NE Day 7/ SD Day 0 - Toadstools, Tow Trucks, and Top Secret Speakeasies
Today was mostly a driving day as a I said goodbye to Nebraska and made my way up to South Dakota, so I didn’t get to do as much sight seeing as I may have liked but I like to think the sights were quality over quantity. My first stop of the day was to get that bastion of the Great American Road Trip: Diner Food. I stopped for an early lunch in Alliance, NE at fantastic (but sadly closed now) retro diner called Fizzy’s Dine In and Drive Up. I couldn’t leave Nebraska without one more steak, so I got in the most wildly comfort foody package imaginable. I went with the Chicken Fried Steak Sandwich, which came with a meaty slab of steak fried up in batter, and gently tucked into a bed of mashed potatoes and corn on a bun, with a heaping helping of fries and white country gravy on the side. I was in heaven, even if my arteries were in hell. You don’t see it too often actually sanctioned by a dining establishment, but I have long been a proponent of treating mashed potatoes as essentially a condiment, so this particular sandwich made me feel equally full of validation as I was full of fried steak. Throw in some good coffee and a fun Americana aesthetic, and it was great way to get my day going.
Fueled up, my main stop for the day was a funky natural phenomenon nestled in the heart of the Nebraska National Grassland: Toadstool Geological Park. The park is named for it’s uniquely mushroom-y rock and clay formations. The grassland around the park is very serene but also very flat, so to see these bizarre and beautiful mounds suddenly start surging out of the land is really something to behold. It was liking walking on to a totally different planet.
At the entrance to the park, there is also a full size Sod House built by the parks department to honor the memory of the first rudimentary houses built by early homesteaders. Sod houses or soddies were common structures on the great plains, proving the old adage that necessity is the mother of invention. Looking out over the plains, you’ll notice there aren’t many trees which are sort of crucial for more traditional log cabins. Instead settlers turned to what they had and built houses out of bricks of prairie grass which, due to the dense root structure, held together better than you might expect. The fact that people had the ingenuity (no doubt mixed with a dash of desperation) to figure out how to construct a house like that is nuts to me, so getting to actually see one in person really helped to convince me that they were in fact possible.
There are supposedly some really nice hiking trails around the Park, but soon after I arrived it started raining pretty bad so I decided to continue on my way, but the rain clouds did make for some cool moody landscape photos that really show off how out of the ordinary the toadstools are.
The next leg of my day’s journey was more treacherous than I expected as the rain started to turn the dirt road to mud beneath my wheels. I was closer to the highway that I needed to be on for South Dakota than the highway that got me here, so it was easier to solider on than to turn back. Luckily, I was just about the only car on the road so i slowed to a crawl and started slipping and sliding along the constantly shifting terrain. Eventually the road got the better of me, and ten minutes away from the highway I careened into a ditch and couldn’t get out. Suddenly being the only person on the road was not as exciting, and I had to wait some time for a tow truck to get out to me. When my tow got there, he laughed and congratulated me on weathering my first experience with the “gumbo” which is what they call the unique sludge of dirt and clay that rain makes out of the roads in this part of the state. He also expressed his disappointment that I wasn’t a hot lady in need of a knight in shining tow truck, which was less folksy and charming and more kind of creepy. He went on to say that whenever he does get called out to tow an attractive woman he always takes longer to help them so he can spend more time with them which was pretty gross. I’m always amazed at what some people have no problem saying to total strangers with no thought to how bad it makes them sound. It was also pretty eye-opening to realize just how many ways women experience the world differently than I do, and that you can’t always trust the person who’s supposed to save you to not make you feel much more unsafe. Truly even the smallest amounts of power can go right to people’s heads.
After all that time spent in my ditch, I had to book it to Rapid City, SD if I wanted to make it there in time for the night’s open mic. Normally it wouldn’t be the biggest deal in the world, but my mom was going to be flying out to visit me this week so I wasn’t going to have any other chances to do comedy in South Dakota and I didn’t want to have missed any states. Fortunately it was a pretty straight shot (with just stops for gas and quick and dirty coffee and chicken nuggets from Wendy’s) and I made it to the mic in time. The location was actually a big selling point because the show was held in vintage speakeasy called the Blind Lion. This super cool bar is actually housed in a much more straightforward family restaurant called Murphy’s Irish Pub but you have to know how to get there. There’s nothing actually illegal about speakeasies any more but there is something just sort of exciting out secret passages. This is the door around the back of the restaurant you have to know to use:
Through there, and boom you’re in a swinging 1930’s bar with craft cocktails, fancy snacks, and the waiters even dress in period garb (It’s thematically dimly lit so I had to go online to find a decent picture of the interior). It was a true delight to find this hidden gem of a bar. The bartenders were all really funny and they made me an excellent Old Fashioned with a house made orange syrup.
