introduced Ed to the stage. He did 20 minutes and could have easily done another 20. I came back for a little crowd work brought Jen up as the headliner. She did an hour that started strong and climaxed with a ten minute rant that had the crowd hanging on her every word. The crowd came back to congratulate us. And we all got paid. Perfect gig.

The drive home was even better. They were a little drunk, I was relaxed and the conversation got deeper. We took a detour to drop Ed off in Brooklyn(I had vowed never to drive in Brooklyn) and headed home. At 2 a.m. Jen decided to do another set at Ha! and hopped in a cab. I got home and wondered how with all the planning life demands, a perfect night can just drop into your lap.

I didn't even expect the Marvel figures.