Ron Ferguson headlines 405 Lounge Wednesday July 25 at 830

With Laffs Comedy Club closing down a few years ago, not many nationally touring comics have stopped through the Duke City. But this week, we are lucky enough to have one of my favorite comics and good friend, Ron Ferguson in town. He will be headlining at the 405 Lounge downtown at 830 on Wednesday night, tickets are only 5 bucks at the door. Part of the proceeds will go to children who lost their parent or parents in the Aurora shooting this past weekend, which is where Ron is from.

Ron is a regular at the world famous Comedy Works in Denver, and has shared the stage with such heavyweights as Bill Burr, Dave Chappelle and Chelsea Handler. He currently tours with Pablo Francisco, but is taking a week off to come hang out in Albuquerque. Check out Ron's website also, you can catch a video or two of his on youtube if you want, but live comedy is the way to go, so get your asses to the show.

Also joining Ferguson on stage will be local comics Ariel Holmes, Sarah Mowrey, Rusty Rutherford, and Curt Fletcher (me!)

should've taken greyhound

So it was my first week working for Funny Business which I was pretty excited about. They book a lot of shows all over the country. I knew I wasn't going to make any money on this particular trip. Albuquerque to Denver to Sioux Falls to Denver to Albuquerque is about 36 hours, that's over 300 bucks in gas. My pay for the week was 250. But I took the gig anyway to get in with a new booker. I didn't want to make the drive in one day, so my buddy, Don Morgan, said I could crash at his place in Frederick, Colorado, Thursday night!

Wednesday I bought new tires for the car, I was ready to go! Normally I take Greyhound, but it would have been 56 hours on the bus. Thursday I took off fairly early so I could stop in Colorado Springs and pick up some t-shirts to make some extra money in Sioux Falls. (Paid 78 for 12 shirts, sold two at 20 each, -38!) I was getting into Denver a little before 5 pm, just in time for rush hour (not the shitty Jackie Chan movie.) As I was driving I ran something over, didn't think it was a big deal until I heard a weird noise coming from the car. The check engine light didn't come on but the car was shaking, so I got off the freeway and noticed the steering was a little jacked up. I pulled into a parking lot off of University to check things out. There were fluids everywhere, I had no idea what was wrong though. Don showed up and noticed the power steering unit was messed up (160 dollar part, hooray!) At that point I didn't know what to do I could hop on a Greyhound which was 288 bucks round trip, or cancel the gig and ruin my chances of getting booked with Funny Business again. Don offered to let me use his jeep to Sioux Falls for the weekend and he would work on my car when I got back. Worse gas mileage, but no labor fee on my car! Finally a plus on the trip. Went and checked out the show at Comedy Works downtown, too, which was awesome. Dov Davidoff was pretty funny.

Friday I got up really early, hit the road at 530. 11 hour boring ass drive thru Eastern Colorado, Nebraska and South Dakota. I got to Sioux Falls around 5. The club (Fat Daddys Comedy Club) and condo are right downtown, which is pretty awesome. Got to the club and met the owner, Bethany, very cool lady, and has a cool accent. Got to the condo, met Mike Smith the headliner from KC, funny guy and super nice. Show was at 730, small crowd, maybe 20 people. Jesse Ross showed up, he's a huge fan of my friends band, AnesthesiA! We both had AnesthesiA shirts on. The show went pretty well for the crowd size. Gin Blossoms were in town, we can't compete with them. Hey jealousy! Jesse wanted to hang out after, but I told them we had another show to do. After he left I realized, we didn't have another show. I should have paid to attention to that, only three shows instead of five.

Saturday we had a bigger crowd, probably 40 and there were two bachelorette parties. Usually those are hell to deal with, but they were really cool. The opener was very funny, Justun Sangster. Warmed up the crowd very nicely. The guy on Friday did a great job, too, Joe (forgot his last name.) I went up and had a pretty solid set that I was happy with! After the show I walked around to check out downtown Sioux Falls. There were quite a few people out and saw a few bands playing outside, they were no Gin Blossoms though.

Sunday night I got to see an old co-worker buddy of mine, John Hult. He was always one of my favorite co-workers at Laffs, never a pain in the ass like most servers. It was cool to see him, I even jammed a cd that he made me on the way to Sioux Falls. He brought a couple guys from his band to the show. We had 15 in the crowd and no mc, so I had to go first. Kinda sucks going on without a warmup, but definately not the worst situation I've been in. Show went well, got laughs. So that wrapped up the week, three shows, 75 people, sold two shirts and zero cd's! Watched the last seconds of the Mavs-Heat game 3 with Mike and hung out a bit at the bar.

