Fortune Feimster: Good Fortune (2022) - full transcript

Please welcome
Fortune Feimster!

♪ I'm a powerful woman ♪

♪ Always get what I want ♪

♪ So don't you get in my way now
That's not what I want ♪

♪ 'Cause I'm a powerful woman ♪

♪ Always get what I want ♪

♪ So don't you get in my way now
That's not what I want ♪

♪ 'Cause I'm a powerful woman ♪

♪ Always get what I want ♪

♪ So don't you get in my way now
That's not what I want ♪

♪ 'Cause I'm a powerful woman ♪



♪ Always get what I ♪

♪ Powerful woman, oh, yeah ♪

Oh man!

Stop!

Stop!

Chicago, what's going on?

Oh man!

Thank you for being here at the beautiful
Chicago Shakespeare Theater.

A lot has transpired
in the last couple of years, right?

The world has dealt with some crazy stuff.

It felt like the end of times,

and I thought lesbians
would be built for that, you know?

Put us in a bunker
with some canned hams, we're good.

But things went south,
and I learned a lot about myself.



I found out I have zero survival skills.

None.

All I had to do was stay home.

I got nothing accomplished.

No sourdough was started in my house.

I didn't learn
how to make cold brew. Nothing.

It was my partner, Jax, who surprised me.

She was the one
outside painting our fence,

rewired our electricity,

fixed our plumbing.

I was the one on the couch every night,

just watching documentaries
about old people in love.

Just crying in my Ugg boots.

I found out, y'all.

I'm not butch.

Yeah.

I am not butch, which is shocking, I know,

'cause I have these broad shoulders
and my favorite color is plaid.

But this is a preview
to a whole different movie

than what you think you're about to watch.

As they say,
the carpet does not match the drapes.

Two things that I do not know
how to install.

I look very handy, though. I do.

I look handy.

If you saw me
and your car was broken down,

you might assume I could fix your car.

I got that look about me,
'cause that is what a butch lady can do.

She can literally
put your car on her back...

...and walk it to a service station.

She can actually
just spit in your gas tank...

...and your car will start.

Magical. But that is not me.

And men are the most mystified
by this information.

They come up to me constantly
at, like, a Home Depot

because they assume I work there.

They're like, "Uh, what's up, dude? Um..."

"Where are the nails?"

I'm like, "Ooh, I'm here
for a potted plant."

"I do know
they sell M&M's at the checkout."

We got bored at one point,

and we drove out to the desert
in California, out to Joshua Tree,

and I noticed up ahead on the freeway,
there was this car broken down,

and this guy whose car it was,
he was really tall.

He was ripped, shirtless,
he had a man bun.

Straight ladies,
are we still into man buns?

No!

Oh, hard no right there.

Wow.

This guy had on
black-and-white striped pants.

Looked like a gorgeous prisoner
that had escaped.

Now his car is broken down
on the side of the road.

I'm driving past him,
I look over my shoulder, I realize

it's Jason Momoa. Yeah.

Oh, you like man buns now, don't you?

Yeah.

That's what I thought.

It was Aquaman,

miles from the ocean, just

stranded in the desert
without his superpowers.

Beautiful, shirtless.

I kept driving.

We've been over this. I can't fix his car.

I can't give him a BJ while he waits
for somebody else to fix his car.

I got nothing for this man.

I did the next best thing.

When I had to get gas,
I went to his Instagram page.

"Let me just double-check
to see if it was him."

To me, all dudes look alike.

Went on his page,
he had posted a picture of him

in the black-and-white striped pants,
side of the road.

I went, "Oh my God, that was Jason Momoa."

And I gave his picture a like.

I did my part.

But I'm a lot different
than what meets the eye.

I am a dainty lady.

I am a delicate flower.

I like a massage every now and then.

This girl likes to be pampered, y'all.

I got a butt massage
for the first time recently.

Have y'all had one of those? Oh man!

I'm not talking
about an elbow to the glute.

I'm talking full-on butt, booty massage.

I mean, I was
at this very respectable spa,

on my stomach, and this guy
just started going in on my ass.

Making noises too.

I went...

I clutched my invisible pearls.

I had never been touched
by a man like this before.

He just kept digging into my butt,

and he unlocked some sort of treasure.

I had never felt
anything that good before.

I went home that night light as a feather.

A whole new woman.

I cooked a three-course meal.

I don't even know how to cook.

I called a few days later.

I had to book another appointment.

This guy was booked solid for a month.

I was like, "Oh, this is, like, his thing.
He's the butt massage guy,

and everybody knows about it."

So I finally got back in there
a month later, same thing.

Went in on my ass.

This time for, like, 30 minutes.

He spent more time on my butt than
I have ever spent taking care of my face.

He wouldn't touch anything else.
Like, my feet, "Ugh, gross! Ugh."

Just all butt.

Went home. Called a couple of days later
to make another appointment.

He had gotten fired.

Yeah, somebody ruined it for all of us.

Freaking butt narc.

