Al Green, a big Italian guy, a loud drunk Mexican guy, the boyfriend's cool, and Happy Birthday to my first ex. Whew.

Hey, I never told you about Sunday night’s Al Green concert down at Buffalo Bill’s arena in Primm. It was fantastic! I picked up my BFF Joey D at Green Valley Ranch, where he was staying, and you ain’t seen nothin’ till you’ve seen a 270-pound hunka-hunk of New York Italian manliness stuffed into a tiny Saturn coupe. He was his own air bag. My driving must be getting better because only once did he say he might throw up. Marone.

I’d never been to Buffalo Bill’s, or to Primm for that matter. Primm is on the Nevada-California border about 40 miles south of Vegas, and there’s no real town or anything, just a cluster of hotel/casinos. The arena was pretty typical, and though I swore off arena shows a few years ago after needing binoculars to see the Rolling Stones in Fresno, these were free tickets courtesy of HouseSeats.com, so I wasn’t about to complain.

I was surprised the venue was just about completely full; I saw Al Green a few years ago at the House of Blues in Mandalay Bay and it didn’t seem sold out, and that’s a much smaller place. In the casino lounge before the show, we enjoyed a fabulous band called Showtime that played Motown covers and blues—so much fun! Joey D has a wonderful, powerful singing voice, and if he were mine to nag, I’d be right on him about hooking up with a band, but I was happy enough to hear him sing along from where we stood.

The show in Primm was actually better, I think, than the one I saw at House of Blues. Our seats weren’t that great—kind of in the nosebleed section, but they were fine for being free. We were having a great time until this loud drunk Mexican guy sat next to Joey D. Yeah, it's all good until Joey D says, "I'm gonna kill this motherf*cker" under his breath. I guess Loud Drunk Mexican Guy kept spilling beer on Joey D as he got into the music and spit every time he yelled toward the stage, so I couldn't blame my friend for being pissed, especially since I accidentally spit on him on the drive down when he was crammed in my little car. Poor guy. When you're in Vegas, you don't exactly think you're gonna need a raincoat to go to a goddamn concert, you know?

Yeah, I spit when I talk--how adorable is that? I say in my comedy act that I can tell how much my date is into me by how long it takes him to nonchalantly wipe my saliva off his face. As you can imagine, I've had a lot of first dates. Mike told me that in the early days, my spit once landed on his lip and he didn't even wipe it off, which to me is a sign of true love.

Mike.

Man, talk about being pissed. Spittin' mad, if you will. He was mad at me, I was mad at him, we're both stubborn as hell, but Tuesday night we finally said three little words to each other. He said, "I screwed up" and I said, "I am sorry," which kinda pained me, but things are cool. Until the next time he shows up a half hour late for a date. KIDDING.

Hey, speaking of Mexicans (not Mike, I'm back to Loud Drunk Mexican Guy), I have a burning Ask-a-Mexican question: How come you never see Mexicans wearing glasses? They do squint a lot--is it because of the sun or are they nearsighted and in need of some corrective lenses? What do you think?

The things I wonder about...

One last thing. As I look at the date, I'm reminded it's my first ex's birthday. Chris Blackwell is a wonderful man, a devoted father, and God bless him, he put up with me for 18 years. If you see Chris around Albany today, buy him a drink and give him a hug from me.