It's So Hard To Type With A Gun In My Mouth (3 page)

February 18, 2006 -
TEMPLE GIG

Well it's a whole new day. I start each day grateful that yesterday is over and that today is a new adventure. It's 9:57 a.m.; I have a migraine and diarrhea. It's raining and I've had to take an allergy pill. My head is pounding and the other arm just fell off my chair. It's like they sent a message to each other "abandon ship". However, there is some semi-good news.  I just got booked for an April 1st gig. In town, no travel. Nice Money.  In a Temple.  A Temple filled with my mother in different dresses. I hate these gigs and here is why.

About 10 years ago I was asked to work a Temple here in town. The booker called and offered me the gig and I turned it down. Why? I only like to work professional venues. This stems for an experience I had when I first started out... where I worked a private party in which the buffet was set up in front of the stage and I had to work behind the ice sculpture. But I digress. So I turn down the Temple gig and the booker calls back with more money. I turn him down. He calls back with more money. I turn him down. He calls back with more money. This goes on for a week until the gig was five mortgage payments. How do you turn down five mortgage payments? I accept.

So it's the night of the gig and I'm driving to Temple as the committee between my ears begins, "What are you doing this for, you're not going to be happy, they're not going to like you, the stage won't be right, the lights won't be right. Why did you accept, there's more to life than money. " By the time I get there I'm looking for a tower to start shooting. It's 8:55 p.m. I pull myself together and go up to the front desk. "Hello, I'm Steve Bluestein. I'll be entertaining here tonight". And the woman looks up at me and says, "OHHHH I KNOW YOU!!!! YOU ALMOST MADE IT BIG!!!"  SLAM-DUNK.

She tells me there is a little problem (tick-tick-tick). The caterer forgot to bring trays (tick-tick-tick) and the waiters have to carry the dishes out two at a time. (KA BOOM) The 9:00 pm show began at 11:00 pm that meant that for two hours I had to hear in my head, "YOU ALMOST MADE IT BIG."  The show begins; I hate everyone in the room. I hate the valet; I hate the guy in the men's room who hands out towels. I hate people who hate people. I hate my neighbor with the effing camper in his driveway. I hate people I never even met. I am insane.  I am getting ready to go on when I hear the M.C. say, "Before we bring out Steve Bloomstein. Mrs. Rosenberg would like to say a few words."  Cut to me on a table having electric shock therapy.  So Mrs. Rosenberg takes the stage...  "When my Harold died....blah blah blah... the Cancer. ... blah blah blah ..... My entire world was shattered... (Crying) blah blah blah. Forty-five minutes... she spoke for forty-five minutes. The only thing she did not do was bring out dead babies from the Holocaust. And now the comedy of Stevie Bloomberg. It's 11:45 p.m.  At this point I don't care about the show, I don't care about the crowd, Mrs. Rosenberg or saving the whales or what my mother is going to say when she finds out I cashed in my Bar Mitzvah bonds. At this point I have jumped off the tower I was shooting from.  I say the first thing that comes into my head. I look at Mrs. Rosenberg, who has a front row seat, "Nice speech, hon. I think you lost them in the last 35 minutes."  The crowd screams with a scream of laughter I have never heard before in my life. And from that minute on the show went wild. No matter what I said they screamed. They were with me every single joke... Mrs. Rosenberg was laughing harder than anyone.  I finished to a standing ovation, got in my car and felt really great!!!  But it taught me something... I DID make it big.

1:57 p.m.

Remember that credit card, the one arriving absolutely, positively, without doubt on Saturday by noon? Well, it's coming Monday absolutely, positively, without doubt. Is it just my life or is the world full of fuck ups?

February 19, 2006 -
EXPLAINING ANXIETY

Woke up this morning.... my mind was a complete blank. Perhaps it's that banging anxiety in my chest.  I'm like a flushed toilet...empty. I thought about the hilarious story of the day my house was hit by 26 tons of mud and debris...oh God, what a romp through comedy land that was.  But nothing seems right, nothing seems important enough or funny enough or... enough. It's the anxiety. I have suffered from it most of my life. I remember telling a nurse, "I think I'm having a heart attack."  I was 8 at the time.

