Chapter 19: Sexual Rock Bottom

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It’s pretty easy to see why this blog is called “It’s Taking a Long Time To Become Famous…” If anything is ruining my career it’s me. I get a good thing going, then take a two week break. (Or abandon a project all together.) Telling of my personality and/or work ethic. (I got a new puzzle!) I struggle with commitment as you might know from my old dating blogs. BUT- I WILL finish telling this fucking story even if it takes me the rest of my life. 

Now where was I? (Yes, I did go back and re-read my last chapter. That’s how lost I am.)

Right! It’s spring of 2002. Not really sure tagging the last blog with David Koresh helped my readership, but sometimes you gotta try new tags.

I believe it was me who first coined the term sexual rock bottom. People always accuse men of thinking with their lower regions but women do it too. The irony being I moved across the continent without actually getting a sample. Women of my generation were trained that way, even though my cousin Debbie fed me Jackie Collins books that warned me otherwise. In my fave, American Star, the protagonist saves herself for marriage- then on her wedding night discovers her husband is impotent. That’s why I do it on the first date now. Gotta play it safe.

(Not that I care if you’re impotent. No pregnancy scares and endless oral? Sign me up!)

But after you follow your genital desires and it fails you swear you’ll never do it again. That’s right. I’m 23. Not making that mistake again. (Insert smirk emoji that didn’t exist yet here.) It’s time to think with my head wherever that is. Sure I’m gonna be crashing with my ex-boyfriend and his new girlfriend, but I was never into threesomes. (I skipped those and went straight to foursomes. Made more sense number wise.)

Lisa Gay-Tremblay has done the saintly job of picking me up in Huntington Beach (from her home in Sherman Oaks) and dropping me off at at my ex-boyfriend’s. (I was like George of the Jungle back then, swinging from man to man like they were vines.) 

She wasn’t wrong. It was a three hour drive with all the Memorial Day weekend traffic. Hard to have one of those Reality Bites Lelaina and Vicki singing “Tempted” moments when you’ve just fucked up one person’s Friday and your own fucking life.

Neither me nor Marcus had cellphones, so the plan was for me to get dropped off at Bikram’s School of Yoga on La Cienega, where him and Tanya were training. I enter the giant, sauna-like classroom wearing street clothes, lugging two giant suitcases containing my entire life. (How do you say “lost girl” in Sanskrit?”) There’s at least 100 people in this room. There’s no way I’m going to spot him when all I can see is backs and butts. Do they really do cartwheels in this kind of temperature? (I knew nothing about yoga at the time.)

When the class ends, all the sweaty bodies pass me in the doorway, and Marcus and Tanya spot me and smile. (Hugs would have been grody in this moment.) I can’t help but think of the last memories I have of Marcus… him high on ecstasy dancing to “Smack My Bitch Up” at an outdoor rave in Chilliwack. Compare that to now, him training to be a Bikram Yoga instructor. Comedians have a fascinating way of cleaning up their lives to the extreme.

As we head for the Pico bus, (like the glamorous Canadians in L.A. we are) Marcus mentions that Bikram guy is actually a huge creep who owns 13 Bentleys and cheats on his wife. Not exactly very “Yogi-like.”

Hmm…. maybe he’s just saying that cuz he’s jealous…*

We get to their apartment which might be a good location if you think the 10 is a tourist attraction. It’s furnished, in that sterile “we’re only here for two months” kind of way- no TV, no Internet, no phone. All the fun of the early 2000’s AND with no money to go out! Oh god- what if I have a threesome with my ex and his new girlfriend just to have something to do…

But it’s not half as awkward as Huntington Beach. If you have to crawl back to an ex, I recommend doing it in another country. I sleep on the couch with a towel as my blanket. (You really shouldn’t chirp someone’s apartment when they’re literally saving your life.)

Then next day, I get up ready for my big day picking Natasha up from the airport. And by “picking up,” I mean I’m figuring out how to take the bus to the airport. This was pre-smart phones, so my big plan of attack was to stand on the southbound side of the road and pray it gets me close. 

(Is this the equivalent of those stories “back in my day we walked to and from school, in the snow, uphill both directions!?”)

I miraculously figure out how to get to the airport. I hang in arrivals, and an older man who looks vaguely familiar approaches me.

“Hi, how are you? I’m so sorry to do this, but my bag got lost by the airline and all my travelers cheques were in there. I just need $20 to get a cab. Could you please help me?”

