Bear with me as I tell you a story of geography and transit. Or go read about my amazing training regimen.

This year, the Bridgetown Comedy Festival has some different venues which is strongly influencing my tentative plan for shows. As a lazy bicyclist (and a city that fails to provide late night mass transit), I have been stuck with waiting for cabs to get from upper Hawthorne to my home at 2am. Apparently we don’t have enough cabs between 1am and 2am. Only really a problem for me once or twice a year, but it has kind of sucked.

This year, the festival venues make an interesting backwards L from the Eagle Lodge (not to be missed) at 49th & Hawthorne down to the Analog Cafe (720 SE Hawthorne) and the White Owl Social Club (1305 SE 8th — pretty much at SE Main) and then back to the Bossanova Ballroom and Doug Fir (both right around 7th/8th on E. Burnside).

As a side note, the Bagdad Theater is out (now showing first run movies), which is a bummer because the seats were more comfortable than other venues but a good thing because the theater just ate up the sound and energy of some shows (which might have been related to my tendency to fall asleep in the more comfortable chairs even though I tried to stay away from the couches in the balcony).

Okay, so we have these new venues — and guess what, I can walk home from E. Burnside and 8th relatively easily. So my schedule is largely based around trying to end my night at the Bossanova or Doug Fir. So there are probably great late shows near 50th and Hawthorne that you might want to explore depending on your eventual destination as well.

Without further ado, my tentative plan (no links but you can see the whole schedule on the Bridgetown website):

Thursday

• 8pm: Dead Authors Podcast with Paul F. Tompkins at Bossanova (I love Paul F. Tompkins and will pretty much watch him do anything. Full stop, as HG Wells would say).
• 10pm: Late Night @ Doug Fir (Yay, Late Night!) OR Stand up with Anthony Lopez @ Bossanova (Yay, stand up and Anthony Lopez).

Friday

• 7pm: Early show @ Eagles Lodge (I like going to the Eagles Lounge and as stated above, gotta go first thing to the far end of the backwards L. I don’t know any of these comedians yet, but I bet they will be delightful.)
• Go have dinner?
• 10pm: Stand up with Reggie Watts @ Bossanova (I think all of Portland loves Reggie Watts, but note that this is a show of lots of comedians along w/ Reggie Watts) OR Baron Vaughn Presents: The New Negroes @ White Owl (I love Baron Vaughn and the uncomfortable show name of the New Negroes)
• 11:30pm: Bossanova late show (better hope I like this venue!)

Saturday

Okay, by now, I may have either seen or heard about performers that cause me to change my plans or I’ve come to hate or love certain venues. So, things are starting to get quite tentative. But, I like having a plan!

• 2pm: Probably Science @ Alhambra (I like imaginary science and I can get to 48th & Hawthorne in the middle of the day. Maybe start with lunch somewhere beforehand?)
• 4pm: Hang out with me @ Alhambra (Why not? Sounds like fun!)
• 7pm: Portland Masters @ Analog (leaning towards this, but there are a bunch of other great shows at 6pm or 7pm.)
• 10pm: Brew HaHa @ White Owl OR W. Kamau Bell @ Doug Fir.
• 11:30pm: White Owl or Doug Fir shows (Probably depends where we have ended up.)

Sunday

Hope I have paced myself, because some years I don’t make to any Sunday shows.

• 4pm: This Feels Terrible @ Doug Fir (I will probably be feeling a bit terrible by now)
• Dinner and maybe another show along the bottom of the backwards L of venue.
• 10pm: Prompter @ Bossanova (I have very mixed feelings about Ted talks, so I think this show will do me good and would be a nice way to end the festival)

Monday

Make sure I am taking the morning off.

Did you note that my punctuation was inconsistent regarding parenthesis? Guess what, it doesn’t matter! This note is mostly to myself.

Do you have questions about the grammar regarding my use of “regarding” above? Me too! But it still doesn’t matter!