A Sad Day Indeed

Two Days ago, the unthinkable happened. My Xbox 360 decided it wanted to take a holiday for the holidays. Heidi and I have guests arriving for the weekend, and we were going to be throwing down on some video games. In anticipation, I went to Blockbuster and rented Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. I’d seen some adds and had been hearing the hype, so I wanted to check it out. After popping it in for all of about 3 minutes, I was going through the training section and my system froze. It was odd, but I just turned off the machine and powered back up. It went to just about the same spot and froze again. This time, when I powered back up, I had three red lights shining back at me.

This didn’t feel so much like a disappointment, but more like I had a loved one taken away from me. Perhaps really not that drastic, but my gut dropped. I take good care of my stuff, and kept it in a well ventilated area, but my launch time 360 finally bit the bullet. Dealing with the problem wasn’t too bad, I called Microsoft, and they are sending a package aka “The Coffin” to send it in for repairs and they will cover the costs of repair and shipping. I am however going to be without my primary means of entertaining myself for probably about a month or so. I have other game systems however, but really it’s not quite the same. It’s kind of like, you’ve been dating the head of the Cheerleading squad for a couple of years, and then she breaks up with you for some guy in his Sophomore year in college studying the metaphysics of plutonium’s affect on tumors in lab rats. Then after she breaks up with you, you have to go back to the girl with the last eye from the glee club that you had said a few nasty things about when you started getting busy with the popular girl.

So instead of fragging noobs in Halo3, and pulling a laserflip to frontside crooks over the gap and dropping in on the hubba in “Skate”, I’ll be rolling balls made of paperclips and kitty cats in Katamari Demacy, and getting some kills in on Black, but still there’s that empty feeling of not playing online with the headset. Not only that, I just ordered 2 games that are coming from Amazon.com and they’ll just have to sit and wait for me. The last 2 mornings have been strange.

I’m a creature of habit. If things aren’t going in order, I tend to forget things and have a strange feeling of emptiness about me when my routine is bothered. Sometimes I may forget to take medicine, sometimes I may skip taking out the recycling. Little things, but enough to know that something’s not right. It’s going to be a long hard road until my system comes back from repair, but I hope it flies by and I’ll be back to my old habits when it comes back and I won’t have to dread the ring of red.

It seems strange to have something so trivial taken away from me. What’s next? No flashy sneakers? No juvenile hip hop? No pizza? Dark days are ahead, and I hope that’s the end of my troubles for awhile.

Until next time, happy gaming?

Artistic Cock, or Terrible Gift?

There’s one of those moments that will hit you. An Epiphany. Sometimes it’s in the form of just the right punch line to a joke, sometimes, it’s realizing you can make a difference in someone’s life, and sometimes it is when you find just the right gift for the right situation. Enter the glass rooster.

Here’s the situation. I got invited to a home warming party. It’s for a couple of old friends that I used to work at Souper Salad with. It was one of the greatest jobs I’ve ever had and made so many great friends. It was a job that never really paid the bills fully, but you had so much fun there it was hard to leave. Even when I worked full time as a Tandem Mainframe operator, I still worked on the side there to make some extra scratch and hang out with my friend Mark Caulkins. Throughout the years I’d worked there, I’d been kind of known as a goofy funny kid. Not much as changed, but Souper Salad doesn’t exist anymore and this is a good opportunity to see old friends.

The invitation said “no gifts”, but seriously who ever listens to that. Not that I’m going to go out and buy a crystal vase or anything ridiculous, but I needed to bring something. My plan was to go to Marshalls and pick out something crazy, leaning towards the side of ugly. Not so much to be a jerk, although that’s a bonus, but for that golden moment when someone opens a bad gift and they’re forced to pretend they like it. I was thinking of a beaded monkey or perhaps a gilded pig, but then like a shining beacon from heaven, my eyes landed upon the rooster. The sound dropped from my ears and a moment of vertigo took over. There was nothing existing in this world at that moment aside from this hand blown glass cock from China. How could I resist. I walked around Marshalls with it clutched to my body like a Heisman trophy. Tucked into the crook of my arm so as not to drop it, it was more precious than a Ming Vase.

Look at it. It’s hard to look away, and it’s stunning in its ridiculousness. It came in at a whopping $7.99 because it was from Marshalls, but I think it would be safe to say that if it were at a gallery in Portland it would fetch hundreds. From the side, it catches the light just right and if you listen close enough you can hear the faint whisper of angels singing. But from the front, it looks like a full on infected pecker. And I don’t mean that in the sense that he’s a foul and eat with his pecker, I’m referring to if this were a flower, it would be the stamen.

Giddily I went home and snapped a couple of pix of it to capture the beauty, and wrapped it up until it unveiling on Saturday. I don’t really know for sure what my friends will think of their rooster, but I sure hope the moment is awkward. Because if you can’t take joy in the awkward moment of a young couple unwrapping a glass cock, what can you really take joy in?

What’s Going On????

A lot of things have happened since my last post. I know I haven’t been very diligent about updating my blog, and for some reason, lately I’ve been getting hits, so I thought I’d make a quick post.

