0+2=15

I'm having a streak of canceled or almost canceled shows. Last night we had two people in the audience. And they were both friends I had brought to the show myself.

Regardless, the show must and did go on. And it was fine. In fact, strangely enough, it was great.

Once again, something for which I've been striving and about which I've been thinking a lot finally happened in a easy and comfortable way as a natural progression of just doing my thing.

A couple comics flaked so there were only four of us. So I got some extra time.

Jamie Jackson introduced me and instead of getting on stage I sat down at the table directly across from my two friends.

"I was wondering, is there anything more awkward than doing a show, with no mic, for an audience of two people, both of them your personal friends? And I realized, yes! Doing a show, with no mic, for an audience of two people, both of them your personal friends sitting two feet in front of them. So how ya doing? You look great! It's great to be here! Let's hear it for your MC."

All this amused me, my friends and the other comics.

I then got up and actually stood on the stage and commented, "No matter what happens after this, no show can possibly be more awkward than that was. So it's all up from here."

After me the headliner started with "welcome to an evening of painfully intimate comedy".

I started my set light, threw in a current event joke, talked about my job, then, half-way through, did the Utah stuff, and finally ended strong with some gay stuff.

Bam!

There it was ... the 15 minute set I've been dreaming of doing on a New York stage.

I'm ready for the next level.

And the timing is perfect, because I have a few possibilities on the horizon for longer gigs.

As I often do, last night I got to share the stage with Nick Cobb. What a great guy. Funny, absolutely. But also just a genuinely likable, good-natured, decent fellow. A rarity in the biz.

Foxy!

Hey you, click this!

Larger Than Life

Saturday's show went smashingly! I did my best crowd work ever.

Ever!

The club was about half full. There was a large group of forty-something soccer Moms from Virginia, Florida and other such places. They were rowdy, laughing loudly and heckling, but not in a mean spirited way. They were just participating aggressively. I engaged them, but was careful to not let them pull me too far off course.

I had lots of fun, spontaneous moments. The mic was cutting out so the show producer came up to fix it. I asked her to tell me the secret to making it work. She said, "You have to be careful, the bottom is really temperamental."

Without missing a beat I said, "They always are."

The room erupted. Talk about getting it handed to you on a silver platter. If a gay comic can't get a laugh out of that set up, just quit.

I was struck by how universally the straight crowd got the bottom joke. Everyone laughed. For this I'm grateful to Will & Grace. As much as I can't stand that show, every gay comic owes them a big "thank you" for giving America a gay vocabulary. I'm amazed I can make a "bottom" joke and even suburban housewives get it. Times are a changin'.

Twenty years ago, gay comic pioneers like Bob Smith and Kate Clinton had to define each of their terms as they went. Their acts were essentially the "coming out process" with jokes added to the explanations. I am deeply grateful for the ground work they have laid. And for the fact that I don't have to explain being gay to the audience. Their years of work, and the explosion of gay television, have literally built the stage upon which I stand.

This weekend I was able to work bits into my act in ways that looked spontaneous. The women brought up Tom Cruise. So I did my bit about him, "We had a meeting and we've decided ... since he's lost his fucking mind we don't want him anymore. You can have him. Tom Cruise is straight." It's a mediocre joke with nothing particularly original about it. But it got a big laugh because it looked impromptu.

I also tried out this bit that's been kicking around my head which involves picking a cute guy on a date with girl and having some fun at his expense. This worked fantastically well. It also helped bring some critical balance to the crowd work. He was sitting on the other side of the room from the group of women. So it helped bring that side of the room into the show. I like this bit a lot. It's what I wanted to do when I got into this ... talk to straight people from a gay point of view and show we're not that different.

I've been experimenting with moving my autobiographical material to the middle or end of my set, instead of the beginning. My thought here is that the audience is more likely to care about my back story once I've established a connection. I've also wanted to develop a set without any of the Utah stuff at all.

I tried that at my Caroline's gig many months ago. I had some cute stories, but the energy was too low and they desperately needed editing. I've come a long way since then.

Saturday night, with the revised election bit, the crowd work, picking on the straight guy ... just as I was about to go into the Utah stuff I got the light. So I went into my current sign off bit instead, "Gay is Trendy."

Boom!

Without even planning it, I had done a set with crowd work and a set without the Utah stuff. All that worry and it finally happened, naturally, all by itself, and it wasn't in the least bit scary.