Turns out he unlocked too many treasures.

But the one person
I did not want to find out

that I'm not as tough as I appear

is my partner, Jax.

I did not want her
to know this information,

because before me,
she dated nothing but butch women,

and I'm talking butch.

I'm talking cops,
truckers, and bouncers. Oh my!

Butch.

I'm a whole different vibe.

I'm like, "Who wants a hug?"
Like, so different.

But we were going
to this fancy Hollywood event,

and I was trying to play the part,
so I had on my Men's Wearhouse suit.

Jax had on her dress and heels, and we got
a phone call from the alarm company.

They said our home alarm was going off,

and did we want them
to send security out to check?

I said, "Absolutely."

We turn back around.
We get home, and nobody's there yet.

Jax shifts. She goes, "Well,
we got to go in and assess the situation."

I'm like, "No, we don't."

She said, "Well,
my ex, Darlene, who was a cop,

said that home alarms
are the lowest of the priority."

I was like, "Wait."

"I thought that ex's name was Pam."

She's like, "There is a Darlene and a Pam.
Maybe you're thinking about Sheila."

I'm like, "How many cops?"

She dated, like,
the whole lady force of Chicago.

She said, "You're really not gonna
go inside and check the house?"

I said, "No!" So she grabbed
the high heel off of her foot like this

and held it up like a weapon,

and she charged in there
with one shoe off.

Just going room to room,

like she was gonna Jimmy Choo
someone's face if they jumped out.

I stayed in the doorway
'cause I had on flats.

I'm like, "How am I gonna protect myself?
I don't have a kitten heel on, nothing."

I heard a noise at one point,
so I held the key fob up higher.

I was like, "I will press this button,
I swear to God."

"It says 'Panic, ' and I'm panicked."

The alarm company called,
they said it was a false alarm.

A battery had died in one of the sensors.

They said, "We are so sorry."

"We hope we did not
cause you any inconvenience."

I said, "My partner now knows
I am useless. This is very inconvenient."

Jax came hobbling out.

She said, "You could have
at least gone in there with me."

I was like, "Oh my God,
that did not even occur to me."

So I am not the protector of my family.

And I know why Jax is so strong. I do.

She is a kindergarten teacher,
and they are tough.

They have to be.

Yeah. That's a hard job.

But I think about
when I was in kindergarten in the '80s,

and, oh boy,
they just let you do whatever.

I have a picture of me
at five years old in kindergarten class,

and I am holding

a hammer...

...and nails.

I mean, first off, somebody
should have taught me how to use 'em.

But I'm like, "Why am I holding
a hammer and nails?"

Were we practicing hammering?

Was the teacher like, "All right, class,

we're gonna build shelves
for the classroom,

and then afterwards,
maybe a nice bench for my garage"?

That's bonkers.

Imagine your five-year-old right now.

They cannot color
inside of a giant circle,

but you're gonna hand them
a large, heavy hammer

and hope that they can hit
this itty-bitty, tiny nail.

No!

But that's the kind of stuff
that they would do in the '80s.

I mean, recess alone was like, "Godspeed."

You were on your own.
I mean, think about it.

Our favorite game, dodgeball.

You were taking a large, heavy ball

and you were pummeling each other
in the face as hard as you can.

That's where we had to learn to Matrix.

To keep from getting our teeth knocked in.

That game did come in handy for me
a little bit later on in high school.

I dodged a couple of balls. Not many.

Um...

Never caught one.

It was actually Red Rover
that would get the most intense.

You guys remember Red Rover?

You get in a line with your friends
and you lock arms.

Your other friends would get in a line
across from you and they'd lock arms.

And then you yell, "Hold the line!"

"Hold the line!"

Like we're Braveheart.

You're staring your friends down
from across the field.

Your only objective is to run as hard
as you can right towards that line,

and they just wanna break your arm.

Then all you wanna do
is when they're running towards you,

you wanna grab your neighbor's arm,
you wanna pull your arms up,

and then you just wanna
crush their clavicle.

And then you start taunting each other.

You go, "Red Rover, Red Rover,

you send that little bitch Timmy..."

"...right on over."

Timmy gets that look in his eye.
He starts running as hard as he can.

We're like, "Hold the line!"

Here he comes.

We grab each other's arm.

We pull our line up.

Now Timmy's crashed through our line.

Now our arm's dangling from the socket.

We're like, "Did we win?"

"Did we hold the line?"

Your teacher's not doing anything.

She's over there on the blacktop,
just smoking a Virginia Slim.

Having some sort of midlife crisis.

She's like, "They don't pay me enough
to care about that."

The PE equipment was insane.

We had merry-go-rounds.

They're metal death traps.

They were only fun
if you would spin 'em 60 miles an hour,

and then we would try to run
and jump on 'em while they're moving.

It's like trying to jump
on the hood of a moving vehicle.

But there was nowhere to land.

There was already 20 friends
in a nook just going around.

Couldn't touch anything
'cause it's 135 degrees in the sun.

