Well, it’s back to normal life.  The week after a festival is always the hardest.  If it weren’t for the fact that the wonderful and handsome Rene Vega is arriving Friday for a long weekend visit, I’d be staring out a window longing for better days.

I loved the whole Italian team.  I wanted to marry all four of them.  We got invited to the Norwegian International Improv Festival in October, and I’ve got a little crush on their spokesperson Eirik (and I think it might be mutual).  We ended up owning that festival after our longform show.  A lot of the participants and even our hosts thought it was the best show of the festival.  One of the festival committee pulled me aside and told me that he thought that I was the best actor in the festival.  So, I’m trying to deflate my ego this week.  I talked him down to being the most consistent actor, anyway.  I hate being ranked, even if it is highly.

You can check out pics of our performances and the festival in general here, just click on ‘Festival Images’.  We performed on the 23rd, 25th, 26th, and 27th.

Ironically there was a huge gay bear party literally next door to the end of festival party, called the “Furball” (pictured below).  The Norwegians challenged me to run in onto the stage at the Furball, scream something, tear my shirt off, and dive into the crowd.  I said that I’d do it if they were there to take a picture.  There are far more stories, but I’ll tell them to you in person.

Well I just trapsed in after about 25 hours of travelling.  There were some rerouts because of bad weather in Germany.  I’m home but exhausted.  I’ll recap later.  Briefly, it turned out to be amazing and special in so many ways.

My jetlag is going away, and I’ve met a lot of people.  I learned about 35 names today.  My faves: Anouk (A-nook), Ana-viek (Ana-veek), Ruma (sounds a lot like rumor), and Eugen (Oy-gen).

 

We skirted the red light district, and visited a few places.  I’m attaching some photos.  One is me at the Homomonument (which is directly across from Anne Frank’s house).  The others are of some glass dildos and buttplugs from a specialty sex toy store (PS – this place is crazy sex central and hella gay), and a creepy clown that we believe stole the soul of a drunk who pestered us into singing “Liki-Liki-Lakki” for way too long.  It turned out that that was the title to a failed television pilot that drunk had started.  That put a sad edge on things.  However, the incident provided us with gut-busting laugh-filled tangents for the rest of the night.  Let’s face it.  Comedy is never too far from tragedy.

 

The theater we’re working at is fucking sweet.  It’s a 200 seat theater doing 2 shows a night, and all of the shows are sold out.  I cannot wait to get up there and play.

 

I nearly shit myself during our landing yesterday.  There was a huge storm front moving up the English Channel to the North Sea, and there were 30-40mph gales, not gusts but prolonged high winds.  It was the first time I’ve ever had to retreat to my happy place to make it through a landing, and I’ve flown quite a bit.  My hands are finally uncramped from gripping the friggin armrests.  The whole plane applauded when we landed.  I changed my underwear….jk.

 

I’ll be posting pictures and reflections on the Amsterdam International Improv Festival when I can here.  So keep your eyes peeled.  Hopefully, I can find a free wireless connection somewhere in Amsterdam.  That will make it way easier.

I’m  flying all day tomorrow with Todd Greblo and Tom Johnson.  This ought to be interesting.  Here we go!  Yipee!