Li'l Jimmy

I took a trip to Baltimore this weekend with a couple of friends. Our mission: to see Opie and Anthony Show regular Jim Norton at the Baltimore Improv. But of course nothing in my life is ever as simple as it should be.

I booked a hotel from a travel site, following a link to the Inner Harbor Days Inn, bought tickets to the show, and got the directions to the hotel from Mapquest. On Saturday morning, we loaded up the car and hit the road. The first clue that something was wrong was when the Mapquest directions took us past the Inner Harbor exits on I-95. But we soldiered on to the exit specified, and immediately after getting off the highway we were greeted by a "Welcome to Baltimore" sign. After a bit of driving around through some pretty rough neighborhoods, we ended up at the hotel--nowhere near the Inner Harbor area. It turns out that the link I clicked on took me to another Days Inn--right in the heart of one of the bad sections of town.

Fortunately, because we got an early start, we had plenty of time to call and cancel the reservation. (Fortunately, my friends have cell phones--I'm pretty sure I'm the last person I know who doesn't.) Then we drove to the Inner Harbor, and were able to get a room at the right Days Inn, and were able to continue as planned. We did a bit of walking around, stopped for a late lunch/early dinner at the Capital City Brewery, then walked over to the Improv to see the show.

And it was a really great show. It was very different from what Jim does on the O&A show, but was absolutely hilarious. Norton has a great act and great delivery, and didn't miss a beat while berating some loud chatty broad in the audience--or when said broad tripped over a step and hit the deck. I was hoping to get a picture with Jim for this site, but the line was just too long--we'd gone to the 7 PM show, so we hit another local microbrew pub for the next couple hours. We also got a chance to size up the crowd coming in for the 9 PM show, and we chose the right one. As my pal Matt pointed out, "I've never seen that many neck tattoos in one place before." Jim Norton puts on a great show, and as long as your sensibilities aren't easily offended, I highly recommend you take the opportunity to see his act if he comes to a town near you.