Because I have a cabbage for a head?

I still feel lettucey as well. That is my disembodied reply to a comment from the "I am made of lettuce" post I made a while back.
Right now, as I'm writing this, I feel lettuce in my throat. Not the texture of it. Just it's essense.
Tonight I perform in the finals of "King of the Mountain."
Against two improv groups and a sketch group. Me versus them. Actually, ever since I moved to Chicago it seems like it's been me versus improv and sketch as opposed to actually being a part of it.
I should teach classes on how to be like me. How to perform like me. Because I'm really good at being me.
Even if the me I be is lettucey.
I hope I win money. That's also lettuce. And it's in my head.

The Tale-erico so far.

A couple Rich Tallerico stories even though I don't know him. One: while I was standing next to the guy who was talking to him on the phone, figuring out why he wasn't at the workshop he was supposed to be teaching, John (the guy on the phone) said, "whoa they're really fighting." I looked across the street and, along with one other improvisor, watched two big tough women team up and beat up another big tough woman while four of their closest friends and a driver of a car trying to leave the Aldi parking lot looked on. Even if no one else had been there, I couldn't have broken up that fight. Each of those women were bigger, stronger and tougher than I am.
I could see that John was trying to quickly wrap up the conversation with Rich so that he could hang up in case he needed to call the police. They stopped beating her up before he hung up though. Then they came back and sort of menaced her backwards across the street. We then realized that they were heading our way so we got inside locked the door and went inside. We are not tough. Nor are we looking to get wrapped up in someone elses trouble.
Then today, when I was waiting at the Hilton Chicago to get my trolley back after my lunch break on the city tour, I spotted Rich Tallerico walking out of the Hilton. I said, "Are you Rich Tallerico?" He said, "Yeah." And we talked for a minute. I told him the above story and let him know that I would be in his sketch writing workshop tomorrow. You know the sketch writing workshop that I backed into because others backed out?
By the way, that related to the trolley-running-a-red-light dream. Which leads me to an edit on a previous "psychic dream" analysis. Turns out that I was supposed to be scheduled to drive the trolley for the Chicago Improv Festival but a mistake was made at base wherein the guy above me on the schedule was scheduled to do it. I was mad at first but then I saw that it was just a pub crawl style shuttle taking people from the three performance venues to two bars. That doesn't sound like anything but a night of watching people schmooze and wishing I was schmoozing too. Yolanda, the woman who booked the charter, wanted to correct the error but I realized that I would be performing during both of the two available shifts (including a performance at the improv till dawn portion of the improv festival).
And there you have it. The strangely amazing semi-good luck of Churchill continues. I slipped out of a potentially psyche damaging driving shift in order that I may perform at the finals of the King of the Mountain competition and at the Improv Festival anyway. AND I met Rich Tallerico a day before his class that I'll be attending even though I never signed up for it.
And I still have my right testicle. Knock on wood. Repeatedly.

A whole lot of psychic going on.

So Cathy and I have been very (in fact, alarmingly) worried about her trip to Frankfurt, Germany. We had a few weird dark moments in our conversations regarding the trip shortly before she left. A lot of talk of having "strange feelings" about this trip. At one point she said she felt guilty for leaving me alone (probably because I'm half-retarded). At any rate, my psychic warning system was going off about this trip.
This is where it gets interesting:
My friend Lindsay of her now unadvertised website and my new improv group, "Lick Your Wounds", called me three times tonight (twice while my phone was off). I turned on my phone in a bar just in time to get her third call. She said that she didn't want to freak me out or anything but that she had just had her first psychic reading and that the psychic gave her a message for her friend. The psychic said that her friends name had something to do with Winston Churchill. I thought and thought about what this had to do with me, Chris Churchill. But then it came to me...I don't smoke cigarettes either. So with Churchill indicated, the psychic went on to tell her that my wife was travelling right now (a fact that Lindsay didn't even know) and that my wife should "be careful when making her travel plans."
So now I'm listening. Lindsay also said not to worry too much because the psychic said it wasn't life or death. Well the next two e-mails (one follow-up from Lindsay to me and one reply from me back to Lindsay) wraps this whole thing up.

