There was a lot of milling around at first. Most people had arrived precisely at 10 p.m. to make sure they did not miss a moment of Julie Goldman's much anticipated comedy. But when she failed to take the stage ontime, people began to grow a bit restless. Triskelion organizers played upbeat pop music to keep the audience at ease while the setup was finalized, and most people sat around the small tables, talking to each other. Then, at 10:30, Dan Hirshon '04 took the stage. His dry, sarcastic comedy garnered laughs from a good portion of the audience, but most of it fell flat. The audience seemed to pick up on his nervousness and seemed a little put off by it. Had he spoken with the same confidence and ease as Goldman did later that night, his set would have gone over much better. Finally, a little after 11, Goldman took the stage.

Goldman's set was fast-paced and side-splitting. She began with commenting on being a lesbian, mocking society's perception of who she must be. Making several obscene gestures around her body as a greeting, she mocked the audience saying, "That's the 'lesbian greeting. Remember, whenever you see a lesbian, you must do this!" She did a beautiful job blending humor about life as a homosexual with humor about life as a person living in this country.

She ranted about Dick Cheney and his refusal to talk about his lesbian daughter, saying, "They said it was inappropriate to talk about her! If my parents ever said it was inappropriate to talk about me on national television, I would be on the top of the Washington Monument the next day, screaming 'Look at me! I'm a lesbian! LES-BI-AN!'" And, before the audience could even catch their breath from laughing so hard, she was on to religion, claiming that anyone with a book could go out into a city and start a religion. She created her own god, the Finger, and proceeded to preach to everyone. At this point, most people were trying not to get sick, because they were laughing so hard.

But, the funniest part of the entire night was when she began talking about her jobs, especially her job as an office temp. Her dead-on characterizations of the flighty women of the corporate world and their fashion trappings had every single woman in the room practically rolling on the floor in hysterics. Many women saw themselves reflected in parts of that characterization, which only made them laugh even harder.

After about an hour of stand-up comedy, Goldman moved to change herself into her folk-rock alter-ego, Indigo Etheridge. By adding a bandana and acoustic guitar, she had transformed from hilarious New York comic, to every lesbian folk-rock stereotype. Even her songs had stereotypical titles, such as "I Go Down." Despite the humorous roots of her performance, however, her songs were quite well-crafted and her voice was beautiful.

For the first song, she called up an audience member to accompany her on the rain stick. The young man, Ben Kampler '05, was subject to her comedic scrutiny when the audience informed her of his nickname, Speedy, provoking her to question, "And they call you that because..?" When he told her it was because he talks so fast, she countered with a simple, "Mmmhmm, right." The second song, entitled "I Go Down," was described by Indigo Etheridge as her "'60s protest song," but the message of the song was quite moving, even inspiring a sort-of sing-a-long at the end. Those two songs finished, Goldman took a huge bow, thanked the audience, and called it a night.

Everyone left The Stein with a great experience. Many people I talked to were pleasantly surprised about how funny Goldman actually was. People said they enjoyed the show immensely. Triskelion could not have started the Coming Out Week festivities in a better way.