Inevitably one friend
would fall off and get trapped.

"Agh!"

Bleeding from the kneecap now, we're
trying to get our teacher's attention.

She's like, "20 more minutes!"

"This is me time."

And because I'm from North Carolina,
we used to play with tires.

Yeah, I'm talking about tires
that fell off of a Mack truck,

rolled into the elementary school
parking lot.

Our administrators are like,
"Well, we don't got much of a budget,

so we'll figure out something to do
with these old things."

These were large tires.

You stand them up, they're this tall,

like 75 pounds, hollow in the middle.

We had a hill
in the back of our elementary school,

so it was our teachers
who had to push these tires up that hill,

Just so angry,
just pushing them up there.

They're like,
"I have a master's in education."

We ran up there, we took our little
five-year-old bodies, and we would...

We got into the middle of these tires.

Our friend would take
their five-year-old body,

get in the other one.

Then it was our teachers
who would get behind each tire,

and get momentum.

"All right, you little fuckers."

"Get ready for the ride of your life."

And then they pushed us down a hill.

We got speeds of, like, 20 miles an hour,
40 miles an hour, 60 miles an hour.

There's no handle. You're just like...

We crashed into a brick wall,
flew out of the tire, vomited.

Your teacher came down the hill,
put her cigarette out on your forehead.

She'd be like, "Recess is dismissed.
In fact, school's dismissed."

"I got to go meet my man friend
who I connected with via the newspaper."

And that was recess in the '80s.

It was a different time, y'all.

It was when you could take
a large calculator

and write the word

"boobs."

Ah.

My favorite number,

80085.

I mean, yeah,
kids can get their phone out right now

and see as many boobs as they want,

but who got to write it out in numbers?

We did.

Good times, y'all.

But I'm glad to be in a relationship.

I like it. It suits me.

Dating is hard. It's really hard.
I don't know.

You got to go on apps and swipe
and do the things.

Like, if I were single,
my favorite dating app would be Grubhub.

For sure.

I think swingers
have it figured out. I do.

It had to be tough for them
dating in the pandemic,

uh, but they have ways to let each other
know that they are swingers.

Did you guys know this?

I'm gonna teach you. All right.

I found out that if you want to let
people know that you are a swinger,

you can put flamingos in your front yard.

Yeah. It gets very confusing in Florida
and at my mom's house.

Maybe that's why she's been busy
on the weekends. I don't know.

I don't quite understand it.

Do people just drive
around the neighborhoods

looking for a flock of flamingos?

They see it, they ring your doorbell
and tell you they're down to clown.

I don't know.

But I like it.

There's also, uh,
an upside-down pineapple.

You can put an upside-down pineapple
on your front porch.

Don't put it right side up.

That is just a pineapple.

I always assumed
that an upside-down pineapple

was letting people know
that you like cake.

I would stop
and ring a stranger's doorbell for cake.

But I actually got approached
by a swinger couple after a show.

Uh, they came up to me.
Yeah, it was very exciting.

And I am not an ageist,
I am just telling you a fact.

This is just a fact of the story.

They both had canes.

So this was not their first rodeo.

And the wife informed me
that her husband really enjoyed the show,

which I very much appreciated,

and she said that he had told her
by the end of the show

that she was allowed to get with me.

Sexually? I don't know.

I didn't know what to say.

So I curtsied.

Which is not a no.

But it is polite.

But you got to put yourself out there,
date different people.

I went out with different people.
I went out with a nurse at one point.

And God bless nurses. They have
gotten us through this crazy time.

Yeah.

I thought it would be different.

I thought she'd come home
in a sexy nurse outfit

and be like, "Who's got an owie?"

And I'd be like, "Me."

But it didn't work like that.
She'd come home in her dirty-ass scrubs.

She brought her work home with her.

She was always following me around
with a clipboard,

asking me about my bowel movements.

She thought I should lose weight,
which, touché.

I'm just saying it wasn't fun
to eat nachos with her,

'cause she'd look at me and then
look at the nachos and be like, "Okay."

"All right. Well, someone made a choice."

"Mm-hm."

"Three kinds of cheeses,
sour cream, and liquid cheese?"

I'm like, "It's called queso."

"And it's Spanish for heart disease."

"And it's delicious."

I knew it wasn't gonna work out
right then and there.

I was trying to find, like,
a legitimate excuse to break things off.

She's doing the Lord's work,
and I didn't wanna just be like,

"Hey, you bum me out when I eat nachos."

Then I eventually met Jax
right here in Chicago.

At Gay Pride.

Yeah.

There's hope.

We met in a parking lot.

We met in a parking lot.

That's how few lesbian bars
are left in the United States.

The lesbians are just
relegated to a parking lot

where you can either party or valet cars.

It's up to you.

But we dated for a bit, but I knew
pretty early on that, uh, Jax was the one.

And it got to the point
where I knew it was time to propose,

and I'm not known for romance,
so I called my friend.