A lot of crowd work is just having a nice catalog of bits at the ready. Then when someone says something that hooks into one of them, you're golden. So I've realized this is something that will come more and more naturally with time. It's also an incentive to write ... to build the catalog.

For months I've been striving to take my own, natural, loud, boisterous, life of the party personality on stage with me. It's finally working. Delilah, owner of the Laugh Lounge, challenged me to figure out who I want to be on stage. And she made a suggestion that has become my mantra ...

Larger Than Life.

Watching the show Saturday night I also got a lesson in what not to do. One of the comics allowed that group of about 15 women, who comprised half the audience to completely hijack their set. As this comic went deeper and deeper with the group, getting their names, learning where they were from, and even bringing one of their cell phones on stage, I watched the rest of the audience. They grew bored from being ignored. They became restless, shifting in their seats, their attention wandered, their eyes glazed over. One couple even left.

These were subtle things that only lasted for a few minutes. It wasn't a major thing. But I noticed them and made mental note.

Malicious hecklers want to steal the agenda outright. But even good-natured hecklers want to derail the agenda and make it about themselves.

Crowd work is fun. And audiences, as much as they may protest "don't pick on me," secretly like it when the show becomes about them.

But I believe a comic has a responsibility to include everyone and to deliver "the show" for which everyone came and for which everyone paid. The quiet, respectful people are every bit as entitled to "the show" as the loud, drunken table.

I feel good about the balance I struck between these competing priorities on Saturday night. And I had a good time to boot.

The weekend's two shows, the one that was canceled and the one that wasn't, combined to give me a major attitude adjustment. I am reinvigorated. My enthusiasm is renewed. And I'm deeply grateful for the opportunities I have to learn my craft and have fun doing it.

Building the Tower

To be on stage, there's a mental preparation process I go through. It starts in the shower. I always run my set at least once in the shower.

I like the shower. I often have good ideas in there. I'm not sure why the shower is so conducive to the creative process. But I think it has something to do with being naked and alone with hot water.

To do my thing, I need to be in a certain frame of mind. Performers call this mind set "being on". I sometimes think of this state of mind in a very literal way, as building a structure in my mind, a tower.

When I'm in a good mood, energized and looking forward to a show, the distance I need to go to achieve the right state of mind is short and the effort required to build my tower small.

When I'm a bad mood, the distance is light years and the effort gargantuan.

I've been in rather a sour mood lately. So when my show last week, the one with only three people, was almost canceled, I was almost relieved. Because still only 40 minutes before I went up, I hadn't finished building my tower. But once the show started, I finally pulled myself together, gave a good performance, enjoyed it and was glad to be there.

This weekend was to be a double-show weekend, a real treat. But I wasn't appreciating it.

It's been a frustrating week and I was pretty depressed last night. So the process of getting ready, mentally, felt like dragging a dead elephant through the streets while wrapped in chains.

But as I always do, I psyched myself up to the task at hand and was quite chipper by the time I arrived at the club. So I was genuinely disappointed when no one came and the show was canned.

The process of getting ready left me in a good mood, even without the show. So instead I went out for a beer. And I'm pleasantly surprised to find my good mood has endured through to this morning. I sort of expected it to collapse when the show was cancelled.

What have I learned?

1. Having a show taken away has made me realize how grateful I should be and am to have the opportunities to perform that I do.
2. With the right incentive, I have it within me, through sheer force of will, to turn a bad mood into a good mood if I really want to.
   

I'm looking forward to tonite's show.

My Promising Future in Voice Over

On Sunday night I went to Adam Sank's new show at Therapy Bar. (He blogged about it.) It was after the Emmy Awards and he had this whole intro bit with a little trophy and celebrity acceptance speech parody. I love how Adam is often willing to go way out on a limb to do customized intros for some of his gigs. It shows the audience that he is paying attention to the particulars of the evening and willing to go to special effort for them.

Adam had me read his intro into an off stage mic as part of the whole gag. After the show he came over to thank me for doing his intro. The audience member I was sitting next to said, "Oh, that was you? I thought it was a drag queen."

Perfect.

If you want something done right ...

I recently tried to find an attractive, ready-made web site template to use for Sacred Underwear. After many, many hours, I finally concluded that all the free and inexpensive templates out there are butt ugly!

