This weekend represented the last major weekend of gigs for the year (or if you look at my website calendar – my life apparently) for me and it was a big one (all due respect to the Connecticut restaurant I will be performing at in November and the casino I will be at in December).  I was opening for the third time in my life for living comedy legend Dave Attell at the DC Improv.  Here is why that is a great gig.  First, the DC Improv is one of my two favorite clubs in the country, along with Helium in Philadelphia.  The audiences in DC are always sharp and typically diverse.  Second, Dave Attell is comedy famous enough to sell out five shows in advance with comedy savvy audiences, but not so famous that it is sold out with people who were solely attracted to the name of a famous actor or celebrity.  Third, I am very good at comedy which also makes it easier to do.  So it has been a couple of weeks of long hours doing legal work so now that I am on a 4 am Amtrak from DC to NYC on a Monday morning this is a perfect chance to give you an extremely thorough recap of the weekend (videos from my sets will be up mid week).

Friday

Any trip in the Northeast Corridor for me involves a trip to Penn Station, the answer to the question, “What if NYC was actually the capital of a developing nation and had a train station?”  Now every major train station in the northeast has enough space and well mannered citizenry to line up in an orderly fashion to get on the train.  Penn Station is more of a post apocalyptic battle for fresh water-type environment when a train gate is announced.  I happened to be within about 15 feet of the correct gate when the train was announced.  As I start shuffling towards the escalator a woman does a 10 yard sprint to duck around me and get in front and then immediately starts calling for her daughter to come to her.  I then start getting quasi-shoved aside by a 14 year old as she seeks to reunite with the piece  of sh*t that birthed her.  I loved their technique – be rude and then act like your daughter, who already has mom’s full grown rudeness has to be reunited like she’s a toddler.  They were both holding Subway drink cups and I can honestly say I was about 80% of the way to knocking them out of each of their hands and dropping a $5 on the ground next to them like Sonny smashing cameras in The Godfather.  Just to prove I do not just pick on women, a guy kept bumping me with his bag and I turned and said “Get the fu*k off me.”  I was in a generally bad mood, obviously.  Normally I would just keep my mouth shut and blog later.

Once on the train I realized how long it had been since I had been on a Friday NYC-DC train – what a mess.  I was on the Accela (used points for anyone in DC who would challenge my on stage assertion that I cannot afford Accela), which is relatively expensive. That did not stop the train from looking like a Depression-era freight train.  On the plus side I observed no bare feet, which is something of a miracle in today’s “the world is my living room” culture.

When I arrived in DC I headed to the Dupont Circle.  I was staying at the Windsor Inn. Sounds fancy right?  Well according to my budget conscious travel agent, AKA Hotwire.com, it was a beautiful 2 star property. What that means is you get a small, oddly shaped room and are greeted by a cat chilling in the lobby all day.  Given its location near Dupont and its unassuming mediocrity I am guessing it is a popular place for low level Republican lawmakers to meet their gay lovers while away from their wives and children.

Then it was time for the shows at the Improv and they were fantastic. CD sales after both shows were robust (I would sell 32 at $10 per for the week and since my hotel only cost me $321.44 I only need someone to Paypal me $1.44 to net zero dollars from my CDs – #Blessed).  A highlight of the evening was having a friend of my brother’s, a journalist, who, if my memory serves me correct won a Pulitzer recently, come up to me and tell me good job.  See people – who needs “comedy industry” or “profitable gigs” when you can make power players in DC laugh??  Truth is he was there with a friend who was an Attell fan so it was a coincidence. He mainly remembered me as one day losing my temper on the basketball court – my brother, when he lived in the area, would play hoops many Sundays with other journalists in DC and when it town I would join him. As a 6’7″ former college hoops player I might seem like a ringer, but fortunately my skills and fitness were at their nadir when I was playing in these games so it was much fairer than it should have been.  Well on what would be my last time playing with them I ended up playing horribly and getting so mad at myself that I was basically (and understandably) not really welcome back, probably by my brother as much as anyone.  Basically it was like the Melee at the Palace if Ron Artest had just yelled expletives at himself and inadvertently scared the young son of one of the other players, instead of going into the stands and beating someone up.

As a special surprise, comedian Nate Bargatze showed up to do a guest spot on the late show. Nate is a wonderful comic and all around guy who, like Amy Schumer started right around the same time as me in comedy a decade-ish ago and has now lapped me several times over.   We had a solid round table discussion of comedy after the show and then Nate picked up the tab. Great end to the day as I walked back to the Windsor Inn.

Saturday

The second day of the three day comedy extravaganza started with a 2pm breakfast at Panera (a clip of a new bit based on a very real showdown in Panera between a 60 year old guy named Timothy and a 25 year old woman I dubbed iCunt on stage will be up this week).  I then went to Washington Sports Club in Dupont for a workout.  It was going to cost me $30 for the day (yikes) but just as I was handing over the cash, the woman at the desk said the system was not working so I could go in for free #Blessed.

The shows that night were great (including a killer set in the side room), the CD sales were great, and the people watching outside was great, being that everyone was celebrating Halloween, even though Halloween falls on a Friday, which would seem like a great excuse to actually have Halloween parties on Halloween, as opposed to 6 days earlier.  Walking along all the bars on Connecticut it seemed the most popular costumes were “Slut” and “Black Guy Dressed as Regular Guy Looking to Pick Off Drunk FUPA Exposing White Chicks.”  Everything seemed in pretty good cheer and order except for the burly guy mouthing off to the cops in front of Lucky Bar, whose girl was pulling him away as a cop whipped out whatever those sticks they used to beat people with (look like the “sick sticks” from the movie Minority Report) and said “Come say that to me again you fu*king bitch.” He didn’t say whatever the cop asked him to say.

Sunday

On the final day of the trip I finished writing two killer sketches during a 1245 pm Panera breakfast (I was really committed to an early bird rise) and then met my fellow Williams and Georgetown alum friend for an early dinner and to watch Ben Roethlisburger rape the NFL record books. Allegedly.  It was a great contrast in what one can do with a Williams BA/Georgetown JD. My friend told me tales of his wife and two sons and the business he is running, while I considered it a win to order and pay for an appetizer AND entree.

Sunday night was the final show and it went great as all the others had, though there was a wretched and miserable woman sitting dead center 3 rows back wearing all pink. She would eventually leave during Attell’s set.  She texted throughout my entire set, but did pipe in with a loud “NO” when after my first bit crushed (duh, #blessed) I said “you guys seem like a happy crowd.”  I ended up selling all but three albums I brought with me.  Now if you are a new reader of this blog or think I am being too self-congratulatory my podcast and previous posts throughout the years should solidify my credentials as someone who only says good things when they really happen because 70% of my comedy news is bad news. So allow me an early morning Amtrak trip blog gloating session…

OK – gloating over.  Time to get home, shower, put on a suit and review legal documents for 11 hours. #Blessed

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