I said, "Where should I propose to Jax?"

And she said,
"Oh, you got to go to Big Sur."

And no, that was not
my nickname in high school.

It's a town in California
out by the coast,

really beautiful bridges and cliffs.

She said, "There's this hotel,
very romantic, call there."

I called the hotel, and whoever was
on the phone was upselling everything.

I just wanted a standard cabin.
She goes, "Whoa!"

"You're gonna propose?
Don't you be cheap, okay?"

"Don't be cheap."

"You better upgrade to that ocean view,
I'm telling you."

"It's worth it."

"It's gonna knock her tits off."

I don't know if she actually said that,

but that was the energy
she was bringing to the conversation.

I'm like, "Fine."
I paid a bunch of extra money,

got this ocean view that's supposed
to be great, and off we went.

We get up there to this cabin, I walk in.
A very old cabin, very expensive cabin.

I said, "But wait till you see this view."

And I'm about to open that back door,
and I say to her,

"Hold on to your titties."

And I open that back door,
we walk outside,

and it is just fog,

fog,

fog.

Just a hateful fog.

I'm like, "What is this?
An 1800s lesbian period piece?"

"Why is there so much fog?"

"Is Kate Winslet down there
searching for fossils?"

Not how I wanted things to start,
but I was like, "It's fine."

My plan was I was gonna take her
to their fancy restaurant for dinner,

and then I would go back to the room,
and that is where I would propose.

So I, uh...
I called ahead to the hotel and I say,

"Can you guys help me make our room
look like it does in The Bachelor?"

I don't know, ladies seem to like that.

"Can we get some candles and rose petals,
uh, how about some champagne?"

"How about some strawberries?
But let's dip them in chocolate."

"Otherwise it's fruit."

They said absolutely,
charged me a bunch of money.

Happy to pay, happy to have the help.

So off we went. We go to dinner. I go
find the waiter 'cause I need his help.

I tell him what's going on.

So I walk up to him
and I see that his name is Craig.

And Craig is very dramatic.

I think that he does
local theater up there.

So I walk up to him.
I go, "Hi, Craig," and he goes,

"Hi."

I said, "Craig, I am going to be proposing
to my girlfriend tonight," and he goes,

"Oh... my... God!"

He reminded me of the candlestick
in Beauty and the Beast.

Just a lot of, like,

"You will propose,
and the curse will be broken!"

I was like, "Thank you.
I'm very excited, but I'm nervous."

"I don't want dinner to drag on.
This ring is burning a hole in my pocket."

"So they're doing stuff to our room."

"Do you mind near the end of dinner,
calling the front desk,

finding out if our room is ready,
then giving me some sort of signal,

and that's when I'll know to wrap it up?"

He goes, "Absolutely. You got it."

I said, "You don't need to offer dessert,
I'm taking care of that in the room."

He goes, "Okay."

And then he turns around like this...

...and leaves.

I'm like, "I like Craig."

So we start eating this meal,

and every course that comes out
just ends up being weirder than the next.

It's too fancy for us. It's too fancy.

It's a lot of foams
and tentacles and shells.

A lot of stuff from that "ocean"
I keep hearing about.

So everything is just a hair off,
but we finally finish dinner,

and, uh, I'm ready to get the night going,

and Craig goes,

"Hi, ladies. Who wants dessert?"

I'm like, "Not us, Craig."

He goes, "Oops!"

I was like, "Craig!"

"You had two jobs, bud."

How could someone be so excited
and incompetent all in one body?

So now Jax is very confused,

'cause she's never
not seen me order dessert.

And I'm staring at her
and I don't know what to say.

I'm thinking about getting this right,
I want it to be perfect.

It's the one story that everybody
asks you about. They want every detail.

And Craig's not coming, he's not coming.

It is the least romantic dinner
of our life.

And then finally,
after what felt like a lifetime,

Craig sneaks up behind Jax.

And he's now hovering over her shoulder.

She has no idea that he is behind her,

and he is just staring at me

so... intensely.

I have been with Jax for seven years.

We have never
looked at each other in the eye

for as long as Craig

is staring at me.

Then finally, he goes...

"Mm!"

So proud of himself.

Turns around.

Into the fog, never to be seen of again.

We're heading to the room.

I'm trying to think of all the things
I want to say to Jax.

I just want it to be perfect,
I want it to be romantic.

We're getting up to the door,
I'm starting to sweat.

I'm getting nervous,

and when I get nervous,
I start doing finger guns.

So I look at Jax and start going...

And then I am ready
to open that door to romance.

We walk in there,

and it just looks like a crime scene.

Our eyes are adjusting
'cause it's weirdly lit.

You know what a room looks like when
just the bathroom light's been left on?

I'm looking around,
there's, like, 50 tea light candles,

but they're all battery-operated.

And half of them are just dead.
They're just dead.

Ten are flickering, like, "We're trying!"

My OCD brain is like,
"Who made this call?"

But I can't even focus on it because
I'm standing on a mound of something.

