The Delocated panel at the Bagdad had no shortage of technical difficulties—videos wouldn't start, the lighting and mics were weird, but everyone seemed too exhausted to make a big deal about it. Watching Jon Glaser, Ali Farahnakian, Janeane Garofalo, Amy Schumer, and the rest of the bunch kill time, talk back and forth, and try to make it work—well, it wasn't a great show—but it had moments.

Over at the Hawthorne Lounge, the Portlandia Players show featured local comics who'd had appearances on Portlandia. And they killed. Ian Karmel, Kristine Levine, Alex Gavlick, Virginia Jones, and Whitney Streed had the packed room screaming with laughter for nearly the entire show. It was great to see some of our favorite local comics tear it up on the last day.

The Bagdad Closing Show started on time, and the technical difficulties from earlier in the night seemed to have been resolved. Maggie Maye had a great set, and Doug Benson made a surprise appearance to thunderous applause.

And now, we get a year to recover until the next one.

I caught the first Sunday show, Kevin Allison's storytelling show Risk! at the Bagdad. Comedians tell stories about risque moments based around a theme. Sean Patton, with his gruff delivery and vaudevillian moves, told a show-stealin' story about going back to a crazy fan's house. Baron Vaughn's gay thug story was also delightful, but Adam Newman delivered the most universal message from Bridgetown comedians on the last day of the fest. "I feel bad. I keep taking all your delicious Portland food, and turning it into diarrhea."

Then it was some late-night antics at the Eagles Lodge for this girl (related: I keep drifting into daydreams about the velvety kisses of my pillow and piling warm cats on my reclining frame). The first show had too many styles, not enough momentum, and some drunken rambling. Jamie Lee did fantastic though, as did stalwart funnymaker Anthony Lopez, and the quirky, cartoon-voiced Mary Mack. The real draw was the late-night Erotic Fan-Fiction competition with a host of performers reading sexy/gross erotica. Covering Law & Order: SVU, Angry Birds, Grimm, Lord of the Rings, and Friday Night Lights, a whole shit-ton of dirty dirty acts were committed by your favorite fictional characters. It was fucking hysterical, and while I think Emily Heller's story about Ice-T's sodomizing ponytail probably should've won, it was Alex Koll's tale of Angry Birds' pig-on-bird love that got the glory. But that was just the pre-written fan-fic portion of the show—in the other room, five other comedians were penning on-the-spot dirty tales with audience's topic suggestions. Aparna Nancherla killed it with her Dora the Explorer story, narrowly beating out Ian Karmel's "Lemon Party," where Liz Lemon gets sent through the Dot Com and Grizz gauntlet. Truly it was the Eagles Lodge's security guard who made the show transcendental—skulking around stage left and shaking his head every time "plum-colored party ripples" were invoked in the name of vaginas. Funny, funny business.

It was too much of a good thing, but Bridgetown always is.

When it was over I headed up the street to the Hawthorne Theater Main (there's been some debate on how walkable Helium is from the rest of the Barmuda Triangle, but when 238-RIDE quoted me a 26-minute wait time, I started marching, and got there in less time than that, FWIW). Hawthorne Late Night was in mid-swing, with notable performers like Hari Kondabolu taking the stage in front of a standing-room-only room. Nearly everyone had a Portland joke. Mike Burns declared his affection for the place by contrasting it with the fact that he had gotten "stabbed by cholos" back home in LA; Guy Branum admonished us for all dressing like lesbians ("you live in a city: buy some heels"—clearly he hadn't clocked my walking shoes) and said somewhat accurately that "Portland is like San Francisco if it quit its job to concentrate on music"; and it wasn't exactly a joke, but Dan Boulger name-dropped the pop-a-shots at Spirit of 77, which is just endearing. Other highlights were a couple of political points, like Branum's that the US has at least three major Holocaust museums rather than slavery museums, and Boulger's imagining of us explaining the Great Repression to our kids: "Oh, it was awful. Nobody had any money... but we all bought iPhones anyway."

After fulfilling Helium's two-drink minimum with a coupla chardonnays, I drank naught but water, yet somehow I am wiped. But I'm going to persevere and head out tonight. I'm especially hoping to catch Jesse Case at 10 back at the Hawthorne. I saw him perform to a nearly empty room early on Day One of last year's fest, and his was one of my favorite sets of the entire weekend. I wanna see how he's seasoned over the past year.