Behold the power of the dragon. The time I normally would have been doing stand-up has now been filled with the sounds of myself getting punched in the face. Heidi and I have been taking karate since January and have been moving up the ranks. Starting at white belt, then yellow, then orange, and currently we’ve graduated to purple belt. It’s something we both always wanted to do when we were younger, and figured what the dilly-oh, let’s do it. We’re part of the Villari’s school out of Scarborough, and I’m pretty surprised how much we’ve learned up to this point. That, and Heidi looks cute as a button in her karate PJ’s.

I’ve still been thinking about comedy and keeping the wheels moving. I’ll be back to represent in 2008’s Portland’s Funniest Professional. I’ve got a few more jokes lines up playing off my Fajita joke, and those folks that have heard it seem to like that direction of my humor. I still miss standing in front of a crowd making them laugh, but the constant nagging fear of “this could be the single worst moment of your life” thought of bombing onstage no longer haunts me.

Recently, people have been asking me a lot about stand-up, even though I’m not active. A really cool thing happened during the World Series in October. I wanted to go to Olympia Sports in the mall and pick up a Red Sox players hat for the Series. A kid behind the counter that I didn’t even know asked me if I was still doing stand up. I was kind of shocked, I didn’t expect it. He said he’d caught my act before and really liked it, especially my Red Sox joke, which is actually my Swahili Lover joke which is also one of my favorites. It almost always works. That was a really great feeling. As I’ve said before, if I can say something funny and put a positive spin on something someone experiences later on in life, I feel good about what I’ve done. That was quite the circular sentence, but you get the gist.

The Red Sox won the World Series. It was just as sweet to see it the second time. I got to go to a couple of great games this year too, with great seats. I saw Dice-K’s first game at Fenway, from about 10 rows behind the Sox dugout. I was in heaven. Elliott hooked me up with a free ticket for that game. I also got to see Clay Buckholts’ first game for the Sox too. My dad brought me along as his guest and we were on TV most of the game we were so close. Also another highlight, that and my dad’s cancer (he states) is close to in remission. He’s hard of hearing though, but he really is doing so much better than a couple years back when we almost lost him.

I’m on two wheels. Maybe not now because it’s gotten cold, but Heidi and I got our motorcycle permits. I bought a 150 cc moped online and put most of it together. It was a great way to learn about my scooter, but I didn’t expect to have to assemble so much of it. Because of the size of the motor, I had to register it as a motorcycle, but it’s been a ton of fun. I’ve gotten it up to about 70mph and put well over 500 miles throughout the season. Because it gets around 90 miles to the gallon, I’ve saves a ton on gas over the summer on my commute to work and back. It’s been a blast, and Heidi and I go on rides all the time when it’s warmer. I may have to move up to something in a big boy bike next year or so, but for now, the moped does the trick.

I’ve been listening to a lot of music lately. One of my favorite finds recently has been MC Chris. If you’re familiar with Aqua Teen Hunger Force, he plays the part of MC Pee Pants. His voice is very high pitched, and at first I had a hard time getting used to it, but after a few listens, its fine. His creativity is really well executed. He can really puts images and phrases together so well, and raps about video games and Stare Wars among other things. I’m real impressed, and his music has been kind of inspirational in my thought process for some of my newer jokes. Not lifting or using his material, but following his thought process. Redman is also a great inspiration to me in the same way in my comedy.

I’ve been playing quite a bit of video games on my 360 lately too. I just beat “skate” which was rad beyond rad. It made me wish I still had that coordination to skate still, but sadly I do not. Bioshock was pretty slick too, but now I’m engulfed in the world of Halo3. Heidi’s brother plays it quite a bit, and he’s really good. We play on XBOX Live when we can. If you play Halo3 and want an easy frag, check me out my gamer profile is: peabean. It’s a combination of my nickname for Heidi “Peanut”, and my musical nom de plume Beanz, from when Pork and Beanz was all the rage.

Speaking of comedy and CD’s, you have to check out Mike Birbiglia’s new one. My Secret Public Journal Live. If you’ve heard his older stuff, some of it will be redundant, but he put it together really well. Also I was surprised with how much I enjoyed Patton Oswalt’s Werewolves and Lollipops. Normally I find his comedy to be too formulaic, but this time it worked more fluidly. Then my friend Mike said he thought this new album seemed a lot like how I tell jokes. That was a nice compliment.

The Celtics are contenders once again. Anyone who knows me, knows I’m a rapid Orlando Magic fan, but Mike and I have been going to the Celtics for a couple of years now. I’ve enjoyed them as a secondary team, but I cheered for them in the New England way. I’d sit there and go “Yup, that’s why they suck” pointing out their faults and giving my opinion on how they could be a legitimate franchise once again. Usually bitching about the selfishness of Paul Pierce or the inability of Coach Doc Rivers ability to coach anything. He was fired from Orlando a couple years back at his supreme ability to suck in an unparalleled fashion. Now with the acquisition of Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen, even with Doc’s horrible coaching they’re doing great things. 5 and 0 as of this post. Let’s hope they keep it up.

My favorite football team, Packers, are still kicking bootay! Behind the helm is the man Brett Favre. I have a man crush on him. Nothing involving penetration, I just think he’s cooler than titties. I expect the bottom to fall out at some point in and around the playoffs, but I’m riding high for right now.

