A seething mass of turgid drama.

Friday the wife and I went to North Beach. We had a decent dinner at one of the many Italian eateries. (This one didn't seem too touristy, at least.) It was vaguely amusing part-listening in to the couple next to us on their first date.

We went to a comedy club after. We were reasonably early, so it was a short line. Went through the portable metal detector; the wife followed me and it went off. At which point they wanded me. Um, what? I took it with good grace, because while it didn't make sense I wasn't trying to sneak anything in.

The first of my two-drink minimum wasn't very good. As might be expected for a comedy club bar.
The two openers were okay, nothing to write home about. The headliner was funny but not side-splitting.

All in all, it was a good date out.

Cow-orker: "(Client) tends to out-wit himself."
Me: "He's half right."

For my birthday, we went to see an Irish sketch comedy troupe that was in town. We saw them around the same time last year and apparently their tour was successful enough to 1) do another one; 2) play larger venues, including Carnegie Hall. In SF they booked the Warfield and it seemed mostly full.

We drove to the area - I didn't want to deal with getting a late-night Sunday cab - found some sketchy parking (it's all sketchy around there; we should have used one of the hotel lots), and went to a regional Italian pizza place for dinner. They call it "pinsa", and it's more flatbread-based. Think the '80s Stouffer's pizza... but much better. Plenty of customers even on a Sunday night. If it was local to us I could see hitting it for happy hour.

This year I was able to get better seats for the show. We were in the second row, about 10' from the stage. This did mean a bit of neck-craning but also meant we were in the interaction zone. The show was good - mostly short sketches but they started with some audience questions that they mined throughout the whole show. Early on they started making fun of San Francisco for having multiple names: "You use Frisco!" and we all booed. "And San Fran." We booed again. "What do you use as a short name then?" "The City." "Oh, that's not pretentious. But you do hate Los Angeles." We cheered.

I did yell out one thing during their last skit that was a callback to one of their questions, and got smirks as they incorporated it.

A fun evening, but we didn't get home until 10:30 so I am listless today. I should probably fortify up with a second cup of coffee.

We saw them live last night. I decided that would be a fun birthday present. They're an Irish sketch comedy group that has been around for a while; the wife sent me one of their videos some time back and I have been sporadically watching them.

After a few hiccups getting a cab, we got there and made it through the metal detector. (Followed by a wanding - which seems repetitive.) The show started and they mixed in sketches and improv work with the crowd. Not "give us three words" improv but interacting with certain people. They couldn't get the town name "Orinda" right -- they kept calling it "Orinn-dee." They also struck comedy gold with a 14-year-old in the audience.

The only sketch I had seen before was "Three Drunken Monks", which happened to be the one the wife sent me. It was still funny.

We didn't try to brave the crowd for their merch table afterwords. While I like the T-shirt having a pig on it, I don't need any more T-shirts... and didn't want to stand there for an hour just to say "Thought you were great." It was a good 90-minute show though.

"Nostalgia conventions aren't what they used to be."

The wife and I went shopping for a couple new kitchen knives this weekend. At the end of it, the salesperson noted that we were 1) communicating (well) in incomplete sentences; 2) finishing (incompletely) each other's sentences.

Well, we have been together for ~28 years. I hadn't noticed that we do that but we should know each other pretty well by now.

Q: What did one brain say to the other?
A: "I lobe you!"

"You know, there's more to being an evil despot than getting cake whenever you want it."
"If that's what you think, then you're doing it wrong!"

Something Positive totally nailed it.
On both sides, says the guy who spent hours playing on his Atari 2600. And who now has Adventure on the phone as a free app.