April 2012 – Stages are Bigger in Texas

We finally finished up our run in Tampa.  I was nervous going into this one, but gotta admit, it went over much better than I anticipated.  The audience's welcomed us with open arms.  Festival management supported us from the start... even giving us a great stage near the front.  Which made things a little interesting for the R/Beer show.  Nothing like wearing a candy bra on-stage twenty-five yards from the may-pole where they have the kids dance.  And no, it's not that kind of maypole.

The only trouble we ha is the same trouble we have everywhere.  Sometimes road boothies, especially older booth owners will give us a hard time about being a "clone" act.  And we can handle some good natured ribbing with no problem. But every now and then ya get the feeling that it's a little bit more than "good natured."  We usually like to think that they just have something against Tortugas in general.  Probably something Ronn did in his youth. (Hi, Boss!)

Lone Star State

And then it was off to Scarborough.  Man, what a festival.  It was a bit of a culture shock going there immediately after Tampa.  In Tampa, even though the show has been quasi-absent for many years, it's still very well establish.  Scarborough we didn't have nearly the fan recognition, and it's a larger festival to begin with.  So it was a lot more "work."  Takes a lot more to drag people off the street and get them sitting down.  And then because it's somewhat "random" selection of festival goers, you really have to be on your toes.  In Tampa, we knew most of the audience knew our show, and our humor style, so we knew they'd be with us.  But in Scarborough, we had to pay a lot more attention to the audience as we were doing the show being prepared to do things like "dial back the naughty" or "turn up the cute."  But don't worry, we still left the high-brow stuff for Zilch.

Visiting My Sister

I was also excited because the festival is about an hour south of Dallas, which is where my eldest sister has lived for something like five years now.  And I'd never gotten the chance to visit.  So I extended one of my weekends and spent several night at her house with her husband and two kids.  We spent a lot of time catching up, having fun, drinking too much tequila, enjoying her homemade salsa (this girl knows her way around the kitchen), and all the usual jazz.  Oh, and hot tub, can't forget the chance to soak in the hot tub after a long weekend at festival!

Next up, is our return trip to Oklahoma!!