Thursday, March 31, 2005

Little Inanimates TM Morsels

(Little Inanimates Morsels are stories with morals based around inanimate objects or creatures which do not exist. Yet, you can learn something from them!)

Hiddy The Walnut With Wings

Hiddy was a walnut with wings. But poor Hiddy was in a wheelchair. It would make Hiddy so sad to see all the other nuts - playing, jumping, running around getting all saturated in their own oils, while he was stuck in his un-fun machine. It made him feel like he was forced to sit in the bad seat, like they had at school. What he wouldn't give to get up and walk over to sit in the bad seat now.

To make things even worse, Hiddy didn't even have wheels on his wheelchair, as his parents were poor and could only afford cinderblocks. So, day after day, Hiddy would sit in his chair in the front lawn, like a broken down car or a flamingo yard ornament.

Hiddy knew he had the capability to do great things. He dreamed of someday being an astro-nut, or a jar of Jiffy brand peanut butter, while all his friends only had aspirations of being a generic brand. He would always say, "I am the walnut! Goo goo ga chew!" After his favorite Meatles song. The Meatles were his favorite band, and he dreamed of even having one half the nutmeat that the Meatles had.

His mother and guidance counselor and physical therapist would always tell him to be strong and brave. "Be strong and brave," his guidance counselor said every day. "For you may grow up to be anything. You could even be Jesus, if you put your mind to it."

He thought about that - "Hm. I could be Jesus." But he decided he'd rather work on being someone else. Like himself, but not in a wheelchair.

So, he decided to start exercising. Every day, he'd pump vitamins and nutrients into his little nut body. He'd put his little nuttles on top of the cinder block and push himself up and let himself down out of the chair, the way you've seen people do when they work out in prison films. He'd do sit downs, which are like sit ups, but you lean down instead of up. And he'd wish and hope.

Eventually, one day, his arms were so strong, he was able to lean over and push himself and his whole chair up into the air and walk on his hands. He realized that his arms could be his new legs, and immediately "ran" inside to put shoes on his hands.

His mother was so surprised to see him moving around, she dropped the dishes she was washing and started jumping for joy.

"Mother, don't cry!" he said, wishing he was strong enough to balance on one hand so he could wipe her oily eye discharge away from her eyes. "I'm a man, now," he said. And mother nut knew it was true.

The moral of this story is, if you're in a wheelchair with no wheels, you have to try to find some other way to get around. Also, if you have wings but you can't use your legs, you should try to fly.

Wednesday, March 30, 2005

TRACHTENBURG FAMILY SLIDESHOW PLAYER REVIEW

....and a little about Jessica Delfino, too.

This was from a show we did in Richmond, Illinois - the place I found my gold lame' fancy shoes in a thrift store for - watch out - ONE dollar.

They don't grow deals like THAT in NYC. The last time I bought something for a dollar in NYC, I became a mother.

Womp womp womp...

This was written by the adorable kid college newspaper writer who gathered up all his courage and waited till the end of the show to tell me that if he was my boyfriend, HE'D have sex with me. (Based on a joke I told about my college boyfriend never having sex with me.)

Hey, everyone. I just got back from being on tour for a week and boy is my vagina tired.

I should be a stand-up comedian for a living.

Sunday, March 27, 2005

EASTER All You Can Take

My show is on for tonight, Easter Sunday, March 27, 2005. We will be having Easter Dinner Chinese style from the Chinese place on the corner of B and 3rd. It's good and cheap. The show starts at 7 pm and I'll be taking orders at 7:15. It shouldn't cost you more than $5. There are cheap beers and wine at the show, too.

Apocalypse Lounge
E 3rd between A and B aves
7 pm - 9 pm
sign up at 6:50 pm. Show starts at 7.

I encourage odd acts to show up, but any acts are welcome, especially acts delivered by intellectuals. I love smart dudes.

Also, I'll be performing at the KNITTING FACTORY on Friday, April 1st - 74 Leonard St. Tickets are $6 each and you can buy them here online or at www.knittingfactory.com.

Show details here.

