Day One was HELL!

Three hours sleep - That is all I got before I had to wake up and go to the airport. Not a big deal really. I knew I had the monthly show at the Fox & Fiddle in Mississauga the night before I was leaving. I also knew that is was a late show and I wouldn’t get home until after 1:00 am.

What I didn’t anticipate was car trouble. We were running a bit late as we pulled out of the driveway we realized the front left tire was flat. Oh crap. “Don’t panic”, I thought, just call a cab. Being that it was 5:30 am, the taxi arrived in front of my home in less than five minutes. The driver was crazy behind the wheel. We raced down the 401 at 150 kms. He never once used his signal. Normally this would piss me off and I would say something, as it is a HUGE pet peeve of mine. But on this morning I only cared about getting to airport as soon as possible.

Getting my boarding pass and checking my bags was thankfully uneventful. More problems came to light once I got on board the aircraft. When I first got to my seat I thought I was going to cry. Why? One of the reasons I book with West Jet is because they have TV’s in the back of every seat. This is an older plane. No TV’s. Some how, I was able to hide my tears.

Maybe this is a good thing I thought. I can catch up on some sleep. Another problem: Bad parents. They were sitting two rows away from me with their demon spawn. To say that they were loud doesn’t quite capture what came out of their mouths. The term blood-curdling scream comes to mind. It didn’t matter if they were crying or laughing… they would scream at the top of their lungs. When I asked the flight attendant for chloroform, he sadly said they didn’t have any, but there was a hammer in the rear of the plane. Unfortunately he never brought it.

Once on the ground, I was immediately taken to my rental car and headed off to Slave Lake. In my original itinerary, I was supposed to go to Grande Prairie. One thing I have learned about working with Bob: Just go with the flow. On a positive note, it meant I had a shorter drive and a different corporate gig in Edmonton the next day.

The show in Slave Lake was so much better this time around (read my blog about the start of my last western tour). The manager decided that instead of starting the comedy in the middle of an Edmonton Oiler game we should wait until it is over. This was a good option. The only problem is that I had been up since 4:30am and on the go since then. By 10:30 pm (which is actually 12:30am with the time change) I was fighting fatigue in a big way. Most of the drunks had cleared out once the game ended, leaving about 25 people who were there for comedy. It was a fun 60-minute show. One of the ladies in the crowd was a piercer… is that what you call one who puts small holes in people? If you know what her official title is, please let me know. I had some fun chatting with her from the stage.

Even though it was a really good show, I was happy when it was done. As soon as I got to my room, I collapsed into bed and fell asleep almost instantly.