Connecticut Day 1 - Capital Cities, Classic Authors, and Connecticut Comedy
I started today with an exploration of Hartford, Connecticut. This was not particularly adventurous at first as I spent about 2 hours in a coffee shop called Tisane’s Euro-Asian Cafe. The coffee was very good, the place was super comfy, and I had a really good time joking around with the barista so it certainly wasn’t a bad place to write and catch up on Bojack Horseman. It just doesn't make for particularly enthralling storytelling.
To keep the action packed morning rolling, I got an oil change because I have already put 5000 miles on my car. Woah! I'm not sure if it's a Connecticut thing or a Steve thing, but this was very much the least a Jiffy Lube has tried to sell me on more than I needed which was nice.
Things got a little bit more exciting at the Mark Twain house. It might not be as thrilling as cliff diving, but I'm a big Mark Twain fan so I ate everything up about the tour of his house. It's an insanely beautiful restoration, and the tour guide tells lots of funny stories about Mark Twain and his daughters. My personal favorite is that every night he improvised a new bedtime story for them involving the same cat, and they would never let him repeat one. Perhaps one of the coolest facts to learn was that Twain paid for the tuition of the first Black student admitted to Yale law school, because he really believed in him and thought it was an important precedent to set on the road toward racial equality.
There was one exhibit on Mark Twain's temper that was all about the many fights and causes he got himself involved in. He was very ahead of his time in many ways, fighting imperialism, racism, religion, and quack medicine. In other ways he was very much of his time, as he was himself racist towards Native Americans and kind of puritanical regarding his daughters' good name.
In a lot of ways, Mark Twain is possibly the most influential humorist there is. His satire was biting at the time and hasn't lost much relevance. I think that is because he wrote with more than just wit but also a deep humanism. His jabs were societal and far reaching, calling out hypocrisy wherever he saw it on behalf of truth more broadly than any one political party or cause. When he was trying to make his money back after losing much of it on a bad investment, he went on a speaking tour of the world, what the tour guide called an early form of stand up comedy. I think his approach to storytelling and social commentary has probably touched just about every modern humorist, and it's no surprise to me that Louie CK has done multiple sets directly alluding to his work. (the top left picture below might be my all time favorite photograph)
After the Mark Twain House, I had what may just have been the best burger of my young life at a place in Hartford called Piggy's Cafe. The sign said to "Eat Like a Pig" so I took it to heart. Their burger buns are Portuguese bread, which is really fluffy and kind of sweet. It might not be obvious from my pale Irish mug, but a quarter of my heritage is Portuguese so this bread always makes me happy when it's done right, and it was done right. I got my burger with cheddar, bacon, and mushrooms, and it came with tater tots (i saw a lot of places advertising tater tots as opposed to french fries. Is that common all over CT or just a coincidence?). The bacon was perfectly crispy, the mushrooms were flavorful, and the cheese felt like real strong cheddar as opposed to a Kraft single. And this whole heaping pile of greasy goodness was only $7. The restaurant is a little out of the way, and kind of has a dive bar aesthetic, but you would be a fool to pass up a burger like that if you're in the Hartford area.
All in all, I'd say Hartford feels a bit more like a business capital than social capital of the state, but it's got a nice character and charm to it. Everyone there was really nice to me, and I'm looking forward to seeing a bit more of it tomorrow.
With my belly sagging, I drove to Middletown, for some light exploring before an open mic. At my cousin's suggestion I went to Wild Bill's Nostalgia Center. Their sign advertises that they have rare books, music, and weird stuff. They did not disappoint. Before you even get into the building, the mural on the outside is a treasure trove of pop cultural references and the parking lot is filled with bizarre sculptures.
Inside there really was wall to wall nostalgia. Action figures, posters, buttons, movies, CDs, vinyl, you name it. There's even a haunted house which unfortunately wasn't open while I was there, but it seems like a real treat.
After that I drove to Middletown center. The town seems sort of like it's on the verge of gentrification if that makes sense. Still tons of good cheap places to eat and shop, but bougie stores are starting to creep in. I really liked everywhere I went though.
I started with Klekolo World Coffee which had a nice hangout vibe. Again pretty cheap coffee for how good it was, and they also had coffee ice cubes so this must be something that's catching on. They're also open pretty late, and people were just hanging out and chatting so it almost had more of a cool bar feel just without the booze.
From there I went to a place called grown which is actually tucked away in the corner of the Wesleyan book store and serves reasonably priced organic meals. I got grilled shrimp with roasted garlic brussel sprouts and sweet potato mash. It was all delicious but I definitely think the brussel sprouts were the star of the show. I didn't eat them for a long time because they have such a bad rap for a vegetable, but they're so good.
whole thing cost less than $10
After that I saw something I'd never seen before so I had to try it, no matter how full I was because I am a hero: Thai Ice Cream. I went to 0degree Thai Ice Cream, and got an ice cream that had nilla wafers, coconut, and caramel. The ice cream is made right in front of you and hand rolled into little ice cream wraps. You get five rolls and then however many toppings you want. It's a little bit on the price-y side for ice cream but it's a huge amount of food and absolutely incredible.
The open mic was next, and was hosted in Keagan's Irish Pub. It's a nice, little bar with different entertainment and/or deals most nights. I asked the bartender for a local beer, so I tried Still Hill Brewery's IPA, which was good if not my cup of tea.
The open mic was pretty well attended. The host Paul Gregory was really friendly and easy to talk to, offering some good advice and pointing me toward more open mics in the area. He also did a good job during the show of looking out for comics and trying to keep volume down in the bar.