I guess this isn’t such a quick post after all. I guess I’ll tie it up for now, and will try and make a valid attempt to update this more frequently. There’s tons of other stuff that’s gone on since my last post, but I’ll catch up on that as we go.

What's Going On? Are You Retired? Again?

I keep hearing it. Are you done? Did you break your funny bone in a horrible gardening accident? Are your stand-up comedy days over? The answer is no, I'm not done and I'm not retired. But I'm not performing. What does that mean? Just about what it sounds like. It's a little cryptic, I know.

Here's the scoop. I'm not retired. I said thank you in my last post, but not as a goodbye. It was an honest heartfelt thank you. The thing is, I'm a stand-up comic. I've got it in my blood, but I became a little too addicted to it, I guess. I had to curb my habits. It felt great to be up there and people were eating up the funny things I had to say. It did wonders for my self-esteem. It was a great escape from the things that were taking a toll on me. The passing of my mother, my father's illness, and my own scare with cancer (still waiting to hear back on that one, but no longer worried about it). Although it took me out of that frame of mind, it took me away from other things that mattered to me. My personal life, and those that I love and care for. I guess I became distracted, and that wasn't fair of me.

So how is that not retired? It's simple. I plan on coming back and doing the Portland's Funniest Professional Competition each year. That way I'll still get to bring it out once a year, dust off a couple of old jokes and have a couple new ones to debut. I figure if I can bring 5 minutes of rabid humor each year, I'll be satisfied. My goal has never been to become famous or anything, it was just to release a creative outlet for myself. I've always done something artistic, be it music, comedy, painting, drawing, or writing novels. I always seem to have some sort of creative feeling to release. If people heard my jokes and look at anything differently or from another angle, I think I did my job.

I know some of my fellow comedians wanted to know what happened to me, I've been a bit of a hermit from the scene. I felt that I needed to remove myself from it, or I'd never be able to leave it behind me. I made some great friends, and hopefully this will make some sense to them why I'm out of contact. Just think of me as the little dog that ran away. If I truly love it, I'll be back, if I run away it was just meant to be. Just know this, I never meant to pee on the rug.

Until the next performance at the Portland's Funniest Competition, I'll update the blog every now and again. Probably nothing for my comedy routine, I'd like the humor to be a surprise to those that like my stuff when I get there. I'll be going on road trips and will take artsy pictures from time to time and make a post. Just know I'll be thinking of new jokes for my 3-5 minutes of glory next year. Enough funny stuff will happen between now and then. As a matter of fact, I've ordered a scooter to save on gas milage. If something ridiculous doesn't come of a grown assed man riding a scooter, I've lost complete control of my comedy barometer. Until you see me on the stage again, know I'm still thinking of it, and will do my best to impress when I get back.

Also, some comics asked to use my material or buy jokes from me. My jokes aren't for sale. Even if I don't use them, a joke seems like such a personal thing, I couldn't feel comfortable doing that. Although I have been flattered that a couple people have used my material with permission, I hope that's as far as it goes. The Portland comedy scene is so ripe with talent right now, anybody can write something more prolific than I have. Trust yourself. The reason you're a stand-up comic is because you feel you have something funny to say, not something funny to repeat. Not busting chops, just explaining why I don't want to seperate my material for someone else's gain.

Thank You

I wish it was something more profound. But "thank you" just about covers it. It'd be more powerful if this blog were a big white space like a snow covered field with those two words in the center, challenging you to think of anything more appropriate outside of those words, but it's not that way.

Thanks to everyone that said I was funny. Thanks to everyone that came to a show to see me perform. Thanks to my fiance for putting up with me while I lived out a childhood dream. Thanks to all the other comics I met and had fun with on the way. Thanks to all the clubs that gave me 5 to 30 minutes to make people laugh. And mostly, thanks for the laughs. A momentary hiccup of breathing that happens almost by accident for some, but it meant the world to me.

Thank you.

Not Too Bad, But It Could Have Been Better

I had been saying all along that I didn't care if I went through and won the competition, and that wasn't a lie. Up until a couple of days ago. Somewhere along the lines, it got in my head that I did want to win it. All through the couple days leading up to the show, the thought kept running through my head "This is my competition to lose". I'm not sure if that's what took me out of last night or not, but I can tell you this, I was disappointed.

And I wasn't disappointed that I didn't win. My real problem was that I had gotten so wrapped up in it, that I didn't have the best set I could. My material was fine, but I was a bit rushed, and I was very nervous last night. More so that I usually get. Also there were some mic problems that were affecting me, which didn't seem to happen to anybody else, but that could be because of the odd way I hold the mic. I can't be sure if it was the anticipation of the show, or hearing less than desirable news at the doctor's office, but something had my nerves up pretty good last night. But it's behind me now and I'm a bit relieved that I don't have to go through that anymore. I know those all sound like excuses, and I'm not saying it would have been different had everything gone perfectly. It probably wouldn't have, I'm just painting a picture from my perspective.

Congrats go out of course to Timmy Brochu, Chuck Sanborn, and Renee Wright for moving on to next week's finals. I wish you luck, because I probably won't be there to see the show. It was fun while it lasted, and I wish everyone luck in the competition.