It's a night of comedy music, featuring ME on first at 8 pm, Sharon Mama Spell, Stuckey & Murray and Tickle Dracula, who I like very much.

Hope you can make it...

Finally, I'd like to say this.

I got an email a few weeks ago from Celia Bressack promoting the show "Mariajuanalogues". It said if we went to the box office and said we had tickets for "Marty Wanna" we could get in for free. My bf and I rode over there today on our bikes a half hour before show time, and tried to get our free tickets. The guy at the box office, who said his name was Sam, was so rude. He cut me off, yelling, "The promotions over! Go away! Get out of here!" I said, "I have an e-mail here which says it's good until today's date." I took it out to try to show it to him, and he just started repeating rapid fire, "The promotion is over. If you want to buy a ticket, they're $35" which alternated with "Get out of here if you don't want a ticket." He said that about ten times while I stood there looking like an asshole in front of ten or so people who were also waiting for tickets.

I was very embarrassed and pretty irritated at this dick for being so rude on top of having a FLAMING gay accent which definitely didn't make him seem any less like an overly melodramatic f-ing a-hole.

I went and got on my bike, defeated, and rode away.

IT'S FUCKING EASTER! Jesus wouldn't have wanted that.

Remember, friends - Easter or not, it's never a good idea to scream at strangers. They could be crazier than you.

As I peddled away on my bike, I thought of ways to get even. I could get a bucket of water, I thought, and splash it into the box office hole all over the guy. I could throw a rock through the box office window tonight after the place is all closed down. I could wait for Sam at the end of the day and spit on him. Finally, I decided to eat a piece of pizza and get over it.

Though not as fulfilling as spitting on him or dumping water on him might have been, at least now I understand why they call the West Village gay. Because whether or not it's gay in a homosexual way, it's definitely fucking gay. I can't wait to move to Chinatown, where gayness doesn't exist - but there's a plethora of cheap food and rent, which is decidedly UN gay, if you ask me.

Friday, March 25, 2005

MY BLOG FUCKING STINKS

I haven't written anything on here in like, four years, and I have pangs of guilt clinging to my insides, but not quite executing themselves into full blown guilt. Just when I swear there's no way my life could get harder, it has to go and prove itself to me that it can.

My bf who I won't mention by name got evicted from his apartment of 14 years by his slumlord landlord Paul Stallings, who the Village Voice called one of the ten worse landlords in NYC. I was living with him, but he didn't know that. I just kept my things there and slept there every night. I had another place to crash, too. But I loved living in the LES. Even with the high risk to white actresses in the neighborhood. Not that I'm a white actress, but I could be one with a little bit of fine tuning.

I've never seen a person with more boxes of shit than said boyfriend. We carried literally 100 or more boxes out of there, down five flights of stairs, not to mention about ten guitars, ten keyboards, and half his roommates clothing which she gave me when she left, as well as food and other crap. My boss kindly allowed Chris to stay with me at his place in the West Village where I was set up for living already. That was the home I never stayed at. But we can only stay here for a month together, then bf has to go.

So, we have been looking for a place in Manhattan to move into together, which is very exciting for me. Finally! My boyfriend and I are moving in together! How trite. And affordable. When NYC said they were going to make more affordable housing, I think they meant they were going to do more to arrange for couples to live together.

I think we found a place we like in Chinatown. It's pretty reasonable - a 2 bedroom convertible for $1300. To someone who isn't from NY or hasn't had to find a place to live for awhile, a convertible is a car. But here, it's an apartment with a living room that could be turned into a bedroom. Every 2 bedroom in NYC was a 1 bedroom at one time, it seems, and many studios are now 2 bedroom apartments thanks to capitalism.

Now, we have to convince the Asians that we are decent people and aren't going to try to hurt their apartment. If they knew us better, they'd realize the chances of us hurting the apartment versus hurting ourselves or someone else instead are very slim. We aren't door kicking, wall-smashing people - unless provoked by a really, really good provoker.

It's been fun though, going through all my old stuff in this move - I found some great junk that I forgot I had. I have a few old issues of STAR LORD which I'll be selling on E-bay, and I also found an old interview with Jim Norton from a while back. It was funny. I was thinking of putting it on this blog, but I decided I might try to sell it, instead.

