I made it...whew!

Eight hours of Santa. I think it went pretty well. I was in a major hotel being Santa for guests at their very fancy buffet. There were all kinds of people there. My favorites were the elderly...very happy people, they. I think I saw the owner of Doug's Hot Dogs and almost said something to him as Santa, but decided not to.

The kids were good. I'm glad I didn't have to do the sit in a chair and have kids forced on my lap thing, though. There was one table that had a high chair, but the kid wasn't there. The two adults that were warned me that she didn't like Santa at all. I said I would give 10 feet...they recommended 20. They were right. She started screaming as soon as I came in. This is when this Santa broke out his "unspoken restraining order" bit for the adults...I had to stay at least 20 feet away or there was trouble!

There were three red-headed kids. Two boys and a girl. They were walking around. I asked if they were walking to their table. One of the boys said "we were supposed to have a table, but something happened. My aunt is getting to the bottom of this." The other said, very matter-of-factly, "we don't celebrate Christmas...we celebrate Chaunaka (sp?)." And the girl said "we're triplettes." These kids I saw the most often and they were VERY inquisitive. Wanting to know all the secret workings of Santa. They didn't see Santa as mystical and wonderful...they saw him as a mystery to be solved. CSI: Jewish Triplettes.

My "Santa voice" is basically a friendly version of the Darrell Hammond (SNL) impersonation of Sean Connery. About five different adults said "Santa sounds like he has a little bit of an Irish brogue." One lady even found me after asking at the table to ask where I was from...I said the North Pole. She said, "No, what part of Ireland?" To which I replied, "it's just my Santa voice" in my real voice.

There were two private rooms amongst the other dining areas. One had a family with about 7-9 kids (cousins I'd guess). They were sort of dressed alike in groups. You know how some parents like to make sure their 2 and 4 year-olds have the same dresses on for xmas and stuff like that? It was like that...except that some of the kids were boys and in the 14-16 range. Don't get me wrong, they weren't wearing dresses. But they were wearing matching shirts under matching sleeveless sweaters. The matriarch of the group let me know that this was the 6th year they had come to this, and in the same room, and later they would be caroling. They asked me to come back to the room for a picture...I came back 3 times and no one budged for a picture...their loss! No GIGANTOR SANTA FOR THEM!!!

I didn't really hit much trouble until the very end. As I was making my last rounds I found a kid who replied to my "are you having a good Christmas?" with "I KNOW YOU'RE NOT THE REAL SANTA!!!" I ignored him and moved on. I also found a 4-6 year old boy who responded with "NO!" I said, "Why aren't you having a good Christmas?" to him as he was walking right by me and he turned and said "I DON'T EVEN CELEBRATE CHRISTMAS!"

YEOWCH! Oh well...his loss.

About every 20 minutes or so I would take a 5-10 minute break to cool off, drink water, and/or use the restroom. Three times I took longer breaks to visit the employee cafeteria and eat. They had a nice salad bar and a good xmas meal going on back there. Just me and the employees...until around 2:00pm. When I went in there were also two cops back there having a meal and watching the game on TV. When I went back around 4:00pm...two other cops eating a free meal and watching the game. 6:15...when I finished...I kid you not: 14 cops all eating and talking and watching the game on TV. FOURTEEN! I wonder if being a cop is dangerous anymore?

Merry Christmas!

That's right. You can stuff your "happy Holidays" in a sack. Christmas wins!

Speaking of. Deanna and I are celebrating xmas today...xmas eve. Why? I'll be playing Santa from 10am-6pm on xmas day.

That's right kids, I said "playing". The real Santa will be tired from a night of delivering toys. Why people want to see Santa on xmas day, I don't know. But I'm not questioning it.

I'l also be coming back home for a small stay in January, so that should be great!

Snow...a lot of snow.

Holy crap! So here's my day today. It snowed a couple of days ago. Not a lot, but enough that there was still a light covering on non-roads.

So, today, I go to ComedySportz for a remote show call time of 11:45am. I'm driving. The show isn't until 2:00pm, but we need to do sound check. Everything goes fine. The show happens. During the show I glance through a crack in the curtains to see a lot of snow coming down outside. A lot. We get done with our show around 3:00 and go to get our stuff and head out. The people we did the show are telling us that the next thing on the docket for them is a cruise on a boat. We laugh. They weren't kidding. Did I mention it was snowing?

Tara was on the remote and she was hosting rehearsal for our sketch group at 4:00pm. It was about 3:40 when our car came back from vallet. And there was snow. The drive was slow going and we got to Tara's around 4:05. Still snowing.

I park right in front of Tara's building and go inside. I'm in a sketch group who's working name is sort of like Black Angus, but we haven't settled on an actual name yet. The cool thing is none of us have day jobs, so we can rehearse during the day. Nights get filled up quick with rehearsal schedules and shows, so it is nice to have the daytime freedom. I'm there until 6:00pm. I come outside to the car...it is snowing. There is about 2 inches on the car.

I drive home with my awesome driving skills in time to eat a sandwich before a photo shoot at 7:00pm. Deanna left for a ComedySportz show right as my stylist, Monique, called me. Deanna said "is that Joe saying ComedySportz is cancelled?" No. It wasn't. She walks to ComedySportz. Monique shows up. About 10 minutes later Beau, the person I was shooting, knocks on the backdoor. I thought it might have been Deanna and that she forgot her keys. I don't know how he got to the backdoor, but he did. You have to walk through a spooky alley to find the backdoor.

About 30 minutes after he got there, Deanna actually DID come home. They cancelled the show right as she got there.

At 10:00pm I went outside (still snowing) with a ruler. 10.5 inches. Snow, ladies and gentlemen.

Tomorrow morning I will be standing on a street corner handing out fliers for 2 hours...this should be interesting.