Hi! I'm Jake!
Right now, I am sitting in my hotel room in the Tri-Cities of Washington State. Snow has lightly dusted the cars in the parking lot.
Yesterday, I headlined a show at Jack Didley's. It was lightly attended, 25 people. The people in the Tri-Cities are not used to inclement conditions. They burrow when the weather gets bad.
I am headlining Jack Didley's again tonight, hoping for a bigger turnout. However, it's tough to say what will happen. My friend Susan Jones called me from Spokane. Her show had 15 in attendance. They got a foot of snow last night. She is worried that she won't even be able to drive the 8 miles from her hotel room to her show tonight. She thinks she might be snowed in until Monday. Yikes.
The I-90 drive from Seattle to Kennewick should have been a 225-mile, 3-hour trip. However, I-90 goes through Snoqualmie Pass, right through the middle of Washington's feeble mountain range.
Snoqualmie had 3 inches of snow so all the local drivers freaked out. They are not used to snow so they drive like my grandma, cautiously to the point of dangerously.
In addition to the crap-driver-slowdown, the state enacted their chain laws. If you don't have chains, you don't get to drive on I-90. If a cop catches you without chains, you get a ticket. Great. Because Washington drivers don't know how to drive, not only do I have to drive a screeching 15 miles per hour, I have to buy chains to put on my tires or the cops will pull me over. What a service. They slow me down even more, and then they charge me money. I'm not the one driving like crap! Charge all those other guys! Let me through you apple maggots!
I should just be able to flash my Colorado license. "Hey, I'm not one of your state's idiots. I drive through snow professionally. Let me by." Actually, I should just speed off. Washington cops would never catch me! They don't know how to drive on snow either!
Check this out: you could actually see pavement on I-90. Chains wreck pavement. Laws wreck pavement.
Fortunately, Susan and Larry knew of an alternate route, highway 2. Highway 2 adds 100 miles to the trip, but it's worth it. You have to go 40 miles out of your way to even get to it and then it winds around a bunch through an alternate mountain pass. It is a state highway so you get to stop every time you run into a town. Plus, the speed limit is lower. Lastly, it's an even worse pass than Snoqualmie. There's snow everywhere. This is the highway you take if you want to get to a ski resort.
Despite all these issues, highway 2 was still the better route. Most Washingtonians think highway 2 is closed for the winter so they stick to clogging I-90. Plus, despite the worse driving conditions, the state did not have a chain law on this highway. Weird.
In the end, it took me 5 hours to get from Seattle to Kennewick. If I had taken I-90, it would have saved me 100 miles but it would have taken 7 hours to complete the trip.
Larry and Susan were headed to Spokane. I was headed to Kennewick. I was glad we got to caravan for most of our respective trips. IT was a cool way to say goodbye.
I stayed at their place from October 12th, when I got to Seattle, through November 26th, the morning after Thanksgiving, yesterday. During part of that time, Susan stayed at my place in Denver. She had some gigs in Nebraska and Wyoming. She booked these gigs around her 1st round of the Laughing Skull Competition at the Denver Comedy Works. That's right: there was a week I was at Susan's place and she was simultaneously at mine.
Anyway, the point is, aside from some road work and my stint in the Boston Comedy Festival, I had been at Susan's for almost 6 weeks. Besides my parents, that's the longest anybody has ever hosted me. I got used to being around them, as well as the 3 other people living there. Now, after a great Thanksgiving, I was following Susan and Larry out of town.
We communicated over the phone a couple times as we were driving. They told me when they needed to stop for wiper fluid. Good call. I got some too. We also stopped at a rest area. Later on, I saw Larry waving his phone outside his car window. Oh shoot. He was calling me. I didn't realize it was ringing. As my GPS confirmed, Larry was telling me my exit was coming up soon. We were about to part ways.
Larry pointed out his window. I saw my exit. I sped up and honked. I could see them waving and vice versa. I don't mean to be melodramatic, but it felt like a scene out of a movie. It felt like the end.
Right before leaving town, I found out a couple of things that bummed me out. My roommates are leaving our Denver home and moving back to Albuquerque in January. Too bad. They are really good roommates. I will miss having them around. Plus, I either need to find a roommate, suddenly make a ton more money to pay the rent, or move out.
The second thing I found out is the gig I had scheduled on my way home has been moved to February. I was supposed to be in Evanston, Wyoming next weekend. That would have been really cool. I don't mean to say Wyoming is cool. However, Evanston would have been nice because it routes. My plan was to do the gig I am doing this weekend, visit some friends and family in Idaho and Utah, cross the border into Wyoming, do the gig, and head home. Instead of spreading that all out over a week, I am going to do it all by Tuesday.
On the plus side, I will be home Tuesday. I miss home and I can't wait to do some more shows in Denver. Also, aside from a few hotel beds, I have mainly slept on air mattresses over the past month. I can't wait to be in my bed again! Yes, it is a mattress on the floor, but it's my mattress on the floor!
Well, I hope this entry hasn't been too much of a downer. I am not depressed or anything. However, I feel displaced. I haven't been home in 6 weeks. Just as soon as I got used to living in Pacific time with 6 really cool people, I left. I am heading home, but that home will change when my roommates move out. If I can't find a roommate in time, I might have to move from my home entirely.
I am sitting in my hotel room as I have done all day. I am waiting to go to the comedy club. I look forward to tonight's show. I have a couple new jokes I want to do. Also, I just made a trumpet fart.
Bye! I'm Jake!
