The only thing cooler that I can think of than having Carl Kasell's voice on your answering machine is having Paula Poundstone's name and number on your Caller ID. I was that lucky this week, and had the chance to chat with the Cable ACE award-winning comedian about comedy, motherhood and her upcoming show at the Bearsville Theater in Woodstock this Saturday, March 7. In addition to touring, writing books (her latest is called There's Nothing in This Book That I Meant to Say) and recording CDs (just out: I HEART JOKES: Paula Tells Them in Maine), Poundstone is a frequent panelist on the popular National Public Radio pseudo-quiz show Wait! Wait! Don't Tell Me!

Poundstone said that this will be her first visit to the Woodstock area, but that a close friend is from here - an artistic type, so she expects "It's probably going to be a whole town of Lizas." She also said that traveling so far from her children and being a working Mom is "a little challenging, but probably about the same level" as most parents experience. She credits her longtime nanny with being a tremendous help: "She actually manages the children a whole lot better than I do."

When Poundstone is home, her office work ends at 1:30 p.m. so that she can spend the rest of the day with the kids. Poundstone has two girls and two boys, now all in their teens. She says that parenthood, with all its foibles, is a satisfying lifestyle. "If somebody had told me, I still would have done it. I just would have been better prepared."

Born in Alabama, Poundstone moved with her family to Sudbury, Massachusetts as a child, and occasionally contemplates returning to the Northeast - perhaps when the children are out and on their own. "California is a pit and a hellhole," she said; and yet she told me about how that morning, she went out to the car and at just below 60 degrees, she noticed how cold it was. She realized that perhaps she wouldn't fare so well in Massachusetts these days. The night before her Woodstock engagement, Poundstone is scheduled to appear at B. B. King's Club in New York City.

She is supportive of the new administration, but not starry-eyed. "I'm just hopeful. I wouldn't know the first thing about it. I wouldn't know what to do!" She notes that so many remark that President Obama is telling the truth, and how her response is generally, "I don't know; he looks honest!" Knowing her, it is certain that Paula will be keeping a sharp eye on things in Washington, as she does on the rest of the known universe.

Poundstone said that she doesn't study up for her shows on a particular community, although it may appear that way to some. "My favorite part of the evening is, 'Where are you from? What do you do for a living?'" She said that the rooms in which she's performing, through those simple questions with a multitude of possible answers, come to have "a feeling of community." She added, "There's a magic about a roomful of people that have come to laugh."

Tickets to see Paula Poundstone at the Bearsville Theatre are $35 and available online at www.bearsvilletheatre.com or by calling (845) 679-4406. Doors open at 8 p.m., and the show begins at 9 p.m.