There are rose petals everywhere.

Everywhere!
Not in any way that makes sense.

There's no heart shape or initials.

It's just chaos.

It looks like
someone opened that back door,

a bunch of shit flew in the room,

then they grabbed a leaf blower...

...and called it a night.

I'm like, "Did I order
the 'It'll Do' package?"

"What is this?"

And when you guys
think of roses and romance,

what color do you think of?

Red!

Red? Interesting.

Well, these were white rose petals,

half-dead.

I googled later,
"What do white roses stand for?"

It's chastity.

Yeah.

This is, in fact,
an 1800s lesbian period piece.

So even though they did not apparently
allow real candles in this cabin,

they did light a roaring fireplace,

and that was exactly
where they decided to place

the chocolate-covered strawberries

and the bucket of ice with champagne.

Both are just profusely dripping

onto the floor.

Nothing about this scenario
makes Jax think

that she is about to get proposed to.

I have a split second to decide

which direction I am going
with this night.

Do I call the front desk and be like,

"Somebody broke into our room
and destroyed it"?

Or do I lean into this

and pretend that every single thing
that is happening in that room

is exactly how I planned it?

So now I'm staring at Jax
like a deer in headlights.

I can't think of any of the romantic
things I was gonna say to her.

I'm sweating again.

I'm getting nervous.

Oh man, here come the finger guns.

I forget to get on my knee.
I can't think of anything.

I'm panicked, so I just go...

And I yelled,

"You wanna?"

Jax curtsied.

And then, thank goodness, she said yes.

Phew.

So, um... So now that we were engaged,

we had to start planning our wedding.

And we were engaged for a while,
'cause truth be told,

Jax and I are not big planners.

And then my mom, Ginger, started
offering up her wedding planning services.

And I was like, "Oh boy."

Because my mom got remarried
later on in life,

and I was at that wedding, and, um,

my mom had a circus theme.

Yeah.

She was marrying
this old-school Southern guy

who sounded like Foghorn Leghorn.

He was not part of the planning.

Uh, I don't know if my mom thought she was
planning a 12-year-old's birthday party

or her wedding,

but that's what happened.
It was a circus theme.

She invited 300 people.

That's right, 300 people.

To come to the Methodist church
for this big party.

And she rented
a red-and-white striped circus tent

and had them put it
inside the fellowship hall.

Not outside where tents go. Inside.

She rented a cotton candy maker.

She said," I'm gonna serve nachos
with 'jalapee-nos, '" as she called them.

There was a juggler.
I guess I was the clown.

She had just 12 gallons of ice cream.

The main entrée was a hot dog cart.

She just found some guy
on the side of the road the week before,

and was like,
"What are you doing on Saturday?"

And this guy got there. I don't think
he'd sold more than 20 hot dogs in a day.

And now he has 300 starving people

wrapped around the church,
just desperate for one of his wieners.

He was just like, "Agh!"

Panic.

In the middle of this party,

there were two round, plastic baby pools.

I was like,
"Are we bobbing for apples now?"

No. My mom had put ice
in both of these plastic baby pools

and then put canned soft drinks
in both of these pools

and announced to the party

that these were our coolers.

I walked in there and I saw two plastic
baby pools being used as coolers,

and I thought, "Here I am
working so hard in Los Angeles,

trying to make a name for myself,

and we are trash."

"We are trash."

My mom's man friend walked in there
in his penny loafers,

not knowing what was going on.

He about fainted. Like, "I do declare!"

But the best part was the entertainment.

They had a woman
from the church choir singing,

and this was her big solo moment,

and she took center stage so confidently,

and she started singing.

♪ Go tell it on the mountain ♪

♪ Over the hill and everywhere ♪

♪ Go tell it on the mountain ♪

♪ That Ginger ♪

♪ Got married ♪

Oh, there was more.

She started singing...

♪ Oh when the saints go marching in ♪

♪ Oh when the saints go marching in ♪

♪ How I want to be in that number ♪

♪ When the saints go marching ♪

♪ In ♪

That marriage lasted three months.

That circus tent was up
longer than my mom's marriage lasted.

So...

We started planning our wedding

and, uh, did not involve my mom.

The pandemic hit, and we thought,

"Well, I guess we're not
gonna be able to get married."

Uh, but then the fall came,
it was October,

and we're like, "Actually,
this is the perfect time to get married."

"We can do it how we want and we don't
have to worry about anybody else."

So yeah, it was great.

We planned it in two weeks,
rented an Airbnb out by the ocean,

had a stranger in a mask be our officiant.

We Zoomed our families.

I think my mom is still on that Zoom call.

And it's not how either of us
ever thought that we would get married,

but it ended up being perfect

'cause it was just about us
and just about our day,

and, uh, we even got baptized that day.

Not on purpose.

But... But we were taking these,
uh, these photographs,

and we saw the sun was setting, and
there was these stairs down to the ocean.

We were like, "Oh my gosh,
we got to get a picture here."

