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.

Sold-out show!

What a great feeling. Last night's show was packed to the gills, and people were having a hard time finding seats. Kelly Macfarlane was the host, and she was very funny. I was supposed to have 10 minutes last night, but got cut down to 8. Have no fear, everyone ended up going over and I did 11 minutes.

I was scheduled to go up 3rd, which if you're one of my usual readers, is my favorite spot in any lineup. I got bumped though, ad George Hamm came in and did a set in my slot, so I had to follow him fresh off a hot set at the Merrill Auditorium with Bob Marley. The energy in the room was great last night. From the first moment Kelly hit the stage, all the way through the end, everyone was putting in the effort and it was a great night for comedy. While I was waiting to go onstage, it was hard to keep focused, because I was pretty wound up. It was kind of like the scene in 8 Mile when Eminem talking about "there's vomit on his sweater already, Mom's spaghetti", except I didn't throw up, but the energy was there and that's what that soliloquy was supposed to represent.

I opened with new material. Actually over half of my set was new to newer stuff and a lot of improv stuff too that was really working. My very first joke started out strong, but I tripped over my words towards the second half of it, and it started to die out. I saved it by stating that the previous joke was certified by waste management as a genuine turd. That saved the day. Everyone appreciated that I noticed it didn't go properly. Towards the end of my set, one guy blurted out that it was his birthday. Then a couple other people did. In short time about 6 people were saying that it was their birthday and how old they were. Before it got out of hand, I reigned in the audience by saying, "That's great, you all had birthdays, good for you. You know who else just had a birthday? Jesus. That's right, Jesus! And I bet you stingy pricks didn't even get him anything. You could've at least got Jesus a Dunkin Donuts gift card. Because Jesus is fueled on Dunkin". I'm not sure where I pulled that from, but it did kill. It was pretty sweet.

I stayed to the end of the show and waited for the crowd to clear. I had people come up and say they liked my stuff and one guy said he "really appreciated my routine". It sounded like I needed to be wearing an gymnastics unitard and dancing with a long ribbon on a stick, but it was still good to hear anyway.

Next scheduled show is January 6th at Spectator's in Sanford and then I believe on the 24th at Club Gemini in Bangor. Next Thursday is also open mic at Bingas Wingas, and where time is short this month, I'll probably do some time there as well. To my new readers in Portugal, thanks for visiting and the stuff on your site is really dirty. I'm not judging you, I'm just saying, it didn't seem like the donkey really appreciated wearing the running shorts you put on him.

I'm Not Disappointed

Last night I went and did the open mic at Sierra. To say the crowd petered out after the second comic was an understatement. It actually looked like it might be a good crowd before it began, but that turned around quickly. Lucky for me (insert sarcastic sneer) I was up fourth.

By the time I hit the stage, most folks were no longer paying attention, except a couple of Nick Salve's friends and a couple heavy girls that looked like they came from USM. I got some laughs, but not like I'm used to. I thought my set was pretty good, but I can't be sure really anyone was listening. I'm pretty sure they weren't. If I had to drive a long distance for that show, I might have been upset, but I really didn't care. I felt like my set was pretty decent, but who really knows. One good thing is that my most recent change to my "Advice" joke went over even in a dead room, so that seems like it'll be a keeper.

There was a point where a show like last night would've eaten at me and I would lose sleep, literally. Not anymore. I've come to terms that not every crowd is the same, and there's things about comedy shows out of my control. I can't control the crowd, the temperature of the room, if the host is being an asshole, the crowd noise, shitty waitstaff, the only thing I can control is my jokes and how I tell them. I think given the situation, I did pretty well, but the crowd response wasn't there. Oh well, there's always the Connection on the 28th. I'm not gonna let it break my stride, I'm not gonna let it slow me down. Oh no, oh no, I got to keep on movin', Sorry, the 80's took me over for a minute there.

A Bit Of A Surprise

It was another good night for me at Acoustic Coffee. I’m not really sure what’s going on, I have historically had bad luck at that room, but the last couple of times, I’ve been very relaxed and the crowd seems to have really enjoyed my sets. Last night was no different.