The room was surprisingly packed when I got to the Mt. Tabor Theater on Saturday afternoon for the Humor Code. They were featuring four great comics (Pete Holmes, Myq Kaplan, Mary Mack and Jordan Morris), but the topic was kind of academic for 4pm on the third day of a 4-day comedy binge. Peter McGraw is a scientist and Joel Warner is a writer. Together, they're working on The Humor Code, a project and forthcoming book to determine what "funny" is and how comedy works. At the panel, the two of them tried to explain their research while the comics commented, questioned, and interjected.

It's pretty interesting stuff, but Pete Holmes put it well: "Comedy is this beautiful songbird, and you guys took it into a creepy lab and dissected it." The comics were great, McGraw the scientist was pretty funny himself, and there was a really interesting discussion of gender and comedy, both from the audience perspective and the comedian's perspective — a conversation during which Mary Mack was brilliant. She's got another show tonight at 8 at the Eagles Lodge. If you haven't seen her, do it.

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This is where we flash forward in the day while I attend an AMAZEBALLS roller derby game at Memorial Coliseum. (Look for a recap of that barn burner this week—but Portland's Rose City Rollers came from behind Chicago's Windy City in the last minute of the game to win it by three points. It was incredible.)

The late-night show at the Eagles Lodge was the most consistent show I've seen at 2012's Bridgetown Comedy Festival. Not a stinker in the bunch. Prashanth Venkataramanujam had a scathing, spot-on set about how Americans waste water (insisting on peeing into perfectly potable toilet water and slathering water over a yellow tarp so fat children can slide around on lawns during the summer). Then he went to work on the absurdity of bearing children. It killed. You know who else killed? Everyone: Nick Rutherford with his Brazilian wax story, Mike Bridenstine with an audience-transfixing tale of cocaine and bull fighting, and my favorite, Portlander Kristine Levine. I've never seen Levine before and that is a dirty shame, she's awesome. She railed on and extolled the virtues of her moon-faced overweight kids, sipping from an airplane bottle of red wine, explaining why she wasn't concerned about neighborhood pedophiles. I could not have laughed harder.

Still tons of awesome-sounding shows this afternoon and tonight—power up with brunch!

Comic Mike Bridenstine has a show. That show and occasional podcast, out of L.A., is called Roast the Week. He gets a handful of comics together, adds in some current events, and together they make fun of the week's news and each other. Mostly, they make fun of each other.

And it's great.

Last night, he took his show to the Helium stage, with Pete Holmes, Myq Kaplan, Mike Burns, John Roy, Matt Braunger, Michelle Biloon, Emily Maya Mills, and Jay Larson. It was a fantastic lineup, and since most of them know each other pretty well, their blasts on each other landed perfectly.

Matt Braunger commented on the strange layout for the show, with all 9 comics on stage at the same time, looking out at the audience. "You have your own audience, and we're staring at you."

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Other Bridgetown ephemera: I caught a polarizing set from Emmett Montgomery at the Mt. Tabor Lounge, where he interacted with an animated character on the movie screen, named Sweetpea. This gelatinous blob was a mix between Weird Science's Chet, Jabba the Hutt, and Sloth, with blinking eyes, nipples, and groaning blurbling. Sweetpea was a hot mess, and Montgomery nailed the offbeat set. Over at the late-night Tanker stage, some entitled passive-aggressive Portland type tried to get me to move from a bar stool she'd occupied 30 minutes prior, while James Adomian (as the tights-wearing Sheriff of Nottingham) made it very, very hard for Bridgetown comedians to follow his act. Then Brody Stevens AND James Adomian together made it near impossible. Shit was tight.

Anyone catch Doug Benson's Movie Interruption screening of Con Air last night at the Hollywood?

The sidewalk in front of the Mt. Tabor Theater was sick with comics last night, as people showed up to get their lanyards and wristbands, comics greeted old friends and bummed cigarettes from fans, and everyone tried to figure out where the hell they were supposed to go next.

As soon as I got through the crowd, I headed over to the Hollywood Theatre for the Primetime show. Things there were a little crazy too, but a lot of the kinks in ticketing and check-in should clear up by tonight.

The show began with about 1/3 of a house, and filled to half by about midway through. Comic Pete Holmes announced that "it looks like the Aegean Sea out there," with lots of little islands of people.

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I also took in the first half of the All Things Brody show at the Eagles Lodge (go there to get drunk—$1.50 cheap beer). Brody Stevens was hosting and closing, and while it was great to get brief chunks of his act between other stand-ups, I find that Stevens works best as a cumulative act, with his motivational speaker steez building and building to ridiculous bombast. He's a lot to take in, but man, is he funny. (You can catch him tonight at 8 pm at the Bagdad.)