So we stand over there,

and our amazing photographer
got a series of pictures.

And in our first picture,
we look beautiful.

We look like, uh,
two lesbians at prom together.

Gorgeous picture.

Our second picture,
we're kind of doing this

'cause something is looming over us.

Like the principal who's angry
that two lesbians went to prom together.

Then in the third picture,
we're doing this

because the ocean is now
crashing into our earholes.

Fourth picture,
we're completely covered by water.

Fifth picture,
the ocean's been sucked back out to sea,

and we're dripping wet like...

"So glad we decided
to take this picture in the sunset."

We have all these pictures,
and I think it means it's good luck.

That's what I've been told.
It's good luck. We're gonna go with that.

But, uh, a few days after we got married,

they announced online
that we had gotten married,

and we got a lot of love and a lot
of support, which I really appreciate.

I try to put out positivity,

so when it comes back to me,
it means so much.

I try not to focus on negative stuff.

I try to surround myself,
uh, with positive things.

I try not to read negative comments,

but in a job like mine,
you do hear from a lot of people.

And I don't see everything,
but occasionally a turd will get through.

And I happened to see this message
on that day that was sent to me directly.

And, uh, I wanted to read that message
to you guys, if that's okay.

- Yes!
- Yes!

All right.

It's from a guy named Gary,

and, uh, I will preface it with

you are not going to like this message,
but we are going to unpack it together.

So here's what Gary wrote to me on the day
it was announced that I got married.

He said, "How long have you and your wife

been mentally ill,

taco-licking lesbians

who should be put in Alcatraz?"

I was like, "Wow, that

is very specific."

There was no grammar
in that message, by the way.

He was like, "Mentally ill taco licking..."

I'm like, "I think he means
'mentally ill, ' comma, 'taco, ' hyphen..."

You guys get it.

Already I'm doing him favors.

And I guess I was bored
on this particular day,

because I was like, "I just got to see
what this person looks like."

"Who sends a message like this
to a complete stranger?"

So I went on his page,
and he did not have a picture of himself.

It was a picture of an American flag,

and written across of it, it said,

"We need God in America again."

That is what Gary leads with

on Instagram,

and then that was the message
that he sent me.

I was like,

"I don't know that God

would be into the phrase 'taco-licking.'"

Call me crazy, which he did...

...but that did not sound
very Christ-like to me.

By the way, there is nowhere
in the Bible where it says

what you can or cannot do
with your Mexican food.

Just so you know.

That is up to you, my friends.

So then Gary said
that we should be put in Alcatraz.

Now, I don't know
if he doesn't have Google...

...but Alcatraz has not been a prison
for a while.

If that's what he intended,
it's not a prison.

It's actually a museum,

and it's a museum in San Francisco,

which is one of the gayest cities
in the whole world.

I'm like, "Is Gary telling me
I should be in a gay museum?"

"Gary, stop."

"Am I a trailblazer? Stop, Gary."

At the top of the message, it said
that he and I did not follow each other,

which was not a surprise.

But it did say that we followed
one person in common.

I'm like, "Who in the world
could Gary and I possibly agree on?"

"We seem like very different people."

And it said, "You both follow

Oprah."

What?

I have to say, I did not take Gary
as an Oprah kind of guy.

But that is how famous Oprah is.

She builds bridges.

So I read the message again.

"How long have you and your wife
been mentally ill,

taco-licking lesbians
who should be put in Alcatraz?"

And I was like, "Why have I not moved on
from this message?"

And I'm looking at it.

"What is it?"

Then it hit me.

I was like, "Oh my God."

"Gary just recognized my marriage."

He said,

"Your wife,"

and that is called progress.

Granted, he spelled "wife" with a Y,

but I know what he meant.

And listen, there are a lot of people
who fought many, many years

for someone like me
to be able to say "wife."

Gary said it in 2.2 seconds
without even thinking.

His head would explode if he knew
how progressive that message was.

So that is, in fact, progress, my friends.

So we got married, we stayed at home
for the next year like everybody else.

I couldn't go on the road and do my job,
which was really weird.

And now that I'm back on the road,
I do not take it for granted anymore.

It is such a beautiful thing
to come out and make people laugh,

and to add
some sort of levity to the world.

I love Chicago, I love coming here.

It's one of my favorite cities.

There was only one city on this tour
I was nervous to go back to,

and that was Des Moines.

Last time I was there,
it was in the middle of winter,

and I forgot that in the Midwest,
when it is wintertime,

and people are freezing,

they get hammered.

Hammered.

It is too cold to go outside,
there is nothing else to do.

So I get to the venue, and girls are
coming out of the bathroom like this.

There is toilet paper
on the bottom of their shoes.

It is 7 p.m.

That is where we are starting this night.

So I get out on stage,
and they are just wanting to party.

They're sending shot after shot,
and I like drinks,

but my vice is milkshakes,

so I'm good.

And they keep wanting me
to drink Fireball Whisky.

They love Fireball Whisky.