One really cool thing that came out of last night was a story I heard in the "green room" before the show that cheered me up. Ian Harvey had left Portland a few months back to head out to L.A. to hone her/his craft. Working in a niche demographic of gay/lesbian humor, she got taken on by Margaret Cho to open shows for her. She told me that she's always talking about different jokes that her friends back in Maine tell, and she told Margaret Cho my "Douchebag (Dowshbag)" joke. I asked if she liked the joke, and she said she almost pissed herself. I can't be really sure if she liked it really that much but it was still a cool story to hear. To think that my little joke in little old Portland Maine, made it to Cho's ears, who makes scratch for being a professional and made an impression, well that was the cat's pajamas.

I do appreciate all of the people that did come out to support me, and I apologize that it wasn't my best work. I've done better and I'll do better again. Comedy isn't easy, and it isn't an exact science either. You try and learn and move on. With that said. I'll be back on the little stage in front of the bricks again on May 13th. I'll be hosting that night and plan on having some fun with the crowd. We'll see if it goes well or poorly, but either way, you'll be able to read about it on the 14th.

Phew! That's Out Of The Way

Last night, my set was good and bad. It's hard to explain why this makes me feel good, but most honestly it's because I'm a little superstitious. I had been on a stretch of really great shows. It seemed like I could do no wrong, and it was making me uncomfortable. Anybody that's worked in stand-up will tell you, you're bound to have some stinkers in the mix, it's just how it goes, but it'd been too long.

First off, the first half of my set went great. I was killing throughout. That was the set I keep running getting ready for Portland's Funniest Professional next Wednesday. I feel really good about that set, and feel it represents my humor well, as far as delivery, content, and creativity. The material isn't over the top raunchy either, and as a matter of fact, I don't believe there's any cussing at all in the set.

The second half of my set is where the gravy train lost the biscuit wheels. I didn't bomb at all, but I wasn't cohesive either. I ran a couple of new ideas I had floating around, but it's obvious they need to be flushed out to become jokes. I ran a couple of other jokes too, and my "accidentally gay" joke seemed to have fallen a little flat last night. In retrospect, it still got laughs, but maybe I'd gotten too used to the harder laughter my usual set gets. Not a problem though, I took the opportunity to play with the crowd. It was fun, and I realize that when I "spar" with the audience, I usually do pretty great. It's becoming a bit of a fail safe for me to bail out if I don't like how things are going.

I capped the set with a street joke, but I had gotten away from my clever joke material, so it seemed to come out of left field. It got some laughs and chuckles, but not uproarious by any means. But it felt good to get it out of the way, to suck a little life out of the room. I'm not very worried about that for next week though, because I feel like I have my competition set down pretty well, and there's not a lot of room for error. When you only have between 3 and 5 minutes, you don't play much with the crowd, and surely don't bounce new material off a crowd.

I'm excited for the competition. Once again, not because I think I'll win, because the crowd should be big and fun. Also I'll be tripping the light fantastic with some great comics and close friends. I was sad to find out that my friend Dustin didn't make it to the finals. He went over on his time, and if you go over, it's done for you. I was really hoping to find myself, him, and Timmy Brochu on the last night if possible. Those have always been my favorite shows to do all along. They're great guys and really funny. I think the three of us have material that plays well off the other and our target audience is about the same.

My next update should be next week Thursday morning, because the competition is on Wednesday night. Regardless if I have a great night, or a lousy one, you'll still get to hear about it. Wish me luck and say some prayers. Because as we all know, God wants a little unknown comic from Portland Maine to do well with his fart and rape jokes.

Stimulater!

It Felt Pretty Good.... Aside From The Poops!

I had a show last night, and it was the first one since the 1st round of the competition. I wasn't entirely as sharp as I'd like to be, but that's why I asked to go up before the semi finals, I want to work out any nervousness or kinks. And I did. My set all-in-all was actually quite good.

My set for the competition is 5 minutes long, and when I showed up last night, I was scheduled to do 10. What I basically did was my competition set, which still did great even though it was a pretty small crowd, and then played with the crowd for the remaining 5 minutes. That worked out pretty well and was fun, considering I'll be hosting in a couple of weeks, it was actually pretty good practice.

The tough part was the little things that were adding up to try and shake my confidence. I was kind of tired, first of all. Heidi and I had been doing some housework etc for a good portion of the morning. At lunch time, we went to the Clambake for lunch. We ended up crashing after that for a nap, and a gigantic plate of fried clams just stewed in my belly for a couple of hours. We went out to the movies to see Hot Fuzz with my friend Mike and his wife and followed that up with dinner at Chia Sin. Flash forward about an hour and I still have the United Colors of Benetton in my belly. From Scarborough to South Portland my body decided it no longer wanted to keep any of the food in my lower half. We stopped by the house and I exorcised what looked like a demon made of funnel cakes.

While we were at the club, we watched the show. I was hoping to be on early so I could go home and catch the end of the Red Sox game and maybe the Sopranos and Entourage, but no dice, I was closing the show. While we were sitting there with Dustin, he decided that he'd like to introduce his beer to my penis, and spilled it all over my crotch. He said he thought he might have a spare pair of pants in his car, but I figured I'd try and use the situation to my advantage onstage. I did a little, it was okay. I also got a really skinny kid named Ben to come onstage and almost strip. I told him he needed to finish a joke I told him, or he'd have to get naked for the crowd. I didn't force the issue, but the crowd chanted for him to take it off. It would've been awkward to see, but really funny if it had payed off. It was funny in the end and he was ultimately embarrassed beyond belief. He and the crowd had a good time with it.