Monday I hit the road at 930, got some sleep, pretty uneventful drive until I hit Sterling, Colorado. Power steering messed up a bit and almost hit a curb. I checked to see if the fluid was good and it was full, then the cap fell so I waited til the engine cooled down so I could grab it. Ended up running into three different Iowa Hawkeye fans while I was there. Ended up at Dons place around 8. We went and hit up some open mic nights. Did a set at Lions Lair, I did my material I had written for my character, 80s guy, but said it was my set I did on Star Search at age 11, pretty funny. Did that set at Benders right after, also tossed in some newer jokes. It was fun, it was good seeing some of the comics again. Went to Pete's Kitchen with Don and Ron Ferguson afterwards.

Tuesday spent all day working on the car, I'm really hating this Suzuki Forenza! I hate comedy, I hate going on the road, I just wanna be home! LA next week for the dvd taping then not on the road for a few weeks! Next year I'm gonna take a break and only do a few gigs.

December 2010

So I haven't blogged much about my shows, but I have a new phone which allows me to do so more often now. You're welcome both followers.

December was my final month in Denver, decided to move back to Albuquerque to be closer to family. I enjoyed my time in Denver, met a lot of great comics and made a lot of new friends.

1-Did open mic at El Charrito, I think it was their second show. I took a cardboard cutout of the most interesting man in the world on stage with me and stood behind it while I told my jokes. I felt bad ass and interesting. It was a fun room.

7-New talent night at Comedy Works was a lot of fun. I always enjoyed the shows there and this one might have been my best one yet. I tried scoring some guest sets there, but Wende never wrote me back so it never happened. Thanks to all the comics who put in a good word though, especially Lori Callahan.

9-I emailed Don at Wits End to see if he needed an mc for the 16-19 because I wanted to squeeze in some more gigs before I left, plus I wanted to work with Ron Ferguson and Russ Rivas. Don said I could do the week, plus gave me this night as well with Talon Saucerman and Todd Johnson. I ran into Todd at Comedy Works the night before he was opening for Joe Larson and Kermet Apio. Kermet is awesome. The night at Wits was fun, kind of a small crowd, but they were fun.

13-My last time at the Lions Lair was a lot of fun. Jill Tasei and I heckled Peter Cohen a bit which was nice. I did some new material that worked pretty well. Caitlin went on stage that night as well and got her best response, she was excited. I'm gonna miss the Lions Lair.

16-19 I got to mc at Wits this week like I mentioned earlier, the shows were great and I got to meet the new owner of Wits, John. He seems like a really cool guy. I'll miss Don, he was always super cool to me. I'll probably never see him again.

28-Filmed a 3 minute set for a tv show "The After After Party" which is a late night talk show hosted by Steven Michael Quezada who plays Gomez on "Breaking Bad." I used to do shows with Steven back in like 04 and 05. It was a fun show to film, there were about 150 people at the Wool Warehouse so it was a good sized crowd. As soon as I filmed my set I ran over to Maloneys to catch the end of the Iowa-Missouri game with my buddy Nate Tramontina. It was cool catching part of an Iowa game with him finally, he was born in Sioux City. He told me he quit Anesthesia he was the lead guitarist. I was pretty bummed about that. They signed a record deal with Sub Noize records. They're bad ass. I'm hoping to hang out with Nate more now that I live in town. I've written a few goofy songs that I want to record with him so I might get that done!

29-Matt Peterson needed rent money so he put together a last minute show at Howies, it was my first show since moving back and it was awesome. I've never had a bad show at Howies. The lineup was great, AJ Martinez and Joe Quesada both went up and rocked, those guys get better every time I see them. I remember seeing them when they first started back when we did shows at the Tavern. Sarah Kennedy was next and tore it up as usual, she's becoming one of my favorite comics to watch. Matt went on before me and tore it up, too. Its cool to see how much he's progressed over the years. We used to work together at Poppis Pizza.