Hold up… OMG he’s a SCAM artist! WHO KNEW? (This is a callback. I hope you guys are reading these in order.)

“Oh ya, I remember you from last time. I’m actually running out of money. Any chance I could get that twenty bucks back?” 

Shocked that any locals would actually be picking their friends up the airport, he slowly and quietly backs away from me.

BUSTED!

I’m getting good at this L.A. stuff.

When I spot Natasha, I’m next to tears. Every sign of home when you first get to L.A. feels like an emotional relief.

And as I guide her back to the bus stop, I can’t help but shout,

“Welcome to L.A!”

We get back to the apartment just in time to drop the suitcase so the four of us can hit Venice Beach for the drum circle. Because any girl who was in her twenties in the early 2000’s definitely fucked a guy who was into drum circles. 

Walking along Venice Beach felt like we were on the set of Romy & Michelle’s High School Reunion, a movie me and Meghan (fellow Phi Sig and BFF) had memorized with dance moves. When people ask what I do for a living (and they WILL) I’ll just say I invented Post-It’s.

The drum circle is not really my thing, but I pretend it is and take puffs of every single joint that gets passed to me. Getting high only makes me wonder more about what my next step in L.A. is going to be… Natasha and I head off for a walk down the boardwalk.

“Marcus and Tanya are going back to Ottawa in a few days… Fuck. What are we gonna do?”

Natasha, not worried at all, starts asking people if there’s a hostel nearby. 

That’s right. People with the Queen on their money are very hostel savvy.

And it turns out, Venice Beach has a few. (It’s not all people living in dumpsters!)

We wander into one on Brooks Street enquiring about rates and availability. Natasha, being the problem solver and world traveller that she is, asks,

“And can we clean in exchange for free rent?”

“Yes.”

So while I always thought channeling my inner Mr. Belvedere had to do with late night writing…

Now…

I was about to become the butler. 

(I don’t have a lot of pics from this time in my life, despite the fact I’m actually HOLDING a camera in this picture. You can tell by the bunny ears we were really worried about our futures. Tasha on lower left, Meghan, the Romy to my Michelle on right, and all my lovely Phi Sigs all around. Drunk photographer, no retakes cuz we never knew we needed one until after the film was developed, so sadly we only have half of Gonçalves’ face.)

*Marcus was SO right! The most interesting part of writing this blog is realizing how many creeps I’ve naively crossed paths with…

Chapter 15: The Shitteth Has Hit The Fanneth

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I’ve never been good at telling people I’m a comedian. It took me years- almost decades. And once I did start blasting the fact, I was annoyed cuz then someone always says,

“You’re a comedian? Tell me a joke.”

But in my younger years, I always felt like I had to say, 

“I’m a comedian/bartender.”

Cuz that was the honest truth. Humble? Maybe…

But that second job always helped me cross the border.

(Canadians know what I’m talking about.)

When the customs agent asked what I do for a living I was swift to pick the better of the two careers. 

“I work at Boston Pizza!”

Sure, “worked” would have been more accurate, since technically I was moving to Huntington Beach for a guy who convinced me I was his soulmate in a nightclub in Las Vegas, but why mention THAT? I still have a warm pay stub in my purse with OVER TIME on it because I’ll need to buy Billabong shirts once I land.

Even if they call my boss to verify I work there he probably won’t hear the phone ring. He’s still using his keys as Q-Tips to clean his ears. Every other word is always,

“WHAT?”

But luckily it didn’t come to that, so I continued into Little America, aka that part of every major Canadian airport where your passport says you’re officially in the States, even though you’re still on Canadian soil eating Tim Bits. (Donut testicles.)  

As I get on the plane, I hope I have a seat close to the TV screen. I lost my glasses sometime after I “finished” university but never replaced them because who cares? I don’t have to read chalkboards anymore. Why waste the money? But in this moment, I was really worried about how I was going to watch Cameron Diaz in The Sweetest Thing.

When I land at LAX, my first fear is,

“What if I don’t recognize him…”

Maybe I DID need new glasses.

But I got a new passport and that seemed responsible enough. I was quite confused by the fact this was the first year they DIDN’T let you smile in your photo. Weird… Isn’t dental work how they identify dead bodies? Why would they want you to hide teeth in an essential picture? They should MAKE you smile. Added security, cuz every one notices an over bite or snaggletooth. Anyway, this is just a round about way of saying I’ve looked like shit in all my passport photos every since.

