Louie Anderson changed my life

The very first stand-up comedy special I remember seeing is Mom! Louie's Looking At Me Again! It's also the first time I remember laughing so hard that tears came out of my eyes. 

It started my love of stand-up comedy. I would watch any stand-up that was on TV. I used to tape it if I couldn't catch it, and I would watch the tapes over and over. I didn't realize it, but it was giving me a sense of comedic timing. I don't know if this would have happened if my parents hadn't had me watch this big guy from Minnesota one night on channel 2. That special was what changed the direction of my life. 

I wound up joining a comedy improv troupe out of high school, and performed from 1995-2005. Toward the end of our days we also started doing sketch comedy, and I tried stand-up at a couple of our last shows. There was (and is) nothing like it. 

In 2005 Louie (that's how big he is in Minnesota. He's known by his first name only) announced on the KQ morning show that he was going to hold auditions for amateur comedians to open for him at his annual New Year's Eve show at Northrop Auditorium on the campus of the U of M. I didn't hear the announcement, but a lot of family and friends told me about it, and that I have to audition.  

The first round I arrived at the club in a hotel, and met Louie for the first time. I couldn't believe how nice he was. Just a gentile giant. During intermission of that show he was in the hall outside the club, and all of the guests were going up to him to meet him, and tell him where they know him from. He spoke to every last person, taking pictures and signing autographs. Intermission went about 25 minutes longer because he didn't start the show again until he spoke to everyone. 

At one of these auditions he watched all of our sets (as usual), and after the show he met with all of us in a room and gave personal notes to each of us. 

See if you can get to your first punchline faster. 

You had that great bit about mowing the lawn, but you don't need to swear during it. 

You might not want to drink before you go up next time. 

He announced the winners (the ones who would open for him on New Year's) on KQ. Again, I don't listen to that show; so I didn't hear that I was a finalist. My co-workers were the first ones to tell me when I showed up in the morning. Friends and family were calling me at work to congratulate me. 

New Year's Eve 2005. Northrop Auditorium. The other amateurs and I got to the theater that afternoon. Like 3:00, or something. It was really early. We all did a dry run of our sets on the stage to the empty theater. It was really echo-y with no one in the seats. A few of us went to a nearby malt shop for dinner before showtime. 

When we got back to the theater Louie was in a tiny dressing room getting a haircut from a stylist. We had drew our order at random earlier in the day, and I was the last of the amateurs to go on. The show was going to be us six doing our 5 minutes each, intermission, and then Louie. There was supposed to be a winner who got $1,000. We never heard how that was going to be judged or anything. It's not like I was doing it for the prize. 

After all of my new friends did their sets (with Louie watching from a black-screened tent on the side of the stage - he could see out, but you couldn't see him), I got to do my act. Walking on stage was incredible.  I have heard that 4,400 people were in attendance, and I believe it. Looking out at the biggest crowd I've ever performed for gave me an adrenaline rush that I've never had since. My first laugh felt like a tidal wave at me. It was unbelievable.

They went to intermission after my set. We were all high-fiving each other, and patting each other's backs. There was no sense of competition back stage. We were all equal, and having the time of our lives. Coming back from intermission, no one said anything to us. Louie just went out on stage and got a few laughs, and said something like "So now we need to pick a winner from the guys you saw earlier," and he announced my name. I strutted out to Louie at center stage and gave a little bow. I thought I had won. 

I didn't win the money

Then he called out my friend Steve, who also didn't win. He brought out one more guy, and announced him as the winner. I was never disappointed. The experience is one I'll cherish for the rest of my life, and Louie made it possible. This would be the 2nd time he changed my life. 

I went with my dad to see him perform at the Parkway a few years later. He had a meet and greet and when I went up to him he said, "Hi Andy. Are you still doing stand-up?" He remembered me. I don't think it's because I was such a good comedian. I think he really cared about people in his life. 

I believe that Louie considered me a friend. I am lucky to have this experience and to have known him. I will miss him, and so will millions of others. 

It's just a game

 

It's just a game. 

And you're right. It is just a game. 

Why do I care?

