Comedian Makes the List

On the most recent "Last Comic Standing," a woman named Andi Smith opened her 3-minute set with a West Virginia joke. Immediately my ears perked up, and I eagerly anticipated hearing our beloved state lampooned. Perhaps she will make fun of the racism we recently displayed in the primary election. Or maybe a delightful incest joke. I always like a new take on that them.

She said that when she played in WV, only eight people showed up, so she responded, "Where's everyone at? Trapped in a mine?"

I cringed, but, ok, not everyone is sensitive to that subject. Even the crowd boo'd her at that point, which made me happy. But I still thought that maybe she was going someplace clever with this. She said that one man in the WV crowd told her that miners face dangerous conditions because there aren't enough safety precautions. She said, "How about this for a safety precaution? Go to college!"

Well, nothing like kicking a hillbilly when he's down. Still I thought, maybe there's a meta-joke here. Maybe her schtick is being super condescending and arrogant, and after a while you see that she is being satirical -- lampooning those who have such views a la Borat. Nope. She just went on to another observational-type joke.

Andi Smith, your name is scawled in large letters at the top of my most recent shit list.

Been In Trouble With the Law...

I was wondering how many times I've been pulled over by the cops. I'm thinking it's much more than a dozen if you include the times I've been a passenger when we've been pulled over.

There's been a few memorable times. Once David and I were pulled over by a cop in an unmarked car who we flipped off as we passed him, frustrated that he was going below the speed limit and we were late for a movie. I thought I recognized him, and as Dave was sitting in the cop car, I walked up beside the passenger window. After the window came down, I said, "Butch?" It turned out to be a guy who had had dinner with us a few nights earlier. Butch said, If you had said something earlier, you could have saved your friend eighty dollars.

Another time I was going about 40 mph in a 30 mph zone in Morgantown, and when I turned into the Taco Bell parking lot, a cop followed me with his lights on. That's when I wondered whether the beers I had had would put me over the legal limit. It would've been close, but I aced the field sobriety test and avoided the Breathalyzer. Standing on one leg in the Taco Bell parking lot while two cops watched was not one of my more glorious moments.

Finally, there was the third speeding ticket in a single calendar year that really screwed me. First, the fine was over two hundred bucks. Second, I had to go to court. The judge reduced and excused fines for a long list of people before I got up--the only misdemeanor among them. Judge White of Belmont County, Ohio, asked me what I had to say for myself. I told him I'd been commuting over an hour each way and that the tickets were the result of zoning out on the highway. What he wanted to hear, it turned out, was that I swear it won't happen again.

After hearing my "argument," he sentenced me to three days in jail. This was two days before Christmas, and my heart stopped for a tick. Then he said that he would suspend the sentence unless I got another traffic violation of any kind in the next sixty days. He suspend the sentence! I went free that very day. And as I walked out of the courtroom, I smiled like a bastard at an incredulous Italian mortician.

They Call Me Mr. Pibb

I'm shamed into adding to my blog by recent comments that Lee made on the "Mamushka!" and "In Case of Rapture" entries. They were entertaining and reminded me that that was the purpose of this blog. Or more specifically, I guess its job is to amuse.

As graduation day approached recently, I took it as an opportunity to revisit some of my favorite Morgantown locales and bid them a fond adieu as I wiped a single tear from my eye, which was kind of silly because I keep going to Morgantown weekly. At any rate, one of my stops was the Metropolitan Billiards Parlor, affectionately known as the Met.

I first went there in 1989 at the age of seventeen with two guys from the dorm who may have been from New Jersey and whose names I believe are Jay and Greg. I lost touch with them after freshman year. I was actually nervous the first time I played there, feeling as if I were on stage and all eyes were upon me. When I went back recently, I tried to tell a young man of twenty two or twenty three that story, and it seemed utterly ridiculous because, even though the place was filled with spectator seats, it was nothing more than a collection of strangers going through the motions of their own games of 8-ball.

Over the next two or three years, I became a regular fixture at the Met. I had something of a routine. I would watch for a while, practice by myself for an hour, then buy something from the bar, and watch some more. Since I was well under twenty one, I would always buy a pop and a bag of chips, and the pop was always a Mr. Pibb. Eventually, the owner, Ruby, a grizzled and gruff old pool hustler, got to know me. He would ask me, "What's your name?"

"Louie."

"Where you from?"

"Near Weirton."

Then he would say how they had some really good pool halls in Wheeling. Eventually when I came down the stairs, he would yell out "Mr. Pibb!" I loved becoming one of the regulars, but I cringed a little at the nickname. Then, once known as Mr. Pibb, it became impossible to order anything else. (My residence advisor in the dorm had the same problem once he became known as "the Tequila kid" at a bar called the Dungeon.) Then one day I turned twenty one and ordered a beer. Ruby paused. "Are you twenty one?" I said that I was, and he served me.

The next time I came down the stairs, Ruby looked over at me, was quiet for a moment, and then hollered out, "Mr. Pibb!" And the name remained.

This is probably the best photograph of Ruby that exists. I'm guessing this was taken about eight years ago.