If you look at my schedule on www.tommyjcomedy.com you will notice I have done a lot of college shows since January of this year. This past week was no different, I did four colleges in Central Arkansas. The problem was I had Thursday off with nothing to do. My hotel was right behind a Wal-Mart and next to a Starbucks. Which I think is the eventual description of this country. “Hey have you been to America?” “I thinks so, is it the one right behind a Wal-Mart next to a Starbucks?” Wal-Mart started in Arkansas and they don’t let you forget by having one off of every single exit. Personally I think they are all connected with an intricate tunnel system. So when you ask for something they don’t have they signal the “tunnel people” which are made up of out of work circus freaks, disgruntled ex-target employees, and two mormon missionaries and they go get it from another store.

I decided that I didn’t want to spend my night off in a hotel room or Wal-Mart. I remembered a few weeks ago I was at the University of Central Arkansas and they offered me tickets to a concert at their school on my night off. It was a Chris Cagle concert. Yes he is country and yes I love him, so get over it. I arrive on campus and realize I have no clue where the concert is. I spot two very, very large guys in cut off shirts and cowboy hats so I decide to follow them. Luckily they were going to the concert. That story could’ve ended with me locked in a cellar for a few years or paying a twenty-dollar cover charge at a gay bar.

I actually get to the door before I realize I am seeing a concert by myself. Most people would have a problem with this, I don’t. My only problem is wondering why I don’t have a problem with it and normal people do. Am I some kind of freak but on a smaller level? Could I be at Ripley’s Believe It Or Not? But instead of showing me getting my testicals pierced or putting a snake in my butt and pulling it through my nose it would just show me watching a concert by myself and enjoying it. I did enjoy the concert. I realized I express how I like things differently than a lot of people. I sat down the whole time bobbed my head, tapped my foot every so often and enjoyed every minute. Some people would look at me and say I didn’t have a good time because people around me were jumping up and down, singing and making out with each other. If I sat down at a coffee shop smiled bobbed my head and tapped my feet people would think I was having a good time, it just so happens I don’t really get above that level. People would think I was a dick if I did the exact same thing at a funeral though.

It is always great to watch live entertainment of any kind. I am a live performer but I was amazed by watching Chris Cagle and how he whipped his fans into a frenzy. As a comedian at best I can get is a long standing-ovation at the end of my show. People stood up for him the entire time. I saw those same two big cowboys I followed in standing out on the floor with their arms around each other, their cowboy hats stretched to the sky just looking into each others eyes singing every word of every song. I thought I will never get that reaction out of two guys at my show…hopefully. That would be freaking weird.

AMENDMENT: After the concert was over I would’ve stood up and clapped until the final piece of equipment was taking out and security had to remove me from the building. So people would know I had a good time.

I went to a tanning salon last week. I know it isn’t manly to tan but I’m not a manly guy. If listed all the non-manly things I did I would be required by state law to sit down while I pee. I just want a little color for something’s I have coming up this summer. I’m pretty pale, I have to complexion of someone who works underground or was in a short coma. All the girls working are pretty and tan; I’m un-showered, pale wearing sweatpants and a sweatshirt on. It looked like we were casting the next high school hit movie where these girls have to turn me into prom king or there family is murdered. Nice twist at the end, huh?

I have to fill out a sheet about my skin or they won’t let me tan. It took forever; it was two pages long. I got a 32 and didn’t even study. My score puts me as “fair skinned.” Which seems like she could’ve just look at me instead of creating a multiple-choice quiz. I said I haven’t been in a tanning bed in a long time and I really haven’t been in the sun much since the accident. There was no accident but I thought it was a funny thing to say.

She sets me up for six minutes in the novice bed. I asked if I needed goggles she said “do you want to go color blind?” Which either meant yes or she was trying to up sell me into the “ultra tanner color blinder bed.” She walks me into the room where the bed is and gives some instructions, showed me the radio and fan then told me I had four minutes to get my clothes off. After finding out the four minutes started after she left the room I was ready. I stripped down put a sock over my privates and started tanning. The sock doesn’t protect my privates that is just where I keep them so they don’t get lost or dirty. I start getting hot at about three and a half minutes but I complete the full six.

Over the next couple days I realized I got pretty burnt. I pulled my shirt up and realized my arms had been at my side so I had a pink belly and white sides. Other parts of my body were like this too but my gut was the worst. It was as if I took a pink highlighter and marked the places on my body that I need to tone up. It didn’t make me feel good to realize that when I lie down my stomach is the part of my body closest to the sun.

AMENDMENT: I would’ve filled out the paper work outside and got a natural tan, and I wouldn’t have worn the goggles because if I am color blind I can’t see how white I am.

Last week I got stuck in the same tornado producing storm two nights in a row. I was in Texas when I got hit the first time. The wind was blowing up to seventy miles per hour. It was blowing so hard that the rain was not only going sideways, at some points the rain would actually go up. Now that requires an entirely new umbrella. I was sitting in my room when either the tornado siren started going off or the Japs were bombing the Holiday Inn Express in San Angelo Texas. I ran outside to the parking lot to see the storm up close. I quickly realized there was a lot of lightning and I was the tallest thing in the parking lot. I ducked down, put my hands over my head and ran for cover. Everyone knows if you put your hands over your head lightening cannot strike you.

I was outside when the storm got so bad I was starting to get afraid. The only thing that kept me sane was the “it never happens to me” attitude. That was quickly ripped away as storm chasers pulled into my hotel parking lot. People who try to get as close to tornados as possible are now standing right next to me; a guy who wants to be really far away from tornados. I would love to see a tornado, just not from the inside. It started to hail and the wind was blowing at seventy miles per hour, which made it seem like someone was throwing chunks of ice at your face.

Luckily the storm wasn’t going to last that much longer and I was flying to Iowa first thing in the morning. Apparently I was on the same flight as the storm. I decided to go to my room and turn on the weather to see when it will be over the weather guy showed the path of the storm and apparently it is a big Tommy Johnagin fan. When you put your schedule on the internet you never know who’ll show up, hot chicks, weird guys, tornados. So the next day I’m held up in a mall while the same crap is happening outside. The night before I missed being in a tornado by a few miles, so I know I don’t want to be driving around. While I was in the mall a guy turns to me and says “have you seen anything like this before?” “As a matter of fact I have.” I told him I was in the same storm the night before. He said “you should leave and take this storm with you” without breaking a smile. I kind of thought he was serious, like I am some kind of God of weather. Or a sad guy on cartoons that has a rain cloud following him around all day.

Unfortunately I had to drive two hours in the storm after my show to get to my hotel near the airport. On the drive the wind was so bad people were pulling off the road the radio said numerous trucks had been blown over. Everyone knows it’s easy to blow a trucker hard to blow a truck.(stupid joke but I couldn’t resist.) It got so bad I had go to a gas station for cover and I needed to write my political opinions on a bathroom stall door. The sign said open but the door was locked. It’s like a chick that wears a skirt with no panties but says she won’t sleep with you. And unfortunately the gas station doesn’t have a drink I can slip something in to change its mind. Someone came to the door and I asked if they were open. She said “kind of.” Wow. That has to be the least profitable gas station ever. Come on down to Chuck’s Pump and Go we’re kind of open, we might have gas, and maybe you’ll get hepatitis. I made it back to my hotel with out seeing or being in a tornado, not a bad night.

AMENDMENT: I regret not saying anything when the guy in the mall told me to leave and take the storm with me. I should’ve just started dancing and chanting until he left or three hours went by and the storm was gone. Then I would have said you’re welcome and just walked away.