My set was fairly short. I had told my jokes to many of the same faces in the crowd before, so I wanted to use some new material. I only used 1 joke that I’ve told before, and one that I’ve been rewriting. Other than that, everything else was new. I had a few that I had in mind that I wanted to tell, but when I hit the stage and got into the flow of it, I forgot which ones I wanted to tell. I hadn’t written a set list. So I did what anybody would do in that situation, I made up a couple of jokes on the spot. It was funny to me because I knew that I hadn’t written them out, and oddly enough Dennis Fog told me one of the ones I told was a really good joke. It was strange, but kind of easy at the same time. Most of the jokes were potty humor, and I thought kind of "hackey", but they worked, so I can’t complain.

The funny thing about my set last night was that the crowd was extremely quiet before I got onstage. I already had it in my mind that they weren’t going to laugh at all. The first thing I did was grab the mic and go to pull it from the stand and the cable popped out of it. Nice. I didn’t let it phase me, and from joke 1 all the way through to the end, I had the entire crowd’s attention and laughter. The only thing that didn’t seem to work was a story I told about the crack addict in Toronto, but I was using that joke to stall for time. Knowing that the joke wasn’t working, I bailed on it and said something to the effect that that joke obviously wasn’t good because nobody was laughing. That got a good rise out of the crowd and I saved a shitty joke by calling it out for its lameness.

Next show for me will be another open mic in Gorham next Tuesday the 19th at Sierra. After that I have time at the Portland Comedy Connection on the 28th. Also there may be a trivia night that I’ll be hosting at Bingas Wingas, but I’ll have to wait to hear back from Timmy B on that one.

Not bad, could've been better.

Last night's show was at the American Legion in Westbrook as a benefit for the Westbrook Cheerleaders. It was a crowd of about 40 or so people. I wasn't sure where the place was, so I planned it out on mapquest. My directions told me to take Rte 25 to Main St and then a right onto Dunn St. If you've ever been to Westbrook, just about every Rte is a Rt 25 of some sort. Rte 25 W, Rte 25 E, Rte 25, Rte 25 Business, etc. I did find it after a spell and the Dunn street sign was about 7 feet back from the road. I got lucky to see it.

Our payment for last night was a couple of free drinks. Miller light, I have to watch my girlish figure, and all the pizza we could eat. There was just about every pizza place in Westbrook that had donated pizza to the show. There were probably about 50 pizzas in total.

I was the first comic for the night. I did about 15 minutes I'd say with my jokes and playing with the crowd. They all laughed, but they sounded exactly how you would expect 40 people in an American Legion Hall to sound. I was expecting a bunch of drunk older cheerleader types living vicariously through their daughters, and I more or less saw just as many men as women, who seemed like they were dragged to the show by their wives because they needed to support the cheerleaders. So the response was good, but I was hoping for something better. Then again, I've gotten used to the fact that the first slot is always going to get less of a response than you anticipate. Folks aren't drunk yet, and haven't gotten into the flow of the show quite yet.

Brian Brenniger went on second, and he has a joke where he talks about a woman's taint. He got up on a bar stool and lifted his legs to point to the magical area, but when he did, he lost his balance and fell backward onto the floor. It was kind of scary for a second, because people didn't know if he was alright or not. This was just 20 minutes after he showed me a bruise he had gotten on his leg 2 nights previous that took over almost his entire lower leg. That's one reason I prefer stand-up straight to physical stand-up.

I left after Brian's set, this was when people were getting up to get more drinks and pizza ans went home. I was tired and this was the third comedy show I'd been to or went to see in as many days. At this point, my next "scheduled" comedy show is back at the Portland Comedy Connection on December 28th. I'll probably try and fill time in at Acoustic Coffee on the 12th, and maybe some time at Sierra's in Gorham on the 19th. If anything else pops up, I'll be sure to let you know. But it looks like a couple quiet weeks coming up, which will give me a chance to write more material.

Yippeee!!!!!

I had a great set last night at the Comedy Connection. It went so well in fact, that I decided not to do a set at Bingas Wingas after, because I didn't want to risk having a less than stellar set and ruining my night.

I had 4 people show up to watch my show. Heidi, my friend Jeff Inman, and his friend Steve and his lady friend. Our MC for the night was a guy named Spanky. To be honest, whn I heard the name, I was pretty sure he was going to suck, and boy was I wrong. He had a strange energy to him that made it almost impossible not to watch him. He was awesome. I wouldn't mind going back this weekend to see him do his whole set.

