Charity Chump

Tuesday May 5th, 2009 - Lake Villa, IL

I’m in a pissy mood today big time. Several reasons for it but the main one is the charity gig I was asked to do this evening was a complete waste of time and effort. I try very hard to give of myself whenever I can and all I ask in return is for people to respect my effort.

There are all kinds of worthy causes and I’ve done whatever I could through the years to contribute as much as possible to as many causes as possible. I’ve hosted shows and lined up other performers of all kinds to put shows together. I’ve also opened for bands and had to host raffles and dinners and silent auctions and game shows. I even sat in a dunk tank.

Unfortunately more often than not charity gigs are a completely mangled evening of out and out torture, humiliation and disorganization. There’s usually an imbecile in charge of everything that is not only clueless about entertainment but also has been drinking all the top shelf hooch he or she can hold since about 11am the day of the event. It’s hellacious.

I’m not going to mention any names or even the cause because I don’t want to make any enemies I don’t need right now. They weren’t necessarily bad people but they didn’t have a clue as to how to run any kind of show much less a comedy show and after all this time in the business that’s just not my fault. What is my fault is that I volunteered to show up.

There was supposed to be some bands playing and they wanted a comedian to do a few minutes to open the show. I said I would do it because a friend of a friend recommended me to the guy in charge and I really like and respect the guy who did it. I wouldn’t turn it down if I was off and I was so I figured I’d do it as a favor to that guy. What a mistake.

My friend wasn’t even there. It was his friend’s son who played in a band and wanted a chance to show off in front of his friends. That’s fine but there was no need for a comic at all. So what did they do? They booked TWO comics. At least I got to go first. There were barely any people on a big dance floor of a nice venue out in the suburbs. It was half ass.

To make it worse the guy who brought me up was telling old corny street jokes and just as I got on a mariachi band started up right outside the doorway of the room we were in. I just laughed because it’s all I could do. Nobody was listening and the louder I tried to talk the louder the band played. Finally I just decided to stand up there and talk to the walls.

I was asked to do twenty minutes and I did. I got off stage and walked right out the door to my car and thought about driving it into Lake Michigan and drowning myself. Why did I need to be involved in this tonight? I still don’t know. I didn’t really have a chance to be of help to anyone and had I stayed home nobody would have cared. This was a bad call.

But if I’d said no I’m sure I’d probably have people say I’m too good to help others and that’s totally not true. I really did intend to donate my time tonight so people could raise a nice big total for the cause and have everyone win. I donated my time tonight but I really don’t think I needed to be here. I feel like a total chump right now. Oh well, it’s all over.