I've been trying to be more money oriented lately. I asked my rich Jewish friend, "Can you please tell me the secret to why you and many other Jewish people and many other people who aren't Jewish are so rich?" He said, "It's easy, actually. You just have to make decisions about money with no emotion in them. Just look at which choice will make you more money, without thinking about who it will be hurting or who it will affect." Spoken like a true capitalist. I found it to be slightly inspiring, but mostly sad. I've been bringing more CDs around with me and trying to sell them at my shows, which I am pretty lazy about doing usually. Honestly, I'd rather the CDs were in stores so I didn't have to peddle them. But while I was on tour with the Trachtenburgs, I realized that you can make a living off the merch table. A living that doesn't involve cutting so and so in on the profits. A fat extra chunk of cash, every gig. So, I've been dragging the merch out with me and actually trying to peddle it. I feel like a hermit or something, but people have been buying the CD, it's only five damn bucks. They probably feel sorry for me.

Speaking of feeling sorry for me, please come to see my show at the Knitting Factory on Friday, April 1st - APRIL FOOL'S DAY. (I think they mean me.) It's a night of musical comedy in the Old Office, and starts at 7:30 pm. The show features ME as the opening act, Sharon Mama Spell, Stuckey & Murray, and my friends Tickle Dracula. I think their website is www.captainhilarious.com. Or there's at least more info about the show at that website. The show is $6. Cheap fun. And I do mean cheap - there will probably be tons of vagina jokes. Most of them made by me.

As usual, my weekly collection of rabblerousers is held every Sunday at Apocalypse Lounge from 7-9. It's an open mic, but I only take ten performers and the order is arranged by me. I also pick the line-up according to who I think would be the most interesting to watch. So, it's not one of those shows where there are ten brand new comics in a row trying out the worst, unfunniest material you ever heard. It's true pros trying out unfunny material. Ha ha.

I wish I had something interesting to write, but my life sucks too much for me to be good at things right now.

Check this shit out - my laptop - the new one I just got about five months ago or less - BROKEN, unusable. I hired a friend to come and fix it and he didn't fix it but now wants $100 for trying!!! What do I do? I mean, besides kill myself?

Bye...

Saturday, March 12, 2005

JESSICA DELFINO at the KNITTING FACTORY!!!

Hey there everyone. Life is very hectic right now, because Chris got evicted from his apartment of 14 years. I've been helping him move and I'm also helping my boss move into his new place as well. But, I've got some very exciting news (for me...) - I'm playing at the Knitting Factory on April 1st at 8 pm!!! Doors at 7:30 pm. Tickets are only $6. I'm also playing with Tickle Dracula, who I like very much. Stuckey & Murray and Sharon Mama Spell are also on the bill. So come on down and boogie with us, won't you all?

In other news, I'm trying to be nicer to my fellow man. I've been holding doors, saying please and thank you a lot, and smiling randomly at people. These are things I normally do anyway, when I'm not writing jokes about how badly the homeless smell, but I'm trying to make an effort to do this even more now. Part of the reason why, is because when I was on tour with the Trachtenburgs, I noticed every rest stop we went to, people would POINT at Tina so overtly and laugh at her. It was like being back in high school, with out the failing grade in Spanish class. It didn't seem to bother her at all, she'd laugh really loud. She has such a great laugh, the people would normally start laughing with her...a little human compassion would take place and before we knew it, we were all chit chatting - where ya from? Whatcha doin' here? That kind of stuff...

It was magical, at times, to see people's personalities change in a second, with just a laugh or a smile. I thought that was something I wanted to bring back to NYC with me. It's so easy to get wrapped up in calling people assholes and staring jerky bitches down - it's so fun! And sometimes so deserved. But it's just as easy to say hello to a stranger, put a quarter in a homeless person's cup, and hold a door for a person with their arms full.