So I gave up looking, bit the bullet and created a new look for the site myself. Have a gander....

www.sacredunderwear.com

In case you're wondering, yes, I took that photo. Those clouds are Swedish. ;-)

Three

I was sitting in the club with the show producer before my Joe Franklin gig this week. With 15 minutes to go the room was empty, which is unusual. Two guys came in, who had been barked (handed flyers on the street) and were a bit tentative.

"There's no one here. Hey, why should we come to the show?"

"Because we're funny!" I replied.

I find that this simple statement said with way too much enthusiasm, almost always gets a laugh. I think because it's just so strangely obvious. It's as if I'd said, "Look! I have a head!"

After a brief chat the guys left saying they'd return. I wasn't sure whether my banter had convinced them to come back or driven them away. But as they left one guy called out to the other, "That was the comic."

The comic?

I though about doing a 90 minute show myself and found the idea intriguing and daunting.

Someday.

The show almost didn't happen. At show time there was one person in the audience, a cute Venezuelan guy named Pedro ... naturally.

The producer held out a few minutes and the two guys came back. So with three, count 'em, three people she decided to proceed. Woo Hoo!

Because the room was so empty my comic buddy Jamie Jackson suggested we all sit in the audience seats, instead of huddling together in the corner like a bunch of wet puppies as we usually do. A good suggestion to be sure, but I said to Jamie, "you think by the end of the show the three people in the room who aren't comics won't notice that everyone else has gone up one at a time and told jokes?"

To which Jamie replied, "Maybe they'll panic and say 'I didn't know I was supposed to have jokes! I'm not prepared! Oh no!'"

This amused me greatly. I thought about using this on stage but decided against it since it wasn't my idea.

Jamie MC'ed the show. I always like having Jamie as the MC, which is a thankless job. He has truck loads of enthusiasm and really helps get things going. Is so much easier going on stage following Jamie's energy than to the dead air of some listless MCs.

The comic who went up right before me wasn't doing too well. The guy I'd chatted with before the show yelled out, "You suck! We want to see him!" And he pointed at me.

So that wasn't awkward at all.

So I went up. Three people. Nothing at stake. Nothing to lose. I had fun.

I tried a new joke about our local elections for Mayor that worked. It's an infantile bit making fun of one of the candidate's names, "Wiener". What a hack. Next I'll be doing "pull my finger" jokes. But must confess a feeling of deep satisfaction in getting the audience to chant "Wiener, Wiener, Wiener."

I tried rearranging my set a bit, moving the Utah autobiographical stuff into the middle instead of the front. This material either works or it doesn't. I've been racking my brains trying to figure out what the determining factor is. For a while I thought that it was mostly young audiences that didn't go for it. But some young audiences love it.

The one thing I have noticed is that audiences that don't go for the Utah stuff, nearly always go for the computer jokes, the more generic gay stuff and dick jokes.

One hypothesis that's been kicking around my head is that autobiographical material may work better after I've made them laugh a time or two. They're more likely to be interested in my back story once I've established a connection.

This sounds good on paper. I have no idea if it's correct. Playing around with the set order is my way of trying to figure this out.

Another possibility is that I might be doing something different with the delivery of which I'm not aware. There are just so many variables here. I'm pretty sure that connection, presentation, accessibility and relevance are the factors here. In time I expect the answers will come into focus.

I'm starting to be able to get a sense of an audience by watching how they react to the comics who go up before me. But it's tricky and I'm often wrong.

In the end, the only way I'm sure a bit will work is to do it and see what happens. If it's not working, lately I've been trying to adapt on the fly, to get out and do something else. I watch the pros do this with fluid mastery.

My two security blankets on stage have always been the microphone and my script. Doing crowd work, frankly, terrifies me. So I have usually stuck to my script. It's safe. But the more comfortable I get, the more chances I'm willing to take. And the more willing I am to deviate from the fucking sacred script.

I'm actually pretty loose about my set list these days. Little by little I am engaging the audience more, being chatty, reacting to comments and things that happen in the room ... just trying to be present and aware.

I'm also getting more comfortable with the idea of abruptly switching gears. If a bit is not engaging the audience, I'm the only one who will know if I decide not to finish it and start something new. In this regard I've decided that connection is far more important than continuity ... at least at a regular gig. At an audition gig, structure and continuity have a more important role.