I felt a little bad. One of the newer comics through the Connection was hanging out upstairs with me. He was talking about how he was going to suck the life out of the room. He had a very negative attitude about his set before he went up. It was starting to make me think I was going to do poorly as well. But I went head first into my set and bulled through it.

My set was supposed to be 10 minutes in total, so I put together a 10 minute set. When I got there, my set was trimmed down to 9 minutes. I ended up doing 12 and a half. I feel bad, I didn't think I went that far over. I'm pretty certain, that's going to bite me in the ass. We'll see. I did a good mix of new and old material. I'd say about 30% of my set was new. 60% was proven, and I did about 10% improv. The crowd was really into my set. One moment I had a joke that was going really well, and I could tell by the reaction of the crowd that they wanted to keep laughing but didn't know if the joke was going to continue. So I said, "Go ahead and applaud that joke. It's been certified by the gemological institute as a true gem". The crowd exploded after that. It was kind of cool. I did that type of thing a couple of times. I had a good number of applause breaks.

Last night was one of my better sets that I've done in my opinion. Not only was the crowd really into my humor last night. My timing and delivery was on and I had a lot of fun plying the crowd. I was bending them and moving the tempo of the set up and down at will. It was a great feeling. Teo things I wasn't fond of last night is that I went over on time and closed with a street joke, which I didn't need. My jokes were doing better tan the street joke last night. But the other thing is I had a group of people say that they were going to show up for the show and they didn't. I gave out three free passes worth 2 admissions each, and none of them showed up. I could've used those for the people that showed up, but that's how it seems to go.

Next show is Saturday night at 8:00 at the American Legion Hall in Westbrook. It's a benefit show for the Westbrook Cheerleaders. It sounds like it might be a great time. Until our next installment kiddies, make sure you eat your vegetables.

One For The Gipper!

First things first, I had no intention of doing a set last night. I figured I'd go to Acoustic Coffee and support Dustin. I told him right off I was just there to hang and nor do a set. It was a quiet night, maybe 20 people total in the room of which more than half were comics. I was hanging outside with Dustin while Dennis Fogg was on. Unfortunately the crowd was pretty quiet. Dustin asked me to do a set. I said that I didn't have a set list ready. He said he just needed me to go on and boost the crowd, and I was starting to falter because I had a couple new jokes I wanted to try. Then Dustin looked at me and said, "Please. Can you do it for the Gipper?" So I did.

My set was very short. I told Dustin it would be. I ran either 4 or five jokes, and probably did just about 5 minutes at most. But it was a good set. I honestly didn't think that I'd get much of a reaction from the crowd, but they were there with me for the new material. I was kind of shocked. I worked a couple of rewrites as well. I'm glad I did it. It was a tough show for a number of comics because it was so quiet, but for the time I was there it was at least relaxed and fun. I guess maybe I was so at ease because I was thinking of it more like goofing around not doing time.

Next scheduled show is next week Thursday the 7th at the Comedy Connection in Portland. If time permits and the stars align, I'll put in some time at Bingas Wingas after as well. Two days later, I'll be working with Dennis Fogg on the 9th in Westbrook for the cheerleader benefit. I believe it's at the American Legion or something like that, but I'll update the blog once I know for sure.

Back In The Saddle

It felt like putting on an old pair of shoes again last night. Lately I've been so busy doing benefit shows, and driving to Augusta etc to do shows, it felt nice to get back and do some time in Portland. My time was cut down to 6 minutes, but basically I haven't really paid too much attention to the time limits they set for the past few months anyway. I try and keep it fairly close, but if they tell me 6 minutes and I do 8 or 9 and I'm not bombing, I call that close enough. If the crowd is digging you, it's a silly club owner that slaps your hand. Last night, the crowd was digging me. I had no real dead spots, but a couple of the jokes got laughter that was kind of quiet. It might have had to do with this self-proclaimed pool champion in the crowd that kept talking through the show and could've been distracting folks, but maybe the jokes landed soft. I'm not really sure. But by and large, given the size of the room and the reaction I got, I'd say I did very well. One of the strongest sets of the night.

