The glamour of comedy on the road

I don’t travel as much as I used to for comedy, but people used to get excited and ask me where my next gig was.  I’ll give you a couple stories to show you it’s not what you think.  Don’t get me wrong, there were some great times on the road – staying at casinos is a blast, having people in a new town buy ten of your dumb shirts is really cool and you get to see a lot of small and large towns and sights.  Other times, though, it sucks.

My second ever road gig out of state was above a bowling alley – huge crowd, fun room, but the hotel was less than expected.  I opened the door and realized there were makeup stains on the pillowcases.  A lot of makeup, like Tammy Faye Baker was smothered to death and the pillowcases were being preserved as evidence.  I went to the front desk.  “Can I get a new pillowcase?  This one is dirty.”  The manager, not native to our fine land, acted like I was asking for another bed.  “WHAT?  MY WIFE CLEAN THIS!  IT CLEAN!”  I stopped for second, taken aback, then got pissed.  “There’s makeup on here, can you not see?  Either your eyesight is bad or your washing machine doesn’t work!”  “FINE!  I GIVE YOU ONE!”  Again, like I was asking for Egyptian linen and fresh rose petals.

I went back, then realized nothing had probably been washed sheet wise, but the towels were clean, so I covered the bed with towels and turned the heat up to avoid using the blanket.  Oh and I drank a shitload after the show so I could pass out in that garbage dump.  That helped too.