I think it tastes
like a bottle of gasoline

with a stick of Big Red chewing gum
plopped in the middle.

I'm like, "I'm good."
They're like, "What?"

"She doesn't like Fireball!"

"She doesn't like Fireball. Shit!"

They cannot fathom this information.

So now as an audience,
they only care about

trying to figure out
what drink to send me next.

"All right, okay,
she doesn't like Fireball."

"All right. Oh, vodka!"

"Yeah, send it, send it!"

All these vodka and cranberries
start coming to the stage.

"I'm not really a vodka person."
They're like, "What?!"

"Uh, she doesn't like vodka.
Shit, she doesn't like vodka."

"All right. Oh, beer! Yeah, send it."
All these beers start coming to the stage.

I'm like,
"I never acquired a taste for it."

They're like, "Well, that's surprising."

I know I look like somebody
that would pound a beer,

take the can and crush it on my forehead,

and still recycle.

I'm now taking these drinks
they've passed up.

I'm passing it back out to them.
I am only making them drunker.

They go, "Please, for the love of God,
tell us what you drink."

"You cannot leave Iowa
without having a drink with us."

I'm like, "That's a weird rule,
but all right."

I'm trying to think of a drink
that's gonna take a while to make

'cause then I can do my job,
tell some jokes.

I go, "A sangria."

I forgot where I was.

I was like, "All right, an old-fashioned."

I assume they got to find
a mixologist with a little mustache.

He's gotta freeze a large ice cube,

bitters, slice an orange...
It'll take a while.

Two minutes later,
these gorgeous old-fashioneds show up.

"All right, fine.
Is this gonna make you happy?"

I grab this drink
that's meant to be sipped, and I just...

Down the gullet.

They are so pumped.

You would think
I had just competed in a decathlon.

So they're having a good time.

We get back into the show,
we're laughing, the show's great.

Later, they start getting restless again.
I'm like, "What now?"

I look back, and there's this older woman
trying to make her way through the crowd.

She's got short, spiky, gray hair,

she's got this worn face
like she has seen some shit.

She's got a leather vest on.

I assume she's got
a dreamcatcher in her car.

She's walking very confidently
towards the stage,

and she lands right there
at the end of the stage,

and I look and I see that she is holding

a Smirnoff Ice.

Oh!

And she looks at me and she goes, "Hey."

"My name's Linda..."

"...and you are about to get iced."

I grabbed the Smirnoff Ice and I said,

"What time capsule
did you dig this out of?"

Thinking the whole crowd would agree.

They start chanting,

"Iced, iced, iced, iced, iced!"

They are relentless.
I'm like, "What is iced?"

I have no idea
what they are talking about.

This very sweet Midwestern woman
stands up. She goes,

"Getting iced is when
you get down on your knees,

you take that bottle of Smirnoff Ice,

you drink that whole bottle
all in one gulp,

and that is getting iced."

I'm not getting on my knees

and drinking a Smirnoff Ice.

The whole room yells,

"Those are the rules!"

I'm like, "I am a grown woman,
professional comedian."

Linda yells, "Get on your knees!"

"You are getting iced!"

So I got on my knee.

This would have come in handy
during my proposal.

And I start chugging this God-awful
Smirnoff Ice. Like...

This malt liquor bullshit's
falling down my face.

It's all sticky and gross,
it's ruining my perfectly good cardigan.

They're just going nuts. The audience
is going nuts. I'm like...

I finally finish this drink. Mm.

And I stand up.

And something about

that old-fashioned...

...and that Smirnoff Ice...

and that low gravity...

...did not mix.

I am immediately seeing double.

I don't finish my set.

I don't say goodnight.

I just look at the crowd and I said,

"You did this."

And I left.

Passed out backstage.

I come to, like, two hours later
in the promoter's car.

I'm waking up, I'm like,
"How did I get here?"

She said, "Well, three very large
security guards had to carry you outside."

I'm like, "I did not ask that."

"And it could have been done with two."

I said, "No, what happened?"

She said, "Well, you got iced."

"I don't know if it was that,
if it was the mix of the two alcohols."

I said, "Get me out of Des Moines!"

She goes to start the car,
and it will not start.

I'm like, "Oh my gosh,
I am not getting stuck in Des Moines!"

It's freezing cold, it's late at night,

there's no Ubers, my plane's leaving soon,

people are icing me.

I'm just ready to leave, and I hear
the doors burst open to the club.

I look over.

Here comes Linda.

She saddles up to the car.

"What's up, ladies?"

I'm like, "Hey, Linda."

I'm trying not to make
eye contact with her, 'cause

I don't know what kind of powers
that dreamcatcher has.

I said, "Hey, Linda, uh, our car
won't start, but we're good. We got it."

"Thank you for coming. Good night."

She took a look at me,
she goes...

Gives me a wink.

Walks to the back of the car,

opens up that gas tank.

Spit in the gas tank,

and I got the heck out of Des Moines.

Oh, Linda.