Back to Pedro ... I wished I'd tortured him with my pathetic broken Spanish.

"Yo tomo uno refresco en el cafe con el burro con los huevos mas gigante en el mundo y una puta con queso."

"I have a refreshment in the cafe with a donkey with the most gigantic balls in the world and a whore with cheese."

This is something I do to my mother and three siblings who actually speak fluent Spanish and I think it would have been funny. But after trying the election stuff and bantering with the audience I ran out of time.

Ah well. Next time.

1,034 Channels of Insipid Drivel ... Now with 30% More Crap!

Would you like to know how much my monthly Time Fucking Warner Fucking Digital Fucking Cable Fucking Tele-Fucking-Vision Fucking Bill has gotten up to?

$142.11!!!!!

The only conclusion I can possibly draw from this is that I must absolutely fucking love television.

Fuck.

The Art of Collecting Photons

My friend and fellow photographer, artist, nerd Murray Williams has published a stunning beautiful slide show of his photography.

Muffins in Space!

The new Battelstar Galactica is the best show on Television.

That's right, punk. You heard me, bitch.

Not, the best science fiction show on Television.

The best show.

Period.

And it's not just us nerds that think so. The critics agree. (Not that I give a flying fuck about them.)

Why?

The writing, the acting and the directing of course.

What else could it be possibly be?

The Master Showman

I've been watching Steve Jobs' MacWorld keynote addresses and other presentations for years. He is the master showman. Steve Jobs presents the release of each new product as a "Revolution!" And the world believes him. His genius, drive, charisma, magnificent arrogance and showmanship practically bend space and time around him. People call it the "Steve Jobs Reality Distortion Field."



His sheer force of personality is the reason why Apple Computer continues to lead the tech industry. Without him, in 1997 Apple would have fallen into an interesting footnote.

People often hate creative geniuses like Steve Jobs and Carl Sagan for their arrogance. This is precisely why I like them. There are few beliefs more arrogant than, "I can change the world." But it is precisely that attitude and that arrogance that is required to create change.

Visionaries are usually arrogant. Because usually only the arrogant can withstand the monotonous, relentless drum beat of the status quo, "You can't. You won't. It shouldn't be. You'll fail."

"I can. I will. It should be. Watch me."

Every time I watch The Jobs, I fall under his spell. No matter what he's selling, while he's selling it, I'm buying. And it's not until a couple hours later and the effect wears off that I go, "Wait a minute! It's not a revolution! It's just a fucking mouse!"

But I love him and admire him for it, for his ability to make me believe and to want.

Years ago, I drank the Apple Kool-Aid. I'm a little older now. And I no longer count myself among the true believers. But I still use Macs. As a computer consultant, I make my living on Macs when I can, and on PCs when I have to. I still have a fondness for The Macintosh Way. And I still like a good technology show.

Steve Jobs' most recent webcast was for the launch of the iPod Nano and iTunes Phone. The "news" in this presentation is, "We made the iPod smaller and we made a cell phone that plays music."

That's it.

Smaller.

Phone.

Period.

But I defy you to remember that while you're watching it. I defy you to not believe that it's a "Revolution!" And I defy you to not want to buy two of everything he's selling by the end of the show.

If you want to see the intersection of technology and art done right, check it out.

Opposites Attract

Under the title, "I Hate Gay Men," fellow gay comic and sexy little vixen, Adam Sank, mentioned in his blog the problem that gay comics have with gay audiences. Put simply, gay audiences are not impressed by gay comics. "Yeah, whatever fag boy. We've heard it all before."

I have experienced this myself. I have bombed in front of gay crowds as badly as anyone has ever bombed. So I don't pretend to be an expert on this. But I do have a few thoughts about this, about which I will now proceed to ramble.

Straight audiences see us as fun, cosmopolitan, catty, outrageous ... whatever. Especially tourists, "Oh goody! A gay comic! I loooooove Will & Grace!" We get extra credit from straight crowds just for being gay. 95% of the crowds I play are straight and I'm usually the token homo on the bill. So I have fun with that status and get extra laughs for it.

But the flip side is that our own people really make us work. They're inherently bored by us, because they are us and we are them. There's nothing intriguing about being gay for them.