It was a Sunday night showcase, and it was definitely quiet. There were 16 or 17 people there and with the heat on, it was a paltry 38 degrees. One of the smallest rooms I've worked in awhile, but they were there to laugh. A couple guys didn't go over so well, which were the two just before I went up. Sometimes when the life is sucked out of the room like that, it's tough to win a crowd back over, but I got them pretty quickly. I ran a couple of newer jokes and a rewritten one and it went over pretty well. It was a younger crowd that would normally dig my stuff, so once I hit the stage I felt pretty comfortable. It was hard to sit there so long, as I was on last, and there is a little pressure to close the evening on a high note.

Bob Marley swung through and did a little over a half an hour I'd say. He had some new stuff, and ran a few jokes I'd heard before. At this point, I've probably worked as many shows with Bobby as any other local comic. It's good company to keep. Maybe some of his good luck and skill will rub off on me.

One thing I felt bad about was a one of my jokes and a personal story involving my girlfriend went over well, and they were funny, but she was there and was embarrassed. I know it kind of goes with the territory, but I felt bad anyhow. My girlfriend has been very supportive of me through this whole process, and I felt like a dick by saying something to put her on the spot. I'll rework the one joke so that it isn't directly pointed for future reference, because it is a great joke. It's fun, but can surely be generalized. The story was funny enough, but on the whole, not really worth saving and certainly not worth hurting feelings over.

Next "scheduled" show is on Thursday December 7th at the Portland Comedy Connection, possibly swinging by Bingas Wingas after to run some time there as well. I may try and do some time at Acoustic Coffee this Wednesday. Dustin Beckleman is hosting, and I'd like to see how he does with that. He's always been supportive of me and swung by the Connection when I have shows like last night, I can try my best to do the same for him. Another date at the Portland Comedy Connection on the 21st, and a possible Trivia Night/Game Show host gig at Bingas, but more on that if it comes to fruition. I also have a benefit show in Westbrook on December 9th for some Cheerleaders. Word on the street is I'll be telling jokes to drunken older women. My kind of crowd.

I'd like to take this opportunity to thank the regular folks that stop by and read my adventures on a regular basis. That goes for Mike, Amanda, and my friend Ping Pang from Korea. Hope you get your fingers back after that horrible firecracker incident. If anybody thinks the blog needs newer information, feel free to let me know. I'm always open to suggestions.

Telling Jokes In The Industrial Park

Tonight was in Westbrook Maine at Victory Kart Racing. Not a bad show, or a great one either for that matter. It was okay. My set was fine, but generally my sets depend on a crowd that's enthusiastic to hear jokes and participate a little. This group was not a participation type of crowd.

I had a decent enough set and others did too. It would've been nicer if the crowd was more into it, but it was kind of like the crowd from the other day in Augusta. You take what you can get I suppose. I wasn't really feeling it, and a couple of the other comics weren't as well.

In the end, we ended up putting on a pretty good show, and Dennis Fogg was doing great to close the night. We each got paid in a prepaid $25 gas card for Exxon/Mobil. To me that's ironic, because my real job I sell gas cards, and tonight in my "fake" job I got paid in gas cards. The owner thanked us and was pleased with the turnout. All in all, even though my set didn't go as well as I wanted, it was a good show to be a part of. We were supposed to race before the show, but that didn't happen, but that's fine with me.

Next show is this Sunday at the Portland Comedy Connection. After that, for the time being, the next show is on December 7th at the Comedy Connection Portland, and then the American Legion Hall in Westbrook for a cheerleader benefit on the 9th.

Delia's in Augusta

It was an odd one for sure. Not crazy odd, but I can't quite put my finger on how I felt about the show, although I'm leaning towards dissappointed. For the record, I'll say I had a pretty good set. Not great, but pretty good. And there was a huge crowd, but my disappointment is in how the whole thing was put together.

Delia's was a pretty good sized resturant/bar. If anybody reading this is a comic, or been to a show at a resturant/bar, I don't need to mention that these are a hard room to tell jokes in. We packed the place, and from what I was told, the 4 comics were going to be splitting the door, and if we brought in a good amount of people, supposedly the owners would pony up a tip on top of that for the comics. There were at least 200 people in the place, easily $1000 for the door alone, and there was a large amount of people that had to stand up. For all accounts and purposes, this place already was a success before it began, and according to what I was told (mind you it was third party from one of the other comics) I'm already expecting $250+ for my services. More on that later.