30-I drove all the way to Dallas the next day, left at 430 am. It was quite a drive, but got to the club at about 6. I met Randy Butler the owner of Hyenas for the first time, he was a really nice guy, showed me around a little bit and let me do some time at the show that night. I was only scheduled for Friday and Saturday. The opener was a guy named Larry Campbell who had some great stuff and got the crowd into it. I went after him and had a pretty decent set, could've done way better, but travel days don't give you a lot of time to prepare. Nick Guerra did 30 after me and destroyed. I'm so glad I didn't have to follow him, I would have ate shit pretty bad. His jokes and his improve rocked. I kind of felt bad for the headliner who had to follow, but he tore it up, too. Headliner was Dustin Ybarra, Gary Hood told me about him before so it was cool to see him perform. I think Nick and Dustin will both make it big, it was a fun show.

31-Big New Years Eve show at Hyenas! I was excited to be working with Carl LaBove, one of the Outlaws of Comedy and Sam Kinisons best friend. I just read a story online that said Carl's kid was actually fathered by Sam. Kinda fucked up Carl's life with getting his license and passport taken away, not good for a road comic. Anyway the shows went great, Carl tore it up both shows and did different material. Plus he was super cool. A lot of times you'll work with a headliner and they think they're way better than everyone else and have a shitty attitude and treat the openers like shit, well Carl was the opposite. I didn't get to meet him before the show but right after my set he came up and introduced himself to me and we chatted for a bit after the show. Hope I get to work with him again sometime.

Comedy Works tonight

Tonight I got to mc at the Comedy Works downtown. Definately wasn't expecting to get on to perform let alone mc. I didn't have a great set or anything, I should have been more prepared. The comics were great tonight, saw a few comics I hadn't seen before. My cousin Dave left me a voice mail, while I was mc'ing, so I called him after the show. His best friend just got in a pretty bad car accident and has had a lot of problems this year, so Dave asked me to do a benefit show for him in Algona, Iowa. Dave's a cool cousin, I'm glad we got in touch after so many years. I hadn't seen or talked him since the mid 90's, but he found me on myspace a few years ago and we've got to hang out when I go back to Iowa which is nice.

Added a couple new bookings to my calendar, I'll be doing the Loony Bins in Oklahoma City and Wichita in May 2011. I haven't been to Wichita in quite awhile. The Oklahoma City club I featured at in May 2009, I worked with Paul Hooper, that was a fun week. I'm working with Paul in a couple weeks in Tucson!

I've been writing articles recently forBuxmag.com I've been doing reviews and previews of college football games and other things on there. It's been a lot of fun, even though I don't know much about Colorado, Colorado State or Air Force. Growing up in Iowa, I was always a Hawkeye fan, and always will be! And they whipped Michigan State's ass with a belt on Saturday!

Albuquerque

Went down to Albuquerque with Jake Sharon to do some shows. Friday the 20th was at the Lotus Night Club. I did a 12 minute headline set, yeah 12 minute headline set! It was fun though. Kind of a shitty place though. Got to hang with my friends, N8 and Ashley after though which was nice.

Saturday did 2 shows at the County Line. Small crowds, but had a great time. Lots of cool people showed up which was nice. Pay was crap, but I got to see some family and friends.

Also I advanced to the semifinals in the New Faces Contest at Comedy Works which is bad ass!

Leela's

Last night I closed the show at Leela's European Cafe, for Sam and Roger's Night of Hilarious Fun. The crowd was pretty noisy, but the people who were listening were great. Had some great comics on the lineup: Roger Norquist, Sam Tallent, Matt Baca, Steven AJ, Jason Keyes, and Josh Nelson.

I'm doing a set at the downtown Comedy Works on Tuesday!

This weekend I will be performing at Hyenas in Fort Worth, TX! It'll be my first time performing there. I'm excited to see my buddy, Jason Russell. I'm working with Billy D. Washington.

Comedy Works

Last night I did a set at the Comedy Works Landmark as part of the New Faces Contest. This is my 3rd time in the contest, first time, I didn't make it past the first round, the second time I made the semifinals, but wasn't able to make it up to Denver. Last night I advanced to the Wild Card round which will be August 18! D. Kelley, Roger Norquist, and Kenneth Newmeyer all advanced, it was a great show, congrats to those guys who advanced!

I'm performing tomorrow at Sobo 151 in Denver, it's part of the Denver Post Underground Music Showcase! Should be a lot of fun, lots of great comics. Hoping to check out some local bands as well.

Today I submitted my first column for "The Diatribe" magazine. My column is called, "Take That...." it's just me ranting a bit, it's pretty fun! "The Diatribe" is based out of northern Wisconsin near Superior and Duluth, MN.

Blogging is neat.