I love to watch NFL football. It's fun. I don't even play Fantasy Football. I love the drama of the chess match on the field. I love to see amazing plays, and even tenacious defense in a low-scoring affair. I don't watch any other sport like I watch football. 

I actually happened to have season tickets in 1998. Every Vikings fan remembers 1998. We went 15-1 with Carter and Moss having a spectacular game every week. Man, that was a fun year... Until the NFC Championship game. Remember? Gary Anderson? (I am being facetious)

35/35 in the regular season. Perfect, until the game-winner in overtime of that game which would have sent us to face the Broncos in the Super Bowl. He kicked it toward the uprights where I sat. I saw the miss perfectly. It's one of the last times I cried, and the quietest I have ever heard people shuffle out of a stadium after a game. 

The last time the Minnesota Vikings played in the Super Bowl was January 9th, 1977. I was born on October 1st, 1977. I have been disappointed by the team my entire life. 

But, so what? It's just a game.

The Vikings are "my thing." It's the common small-talk I can make with almost anyone. I can go through the roller coaster of emotions with friends and co-workers. I can cheer with a bar/restaurant full of fans. 

I make sure to take care of all of my chores on Saturdays during the NFL season so I can watch football, guilt-free, all day on Sunday. 

I want to talk about our team this year. Do you realize the talent we have on the field? Just the talent, on paper, should be enough to take us to The Dance. I have a real problem with the way the team has been coached; and that's from the head coach all the way down. 

Our clock management has been embarrassing. Play-calling, on offense and defense, has been abysmal.  The (7) games we've lost have been lost by an average of four points. The players are playing well enough to win every game. All of our losses can, and should, be blamed on the coaches; directing games and calling the plays. 

I doubt any coach will lose their job mid-season. But us fans deserve a better product. We buy the hats, and clothes. We pay the exorbitant ticket fees to watch games at (the beautiful) US Bank Stadium. 

It's just a game. But we bleed purple. We invest in the team. We invest our time, our emotions, and money. We deserve more for our investment. 

Summer 2018 headaches Part 3

Day 3 of 14 in the hospital with fungal meningitis. I was sharing a room with a curtain between us. 

The old guy on the other side of the curtain’s family was always there. They were really loud. Nice, but always talking, face time phone calls… It was like a party over there. Megan came to visit me, and brought a big bucket of candy for the nurses. That may or may not have led to my move to a much quieter room/roommate. Megan crawled into my bed and they wheeled us into the new room. 

Around Friday night (day 4 inside) I realized that I hadn’t eaten anything since Monday. I had been in so much pain, and in and out of sleep, that I never thought about eating. I missed the cutoff to order supper, but my nurse was able to find me a beef dinner they had sitting around. I picked at it. 

Saturday morning, I started to turn a corner. I’d had four doses of the daily I.V. medicine by then. I was still pretty sick, but I had my appetite back, and Megan came to visit WITH Ozzie! I hadn’t seen him since I could barely take pictures on the morning of his first day of school. 

I realized how blessed I am to be married to a nurse that morning. She clipped my fingernails, and helped me take a shower. I wasn’t out of the woods yet; I needed that help to take a shower. While she was there, another doctor came in to give me another spinal tap (it's how they monitor the disease). 

This ‘doctor’ (resident) was alone. Megan told him that she’s a nurse and can help. I rolled on my side in the fetal position, and this doctor put the needle in, but didn’t find my spinal cord. He had to try again. And again. 

And again. 

Remember when I said that I wouldn’t call spinal taps painful? This one was, because he went in and out with the needle many times. Megan saw the whole thing. She said that he did it over a hundred times. 

I said ‘I know he did it a lot, but if you had to give a real number, like if you had to bet money on it, what do you think it would be?’ She got a cold, serious look. 

“A hundred.”

He NEVER got the spinal tap. He had to send me to radiology to lie face down on an x-ray table so another guy could do it. 

Battle scar

I’ll also remember this Saturday as the day that I got my own room – all by myself. 

Things I'll never forget: My wedding. The birth of my son. The day I got my own hospital room. 

