DC Improv

Last night, I met up with a few friends of mine and we went to see Pablo Francisco, live at the DC Improv. The show started at 20:30 we were all there about 20:10-ish.

The show actually started rather promptly! For all of those used to Christendom time, this would not have worked for you at all! Believe me when I say this: if you get too used to Christendom time, you'll be late for every real-world activity! ANYway, back to the story...

Paul, David and I rode together from work. Now, I fancy myself a pretty good driver, aggressive when I need to be, defensive when I need to be. HOWEVER -- directions are not my thing. Yes, I'm a male. But directions and I just don't work out well. Even with the Google Maps directions, I still would have gotten lost if it weren't for the two guys in my car who know DC quite well.

We were on Connecticut Drive, the street we needed to be on, strictly by accident. I was too busy looking for Connecticut to notice that we were actually already on it. When we figured this out, we looked around quickly, and made a judgment: we passed the Improv, and need to turn around. A second later, we realized that it's actually highly likely that we did not pass it. continued driving, and in less than 500 feet, there it was on our left. No time to turn in now, go up and make a U-Turn. With Divine Providence, we stumbled upon a perfect parking spot on the street. We parked, David and I left our coats in the car.

I've rarely ever seen DC at night, so I was rather taken with all the lights on and the hustle and the bustle and the excitement and the ... really ... cold weather... Paul was standing outside all nice and toasty, and David and I were looking like fools without coats on. We sauntered on back to the car, like, "Nothin' goin' on here! Just goin' back to the car!" {insert casual whistling for effect} We got our coats out, and all of a sudden, DC became a lot better place. :)

Alex hadn't arrived yet, so I gave him a call. He was in the area already, and should be there shortly. He had passed the Improv and was looking for parking. David and Paul went inside and saved us a table. When Alex showed up, we went downstairs into the Improv, found David and Paul, and ordered something. We all got drinks and food.

On a side note, I was the weakest person in the group when it came to drinking. I had a '57 Chevy, a mix of rum (or vodka), amaretto, orange juice, and pineapple juice. I'd never had it before, so I decided to give it a shot -- no pun intended. Alex had a Long Island Iced Tea (same size), David and Paul both had beers. I got it before my food, and it took me over an hour to get through it. It wasn't that big, I'd guess maybe 8oz total. After I finished it, I was feeling a definite kick. This is why I don't drink much... :)

Anywho, the DJ dimmed the lights and announced the program, along with the house rules. The first guy up was the M.C., obviously. He put on a show. His main method of entertainment was his antics. Don't get me wrong, he was very clever, but his antics really filled out his act. The crowd loved it when he started talking about physics, and the people who decide to play physicist by sticking their arms out of a moving vehicle and waving it through the wind. For fun, he pulls up along side someone, and pretends that the airflow in his car is so great that it's just blowing him around inside. For me to describe his motions is to not do it justice. Let's just say that he was pretty thin, and more flexible than I could ever be, if that gives you an idea of how much motion he was putting into the idea. A few of his jokes were about people, a few were one-liners. Overall, he was good. I liked him.

He introduced the first act, ??? Jokes. I can't remember his first name... He was a black dude with dreadlocks. He talked about a lot of drug use. I don't remember a lot of what it was he talked about, but I remember one of his jokes: He was driving along I-95, when a police officer quite literally stepped out into the middle of his lane, and waved him over. He pulled over, thinking, "OK, I've used weed, but I'm not doing anything illegal now, so he can't bust me. I don't have any weed or paraphenalia in the car, so I'm safe." The police officer walks over to his car, and he rolls down his window. The policeman asks him if there is anything wrong. He said, "No, why?" The officer asks him why he was only doing 15mph on the highway. His reponse {insert sheepish grin}: "I wasn't in a hurry?" Convinced that he's drunk, the officer gets him out of the car, and proceeds to give him all the tests (walking the line, alphabet backwards, etc.) -- which he passes very quickly and with much glee. The is bad for the police officer, because he can't convict him. But then he remembers something. He gets a cupcake from the back of his car and sets it on hood of the guy's car. "This cupcake has been sitting in the back of my car for two weeks -- in the heat, in the direct sunlight, upside down. Would you eat it?" "Is that chocolate frosting?” “You have the right to remain silent…”

The next guy up was very good all the way through. Don’t even bother asking me his name – I have no idea. Alex sounds right, but I don’t know. He talked about music and how rock ‘n’ roll isn’t the same since the 80’s. He talked about how old he was and how old he felt, especially when he asked this one kid how old he was. The kid said seventeen – nice carding, Improv! He talked about how music can say anything to anyone, but if he were to actually use a line in a song as a way to attract girls, he would be viewed badly – not because of copyright infringement, but because of the lyrics of the song. Lyrics of songs are so weird nowadays, but if you put weird lyrics together with an acoustic guitar, for some reason, this makes you attractive. I’d never thought about that, but it’s true…

The third and final act was Pablo Francisco. If you don’t know, his main source of humor was impressions. Thus: he did impressions of Star Wars characters, Mexicans, blacks, whites, Chris Rock, etc. He also did his famous “movie” voice and Maria, the Mexican woman. The one thing that bugged me was that the audience started asking him to do his old stuff. Yes, he's entertaining the audience -- yes, they paid to see him, but they should let him do his thing. He was on a roll! They interrupted him in the middle of it, and he had to just do the movie voice. It lost the effect that it would have had if he had worked it into the act instead of just bringing it in out of nowhere. But, hey, the audience wanted it.

Anyway, that’s about it. It was a fun night.