Both the comics and the audience skewed a bit older, though there were some younger folks as well. I'd say the people in the bar that weren't comics were more interested in the football than the comedy, but they were still pretty attentive and receptive all things considered. Not a lot throughout the night was off limits, with most of the material going more rant based or self-deprecating or both. There was only one 9/11 joke given the day, but it was actually more clever than offensive so that was nice.
I'd say this was a very typical open mic for what I'm more used to. Lots of comics with solid premises trying to figure out how to end the jokes. Makes for a mixed bag audience wise, but I feel like a lot of the comics had some real strong stuff they were working through that just wasn't quite there yet. But that's what open mics are for.
I felt a little bit off delivering my own set. I think all my big punch lines landed, so there wasn't a big difference in the reactions to mayonnaise vs. making fun of white supremacists, but for both sets a lot of the smaller jokes on the way to the big punch lines got much smaller reactions. This made it kinda hard for me to gauge if the audience would like a punch line leading up to it, which shook my confidence a bit. Something I noticed in both my set and all the others though, is that part of the reason my bigger punchlines worked and others didn't is that is when I chose to make eye contact with the audience. It's a micro thing, but if you're looking off to the side to remember jokes or kinda zoning out, you're not engaging with the audience so why should they engage with you. Little things of just acknowledging their presence with a look or a nod, makes a huge difference. I think any kind of performer can relate to the feeling of after performing several times doing the same thing, it becomes a bit like a job or something you do because you like doing it, but really it's something you're doing for the audience. If it's not for them, what's the point of performing, so keeping that in the back of your mind is easy to forget but so important.
There was one featured performer at the end, so it would be maybe a bit unfair to call her also the best comic of the night since she was doing real material (though she did try out some new stuff, which was very good), but Crystal Dyer was definitely the comic that I felt had the best mix of content and delivery. She did a lot of jokes about dating after getting divorced from a long marriage, which were self-deprecating but insightful and funny, and oddly relatable given that most people there can't have gone through the exact same thing.
Other notable comics, I thought were Pete Angelo and Andrew Manning. Pete had a really unique outlook as a bisexual metal head, and Andrew was younger and just brought a ton of energy and confidence to the stage.
My favorite joke of the night: Pat Oats (all of these names are possibly spelled wrong because I was going by ear) on running while suffering depression- "I was running on a track, and I just started crying for no apparent reason, and these old guys looked at me and I could just tell they were thinking "Wow he must have really loved being fat""
Favorite Random Sightings: Wash Tub Laundromat (tub is a gross word); Grinder Shoppe; Kid City; Vinnie's Jump and Jive
Regional Observation: Hartford has Duckpin bowling! I've never seen that outside of Rhode Island, but it's so weird and cute.
Favorite Mark Twain Quotes: "Man is the only animal that blushes, or need to" "There's no sadder thing than a young pessimist, except an old optimist" "The muscle in her chest that does the duty of the heart is nothing but a potato"
Albums Listened To: Bop Til You Drop by Ry Cooder; Borderline by Ry Cooder
People's Favorite Jokes:
What did I say to my friend when he asked me to stop singing Wonder Wall? I said Maybeeeee
Why did the scarecrow win a nobel prize? He was outstanding in field
How many South Americans does it take to change a light bulb? A Brazillion
(this is a true story that the bartender at Piggy's cafe told but it perfectly has the structure of a joke) A drunk guy walked into the bar and started ranting and raving. The bartender said, "Hey you can't be in here. Get out". The drunk guy leaves, walks down the street and then comes in the side door of the same bar. "You'll never believe it" he says, "that bar down the street kicked me out!"
A blonde, a brunette, and a redhead are stranded on an island trying to swim to a nearby shore. The brunette swims out five miles, gets tired, and swims back. The redhead swims out ten miles, gets tired, and swims back. The blonde swims out 15 miles, makes it to the shore, gets tired, and swims back.
(this is long and raunchy but I'm trying to replicate it as I heard it as best i can) A traveling salesman frequently has to leave his wife for long periods of time. She's getting sexually frustrated and starting to want to see other people. He thinks to himself that if he can get her a really good sex toy as a gift, that might keep her satisfied. He goes into a sex shop and he's looking at all the dildos and vibrators, but nothing seems right. He asks the clerk if he has anything better, so he shows him all these really big ones but it still doesn't seem right. He asks if there must be something better, and the clerk pulls out a small case, and says "this is the best one we have but it's very expensive" "I'll pay anything" the man says, "what is it?" The clerk opens the box and it just looks like a regular dildo. "What's so special about that?" the man asks. "It's a voodoo dick" the clerk says. "How does it work?" the man asks. "Voodoo Dick, key hole" the clerk says and the dick flies up and starts fucking a key hole. "Wow, I'll take it!" the man says. He brings it home to his wife and shows her and explains how it works. The next time he goes on a business trip, she's getting sexually frustrated so she decided to try it out. "Voodoo Dick, pussy" and the dick flies up and starts pounding away at her twat. She cums a bunch, but then realizes she doesn't know how to get it out. She decides to drive to the hospital, but because she's cumming constantly she's kinda swerving on the road. A police officer pulls her over and says, "Do you know why I pulled you over?" She says, "Yes I was driving erratically but let me explain." She tells him the whole story, but he doesn't believe her and says, "Voodoo dick, my ass". So it flies out of her twat and starts fucking his ass.