Anxiety is anger turned inward...or is that depression, I always get the two confused.  They are my constant companions.  With me it's non descript anxiety. That means for no reason I wake up one morning wanting to rip my heart out, stomp it on the floor and dance the Meringue.  It's a healthy way to start the day. NO? Over the years and after sitting in God knows how many shrink’s offices, I've learned to ride it like a wave. It passes, it always does, and it doesn't kill me unless I let it. So it's lots of deep breaths and moves forward one step at a time.

Oh, and one other thing. To that woman that wrote me and said..." Boy, you're negative. I couldn't live around so much negativity."  FUCK YOU LADY.

February 20, 2006
-
I SEE A KAISER

So here's today's agenda. I have a doctor's appointment. Why? It appears my blood pressure is stroke level. It's genetic. Some people get blonde hair and washtub abs... I get high blood pressure and an allergy to Shrimp. I belonged to Kaiser, an HMO. A Horrible Medical Organization. It's easier to get a real Kaiser to treat you. Once I fell and thought I broke my leg. I was rushed to the Kaiser Emergency room. On the wall was a sign, "Time heals all wounds".  And who would want to go to a doctor who thinks Kaiser is what he went to Medical School for. I think I'd rather live in the Mexican desert and wait for one of those planes. You know, the ones from Houston full of doctors who take big moles of Mexican Children.... with a camera crew.  So dedicated. And how about that Doctor on 90210? There's a nervous breakdown waiting to happen. I wouldn't let him touch me if I had a foot growing out of my eye socket.

So today I go to the doctor's and after that I wait for my credit card to come. OH didn't I tell you. NO CREDIT card... I tracked it; it's on the truck somewhere outside St Louis. Oh joy oh rapture. By the time I get it I'll be too old to shop.

3:40 pm

Well, I'm back from Kaiser. I'm on blood pressure medication and officially have become my grandfather.  It's all down hill from here. I'm looking for a coupon for walkers.

So let me tell you what a visit to Kaiser is like. I walk into the waiting room and they've got Jerry Springer on the TV.  Jerry Springer in a doctor's office... that's like playing the Osama Bin Laden tapes at a Bar Mitzvah. The most intellectual magazine I could find was American Rifle with four of the pages stuck together.  I take a seat between Lenny from "OF MICE AND MEN" and two women... one wet, just out of the shower, and one with her hand in a cast and in desperate need of a shower. They are gripped by the Springer show. I guess they never saw a transvestite hooker who was looking for his birth mother from a prison line up. Suddenly, shower girl takes out a brush and begins combing her flaxen locks onto my pants. Mid comb she parts her hair, bends over and shows her scalp to the "dirty girl".  They looked like two baboons grooming.  The door opens and the nurse shouts out, "Roger R. ". No one moves.  "Roger R." Nothing.  "Roger Ripellli?" Lenny gets up. I guess the "R" thing threw him.

I am called next "Steve Blue-sssss---t-t-t-" I'm in the door. Now here's something I need to know. Shouldn't the nurse look at you when she's taking your history? This girl is so detached I'm beginning to think I sexually assaulted one of her children.  She takes my blood pressure and gives off a reassuring "Whoa!!"   The doctor comes in and I remember why I go to him. He knows my name, he knows my history, he's concerned and..... HE'S A JEW!  I got the only Jewish doctor in Kaiser without a prison record.  He wants to see me in a couple of months, I fill my prescription and I'm outta there.

On the way home I stop at Trader Joes. Is it just me or do they intentionally build Trader Joes with parking lots made for demolition derbies. Huge store, teeny tiny parking lot with six-inch spaces and 70-year-old Hippies. Love the food hate the parking lot, hate the Hippies, which I call the Birkenstock and Bunion set. I love Trader Joes... I started going there for the dried papaya and soy cheese, both of which they no longer carry. My present addiction is rice crackers and dried peas. If you look in my car, in the space between the console and the seat, you'll find 1600 dollars in rice cracker and dried pea crumbs. Oh what the fuck... at least the anxiety is gone.