When the nuclear bomb hits this city, we'll all burn together - the poor, the rich, the fat, the pretty. I'm not suggesting we all try to love one another, but I am suggesting that it wouldn't hurt us any to be kind to one another, especially people who are assholes. Probably the reason they are assholes to begin with is because people have been mean to them so much with such regularity that they are trained to expect it, and then trained to give it back.

Try it if you can - do one nice thing for someone every single stinking day. Even if you hate your job. Even if you hate your boyfriend. Even if you hate yourself. This world sucks enough without you being a dick, too.

This Sunday at Apocalypse Lounge, 7 pm to 9 pm, my dear friend Claudia Gross will be hosting. I'll be there for a bit, but then I have another show to go to at the Living Room called "East Side Oral" where I'll be doing a reading. Come on over, won't you, to either show, or both?

Sunday, March 6, 2005

back to our program...

so, where was i...

currently, i'm at bard university in new york. we arrived about a half hour ago. it took us about 15 hours to drive here from indiana. we stayed at the shittiest hotel i've ever stayed at, and it cost 70 smackers. it was a super 8 - more like suck-ass 8. this entry will be written with no caps, special characters or exclamation points because i have no shift key at this student computer i'm sitting at.

the show in indiana was so terrific, besides it being little sibs weekend. jason joked that little sibs sounds like a disease you get...ha ha. little sibs are like a disease you get.

my set started out good and dirty, and within about ten minutes, the show director approached the stage and told me to knock off all the dirty stuff. so, i didn't, and the audience loved it all. the kids, too. when i got off stage, an 11 year old in the audience told me she loved me. awww.

the trachtenburgs were so terrific. jason was extra charming and funny on stage, though rachel seemed tired. it was a late show, it didn't even start until ten pm. they forgot the mountain trip slides, so the audience was bummed about that, but rocked it out with all their other hits, so christmas was saved.

at the end of the night, zak, a writer for the school paper approached me. he told me he enjoyed my set, bought a cd, had me autograph it - a first for jessica delfino on her own cd - and then he told me that if he was my boyfriend, he'd have sex with me. awwwwww, exclamation exclamation exclamation.

- i have a joke i tell about a boyfriend who'd never have sex with me.

all in all, the evening was a total success, even though jason and tina were briefly worried that they might get shit for me being so dirty. dammit, if they'll subject their own daughter to it, it couldn't be that bad.

this trip was pretty fun, though i hacked and coughed non-stop the whole time, and started my period mid-trip.

apocalypse lounge is still going on tonight at 7 pm, all you can take...abby rosen is hosting. get there at quarter of 7 to sign up. if you miss the sign up, you can always do the speed round at the end. everyone gets two minutes in the speed round.

bye...

Saturday, March 5, 2005

ON THE ROAD with the Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players

Richmond, Indiana is remarkable in its unremarkableness. However, this town has a Salvation Army, a Goodwill AND a no-name Jesus Loves You thrift store. I bought a fucking drop dead beautiful pair of old lady gold lame shoes at the no-name Jesus Loves You place for - ready? - ONE dollar. You can't even buy directions in NYC for a buck. Brand new. Some old lady died and left me her shoes.

This town has no vegetarian restaurants at all, and Jason and I are vegetarians, Tina doesn't eat much meat, and Rachel is trying out vegetarianism for a little bit. So, the most obvious answer then, would be Mexicano. We found some little place called El Chimichanga or something and ate there TWICE today. Good food, cheap, and get this - they CUSTOM MADE food for us off the menu! I ordered the chicken rice soup sans chicken - and like magic! No chicken.

More later...

Friday, March 4, 2005

Earlham College and More

I'm on a mini-tour with the Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players. We are staying at a super fat Holiday Inn, if you can imagine such a thing. Heated pool, jacuzzi, mullets galore. I got my own hotel room to myself last night because the college set it up that way.

Fancy!

I totalled my room, in real rock star mode. The TV is in the garden, six stories below - towels and vicodan littered among the fresh, new carpet - two huge double beds - one for me and one for my shoes.

Who wants to host my show at Apocalypse while I'm gone? I'll be back late Sunday. E-mail me immediately!

I'm excited to see how Indiana does Delfino...