Overall my nerves were a little up, but I don't think it mattered because the crowd like me last night. Also I have one more show before the semi-finals this Thursday, so it'll all be good. I'll run my set again and maybe have some more joke at the ready.

The Retirement Is Off For Now

A recent bulletin on myspace from myself explains it mostly:

Recently as some of you may be aware, I retired from stand-up comedy. Although during my retirement I continued to do shows, I was commited to the relationship with my retirement. That being said, I have some sad news.

Retirement and I have broken up. That's right, and it wasn't quite amicable either. Sure I get to go out and do shows, but in the settlement, retirement got half of my prison rape and roofie jokes. I do get visitation rights with the awkward thumb up my ass jokes on the weekends. If you love me at all, you won't bring this up.

I'm sure a lot of you are gloating right now thinking that you knew all along that it wouldn't work out, but sometimes a dude has to make his own mistakes. But I understand if you want to gloat about it and say "I told you so", so I'm letting you know right now that you can do just that.

So in order to say I told you so, swing by the Portland Comedy Connection on April 22nd, 26th, May 2nd (Portland's Funniest Professional Semi's), and May 13th when I'll be hosting, to tell me to my face that you told me so. It's just $6 most nights to rub it in my face.

Have a lovely day,
Rob

P.S. I thought of faxing that I was back like Michael Jordan, but figured the underwhelming response that would get would make it pretty anti-climactic. Plus most of you don't have fax machines.

I Need Help

And no, I don't mean mental help, although I'm sure that would be appropriate. I basically need help trying to raise funds for the American Cancer Society. I know what you're thinking, Rob this blog is about comedy and foolishness. Be that as it may, if you've read my blog for any length of time, you know that the catalyst for my starting stand-up was based on my own mother's fight with cancer. She may not have made it through, but others can, with help.

Basically I've volunteered for the Relay For Life with my extended family in Rhode Island. I need to raise money through sponsorships, and could really use your help. I have friends that come through this site every now and then and see what I'm up to, and this is important. If you want to donate, that's great, the link will follow. If you know of someone that has been effected by cancer, you know how it can really put a hurt on those people and the families and friends that love them. If you don't want to donate, that's fine, but at least take a minute to either think of someone that might have gone through something like this, or think of how you'd feel if someone close to you had to go through something like this. I'm not trying to guilt anyone into donating, but I don't want you to take my request lightly. Please just give it some thought.

If you chose to donate, you can do so through this link:
http://www.acsevents.org/faf/donorReg/donorPledge.asp?ievent=206337&supId=167937936

Sorry to get heavy there, but make sure to swing through sometime soon for comedy updates. As you know I'm in the semi finals for Portland's Funniest Professional at the Portland Comedy Connection on May 2nd. Also I'm waiting to see about a couple of paying gigs I may be doing in April. If I do confirm those dates I'll certainly post to keep folks informed.

The Retirement Is In A Circle Pattern

I just got back from round 1 or Portland's Funniest Professional, which many people said they couldn't make it to, and they'd catch me in the second round. Well, the bad news is, I didn't make the second round. The good news is, I shot right to the semi-finals. My next show will be on May 2nd, so if you're one of those people, you have plenty of time to plan if you really want to go.

The reason I shot right to the semi-finals, was because I came in first place tonight. Apparently I did good enough to win the heart of the judges tonight. The first place winners get a pass from round 2, and go right to the semi's. I have to be honest, I wasn't really stoked on my set. I thought it was fine, but definitely not my best. I thought other folks did a better job, but I am usually my own worst critic. I am pretty excited about the next round for me, I'll be going up against Tom Ryan. For those faithful readers of my blog, he was the assistant instructor when I was going through the class. He also helped me pop my first cherry outside of the class by doing that horrible show up in Lewiston at Confetti's. It'll be nice to do a show with him again, it's been awhile.

I thought the other comics did a great job tonight too. There were some folks I'd worked with up in Bangor before, Adam Hatch, Ryan Waning, and Sampson who seemed like they were well received my the Connection crowd. There was also the second place guy named Kevin who did a great job, I just didn't catch his last name. Also Paul Hunt came in third, but only gets to advance if myself or Kevin can't continue for some reason.

When they announced my name as the winner tonight, I stood up to to take a bow. The applause was so loud, and it felt so good. Tomorrow's my birthday, but today I got a gift. It's not something that you can package or sell, I felt good inside. For myself, with crippling low self esteem, it's hard to feel like that. All the while that I do stand up, I think about my mom and why I decided to do stand up. The applause was something I never thought I'd get. I knew I was funny and people would laugh and clap, but I never thought I'd get the applause that the last couple have shows have given me. If you were there for either of the last 2 shows and you were cheering, I just want to say thank you. It means a lot to me, more than you'll probably ever know.

That being said, there's a possibility of a couple more shows coming up next month. Timmy B was talking about a couple of paying gigs next month in the Portland area that he might put me on. I'd be crazy to pass up money for a 5 minute commute. So as I said, looks like the retirement is slightly delayed. But the May 2nd semi-finals is a go. Mark your calendars bitches.