So I have now been married for two years.

And it's great. I love it.

And, uh, we get that next question that
you always get when you're newly married.

Everybody wants to know
if we're having kids.

And I'll tell you parents,
you are not making it look fun.

You guys all have a glaze in your eyes.

So we're dog moms right now.
That's what we're doing.

And, uh, we'll see what happens.

But we have this little Pomeranian
named Biggie.

So cute.

He's a little guy, eight pounds,

and a very happy, healthy guy,

but he came down
with something called HGE.

Now it's this thing that dogs can get

where they go from being
totally healthy and fine

to being super, super sick,

and it can be deadly.

It comes on fast, like 48 hours,

and vets don't know how dogs get this.

They say it could be from something
they ate, it could be from stress.

I was like, "The Humane Society
found Biggie eating out of a dumpster,

and now he is walking around Beverly Hills

in my wife's Gucci purse."

"He ain't got no stress."

His food is more expensive than mine.

He ain't got no stress.

So we have no idea where this came from
or how he got it,

but the signs of it start to show up

at the beginning of our flight
from LA to New York City,

five and a half hours, and every hour,
he got significantly worse.

We couldn't do anything.

We landed, it took us an hour
to drive into New York City.

We went straight to an animal hospital.

Jax took him in the examination room,

and I was filling out tons of paperwork.

It's so different
than when I grew up with pets.

I mean, back in the day, your dog slept
inside, outside, your neighbor's house.

It'd roll up after two days,

you'd be like,
"Sparky, where've you been?"

Your dog ate whatever leftovers
your grandma threw over the fence

from the Sizzler.

And if suddenly your dog required
a large medical procedure,

your parents were straight up just like,

"It's been fun, Sparky."

And that was it.

But now I am the adult.

I have to be the one
that makes these decisions.

So I filled out everything,
and I hadn't seen Biggie in 45 minutes,

so I don't know
how he's doing at this point,

but I do know this.

It is time for me to step it up

and be that protector of my family.

It is time for me to be

butch.

I have my Rocky moment,
I'm, like, hitting myself in the face.

I would do a push-up, but I can't.

I'm all bowed up,
ready to walk in that room, all tough.

I walk in that door,
and Biggie's laid on the floor.

There's blood everywhere, he is way worse,

and I lose it. I just start going...

"No!"

And Jax goes, "Get out of here!
You're bumming us out."

I got kicked out of the room!

I was forced to stand
behind the glass door.

I'm just staring at my family.

And I'd finally calmed down
'cause the nurse gave me a lollipop.

And I was so frustrated,
I was so disappointed in myself

that I couldn't just pull it together
for three freaking minutes,

but it's not who I am.

I'm a Cancer, I'm sensitive,
and I cannot change that about myself.

So I go wait in the lobby
till four in the morning.

Jax joins me, they go take Biggie back
and hook him up to all these machines.

Finally, the vet comes out
and he talks to us.

He says, "Listen, it is bad."

"He is at, like, 5%."

"And we will do whatever we can
to try and save him,

but for us to do that, he will have
to be here for three to four days,

round-the-clock care."

"He's gonna have
to have transfusions, plasma."

"We can't even guarantee
that it will work."

"But for us to try,

it is going to cost a minimum

of $10,000."

"What do you two want to do?"

Jax is like, "$10,000? I'm a teacher."

"That's like a whole year's salary."

I'm like, "$10,000?"

"He's eight pounds.
How much plasma could he possibly need?"

"He can't just share a crate
with a squirrel?"

The vet's like, "I need an answer."
I'm like...

Jax isn't saying anything, so it's clear
I've got to make this decision.

I'm like...

I'm like, "What would my parents do?
No, no, don't think that."

Jax is starting to get more upset.
I'm like...

So I pulled out my man wallet...

...and I grabbed my credit card

and slammed it on the table.

I said, "Charge it."

And then I looked Jax

dead in the eye, and I said,

"You think Darlene could have done that?"

"No!"

"Pam is broke."

"Sheila has shitty-ass credit."

Who's butch?

I'm butch!

And the best part is, you guys,
they did, in fact, save Biggie's life.

Who's that?

This is Biggie, everybody!

Worth every single penny
right here, you guys.

And give it up, everybody,
for my wife, Jax!

That's it from me, everybody.

Thank you so much.

Aw, thank you, guys.

Thank you, Chicago!

Look at that.

Goodnight, you guys. Thank you.

♪ You know we like to keep it lowkey ♪

♪ Windows down, feel the breeze ♪

♪ No cares, no worries ♪

♪ Just you and me ♪

♪ You and I, we don't have to try ♪

♪ We just work, can't deny ♪

♪ I know you'll stay by my side
Ride or die ♪

♪ It's feeling good ♪

♪ It's feeling good ♪

♪ it's feeling good, good, good ♪

♪ Good, good, good, good ♪

♪ It's feeling good, good, good ♪

♪ Good, good, good, good ♪

♪ It's feeling good ♪