Four years ago, when I was very sick and recovering from pneumonia and a two-week coma, I had plenty of time to watch TV in the hospital. I've always loved animals, and the hospital carried the Animal Planet, which I had not seen much. Every day I would wake up at 6 for breakfast, and then have nothing to do, so I would watch reruns of old shows on Animal Planet. One show that I fell in love with is EMERGENCY VETS.
As the title suggests, it's a reality show about life in an vet's ER. One of the things I liked about it was the real-life characters, including one of the vets who specialized in exotic animals. His own life had been somewhat exotic; he became a vet later in life, after being a bouncer for various rock acts including the Rolling Stones.
Little did I know that only a few years later, I would get a dog, move about a mile from Alameda East Veterinary clinic, and take my dog there.
Dr. Kevin Fitzgerald is also a stand-up comedian. As he says on the show, "Everybody laughed when I said I wanted to do comedy, but no one's laughing now".
We got the chance to see him at a local club on their comedy night. Unfortunately we had to sit through a half-dozen local comedians who were embarrassingly bad in order to get to the main act.
Fitzgerald is a good performer who connects well with the audience. He clearly loves his nights on the stage, and laughs heartily at his own jokes, in a very endearing way. He brought a pet he saved from near death at the clinic, a geriatric chihuahua named Yoda, who roamed the room while Fitzgerald told jokes.
To close his act, he made the strange choice of dropping his pants and tap dancing. His tap dancing was very bad and was clearly a routine designed for children. I'm not sure if it was even supposed to be funny, but it was well-received by the crowd, which was clearly on his side.
If you get the chance, catch him in a show, but skip the opening acts...
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