Still Riding High

I still feel great about my performance last week. It was the craziest set I've had, and it was so much fun. It's real hard to describe how great I felt after that show. It was great.

The reason for this post however is not to gloat about that last show, but to let you know that I got my date for Portland's Funniest Professional. It's on March 14th (the day before my birthday) and hopefully all will go well. I can't imagine that it'll go poorly. Once again, my goal isn't to win the competition, I just want a big crowd to go out on. I could almost just not do it based on how well my last show went, but I promised myself I'd finish out my shows.

I'm already missing doing shows. I only need to prepare for another 3-5 minutes of being funny for the competition, but already it feels like something is missing. We'll see if that continues, but I know I'll miss it. And I'll love that there's no more worrying or planning and then being disappointed because either nobody showed up or the crowd wasn't into my humor that night. But through it all, I made some great friends, have some great memories to hold onto, and can say I gave it a shot and often did great. No more mystery there. So hopefully I'll see some folks out at the Comedy Connection on March 14th at 8:00. Who knows, if I do well, there will be another date.

Wow! Just WOW!!!!

I can't even believe the show last night. It was beyond my wildest dreams on a show to go out on. I wasn't alone either, there was something magical about what went down last night for Portland comedy.

I'm going to lay the groundwork for what happened. Linens-N-Things was having their Christmas party and decided to have it at the Connection. They pretty mush filled up almost 3/4 of the room alone. They were a young and rowdy bunch. None more rowdy than this flamboyant gay man named Nick that was heckling at the drop of a hat. He was interrupting everyone. There was also a group of young women stage right that were getting more and more drunk as the night went on. It was a recipe for disaster, but it was holding together enough up until my set which was the last for the night.

I was going to play my set straight, but sitting there and seeing how annoyed everyone was getting with Nick, I decided to play off that through my set. I made up a couple of jokes on the spot about Linens-N-Things that went over well. I asked if they had any regulars that came in and if they called them nicknames like Wet Spot. Nothing too crazy, but just enough to engage them. Then I went off.

It was one of those moments that Dustin likes to say, I verbally raped a heckler. Although, it went even further and more over the top than usual. Yes it was a verbal rape. Yes I left him a quivering mass on the floor, but I let him have both guns so hard it shut up the gayest man I've ever seen. Not a peep from him the rest of my set. And I was killing. I must've had about 6 applause breaks through this section. Even with the microphone, I couldn't get louder than the crowd.

Then when I was getting back to my jokes, trying to focus everyone in the room. The girls to stage right were chatting up a storm. I stopped mid-joke (The one that the punch line is "Legendary" in case you heard it, which was oddly appropriate) and turned to the girls and said. "Excuse me ladies. I don't mean to interrupt, but there's a skinny kid onstage telling some jokes. It's my last set ever, think you can hold off for a minute?". That went over pretty funny, but here's where the set climaxed, one of the girls grabs the front of her shirt like she's going to flash me, and screams "I love you!". I don't for a second believe she loved me, but i did believe she was really shitfaced, and pretty close to being coaxed into flashing her boobs. We went back and forth for a couple seconds, and within 15 seconds, she was flashing her chest. The room exploded. I was speechless. It was crazy.

Then when the room finally calmed down for what seemed forever, I said. "I had a couple more jokes I could tell, but honestly, there's no way I can top that. I just want to say thank you to everyone for making my last set great. I want to thank you if you came out to see me perform one last time, and I want to thank..." It was starting to sound like an Academy Awards speech, but it felt good. There wasn't just applause, there was hollering, applause, and a standing ovation that lasted all through the high fives and hugs the other comics gave me on the way out.

It was a night like no other, and will be hard to ever get that rush, or that feeling ever again. I'd never give it up for the world. It was one of my proudest moments, and sincerely thank anyone that I know that went to see it. I appreciate everything, and all the kudos last night and on myspace.

I know I've been referring to this as my last show, but there is Portland's Funniest coming up at the end of this month and the beginning of next. Once I get my date I'll post it here and myspace. Even if I won that, with the $1000 prize money, it'll never come close to how I felt last night. Thank you.

1 Down and 1 To Go!

As far as next to last shows go, I had a pretty decent one. The host for the night was DJ Hazard, and my friends Tuck and Dustin were on tonight. DJ Hazard was a nice guy. He was friendly and just chatty enough between sets and did a great job keeping the energy up in the room. I had an eight minute set which went pretty well.

The crowd was into the show. Dustin had a great set, and so did Tuck. My set went pretty well too. I opened with a new joke that I hadn't written out about tax season. I thought of the premise earlier today and figured I'd give it a try. It was fairly clever and G Rated which isn't normally my style, but it struck me as cute so I gave it a shot. The rest of my set was fairly tame too. I kept away from "crotchular jokes" as Luke would put it. As a matter of fact, none of my jokes ended crotchular, I even changed some that normally would be into more tame versions. The only thing close was a vagina reference, but it was brief and not really graphic to that region, so I won't count it.