In other Bridgetown ephemera: Yes, the Tanker is still hosting their cavalcade of continuous comedy all weekend long, even though you're not seeing it listed on the official schedules. As Marjorie has already noted, print your own schedule at home if you want to know what's happening—or just use that smartphone, smarty. Don't expect to just stroll into the BOG's tiny, tiny comedy room—that place is teensy weensy and very full. No Portland jokes yet?! What the what. Note to performers: Perhaps you should mine the Mercury's I Saw U personals, where you can find such gems as "i messed up more than a few orders when you mouthed thankyou across the cafe. i was wearing a quinoa-covered apron. let's hangout when i don't smell like vegan/gluten-free food."

My haphazard strategy led me to the in-progress Best of Boston showcase at the Bagdad, where it was pointed out by somebody onstage that "this isn't Boston. Who gives a fuck?" The crowd was pretty thin, but enthusiastic and receptive. "The little crowd that could," as we were dubbed. I caught complete sets of Jono Zalay, Jay Larson, Dwayne Perkins, and Shane Mauss. Of those the two I'd maybe seek out again are Larson and Perkins.

Larson was the only dude who had a noticeably Bostonian accent, and his jokes about pranking people were the funniest bits of the evening. The best was when he got a phone call from someone in New York who had the wrong number. It was a dude looking for "Brad" who was pissed off about some kind of budget that had gone from $15,000 to $10,000. Larson ran with it, making up shit as he went along, and amazingly the dude totally bought it. Days later he called back to bust him. Obviously, Larson didn't give a shit. HILAR. He's on again twice tonight (7 at Helium, 10 at the Bossanova main room) and again on Saturday (7 at the Hawthorne Theater main room).

Perkins' was the only African American of what I saw of the set, and as opposed to last year when every single comedian of color had a bit about Portland Whiteness (in fact there weren't any jokes about Portland at all, which is really unusual for this fest—maybe a memo went out, or maybe Portlandia already ruined the potential)—not that that isn't deserved—the closest he got was a pretty charming impression of white people dancing to hiphop, and how he wished he had that kind of freedom instead of being bound to constraints when he danced, such as the beat. It was pretty good update on an old saw. He's on tonight (8 pm at the Hawthorne), Saturday (7 at Hawthorne Theater Main) and Sunday (8 at the Eagles Lodge).

I really only dipped my toe in the massive schedule of performances last night (I had to go see Bear in Heaven too), but there's a whole lot of festival left. As ever, the best thing to do is spring for the pass, bring cash for beer and pizza, and just swing for the fences.

Okay, comedy nerds—this is pretty cool. Two of the guys who'll be performing at this week's Bridgetown Comedy Fest are each teaching a master class at Curious Comedy Theater this weekend.

Matt Besser, a stand-up comedian who's best known for his improv, is teaching a class in long-form improv on Saturday afternoon. He was one of the founders of the Upright Citizens Brigade, and is a part of their hugely (and deservedly) popular show ASSSSCAT.

Besser will be here at Bridgetown doing both stand-up and improv, including an episode of his podcast, Improv4Humans. They say all skill levels are welcome at the Saturday class—so sign up and get your improv on.

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I did a little pre-func-ing last night for the upcoming Bridgetown Comedy Fest at Action/Adventure, who was playing host along with Action Comics to the Super Mega Ultra Virgins of Comedy Tour. It was criminally under-attended with three very funny comedians from Seattle (Travis Vogt, Derek Sheen, and my favorite of the Seattelites, Mike Drucker), but the small crowd was super into the nerdly comedy, laughing hard as the stand-ups riffed on the haunting train whistles going by the SE industrial space. But it was Mike Drucker in particular who killed it with his self-deprecating set about porn, videogames, and vampire fan-fiction. Now I'm super stoked to see both his shows at the Eagles Lodge (god, I love the Eagles Lodge) during Bridgetown. In fact all the comedians at the show last night (except for Sheen) will be performing at Bridgetown next weekend: Whitney Streed, Anthony Lopez, Shane Torres, Travis Vogt, and Mike Drucker.

Oh my.

And this from Blogtown commenter Warrjo, who was apparently tainted by Andy Dick's performance on Friday: "I had Andy Dick's dick and balls rubbed on my cheek with a good old-fashioned unwelcome face humping [during the show]... I heard stories of him being kicked out of some of Portland's least likely to be kicked out of bars like BOG and Sewickly's Edition. I heard he was even physically removed from the afterparty."

