In welcome news, Saturday Night Live will make its return tomorrow night with its first live broadcast from Studio 8H since March 7. The return of SNL will hopefully give at least a small sense of normalcy back to the country tomorrow night, and help lift the spirits of a beleaguered city.

Even before the pandemic and the shutdown, it wasn’t too often that I found myself out past midnight on a Saturday night (though, unlike Red, I refuse to use the term “washed”). Speaking for myself, I need this and am ready for this. Considering that in many parts of the country you still need to order a full meal of food in order to drink in public, there should be lots of people home tomorrow night and this episode should do monster ratings.

While I don’t like to make any comparisons to 9/11, this episode could have a similar vibe to the show’s first episode back after the terrorist attacks in 2001. With all that has happened over the last seven months, over the last week, and in the last 24 hours, I’m sure the cast and writers are still trying to figure out what to lead with and what tone to strike. But I’m certain that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris will still be front and center…

It doesn’t hurt to have a former cast member, and one of the best stand-up comics of all time, Chris Rock as host this week. Whatever tone the episode strikes, I’m confident that Chris Rock will hit it out of the park. It also looks like the show will have at least a limited studio audience based on tickets being made available. Free tickets AND a COVID test? If I lived in New York City I would sign up for that deal in a second. Probably still easier than getting a test at CVS.

Based on tickets possibly being made available, it looks like there could be episodes each of the five Saturdays this month, leading up the election the first Tuesday of November. While SNL usually doesn’t do that many new episodes in a row, and the fact that no other hosts or musical guests have been named for this month, it could be a chance to strike while the iron is hot. Maybe they’ll see how things go this week?

The path to reopening the country, getting back to work, and regaining some sense of normalcy is going to be long and challenging. We could all use a few laughs to relieve some anxiety along the way. So practice social distancing, wear a mask, and stay home and tune in Saturday night. That’s what I’ll be doing, and rooting for SNL to help bring back even just a little bit of normalcy to my weekend routine.