At first I was a little bummed to see that I only had 8 minutes, while my other friends had 10, but then I figured it's better to get me used to shorter time for the Portland's Funniest. Then again I don't really care about time and wasn't 100% sure I stuck to my time tonight. One more show left before the competition. The last scheduled show is February 11th.
Until then, make sure you wash behind your ears.

The House Was Packed..... Not Really.

Last night was funny, but not really so much for the show itself. Club Gemini in Bangor is the room I liked doing before and last night was my last one there as I’m winding down. There were only 9 people in the audience and the comics. The employees of the club sat down and watched, I’m presuming so that it would look like people were there.

I went up second after Tuck Tucker, who had just got done working the room over about as well as was going to happen last night. I think I had a good set and felt good about it. I even got laughs throughout, even though as Luke pointed out all of my jokes were “crotchular”. Upon review only about 70% of them were, but it was an alarming amount, but that doesn’t change the fact that Luke’s a “Dowsch-bag!”. I ran a few new jokes and did probably about 17 minutes. It went pretty well except my closer ended of deaf ears. What are you going to do when there’s only single digit audience? Dustin went up next, and had a rough go of it, and then Sean Carr, and closed out by Luke. I think we were all disappointed that it was such a small and quiet crowd, but all-in-all it didn’t much matter.

The road trip up was pretty funny. The jokes and barbs were flying. Somehow we got on the kick of doing impressions of other local comics, and it all exploded when we started doing our Tuck Tucker impersonation. He seemed to be oblivious to the fact that he has a very distinct Indiana accent that sounds like a calmed down Shaggy from Scooby Doo. We laughed pretty much the whole time up and back and this morning my voice is horse due to lack of sleep and all the chuckles. On the way back however, Luke needed something to eat so we stopped at a 24 hour convenience store. There was a young girl working all by herself and it was just about midnight. Tuck kept asking her questions that were really sketchy. I’m not going to go into specifics on what he said, because it may or may not be incriminating, but he did ask her when he was at the check-out if she’d ever been robbed. It was exactly the wrong thing to say at the wrong time, but if I were in that girl’s shoes, I would’ve been a bit freaked out. I apologized for him and we went on our way without any police intervention.

The funniest part of the whole night for me was the moment when Tuck was onstage doing his set, and he started telling the joke we were doing on the ride up while we poked fun at him. “A Taco and a Neyap!”. It’s out of context right now, but when he was doing it onstage he was starting to crack up, which had the other comics rolling because we were in on it. The crowd was laughing pretty hard too, but it was obvious that they didn’t really know why. It was classic.

Two more scheduled shows coming up at the Portland Comedy Connection. Feb 1st, and I found out that Dustin’s on the bill that night too, as well as Feb 11th. Other than that, I’m still waiting to hear back on what date I get to do Portland’s Funniest, and then it will be done. Once again, thanks to all my regular blog readers, I hope it’s been fun to read up until now, there’s only a few more left.

And A Fun Time Was Had By All...

First of all, let me put this out there, I made my payback goal for comedy last night. I had promised myself that I'd make back the money that I put into the workshop class, and now I have and with one more paying gig lined up, I'll actually turn a profit. 18 months or so later that is.

I have to say thanks to Luke. He wasn't feeling well and suggested me for the show last night. I gladly did it, and had a good time doing it. I told a few jokes throughout the night, but mostly kept it to playing with the audience and reading the trivia questions. You could get the impression that people wanted to get through the contest, but I did tell a few jokes in between. All in all it was a blast to do. The trivia topics covered 80's TV, music, movies, and George W Bush. For instance, were you aware that Vinnie Vincent from KISS was a music writer for Happy Days and Joanie Loves Chachi? Not many people do.

Now comes the sad part of this post. If you are a friend of mine from myspace, I've already sent a bulletin about this, but if you aren't here's the rub. I'm getting out of stand-up and hanging up my seltzer bottle. I'm going to finish out my dates and then do Portland's Funniest Professional Contest, and then that will be it. I'm not saying that if the urge strikes me, I won't pop up in a random open mic, but chances are, this will be the last couple of shows I'll do. It's been a blast, and being onstage has helped relieve some stress and take me away from my normal life while things have been heavy the past couple of years. With my mother passing away, and my father being diagnosed with cancer, it was a little place I could go and feel in control even if just for 5 to 20 minutes at a time. But I've made it through the worst of that for now, and don't have a clear goal of what I'd like from stand-up.

Here's some things I know I got out of stand-up. A tougher skin. I've always had very low self esteem, but being onstage and bombing a few times tends to toughen you up. Friends. I've met some amazing and funny people along the way. I'm not going to name them all, because I'd be afraid to miss someone. But if you were there with me onstage at Gemini, Acoustic Coffee, Slainte', Comedy Connection Portland/Boston, Binga's Wingas, Mr Goodbar, Spectator's, Maine Indoor Karting, or any of the other myriad of places where I've stood and bared my soul, you know I appreciate each and every one of you. Confidence. Stand-up is very honest. You can go out there with material that you've seen do really well, and bomb for your entire set. A couple nights later you can use the same material and kill, there's nothing like a retribution show. Dreams fulfilled. I never want to lose fact that the reason I wanted to do stan-up was because I love the art. I remember going to the Portland Comedy Connection several years ago to see Mike Birbiglia, and only about 7 people showed up. I sat right up front. I might have been the only person "getting him" that night and I laughed hysterically. He may have thought I was a psycho, but sometimes someone will say something that strikes you funny, and you'll never look at something the same way again. That's pretty powerful. Now I've worked those same stages, and had some of those same awkward moments with some audience members. I hope that if someone hears the phrase "You say tom-aye-to, I say Tom-ah-to" they'' finish it with "You say fajita and I'll say vagina". Then I know someone "got me".