The next day – Sunday – was the Vikings season opener. I was well enough to shave that morning. Feeling a little better by the day, tomorrow would be my seventh day, and my stay would be half-over. I was missing Ozzie like crazy. Missing out on his first two weeks of school, but I was alive. 

The next steps of meningitis for me were brain damage, and then death. I don’t know how close I was to either, and I’m glad not to know. 

The second half of my hospital stay is less interesting, because I was getting better and better. 

I made friends with the nurses who would visit me every day. One brought me a stack of DVDs they had in a back room. I watched part of The Matrix and most of The Wedding Singer one afternoon. I’d seen them both in the 90’s and didn’t think they held up. (Actually I didn't like The Wedding Singer the first time, and still didn't like it this time)

Day ten or eleven - a nurse saw me walking around the floor and said “Oh my God! Are you Andy?!” She took care of me in my first few days. She said she never saw me with my eyes open. I didn't remember her at all. 

I had a total of six spinal taps in the hospital. They say the fungus is still inside me, only it’s dormant. It can wake up if it decides to. I get to have that anxiety now anytime I have a slight headache for the rest of my life. 

My mom brought me a big bag of candy and usually around 2am when I couldn’t sleep (steroid insomnia), I’d get up and munch on it. From not eating anything for four days I lost at least 20 pounds. I could afford to eat a little junk in the middle of the night. 

My last day in the hospital – stupid Dr. Smythe was the doctor on my floor. He came into my room and told me that he reported my case to the CDC. I was the 26th person (ever) to contract this meningitis the way I did. There is no prize for this.

Because stupid Dr. Smythe kept me on the (unnecessary) steroids for so long, I came down with clinical depression. I was well the day I left the hospital, but fell into a deep depression in the following weeks/months at home recovering. 

You can’t just stop taking steroids. That would really shock your system. You have to step down slowly. 

I was finally off them by Thanksgiving, and didn’t feel back to myself until early 2019. This had nothing to do with the meningitis. The extended illness (myriad steroid side effects) was completely courtesy of stupid Dr. Smythe. 

He left the clinic where I saw him, and I like to think that he’s a (bad) night manager at a Dairy Queen now. 

Time for the fun game. 

Wanna guess what the total bill for this 14-day all-inclusive stay in the hospital was? Put your guess in the comments. 

Summer headaches Part 2

 Monday - Labor Day 2018

Ozzie started kindergarten the next day. Megan took him to get some last-minute school shopping done. I was in bed with headaches. So sick of this. It was labor day; clinics were closed. I called my brother to take me to urgent care, but Megan told me that they won’t help. If I wanted any kind of care I would need to go to the emergency room. 

So that’s where she took me. 

First off – nothing is an emergency in the emergency room. I lied in a cot as Ozzie read books and Megan played on her phone for hours. The doctor, or nurse, would come in about every hour to check on me, or try a different pain remedy. The doctor recommended a lumbar puncture (which is what they call a spinal tap now – I think because it sounds more gentile. Like ‘civil unrest’ sounds more gentile than ‘riots and looting’) to see if the worst headache I ever had the other night was an aneurysm, or as she called it, a ‘brain bleed.’ 

I figured 'if I had a brain bleed I’d be dead.' I was quite sick at the time, but that sounded good enough to me to NOT get the ‘lumbar puncture.’ I asked to be discharged from the E.R. and went home, and somehow fell asleep. 

Tuesday 9/4/18

Ozzie’s big first day of school. 

And I had a thick headache when the alarm woke me up. It hurt to walk, or move. Light hurt my eyes. 

Megan wanted to do all of the first day of school photos, and I had to pull myself together enough to snap a few pictures, and then crawl back in bed to ice my head. 

She drove Ozzie to school, came back home and drove me back to the emergency room. 

I had a different doctor this time (it was only about 12 hours since I'd been there) and I liked this one better. She checked in with me more, and tried some different things than the night before; including a long Q-tip soaked in Lidocaine up my nostril (it felt like it touched my brain) for 10 minutes. It did nothing to the pain. When this doctor suggested a spinal tap, I took it. 