The event was put together by Reach For The Sky or Sky's The Limit Entertainment, run by Lisa Babb. She laid down some rules at the onset, that we shouldn't get on a pulpit for political humor, offensive humor, and above all we were not allowed to drink at the venue. These are all odd requests for comics, but I played the game. Although I did see her walking around all night with quite a few colorful concoctions myself. I was kind of turned off about it from that point forward, but my father and sister had shown up for the show, and nobody from my family had ever come to see me perform stand-up. I trudged through the night, and did okay. I would've like to have done better, but a lot of things were working against it.

Out "stage" setup was rickety at best. A 3' x 3" concoction of old speaker boxes, 2x4's, and some loose laminate on top. The P.A. system was rediculously quiet, and kept going in and out. But I championed through my set and got my laughs. I had mentioned that these types of places are hard to work, because in a dinner atmosphere, people like to chat with each other, and comedy does require folks to listen, to go as planned. I did mantain the attention of most of the audience for my entire set, but there was a group of drunken women in a horseshoe shaped couch system set-up around the stage. They were so loud it was difficult to hear myself and I had the P.A. and the mic. Later on Dan Frederickson may or may not have told them to "Shut the fuck up", several times. He had a rough set from beginning to end, and had to do 25 minutes. I felt bad for him, because he's a gifted comic, and this wasn't how his stuff usually goes off.

Paul Hunt had a good second half to his set and he had to kill 20 minutes. His first half was tough, because the crowd wasn't with him, but he pulled it together and closed strong. The closer for the evening was Brian Brenniger. He did about 30 to 35 minutes, and ripped it. He's very physical, and nothing seemed to be distracting him. I give him all the credit in the world for last night. He was truly there to tell jokes and he didn't care if people wanted to laugh or not, but they did. He ruled the room. Like I said, my set was good. I had laughs from beginning to end and few dead spots. I was up first, which is always the toughest slot to get, because the crowd usually hasn't drank enough, or gotten into a comedy flow. I did do a good job I think in setting the tempo and getting people focused and as I said before, got my laughs along the way.

Now the foolish part, getting paid. After the show, I went up to Lisa and asked if I could get paid for the night, and she said she was waiting for people to settle up. Normally this is something that gets done while the last comic is up, so that everyone can get paid and get out. Not so this evening. Not only did she start collecting late, most of the bar was full before she began collecting at the door. I was a bit testy at this point, because I still had to drive back to Portland, because in 8 hours I needed to be in Cape Elizabeth to run a 5K. She tried to have the wait staff add this to their bill if folks didn't pay at the door. It was pretty a piss poor and Mickey Mouse way to do things. I usually don't get paid to do most shows that I do, so it's not the money aspect of it, but this was an amature way to handle things at best. Fast forward 45 minutes or so later, and I'm handed $100 in $20's. Ummm.... granted I didn't attend MIT and I'm not the best mathematician, but based on what I saw, this was a slap in the face. No tip on top, and we made that bar a shitload of money for the night. I took my money and left before I spoke my true feelings at the time.

I'm sure stating that might burn a few bridges for me, but getting caught up in any operation that runs like that shouldn't propel you forward most of the time anyhow. Sorry Delia's and Reach For The Skylar, I can get other work, thanks.

So, as far as how my set went, I'm pleased with how it went, but a comedy room that full would've been a much more positive and different experience. As far as the whole experience went, I won't work for that bar, or that "entertainment group" again. That was a poor way to treat comics, and that was the reason the bar was full to begin with. I'd hate to see the bar profits, or what Lisa figured she was entitled to for putting the whole thing together, because I'm sure I'd be furious.

Normally I won't rant so angrily, but as I said at the onset of this blog, it's not just about the jokes, there's a lot of politics involved in the business. I feel like I was used, not a single thank you from Lisa or the bar owners for doing the show. Maybe a simple thank you would've saved my angry feelings, but who knows. Someones pockets got lined, and they weren't mine or the other comics.