It's not over yet though kids. There's 3 more scheduled dates, and obviously Portland's Funniest. Next show is next Wednesday in Bangor with 2 more Portland shows coming up next month on the Feb 1st and the 11th.

Breaking The Law

Last night's show at Spectator's in Sanford was decent enough. I was up third, and as we all know, that's my lucky spot. I had carpooled up there with Dustin Beckleman and Heidi. One quick pit stop at Wendy's in Biddeford, where the bathroom was covered in a large amount of vomit, ans we were at the show shortly after that. Dustin and I decided to jockey for early slots because we didn't feel like hanging out much. He had #2 and I went third.

Dustin had a great set, and the crowd was into him from the start. he kept them the whole way. I figured I'd be golden to follow him, as our styles are complimentary. Except a funny thing happened before I hit the stage. Our host, Mark Morrison I believe his name was, was really taking the energy out of the crowd from the start. He has a very slow delivery, and he made so many molestation and rape jokes he made everyone feel awkward it seemed. He finished some material just before I hit the stage about his uncle giving him oral sex after applying Vicks Vapo-Rub all over it. When I hit the stage, the crowd for one was taken completely out of the show and disgusted, and i was a little off too. That was definitely not cool to bring me up like that.

My set started off tepid. I wasn't bombing, but I wasn't carrying the room like I thought i should have. My jokes were landing a little flat, but my delivery is quick, and I think it was a little awkward after the host's slow as crawling death delivery. About midway through my set though, things turned around. For some reason, people were getting into it, especially the table right in front of me. There was a thin tall guy who looked kind of like a military kid wearing a zip up white turtleneck sweater. I said I had a joke I'd like to tell everyone about advice. He was a little shitfaced and said "I need advice" and I replied, here's some good advice, "Lose that sweater". The crowd exploded. He was a good sport and fed me back. He said he'd been wearing his clothes for the last 48 hours, and I asked him how long his boyfriend was wearing them before he gave them to him. I mentioned to him that he looked like the only sperm swimming upstream in Sanford that night, because he was wearing the gayest sweater the town had ever seen. His mom was sitting across from him and piped up, "Hey, I bought him that sweater for Christmas". I said, "Here's some better advice, don't buy him anymore sweaters."

I even went into my hockey joke that normally doesn't do too well at that point and dedicated it to him, because it's a self deprecation joke that calls myself a faggot. It was what the crowd needed right at that moment, and it killed. Normally I wouldn't go that deep into a gay joke like that. I'm not homophobic at all, but you could get the vibe from the crowd that they were, so I gave them what they wanted.

So I pocketed the $20 we got paid for the gig ($60 left to hit goal) and we got back on the road. We chatted about how the evening went, and laughed. It was fun. I had to drive Dustin back to Portland, but when we hit South Portland, there were blue lights in the rear view. Now to pepper this story, I have a bit of a lead foot. I'm always speeding, not because I like the thrill of speed, but I drive whatever speed feels comfortable at the time generally. The cop that pulled me over asked if I had seen him, I said "No". He's said he was on the side of the road with his paring lights on, and he locked me doing 76 in a 55. Oops! I told him, I was sure that probably was the case, and that I wasn't paying enough attention to how fast I was going. I was going to go deep into a story that said He pulled us out of the car and slammed me on the hood etc, but he was really quick and cool about the whole thing. He ended up giving me a ticket, but only put on it that I was doing 65 in a 55. That makes my little infraction quite a bit less expensive. I'd only been pulled over once before about 13 years ago for running a red light, but that didn't stop my running of red light. We'll see if this slows me down from speeding.

No Salmonilla Here!

Last night was another open mic at Bingas Wingas. The crowd was a little smaller, and the number of comics was as well. I guess last month's (which if you recall I didn't do a set because I didn't want to crush a good vibe) show went a little sour towards the end. That might have had something to do with it. Last night I took the bullet and went up first.

I had a pretty decent set. I kept it fairly short, maybe to about 7 minutes or so. All of my jokes hit and every punchline got a laugh. Maybe the laughs were not as loud as I would've liked, but they were laughs all the same. The crowd was a little tough to read on which way my jokes should've gone, but I think it was decent enough, and certainly not a bomb. I have recently got a cold, so my timing was a little off, and my energy was a little low. All in all, it felt pretty good.

Other comics didn't seem to be having the feedback that they were expecting either. It was one of those odd nights that comedy and restaurant didn't seem to want to mix, but I did leave a little early in the night, so it may have turned around. Perhaps Saturday night in Sanford at Spectator's will reveal the laughs I was hoping for, but probably not. I'll show up and tell my jokes, and we'll see what happens.

Thanks for coming through and reading this post, and just know this: Every time a retarded boy laughs, he pees his pants just a little. That's a little nugget of wisdom from me to you.