February 21, 2006 6:59 AM -
HUFF PUFF

Did you notice the time? Anxiety rules. Had to call the city about the unresolved permits. You see 6 a.m. is the only time they answer the phones...little fuckers.  AND, they answer it with attitude. My inspector was upset that I called to discuss this. "So what do you want me to do?" OH, I don't know.... maybe YOUR JOB!

Still have not resolved the 1:10 a.m. flight and the agent from hell. Anxiety level 8.9 on the Richter. It's just a joy to open my eyes and know I'm going to die. For breakfast oatmeal and Xanax.

                             12:14 PM

Here's where we stand at noon. Credit card arrived, car back in garage.... and a truck bomb did not go off on the ride home from the body shop.  No word from the agent, I still do not know if I'm doing the March 1 gig.

Ok so today appears to be all about cars. Lead story on the news. 1,000,000-dollar car demolished in car crash. Who buys a one million dollar car? How small could your penis be that you need to drive a million dollar car? My friend Deedy ate cat food 3 times last week for dinner.... and this guy has a million dollar car. What are the monthly payments on a million dollar car... it's a mortgage? What's the registration fee, a Toyota corolla?  And naturally all I could think of was, "I wonder if that includes air conditioning".  How self obsessed does one person have to be to spend a million dollars on something birds shit on. Here's my advice... take the insurance money, have your member enlarged and with the rest of the cash open a home for unwed mothers in Orange County.

Huff puff.

So I'm on the freeway and in front of me is a huge dodge truck. HUGE. It's the one the circus uses to pull up the tent. Huge wheels, chrome rack with four lights, bed liner, four doors, landing strip and guesthouse.  And what is the license plate on this gas pig? "Nuke Opec". Talk about shooting yourself in the foot. This guy's got a car that sucks gas like Heidi Fleiss at a bachelor party and he wants to "nuke" Opec. He's angry with them? He should be angry with himself for going into a car dealership drunk.

Huff puff.

So I filled my car up with gas on the way home from the body shop. $42.00. And I'm thinking, "That's not so bad."  Which only goes to prove that human beings can get used to having their arms pulled out of the sockets if you do it long enough to them. I remember gas at .28 cents a gallon.  We would talk about it at chuck wagon as we made it through Donner Pass.

2:01 PM

OH HAPPY DAY!  The gig is off! The car is in the garage, credit card is in the wallet,
and sanity is in my head! You have no idea how happy I am today! I'll probably have a stroke later this evening. Do you think I'm bi-polar?

10:14 PM

People have been coming out of the woodwork to be funny in my guest book. My favorite... the one from my mother. The one with my name spelled wrong. Yah that one, so clever. Not. First of all my mother has a wood burning computer, for her to get on line it takes an act of Congress. Secondly, she thinks a blog is something that obstructs her lower intestines.  Thirdly, she doesn't like me that much. So not for a moment did I actually think she entered a message in my guest book.  But nice try.

I keep reminding myself, I do not have to go on the road. I do not have to, by contract, sit and sign autographs for morons on vacation. I do not have to dumb down my act. I am free to stay home and have nondescript anxiety. Free at last, free at last thank God oh mighty I'm free at last. Ativan anyone?

Here's tonight's saga. . Petco.  I had to get my dog, Tori Spelling, her annual shots. They do it at Petco to lure you in to buy pet crap you may not already have and absolutely don't need.... like dog socks. "To keep their little feet warm" Hello! Remember fur?   I buy my dog 600-dollars worth of chew sticks and toys. What is her favorite toy...  my old sock with a knot in it. I guess if she can't have her own socks, she'll chew mine. And what is with the employees, more lesbians than a Melissa Ethridge concert. And so pretty, "Where are chew sticks, sir... ah... ma'am...ah... Pat?" (Obscure SNL reference from 10 years ago) Who grows up wanting to work at Petco? What life-crushing event leads you there? I guess it's better than Costco where the intelligence level of the employee is just higher than trail mix.