One of my favorite comedies

My first spinal tap.  

They had me sit up and lean over a bedside table. I wouldn’t call spinal taps ‘painful.’ It IS very uncomfortable, because you need to stay stock-still while they gently poke a needle into your spinal cord. 

My memory starts to fade from this point through the next four days. I was in and out of consciousness. These memories are in clips. 

The next clip I remember is being told that I have cryptococcal meningitis. They found it from the spinal tap.  It’s a fungal meningitis. I had heard the term meningitis before, but had no idea what it was or did. I would have to look it up later, because it still hurt to look at my phone. Any light hurt my eyes and head. 

I know that Megan went to pick up Ozzie from his 1st day of school at some point, and the next clip I remember is my mother waking me up in the E.R. My dad was there too. Megan had called them to tell them about the whole ordeal. I had an I.V. in my arm, and was waiting for space in a real room to open up. I realized that I was going to have to spend the (my first ever) night in the hospital. 

Next clip - I was very uncomfortable in the ER cot. It was night time, and they still hadn’t found me a room. 

I remember a dose of Dilaudid through my I.V. Dilaudid is the drug they’re always trying to score in Drugstore Cowboy. It did make things feel pretty cool for a minute. 

I have a memory of my parents speaking up to get me a real hospital bed for the wait instead of the uncomfortable cot. I remember a ride in that real bed to my room, which I shared with an old man whose family was with him. It sounded like there were eight people on the other side of the curtain. 

The next morning, the old man’s farts woke me up. I had gas too, and thought hey, I’m on death’s door. Now isn’t the time to hold them in. And we were like dueling (farting) banjos, but neither of us were laughing. 

A doctor told me that I'd need an I.V. treatment once a day for 14 days, so I’d be in the hospital for 14 days. What?! 14 days?! I can’t. 

Our wedding anniversary is 9/20, and we had a trip to Las Vegas planned. Plane tickets, hotel, Penn and Teller tickets, all bought and paid for. 

Cancelled. (Luckily, we were able to recoup most of that)

On one of those first four days, stupid Dr. Smythe stopped by. He’d heard about my diagnosis, and wanted to apologize for not catching it when I told him about my symptoms (when he'd ordered the 1st MRI and said I was having an MS attack). 

I developed meningitis because of the M.S. treatment I was on at the time - Gilenya. It suppresses the immune system. Everyone is exposed to this "fungus" every day. Almost everyone’s immune system is high enough where it doesn’t affect them. Mine was so low that it got me. 

I remember another spinal tap in bed, and this time I was on my side in the fetal position. I had to pee really bad (another benefit of M.S. – overactive bladder), and sprung from bed as soon as he said the needle was out. Blood trickled down my back, and got on my bed sheets. 

Tune in tomorrow for the conclusion of this incident of my life that gave me PTSD. Do I get more spinal taps? (Yes)

And we'll end it with a fun game. 

2018 -The summer with the wicked headaches

    

Summer will always remind me of the worst illness I’ve endured. 

Headaches started in August of 2018. 

I don’t usually get headaches. If I do, it's a sign of something going on. A bad tooth, or stress… Something. In early August 2018 I started getting headaches. They would come and go. Sometimes just an annoyance, but more often I would have to lie in bed with ice on my forehead; which didn’t do anything to the headache, but felt good. 

I was sensitive to light when these headaches would hit, and it would hurt to look at the TV, or my phone, or open my eyes, really. 

Pain pills (Ibuprofen, Tylenol, etc.) didn’t do anything, but I was constantly taking them hoping it would work. 

I thought I was starting to get migraines. My brother gets them. That must be it. 

Wait. I had a crown put on a tooth at the beginning of August. It was just a temporary crown, and I bet it needs to be adjusted. That must be it. 

I went back to the dentist and had him look at it, and he didn’t see anything unusual. 

I had a checkup scheduled with my neurologist (I have M.S.) later in August. I couldn’t wait to ask about the headaches. 

Well; his office called to reschedule the appointment. I said that I needed to see a neurologist, so I saw a different one. 

