The day’s agenda: Destroy a fallen tree in our friend’s parents’ backyard, then drive to Richmond. Typical comedy tour fare.
We’d hoped to rent chainsaws, but the company doesn’t trust us with them, and gives us handsaws instead. Turns out that it’s really hard to cut up a tree that’s been buried in snow for weeks with handsaws, so Chris goes and rents an electric saw from a different place that doesn’t care as much. As soon as Chris bends over to start cutting, his pants start falling down, and I hear someone say “Can’t he just have a triumphant moment?” We finally got a few small sections off the tree. Sadly, this takes us well into the afternoon.
We hit the point where we have to admit that we have no chance of chopping up the tree up all the way, probably even over the course of this week, let alone the day. We have to move on. We’re a little disappointed in ourselves, but our host mother doesn’t mind in the slightest. “Just make sure you have fun!” she keeps telling us, before feeding us lunch, and taking us to see an art installation she was responsible for around the corner from Yale University. Then we get back on the road.
We’ve had some offers to head to Philadelphia – someone who wants to make us dinner, and someone who wants to fight Chris. It’s not the longest drive from Connecticut, but it still feels weird, especially passing through New York City and New Jersey. Our first stop is a comedy show that Chris’s brother Greg hosts. When we get there, Chris storms the stage, and he wrestles the mystery challenger. They only go for a few minutes, but Chris wins, and is not humble about it at all, calling out another group (“I don’t know who they are, but they’ve been talking shit.”). They’re apparently in the audience, and immediately storm the stage. However, it’s a four person sketch group, so Chris calls up Shannon and Will and needs one more, so I decide to step up and run on stage, at which point I quickly realize “I have no idea how to fight.” It takes only seconds for me to be pinned by the largest member of our opponents, but I don’t tap out, and moments later, we win. We rushed out of as the audience boos us.
After storming out, we head over to our dinner invitation. It’s a fairly casual meal of spaghetti, and by casual I mean “there’s no silverware, so I eat with a pair of skewers.” It’s a little strange, but sitting in the living room, silently contemplating what else there is to come on this trip, I can’t complain.
After we finish up, it’s snowing fairly hard, but we have to take off again, driving a few more hours south, finally stoping for the night in the outskirts of Baltimore.
Up next: The gang heads further South, and get a tour of the Slave Pit.
— Joe Evans III
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