The comedy lived up to the sweet digs, and even though it was a relatively intimate environment the small crowd was really supportive and into everything, and all the comics were super nice and hung out for a while afterwards just drinking and chatting.
The coolest comic I met was a guy named Charlie Martin, who worked for years as a professional clown and once got to spend a tour opening for Robin Williams! He was really nice to boot and I could have spend most of the night just picking his brain and listening to old showbiz stories. His comedy was a lot of absurdist one liners, but he had the right delivery and silly demeanor to really pull them all off. Some highlights: A woman was caught smuggling cocaine in her breast implants. Talk about a drug bust. Cremation is my last chance at a smoking hot body An old German plumber accidentally hiked up the gas heater to the shower. I guess old habits are hard to break.
Other highlights:
Valerie Schwinn - My dad says he's a math genius but he never taught me, so I think he just never wanted me to check his work.
Brittany (didn’t catch a last name unfortunately)- My dad called from me jail and said "when I get out do you wanna come to long beach, California. and we could hang out and you could buy me groceries"
Greg Beach- If you've asked for the manager more than five times in your life we can't be friends
Angie Thoran- Dad used to chase me and my brother around the house with his toenails and now i’m manicurist. Don't know where that comes from.
Erica Russel - Circumcision and cat declawing are similar because if I had a dick or a cat I think I would be against those operations but if I pick up a stray or guy off the street I'm happy the operation has been done
My own set went pretty well despite me still being a little frazzled from having to rush to get there, and if it was only my only experience with South Dakota comedy I couldn’t have asked for a better introduction.
Favorite Random Sightings: A florist store called The Tarnished Halo (fascinating name, not at all related to flowers); mysterious graffiti asking "Who's poor Jerry"; An advertisement that confusingly said “Taco the Faith”; High Country Erectors ( Oh I laughed instantly); a thrift shop called Booty and Loot
Regional Observations: It’s crazy that the National Grasslands are only a few miles away from the Nebraska National Forest so you really go from all the trees to no trees.
Albums Listened To: Wildflowers by Judy Collins (the album that gave us her iconic version of Both Sides Now); Willis by the Pietasters (a very angry album disguised as soulful 90s ska); Willy and the Poor Boys by Creedence Clearwater Revival (just a top to bottom great album); The Wireless by Punch Brothers (a weird fun EP by the alt-bluegrass band); Wise and Otherwise by Harry Manx (cool blend of country, blues, and traditional Indian music)
Joke of the Day:
A sweet grandmother telephoned St. Joseph 's Hospital. She timidly asked,
'Is it possible to speak to someone who can tell me how a patient is doing?'
The operator said, 'I'll be glad to help, dear. What's the name and room number?'
The grandmother, in her weak tremulous voice said, ''Norma Findlay, Room 302.'
The operator replied, 'Let me place you on hold while I check with her nurse.'
After a few minutes the operator returned to the phone and said, 'Oh, I have good news. Her nurse told me that Norma is doing very well.. Her blood pressure is fine; her blood work is normal and her physician, Dr. Cohen, has scheduled her to be discharged on Tuesday.'
The grandmother said, 'Thank you. That's wonderful! I was so worried! God bless you for the good news.'
The operator replied, 'You're more than welcome. Is Norma your daughter?'
The grandmother said, 'No, I'm Norma Findlay in 302. No one tells me shit.'
Nebraska Superlatives:
Favorite Coffee: The Mill Coffee and Tea in Lincoln
Favorite Restaurant: Plank Seafood Provisions in Omaha
Favorite Burger: The Croque Garcon Burger from Block 16 Omaha
Favorite Bar: Upstream Brewing Company in Omaha
Favorite Beer: The Moscow Mule Ale from Kinkaider Brewing Company out of Broken Bow
Favorite Attraction: The Henry Doorly Zoo in Omaha (though the International Quilt Museum in Lincoln and the Petrified Wood Gallery in Olgalla are high up there)
Favorite Open Mic: Backline Comedy Theater in Omaha
General Impression of the Omaha/Lincoln Comedy Scene: Small but solid, with a good mix of weirder more experimental comics and more traditional observational and personal comedy. Seemed like a pretty close knit community.
Songs of the Day:
this was a cool thing for the Boston Pops to do
so much 90s
This song always gets stuck in my head, and now it’s in yours
As technically impressive as it is very silly, my kinda song
Sweet and mellow