This other ‘neurologist’ (I’ll call him ‘stupid Dr. Smythe’) thought I might be having an M.S. exacerbation (attack). The only way to diagnose that is to undergo an MRI. It takes about 90 minutes times two. 

I had the stupid MRI, and stupid Dr. Smythe thought he saw evidence of an attack, so he treated it. The current treatment for an M.S. attack is to take 2,500 mg of oral steroids (Prednisone) a day for three days. 

(A ‘normal’ dose is 5-60mg)

Twenty-five 100mg pills a day. These pills are huge, and bitter, and swallowing 25 of them in one sitting is a punishment. I almost threw up every time I had to do it, but I did it. 

And it didn’t do anything to the headaches, because I wasn’t having an M.S. attack. I DID, however, end up with almost every side effect you can get from steroids. More on that later. 

Labor Day Weekend 2018. 

Saturday September 1. 

We went to the MN State Fair for the second time that year. We always spend the whole day there, eating, walking, and more eating. This date holds the all-time record for the highest attendance for one day at the fair, so you were probably there that day too. 

It was hotter than hell that day, but I don’t remember having any headaches. We got there early, like before a lot of places open for the day; and around 4:00pm I started having trouble catching my breath. My fingers and lips felt tingly. I was coming down with heat stroke, and fast. I sat down and fanned myself. I felt bad that I was the reason that we had to leave at 4:00. That’s early for us. 

On the walk back to the car, Megan told me to sit in the shade under a tiny tree on a boulevard, and she’d pick me up. I was struggling, but I needed rest. I ripped off my shirt, and knew what a big, fat, pasty white guy I was sitting in the grass with traffic going by, but it was necessary. 

She picked me up, and I started to feel better about halfway home with the air conditioner blasting, and ice from the cooler in my armpits. 

Heat exhaustion. No headache, but it sure was scary. By the time we got home, we were all hungry. We didn’t get to have our last round of fair food, so we ordered Chinese. The heat stroke episode was over. Still no headaches all day. This should be a nice Saturday night. 

And the rest of the night, until I fell asleep, was unremarkable. 

I woke up in the middle of the night with the WORST headache I’ve ever had in my life. It affected my vision and balance. I was nauseous. I thought I might need to go to the hospital right then, but it was the middle of the night.

I put the ice pack on my head, and somehow fell back to sleep. 

When I woke up for the day (Sunday) I still had a headache, but nothing like the middle of the night. I was supposed to work at 1:30 that day, but I called in sick. 

Around 2:00ish I ate something, and I didn’t feel sick anymore. Sundays at work are a skeleton crew, and I felt bad not being there, so I went in. I was supposed to work until 10:00, but only made it until 7:00 before I got sick again and had to go home. 

Tune in tomorrow to find out what the heck is going on. 

Restaurants aren’t only businesses suffering amid pandemic

 

DES MOINES - Clint Lingman, owner of Hams and Clams, downtown’s premier sex shop for some 15 years, is closing shop following stay at home orders and record low sales during the pandemic. “Business was already slowing down before the coronavirus with unlimited free options for porn online,” Lingman lamented. “You have to try pretty hard to pay for pornography nowadays. But we also offer gifts, bachelor and bachelorette party favors, marital aides, an adult arcade. We’re a full-service smut shop. Well, we were.” 

He said there is no going-out-of-business sale with his kind of store. “It’ll be chocolate tits for lunch, and chocolate cocks for dinner at the Lingman house for a while. Can you think of another use for a rubber fist? How about eight of them?” 

A father of four, Lingman knows that it’ll be a struggle to get back on his feet. “If I needed a little extra money before, I would do happy hour prices all day on the nudie booths,” he said referencing private booths where people pay for a personal burlesque show. 

“I’m really taking it in the rear. Normally I’d say ‘that’s what she said,’ but COVID-19 has taken all of the fun out of it.”

Hams and Clams will close on the last day of the month. 

Sober ten years

 

I’ve been sober for ten years today. 

I never socially drank. Was never interested in having A drink. Toward the end of my drinking days, there were signs that I needed to hang it up. For instance: blackouts.