Here's Lindsays e-mail...
>"From: "Lindsay >Reply-To: lindsay@unadvertisedwebsite.com
>To: "Los Shut Up"
>Subject: Hey....
>Date: Tue, 26 Apr 2005 00:52:28 -0400 (EDT)
>
>Hey Chris! Just wanted to write and reiterate that I hope you're not too
>weirded out about the message I passed along. It's just that when a
>psychic tells you to do something, you listen. Or, at least, I do. That
>was my first-ever reading, but she was so right on about a lot of things
>in my life, and, well, I was totally amazed when she gave me something to
>tell you specifically.
>
>Also, re: your blog -- Prophetic dreams and recurring tiny trolleys? Now
>messages during _other_ peoples' readings? Has your life always been this
>interesting?
>
>Anyways, hope that all is well in Churchill-ville. "

Here's my reply where I get all poetic at 2:30AM.
"I e-mailed Cathy with the facts. Then I woke up at two in the morning to go to the bathroom and decided to give her a call. Believe it or not, I woke her up. She's been catching up from her jetlag and she's been a little nervous and upset but she's fine. I talked to her about the psychic and she said, "It's probably that we've been having a lot of trouble coordinating where and when to go places because the kids are in school and..." some other stuff. So she said it's probably that she needs to carefully plan her travelling so she can actually go and see all the things she wants to see. But also, I warned her and she agreed to be very careful and wary of her surroundings and all that good stuff. Because they are actually travelling some today. They're going to a small suburb of frankfurt called Wiesbaten. So there is some travelling within her travels. Weird. If you see the psychic, tell the psychic thanks. And stay on the light side of the force, Yoda.
As far as the blogging and my interesting life. Apparently, the answer is yes. My life has always been interesting. Starting with being an accident in the first place (mom says, "happy surprise") who was born to a woman who has had frequent hospitalizations for mental illness including a stay in a padded cell shortly after my first birthday to being the only gifted kid in my school. From being one of the only white kids in my all black (and breakdancing) neighborhood. From my frequent injuries, accidents and bad luck to all the good luck that has come from the "bad" luck. From the many different performance opportunities to the cancer. From my crisis of faith and my bouts with mental illness to my last few years of psychic dreams, solo performance success and the noticing of the weird little gifts and messages that life gives you (i.e. my favorite piece of trash, the tiny schoolbus). Yeah, I've had a weird life so far and I hope it only gets weirder and better. Life's really short. It's ridiculous that life even happens so it's good when life gives you something to notice, to enjoy, to love, to hate, to feel strongly about in anyway and to talk about with people you really care about."

Boy am I pretentious. But I've got to be something.

By the way, had a dream this morning where I ran my trolley through a red light inadvertently but that somehow I knew that it was no problem, no repercussions. Later today, I got a call from a friend, asking if I wanted to do Rich Talerico's (writer for SNL or MadTv or something) improv workshop for free. I had been wanting to take this workshop but didn't think I could spare the money (there's my red light). But my lucky life (my big red trolley) just rolled right through the red light with no cost of any kind. Well, unfortunately, there was nothing behind the red light because Frankie J had e-mailed Rich with the wrong day. So I'll be taking Rich's sketch writing workshop for free on Thursday.

I am the Kaiser del Mountainito. Amn't I?

I took my wife to the airport this morning. She's going to Germany for a week and a half. What will I do by myself for 10 days. Blog.
I remembered what that funny thing was (see my previous blog regarding what that funny thing was.) I don't want to give away the joke (in case anyone comes to see me perform later) but it has to do with whistling.
I performed last night at "The King of the Mountain" and became this weeks king. I had a really funny show. My little marionette friend, "Jose Tovar" (not the mechanic from work, but his smaller marionette doppelganger) made his debut stand-up comedy performance last night. He's good. He's better than I am. I haven't found a catch phrase yet.
I was given an extra private charter to drive tonight because a co-worker of mine was tired and wanted to go home. Turns out a friend and (as I found out later) frequent responder to this blog, Dave B. (because he's an alcoholic, he gets no full last name) was on the charter. He informed me that he was a frequent "anonymous" responder. Made me happy. Now sure, some days only seven people read this blog but some days it's better than that. And it's weird when you meet someone in real life who knows what you've been typing and who follows you. These blogs are the worlds tiniest cults. Now I know where the tiny school bus was headed before the tiny disaster. They were headed to Tiny Jonestown.
By the way, Dave was a champ tonight. As drunk as he was, his former trolley driver self was trying to break through to the surface to control his friends (who were all "Strawdog Theater" folks).
Well, I have to perform against the three previous high vote getters in King of the Mountain in this upcoming and final week of the competition. I hope a lot of people come and enjoy. I could win money. Josito Tovarito (Litte Jose Tovar) "El Pistolero" will return this week I believe.