Any other Dick sightings from you land lubbers?

Kraken references: 2 (plus 1 "crackin'")
Holocaust references on Easter Sunday: 6,000,000
Andy Dick-is-missing references: 1 from Festival Organizer Andy Wood. I'm trying to figure out what happened here. It seems Dick might've missed his plane and is now wandering the city with his penis tucked up into his taint. Did anyone see him at the Persona show on Friday? Apparently there was a lot of Dick on display.

Alison and I hit up the Iron Comic show at the Bagdad. It was a lot of bang for the buck, with nearly a dozen comedians onstage. Hosts Nato Green and Moshe Kasher corralled the contestants (Hannibal Buress, Kyle Kinane, Emily Heller, Doug Benson, and Baron Vaughn), with a couple acts interspersed between the competition. Kinane won, but he probably shouldn't have. Hannibal Buress was particularly good and Doug Benson was on fire.

I ended the night at the Eagles Lodge, with a stellar lineup and a packed house of festivalgoers and comedians there for one of the last shows of the weekend. I was looking forward to Jon Daly and hoping to see his Bill Cosby-Bukowski bit, but my sleepy-time tea must've kicked in around 11. But Andy Wood and Portlanders Nathan Brannon and Tim Hammer killed it (Hammer had me with his first pun). Nice one, gents.

Now if I can just figure out where Andy Dick is, I can finally get some sleep. 'Til next year Bridgetown.

Highlights:
Due to a combination of sun and roller derby, I merely skimmed the surface of last night's shows, but it is confirmed—Iliza Shlesinger is one funny lady. Also the lasses of the You Had to Be There podcast had a fun panel and live taping at the Mt. Tabor Lounge earlier in the day, with hosts Nikki Glaser and Sara Schaefer and guests Chris Fairbanks, Nick Thune, and MC Mr. Napkins. It was a charming way to suck down a bevy. Laughs were had. Heads now hurt.

Tonight:
I think you can still get a $20 ticket for all of tonight's shows. I wish Iron Comic didn't butt up against Comedy Is OK, but that's how the evening is stacking up. Also the late-night Eagles Lodge show looks promising. Maybe Jon Daly will break out his Bill Cosby-Bukowski character that Andrew mentioned.

Schedule here.

Highlights from last night:
Kurt Braunohler (as Ned mentioned he'll be doing Hot Tub tonight), Kyle Kinane apparently killed it last night (so says the hubby; I was stupidly too busy drinking at the Watertrough), Alex Gavlick (a 17-year-old high school student at the Bar of the Gods' tiny room), Robert Buscemi, and my personal favorite Cameron Esposito, a charming, hysterical, vest-wearing lesbian from Chicago who knocked everyone's socks off at the lounge at Mt. Tabor. Catch her set tonight at the Hawthorne Theatre at midnight.

Lowlights:
The drunk dude in the Bar of the Gods who kept falling down in everyone's laps. Check yourself, sir.

But the highlight may well turn out to be Hot Tub with Kurt and Kristen, a variety show hosted by Kurt Braunohler and Kristen Schaal that's a semi-regular event in New York. Schaal is one of the better known faces at Bridgetown this year (full disclosure: she and I ran in the same circles in New York), but she and Braunohler have been working as a comic duo for several years now, and the Bridgetown edition of Hot Tub will include guest comedians Kyle Kinane, Jon Daly (possibly in his Bill Cosby Bukowski guise), Brett Gelman, and Pete Holmes. The variety show will be an ideal change of pace from the constant stream of standup—and while there likely be some standup in Hot Tub, there will also be music from Nick Thune, plus the "occasional oddity," perhaps taking form in weird, subtle, funny, semi-improvised skits that change direction on the turn of a dime, like this:

Hot Tub with Kurt and Kristen, Mt. Tabor Theater (main stage), 4811 SE Hawthorne, 9 pm, $25

Oddness: Andy Dick at the Eagles Lodge was a bit disconcerting and awkward, but it was less traumatic (comedy wise) then I was expecting.

Randomness: The Tanker, as always, was fun, with the open mic-esque cavalcade hijinks. It's a great way to cap off the night, like a funny digestif. Also, the ladies were hot last night—Barbara Gray's set at the Mt. Tabor Lounge... funny as get-out.

Tonight: Go to the second Music Comedy program (Bagdad Theater, 10 pm, $15). Mindy Raf will be there, as will Chip Pope, Howard Kremer, Nick Thune, Mike Phirman, DJ Real, DJ Dougg Pound.