The same is sometimes true in reverse for straight girl comics, who can have a tough time with mainstream crowds. If they're ugly, the guys hate them. And if they're pretty, the girls hate them. (It ain't PC, but it's true.) But gay male audiences love girl comics. Witness the force of nature that is Margaret Cho and her eight billon gay fans. Girl comics get extra credit from gay men for being themselves. "You go girl!"

I find that just realizing these dynamics can help.

Some of my gay material is constructed to play to the audience's reaction of, "Oh neato! He's gay!" And when I play straight rooms a lot, I get used having that there. When that feeling isn't there, that means of establishing a connection doesn't work. That doesn't mean the bits can't work. It just means there needs to be a shift in attitude and delivery.

I find that if I just switch inside my own head from "Look at me, I'm gay, Wheeeee!" to, "OK, we're all gay here, so let's relate," sometimes it's enough.

Gay comic Michael Brill is an absolute master at this. Every time I play a show with him at Don't Tell Mama's I learn from him. I watch him on stage with something approaching awe. He can connect to any audience, gay or straight, guys or gals, time and again.

If I'm having a tough time connecting to a particular crowd I'll play to the girls first. As a gay comic, I can use that gay guy/straight girl bond to bring the girls in. In fact, whether or not I'm having a tough time, I usually play to girls first, even if it's just for 30-60 seconds.

Guys out on dates with girls wanna get laid after the show. And most girls hate homophobic guys. So if the guy is a jerk, he's not gettin' any.

"Ooooo! Isn't he fabulous, honey?"

"Yeah, sure, baby. Whatever. Have I told you how great your tits look in that outfit?"

So girls bring their guys with them. This is still true when the guys are gay. Get the fag hags and you'll get their fags with them.

So, yeah, gay crowds are tricky for a gay comic.

But, "Ve hov vays ov making you laugh."

This Is Getting Out Of Hand

These are the campaign brochures I received today. Not this month or this week. Today. A single day. It's been like this for weeks ... and for a measly, off-year primary no less.

There's the reasonable candidate.
The angry candidate.
The ambitious corporate candidate.
The selfless community candidate.
Several this, that or the other minority, "it's our turn to hold this office," candidates.
And then there's someone who is really pissed off that one of the candidates supports capital punishment, although I can't tell who.

Enough already!

I'm voting for the pretty boy.

(Did anyone really expect any different from me?)

The Sistine Car Park

Does anything say glamour better than bad Davinci knock offs in a parking lot? I think not. Visit these masterpieces for yourself at the Chelsea Piers.

Let's Beer!

My friend Ron, aka Tarzan Boy, has just arrived in Japan for a year stint teaching English.

Which reminds me what a kick I get out of Engrish, the Japanese habit of making products, signs and stores with badly mangled English.

I took this photo in Japan four years ago. (Click for a closer look.) The box reads, "Let's Beer! Any time, any where, all friends come together and drink beer with fun. It's excellent to drink beer with all the people!"

Yay! I couldn't agree more!

For more mangled English fun, check out www.engrish.com.

Get Your Blog On! (RSS)

I've mentioned RSS Feeds before. Put simply they allow you to read a bunch of news or other items from many different web sites all on the same page. This is fabulous for blogs. By subscribing to the RSS Feeds from all my friends blogs, I can read them all on a single page. It's quick, easy and free. You can do it too, and it's much easier than you think.

The first thing you need is a browser that supports RSS Feeds. There are two popular ones. For Mac there's Safari and Firefox. For PCs there's just Firefox.

Microsoft Windows Internet Explorer doesn't support RSS Feeds. But it does support your computer being hijacked by various pornographers and hackers. Please oh please won't you switch to something safe? Do it for me.

Once you're using the right browser, here's what you can do!

This next link demonstrates RSS Feeds. If you're using Safari, click on it and you'll see how cool it is!

RSS Feeds for Dale and All His Buddies

This is really easy to set up.

Safari RSS Setup

The first thing you should do is create a folder on your bookmarks toolbar. Call it something like "RSS Feeds" or "Mondo News".

Watch for sites that offer RSS Feeds.

In Safari, you'll see this logo at the top.

When you see this icon click it. You can be sure you're looking at a feed page because the address starts with "feed://" instead of the usual "http://". Then drag the site address into the folder you created on your bookmarks bar.

Here's some more help.