From americanaddictioncenters.org/ - Blacking out does not mean that a person becomes unconscious, like falling asleep. Instead, people often continue to interact with others, engage in routine or potentially dangerous behaviors, and even continue to drink.

I would wake up the next morning and people would reference conversations or activities from the night before, and I would laugh along like I knew what they were talking about, but I didn't remember any of it. 

I’m lucky that I didn’t drink and drive. I would usually drink at home so I wasn’t a danger to many others… But a big danger to myself. 

12/7/2010

I got drunk. It wasn’t a special occasion. It was a freaking Tuesday night. 

After passing out, I would never know when or where I'd go pee. This night I made it to bathroom in the basement, which I almost never used. I don’t remember using the toilet, nor do I remember walking back up the first few stairs. 

What I do remember is waking up in heart-pumping-pain from when I tripped on one of the stairs and fell forward, catching myself with my left forearm on the corner of a step. 

My ulna snapped like a Kit-Kat. 

This was my ‘rock bottom.’ 

12/30/10 (My mother’s birthday)

Drinking was becoming less and less fun. I was feeling more shame and guilt after drinking. I had anxiety and panic attacks. I was thinking hard about finding and getting help. There was an AA meeting within walking distance from where I lived. I went to an afternoon meeting to check it out. 

There was a guy at that meeting (let’s call him Manuel) who saw ‘me,’ and talked to me. He gave me a Big Book, his phone number, and sent me on my way. 

I liked the meeting. The room was full of good people and gratitude, and I could feel in my bones that I was ready to turn my will and my life over to the care of God as I understand Him. 

I used to love to watch the TV show Intervention. I didn’t know why, but I would watch it anytime it was on. After I got sober I didn’t care about the show. It took a few years before I realized why I liked it when I was a drunk. 

I knew deep down that I would eventually have to stop drinking, but I didn’t want to be the one to make that decision (denial). I didn’t want an intervention, but I couldn’t see how I’d ever decide on my own that I needed to quit. 

No one can make someone else stop drinking/using. It only works when the user recognizes a ‘bottom’ and chooses to get help themselves. An intervention is an attempt at creating a ‘bottom’ so the alcoholic will decide to seek help.

12/31/2010

I thumbed through the Big Book and told Megan (my wife) that I wanted to start going to AA. I wanted that night to be the last time I drank.

And it was.

New Year’s Day 2011 I had my usual (and last) hangover. I felt a little relieved. There was a light at the end of the tunnel. 

I didn’t feel it was appropriate to go to a meeting hung over, so I went to my next AA meeting on 1/2/2011. This was an evening meeting, and there were far more people at this one. 

AA gives medallions, or ‘chips,’ as markers of days/months/years sober. A few were handed out this night, and I always remember a guy who got his three month chip and thinking, “I wonder if I’ll make it three months.”

I called Manuel the next day and asked him questions about AA. He was very open and warm. No question was stupid. He gave me all the time I wanted and answered every question. 

The first several weekends were the hardest. I had always got drunk on Friday, or Saturday (or both) for about 15 years. I didn’t know what to do with myself. I called Manuel and asked him. He gave me some suggestions, and told me that soon I wouldn’t believe that I had the time I did to drink. 

Manuel became my sponsor and took me through the Big Book and the 12 steps. It was hard work. Not hard, like building a house, but like learning a new language. Manuel gave me assignments to complete before the next time we’d meet, and I didn’t want to disappoint him or myself by blowing them off. I felt that I owed it to myself to put everything into working the steps as I had put into making sure that I had beer in the fridge. 

After about six months most craving for alcohol dried up. Now, a decade later, there is no craving whatsoever. I don't even think about it. 

And being around alcohol doesn’t bother me. In fact, I like being the sober one to give rides, and remember everything. No judgement. Have fun. I am. 

Also, Manuel nailed it.  I really can’t believe that I had the time that I did to drink. 

Questions? Thoughts? Reach out.

AA saved me. Getting sober changed and saved my life. 

I’m happy to share my experience. 

Happy to help anyone out of it who is ready.