As I walk into the arrivals area to look for my suitcase and now boyfriend, I’m approached by an older man.

“Hi, how are you? I’m so sorry to do this, but my bag got lost by the airline and all my travelers cheques were in there. I just need $20 to get a cab. Could you please help me?”

Seems legit. I hand over $20, even though the Canadian dollar was so tragic it cost me $1.46 to buy one American dollar, so my life savings turned into $1600 USD. Whatever. That should last for a while.

I see a guy I think could be Mr. Huntington Beach, wearing checkered Vans and a Hurley baseball cap, looking bored sitting on a bench. It’s 2002, pre-smart phones. If you didn’t bring a book to pick someone up at the airport you were staring at baggage carrousels and counting fanny packs. He looks up and gives me a nervous wave. I walk over.

“Is it you?”

(Facetime really would have helped. All these phone calls and AOL chats didn’t do anything for remembering what he looked like.)

“Yes!”

He seems a little upset I forgot what he looked like. Or he’s pissed I missed my first flight. But I sit down beside him and hug him. He warms up immediately.

“You’re just as hot as I remember.”

“You are!”

Phew. I was so scared I looked gross after traveling across the continent. Plus I’m so much paler than him. I tried going to the tanning bed a couple of times in Ottawa, but I always got scared it would break and I’d land on all the burning hot bulbs. (I think that eventually made it into a plot point of one of the Final Destination deaths.)

We cruise south on the 405 in his Ford F150, the preferred ride of surfer dudes in SoCal. He blasts punk music, appeasing me only slightly with a version “A Thousand Miles” I had never heard before. Due to my lack of knowledge in this genre of music, I assumed all songs were by Blink 182.

The exit for Beach Blvd approaches. I can’t believe I’m going to LIVE on BEACH BLVD… it all seems so surreal… (A phrase we all use at 23, eh?) We ditch the two suitcases I narrowed my life down to in his townhouse and head to Fred’s Mexican Cantina to meet his friends. 

The Huntington Beach pier looks so cool. As I hear the waves of the Pacific Ocean crash, I feel so far away from Ottawa. I can’t help but think,

How crazy is it that you can just LIVE somewhere else in the world when fate takes over…

 (By spontaneously purging your job, car, boyfriend and apartment.)

I’m a little spaced out and tired at Fred’s. I didn’t worry too much about my lack of personality since I was fighting a three hour time difference. Plus I had already met his roommate in Vegas (who I liked) and my “bf” had trash talked the other girl at the table so hard I didn’t worry too much about impressing her. (Classic 2000’s! Trash talking people you hang out with on the reg. lololol.) On the way home, he took me to the Del Taco drive-thru, because I had never had it before, and he said it was a California delicacy. 

But as I woke up the next morning, I realized there were a few loose ends I forgot to tie up before I left Canada…

Like for instance…

I forgot to tell my parents I was moving.

Oopsies. It must have slipped my mind. They live in Vancouver. I couldn’t even use them for a ride to the airport, so how were they to know?

And remember how I refused to give my family my cell phone number?

Well, Daddy Walkinshaw sure did call my sweet Glebe apartment in Ottawa. And my roommate sure was home and picked up.

“Hi, is Christina around?”

“No, she JUST moved to California, but if you talk to her can you tell her Kïrsten says HI!”

A few days later, I get an email from my cousin Debbie in Surrey. (Ya, Kristeen. I said SURREY! I know you’re excited.) The subject line reads:

THE SHITTETH HAS HIT THE FANNETH!

To be fair, the part of this conversation I was avoiding was less about moving to Orange Country and more about my issues with discussing boyfriends with my parents. A girl with my level of turnover can’t mention EVERY guy to mummy and daddy. (Using those words makes me sound posh but I assure you I was upper white trash at best.) I had to be sure a guy was lasting at least four months first before my introducing them to family.

Soooooo….

Should I wait another two months to respond to the email?

(This is me and my cousin Debbie and she will LOVE I used this pic.)

Chapter 1: Diary “A-ha” Moment

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Chapter One: Diary Aha Moment

I’ve been doing stand up comedy for 24 years and still feel like a total loser. Not sure if it’s admirable or embarrassing I’m still chasing my dreams, but the 90’s seem to be trending again, so I might as well attempt to throw my amateur comedy career in the nostalgia mix. It hurts a little knowing you could fit six Midge Maisel careers in the span of mine. Does this blog already feel depressing? Stay with me. I’m actually a positive person. Watch me turn this around.

