Okay, Carey wasn't in this show; that's why Rhonda and Kathleen stood in.
 Carey's boyfriend at the time, Gilles, had taken her home with him to France
 for the holidays. She might have been on some audio stuff, I can't remember.

 This was a fun, but hectic, show. Steve and I had trouble finding a place
 and had booked Temple Hill a week or so into December, so it felt sort of
 thrown-together. I can't remember if it was this show or a Slapstick! show
 where the owner's son, Marc, got drunk and heckled us during rehearsal.
 Anyway, we got ripped off on the theater price and some outrageous bartender
 fee we hadn't known about.

 The show itself was fun. The place was packed and it went really well, as I
 recall. Thommas Dickens, a friend from the Riverfront, ran tech for us. The
 inclusion of Rhonda and Kathleen (who had worked together before, but not
 with us) gave the show an interesting and new dynamic.

 I really blew Steve's "Sammy and Larry" sketch. As usual, I was doing way
 too much on the other aspects of the show to learn those lines. I've always
 regretted that. It was a well-written piece; funny buit very poignant and
 kind of sad, too. Well, REALLY sad the way I performed it. I just didn't
 know it and we should have cut it.

 Some things on the set list weren't in the show, as I recall. I don't think
 we did Schilling's "Blue News Year in Review" sketch. "You Will" is one of
 my all-time favorite Josh pieces; I don't think we ever performed it again.
 We did this weird piece I wrote, "Slice of Life," which took place in a cafe
 and was based around all of the news reports of people getting trapped under
 rocks, etc., and slicing off their own limbs to survive. Really good stuff:
 Trump Song, Rate Your Mate, Really Big Game, Trump Song, Dramamine,
 Spiderback, Katie Lang.

 Before the show, as we were setting up, Jack Schultz came over from the
 Riverfront, where Slapstick! was performing. Ostensibly, he was there to
 wish us luck, but I think he wanted to see what we were up to.

 One of the cool things we did in this show was a running audio Gag where
 Josh played a roving reporter on the streets of Aurora on New Year's Eve,
 reporting from the Riverboats and other locations around town. When he got
 to the Riverfront, whoever was "checking in with him" from the stage asked
 him to open the door and see how the Slapstick! show was going. The audience
 heard the sound of a door opening, then just a few chirping crickets. It was
 pretty funny. In those days, we had a healthy rivalry that had not yet
 turned ugly, but was about to.

 After the show, Kathleen was on a high. We asked her to join the group
 (Rhonda wasn't interested) and I think she said yes, but later reneged when
 Jack told her, in response to hearing that she was going to join us, "Well,
 you choose your friends."
 
 -Dale
 
 ******************
 
 Dale's right, we got screwed by the place we rented. 
 They hit us with a room rental rate, AND a bartender 
 rate of $19 an hour. For a bartender! The bartender, 
 by the way, was one of the owners, so why the hell 
 did he need another $19 an hour? We were stupid enough 
 to agree and pay it. That's one of the reasons we 
 barely broke even.

 Another reason was at the last minute, we bought 
 some small ads in a classified section of The Beacon 
 News. We had only a few reservations, and we panicked 
 that our usual assortment of free press was not enough.
 That's the show where we learned that the New Year's 
 Eve crowd is famous for not making reservations, 
 and showing up at the gate. We had almost 100 people
 there.

 This place was a scream. It was a former Masonic 
 Temple, and this was a room where they had secret 
 ceremonies and such. The altar was gone, but the 
 stage was about four or five feet off the ground. 
 Most of the audience was in folding chairs on the 
 floor, and we towered over them. But some were able 
 to sit in a balcony that rimmed the room, squared 
 off. It was weird. Backstage, there were all these 
 old velvet robes and sceptres and crowns from the
 old Masonic days. I tried to figure out some way 
 to work them into the show, but failed.
 
 - Steve