Safari RSS Feeds


Firefox RSS Setup

RSS seems to work best in Firefox as a Sidebar. Turn your Bookmark Sidebar on.

View -> Sidebar -> Bookmarks

Create a folder for your RSS Feeds and watch for sites that offer them.

In Firefox, you'll see this logo at the bottom.

Click the logo and choose "Subscribe to this feed."

Here's some more help.

Firefox RSS Feeds

Advice for Bloggers
If you are a blogger yourself, you may already be publishing an RSS Feed and not know it. Blogger.com, LiveJournal.com and a lot of other blog engines support RSS and you don't have to do anything extra. Just check your blog settings and make sure RSS Feed publishing is turned on.

Blogosphere

I've added links to friends' blogs to the panel at the right. These are intelligent, funny folks whose musings I enjoy very much.

If you're using Windows Explorer you'll have to scroll to the bottom of the page to see them. (I'm having a template issue I can't figure out. Help! Murray? Are you there?)

And if you're still using Windows Explorer, for fuck's sake, go download Firefox right now! It's free and will keep you from getting infested with spyware. Which, if you're using Windows Explorer, you probably are already.

Worst Ever Bar Pickup Offer

This is the offer I received last night at 3:00 A.M. from a drunk "straight" Dominican guy who claimed he'd never been in a gay bar before.

"You can't come back to my place because my mother will be there, but if you want to share a taxi, I'll give you a handjob on the ride home."

Oooooo ... pinch me.

Tough Crowd

The crowd at Joe Franklin's Comedy Club last night was tough, tough, tough. They just weren't givin' it up, to anyone, for anything. The headliner was black albino, Victor Varnado, a guy whose unique style and stories I quite enjoy. They didn't even perk up for the headline act, something I've never seen before. Usually no matter how stingy a crowd is, they'll finally start getting into it once they've gotten their two drinks in them ... not these folks.

I think part of a the problem is that the light in the room is too bright. There's a good reason comedy clubs are usually dark. If people feel like they're being too-closely watched, they get self conscious. If they're self conscious, they won't laugh. In fact, like a geisha they'll actually intentionally stifle their own laughter because the don't want to be seen laughing. I saw some of them doing that last night.

I gently mentioned the lighting to the show producer afterwards and she agreed. In fact, she's way ahead of me. She said dimmers are being installed, which I think will help the atmosphere immensely. It's a small thing, but it's one of the many factors that determine whether a show works or not.

Despite the crowd's low energy, I enjoyed myself. Leighann Lord's attitude rings in my ears, "They're facing the stage and they're paying attention. I can work with that."

And so can I.

I dragged a few good laughs out of them and tried a few new things I've been wanting to do.

One of them is a simple little audience participation gag that worked far better than I'd ever hoped it could. In fact, them being only barely engaged made it work even better.

I've been thinking a lot lately about how material that actively engages the audience usually gets the strongest response of anything. That's why crowd work, works.

I was also thinking this week about two things: how I enjoyed having fun at the expense of last week's hecklers, and how one of my girl comic friends at the show was teasing me for the white silk pants I often wear to perform.

I combined these two things into the following little practical joke on the audience.

I did two short bits, including the opening bit about my new clothes, and then I said,

"I have a theory I'm hoping you folks will help me out with. I think comedy show audiences can be divided into two groups. So group one, by applause please, everyone who's already figured out that I'm your token homo comic for the night."

[A smattering of chuckles and two people clapped timidly.]

"And the second group, by applause please, blind retards."

[Big laughs, nods of recognition and most of the rest of the audience applauds.]

"You sir, you couldn't figure it out?! How much help did you need?! I'm wearing white pants and the gayest shirt ever! I got this shirt because the costume department for Will & Grace thought it was just too flamboyant!"

The bit worked really well, but for exactly the opposite reason I thought it would.

I expected almost everyone would respond to the first question, leaving only a couple people to pick on with the second question. Instead, only a couple people responded to the first question. So by refusing to participate, they put themselves into the second category without knowing what it would be. So part two worked as a kind of "Gotcha!"

I like this bit a lot and plan to make it part of my regular set whenever I'm the only gay comic in a show with a straight crowd. I think it will play especially well with the tourists.

Speaking of Leighan, she mentioned me in her blog recently. She commented on me, commenting on her. And now I'm commenting on that. Oh the circle of love just goes 'round and 'round.