When I still had a day job, I felt guilty calling myself a comedian- I’d say comedian/bartender. (You don’t have to do that, btw.) Now I’m back to feeling uncomfortable declaring I’m a comic, cuz like most of us, I’m barely even doing it right now. The future is a wild card, the present feels numb, but the past is sitting all pretty, waiting to be graded.

I’m sure the last year has been both introspective and retrospective for us all. Having created an act bragging about being single, you know I spent a LOT of time alone in 2020. (I moved to New York on March 1st, so you know I have impeccable timing.) But I wasn’t totally alone. I had myself, in different versions. An entire book shelf of me. I’ve written in diaries since I was eleven. I’ve dragged them all back and forth across the continent multiple times as I try figure out what fucking city I’m meant to live in. I tell myself I’m lugging them through life because obviously I’m going to write a book one day, but it could be that I just don’t want anyone to find/read them. I don’t even trust USPS with them. I FedEx’d them here. And if you’ve ever shipped a box of books, you know it ain’t cheap. (It’s also a workout carrying them up your five story walk up.) But sentimentality can’t be replaced. Plus there’s no way I would remember half my life without these diaries. I’m simply prepping for Alzheimer’s. I can’t wait to re-read the story of my life when I’m in the old folks home spreading STD’s, as I hear they do. (It’s socially acceptable after 85.)

I have a tradition I do by myself every New Year’s Day: I pull a diary off the shelf and read the entire thing. I think it’s smart to start your year reflecting- figure out how not to fuck things up this year. Having no job currently, I had time to real them all. (Sadly there was no option for me to put this on my Goodreads page.) That’s when I had my inciting incident for this blog:

Sure I can’t DO comedy right now… 

But I can tell the STORY of my comedy…

It’s something. And it’s Covid compliant. Plus, the Internet lets you put anything on here. Have you seen it’s work?

This blog is gonna be quite the ride. If stand up comedy is a game I’d say I’ve played all the levels:

Open mic-er

Feature/Middle

Hide all signs of being a comedian from family 

Host 

Move to Hollywood too early

The road 

The shows you called “The road” but really you just drove five hours for fifty bucks

Comedy competitions

“Sent” back to Canada

Headliner

Comedy festivals

TV Tapings

Blog

Optioned my own TV show

Dated comics (could be a full other book)

Gone viral

Podcast

Another podcast

Two more podcasts

Move to Hollywood too late

Vegas

Performed for the troops overseas

Cruise ship act (THE FINAL LEVEL!)

I’ve done everything except save the princess. (You know, become famous.)

Having my own personal George Bailey moment re-reading all these diaries really put things in perspective. They almost made me mad at myself. (Again, positive person, I will pull it together in the end.) 

I feel like I said “no” to all the things I should have “yes” to…

I feel like I said “yes” to all the things I should have said “no” to…

So here I am, re-reading my life from the point I was literate. How did I become a comedian? Why am I still doing it? Am I trapped in the dream of my 18-year-old self?

These blogs I’m going to release are chapters I’ve been compiling for years now. If you know me, you’ve heard me say I’m “writing a book” for at least the past five years. (Sometimes I bail on comedy shows saying I have a “deadline.” LOLOLOLOLOL.)

Somehow my work ethic for the long term has been interrupted by the instant gratification of social media. A cute pic. A funny Tik Tok. A clever tweet. You convince yourself these sort of posts are a pretty good work day, then go back to doing nothing. But then you wake up the next morning and waste hours looking at other people’s posts until you feel like that avocado you bought when it wasn’t ripe yet, waited too long to actually use, finally cut it open and now it’s rotten. I hope this blog doesn’t make anyone feel like that. If it makes you feel any better, I’m 42. It’s taken me this long to figure shit out and I’m only half way through the pile.

There was part of me that was thinking,

“Don’t do another blog…. You’ve exposed your personal life online enough…” 

But then I thought:

“I also don’t want to forget anything when I finally publish a book. Might be good for all the people from my past to add their memories and/or fix mine. I’d like to save myself from a few law suits if possible, so feel free to tell me what you think I’ll get sued for.”

So in the spirit of my Tinder Tuesdays, I’m going to post blogs every Tuesday. Even though these stories are more about comedy than sex, I promise…

There’s a LOT of over lap. 

Move over Bridget Jones. I know more Hugh Grants than you do.