The Last Bigger & Weirder Dance: Farewell at Milwaukee (Ep. 5)

One of the shortest drives of the trip were ahead for the last show on 17th October 2026. Nonetheless, I knew it would be very exhausting. First of all, the long drives, especially on the day before, would pay its dues. More than that, that show in Milwaukee would be special. Not only as it was my 50th Weird Al Yankovic concert overall and the last show of the tour, so a lot of farewells were likely. 17th October 2026 was also the 85th birthday of my father, who died some nine years ago. Tears and mental exhaustion felt to be almost guaranteed that day. This is the penultimate part of my The Last Bigger & Weirder Dance report. My trip back home to Germany and a reprise will close this trip report.

 

Saturday, 17th October 2026

Morning Issues – and Planes

My health situation was still bad. Just walking around a bit boosted my heart frequency. I thus had to reduce my program – and thus unfortunately had to decide skipping the National Railroad Museum in Green Bay. However, I have to come back to Wisconsin soon again anyway – really loved this part of the United States I had visited the first time on this tour. As I had a bit of physical trouble overnight and had to play it slow, I rather late headed to Oshkosh. Again, it has been a lovely drive there, with at least having a bit of a visit of the EAA Aviation Museum there. A really nice place with a good mixture of military and civil planes – and an amazing gift shop. By the way – Wisconsin was still chilly – despite the sun shining, temperatures were around 10C.

 

Going To Milwaukee

After a comparably brief visit – I would usually have stayed in the museum much longer, it was time t head further South. The last show of the tour was up. I finally opted for a quick bite as I had to refuel the car anyway. The outskirts of Milwaukee were not too inviting, but the city center is really beautiful. Due to booking issues – I had two parallel active hotel reservations, I ended up at the Aloft Milwaukee Downtown. Being located right at the Fiserv Forum, this was an expansive, but likely rather fortunate stay, based on my phyiscal condition. I just had a brief walk around the hotel to at least slightly enjoy the wonderful Riverfront of the Milwaukee River.

 

Time To Say Goodbye To the Clown

It felt really hard for me to line up for Fiserv Forum that evening. And the physical limitations were indeed a minor factor for that. The more I loved that the arena in Milwaukee was modern and came with up to date facilities – in contrast to the three ones on this trip before. The home of the Milwaukee Bucks has a capacity of 18,000 for concerts. The upper ranks did not feel being fully sold, but apart from that, it was quite a good audience. I loved running into so many community friends again – especially as I physically could not join the meetings before.

Puddles Pity Party had some special features for his last tour of the show. At the opener I’m Always Chasing Rainbows, there was a person in fact dressed in the rainbow suit. For Let’s Give Em Pumpkin to Talk About, the whole stage crew was on stage with pumpkin dresses – in contrast to the two ones they usually had. The guitarist and Ding Dong eating challenge were really entertaining. Thank you, Mike / Puddles – hope to see you on European stages again soon.

 

A Hard Farewell

And then, there was the main event. All the mental stuff in my head came already up in the second song, Mission Statement, as Al stated that this one is the last one of a total of 165 shows of the Bigger & Weirder tour. What an outstanding achievement – which lead to my first tears of the evening. Again, there were some additional fun events for the last show of the tour. The crew turned the stage into a mosh pit at Canadian Idiot, for example. I was somehow in a state to fully enjoy the show until the cover song made me very mental again. You Can Call Me Al is truly my favorite, I also made a Songs of my Life post about it. With my favorite Skipper Dan thereafter, I was definitely mental.

I loved that this time (I feel it was the first time I saw it), the vast majority of the people stood up for the entire encore. Even though it was close to my physical limits, I really loved that Al and the band members got the respect this incredible tour deserved. At Yoda latest, it was time to cry – and you also saw some of the band members being really touched by the last minutes of what they had so brilliantly done.

 

Walk of Shame

I did not have any kind of backstage or VIP pass for the show, so that it was time to walk back to the hotel. The five minute walk rather took me half an hour. I was exhausted, mentally and physically and had to sit down. Milwaukee was cold on that day and it was hard to keep some warmth about all the great things which had happened in 2026 in my heart.

Unfortunately, that also meant that I could not say thank you and farewell to a lot of people you turned this year with this tour into a special event. Back in the hotel, I more or less immediately fell asleep, even though I just wanted to check out some stuff on my cell phone.

 

 

 

The Last Bigger & Weirder Dance – The Episodes

I split my trip report in five sections (and an introduction post). The first section is about my experience in Rhinelander, Wisconsin. then, there is more or less one episode per concert I visited:

• The Last Bigger & Weirder Dance – Introduction
• The Last Bigger & Weirder Dance – from Rheinland to Rhinelander
• The Last Bigger & Weirder Dance – Heading South – the Peoria Show
• The Last Bigger & Weirder Dance – Heading East to Indiana – the Fort Wayne show
• The Last Bigger & Weirder Dance – Going back to Wisconsin – Green Bay
• The Last Bigger & Weirder Dance – Farewell at Milwaukee
• The Last Bigger & Weirder Dance – Going Home and Reprise

 

Flyctory.com about Puddles Pity Party

Here are all postings related to Puddles Pity Party:

 

Food I Had Onboard

My bites and drinks on flights and trains are shown in Food I Had Onboard: