June 17 - Haircuts, Conan, Twix

For logistical reasons Lauren joined me at the barber for my semi-annual haircut.

The place I've been frequenting of late is a tiny two-chair spot in Logan Square run by an old school owner and his rockabilly accomplice. It exudes masculinity like an Italian beef and a GTO. Though its quirks are what keep me coming back.

Lauren and I walked in as a violent movie played on the DVD player. The owner shut it off, out of respect to Lauren's gender. She said it was okay and he began the movie from the beginning.

As I sat in the barber's chair on this Thursday morning, the opening credits rolled for an update on the 1993 revenge fantasy Falling Down.

The film was B in nature and had some unnecessarily loose dialogue. The main characters, pissed off at the world, harbored truly vague left wing ideology, and walked around town waiting for something to trigger their postal potential. As my hair became shorter and shorter I was entranced by the protagonist, first getting driven to the edge by a barista who didn't put enough foam on his latte, then by a combo-ordering nightmare at a fast food chicken place.

Sample dialogue:

"Why do we eat this fuckin' shit?"

"'Cuz we're fuckin' Americans, we're supposed to eat this fuckin' shit."

My barber rewound the moment when the fast food waitress accidentally spilled a beverage on the protagonists and they sort of flipped out. We watched it three times.

He told me if I needed movies, he was the guy to see, showing off a DVD of a Samuel Jackson vehicle that hadn't hit theaters yet.

Meanwhile my hair was beginning to look more Italian beef and less GTO.

I love the old school barber, but next time I'm going to camp outside the door until a spot in the rockabilly guy's chair opens up.

After work, I rode my bike downtown and met John from the Bitter Tears. We had plans to see the Conan writers at the old Shubert Theater as part of the Just For Laughs Festival. I signed up for free tickets through my connections at the Annoyance. When we arrived there was a line around the block, and we were at the end of it. It seems 14,000 other people also had connections.

But John is a good conversationalist. In fact, John can have a conservation about anything. If you wanted to discuss tangelos, ceiling fan blades, or branches, John could do it. So we caught up in the stagnant queue. After awhile though, I was willing to bail on the show. I didn't need to stand next to a forever closing Forever 21 for over an hour to see people I vaguely knew from my days as a beginning improviser. But as luck would have it, the line started moving so we had to see the show.

Our seats were extremely shitty at first. We were up in the balcony directly behind the guy that operates the spotlight. I had a nice view of his shoes and his water bottle, but it was time to really consider leaving. But then, as fate would have it, some seats opened up a few rows in front of the spotlight guy so we had to continue with plans to see the show.

TBS was taping the show for televisions in the future.

The audience was youthful and twinkling with college wonder.

They obediently made all that yippy yappy noise when the crowd fluffer conducted his symphony of manufactured excitement.

Ugh.

I have never understood the idea of wasting energy before a show begins.

It's the reason I hate warm ups before doing an improv show.

It's the reason I take a nap sometimes minutes before I go on.

But that's me.

A grouchy, jaded curmudgeon.

Believe me, though, I still do love and appreciate comedy.

So when the warm up comic came out yelling "YEEEAAAHHH!!!" about 16 times, I was on the edge of Laugh Heaven. He went right into his act without even introducing himself. It could have just been some random person, and maybe was. He yelled his routine through the world's trebliest microphone. Maybe treble is the new going viral. To keep myself entertained I plugged my ears and hummed a decent Bruce Willis blues jam until he went away.

Okay, time for the show to start!

After some more tired, manufactured audience screaming.

Andy Richter hosted the evening, an evening of stand up comedy it turns out.

Oh.

I thought this would be a sketch comedy show from Conan's writers.

Okay, then. Stand up.

Oh, wait, I don't know any of these people.

It was pretty good really.

The first comic had some Catskills twists, the Chicago guy had a fun cellphone bit, and the abstract comic in an ascot was moist fun. Reggie Watts was a favorite from both behind and in front of his Nord and sampler set up.

About halfway through John leaned over and said, "I think if I were watching this on TV I'd turn it."

I think I would, too.

After the show, the loudspeaker asked us to remain in our seats so they could retape the opening with more audience screaming and acting like stupid assholes. John and I said fuck to that and split.

But it was free and we got to try the new java flavored Twix bar.

Verdict: Win