exhausting

i have a bunch of stuff to do today, work-wise. far more stuff than i actually have time to do. normally i would just ignore most of the work until i was about to be in trouble for not doing it, and then do it all quickly (i suck) but today i just feel fucking tense and stressed out about it. i think it's mostly because i need to eat something and i can't seem to get that croissant into my mouth.

sigh.

my apartment's really clean though.

i listened to an interview with eddie izzard on the train this morning. his style is a pretty massive influence on my conscious comedy development. he's conversational and intelligent and passionate and silly. and british. sooooo everything i want to be. plus we both love playing with make up.

i have 2 pretty solid jokes to write out today, and i thought of something in the shower last night. i don't think this is capable of being funny, BUT it is one of my guiding principles so i need to be aware of that. is it weird that i think you need to be aware of your own perspective and guiding principles in order to really write comedy from your perspective? a little. does it mean i think about comedy too much? yes, definitely. but onwards to my guiding principle revelation:
behavior HAS to be rational. always. but art (particularly music and comedy) does not. both of those genres (in the post modern age at least) are almost designed to be irrational. i think that's part of why i connect with both so deeply. and emotionally. emotions are not rational, but i want them to be. so i don't deny that i feel them, but i do ALWAYS require that my resulting behavior be rational. which is one reason i think i get so frustrated with people who do what they WANT as opposed to what (i think) is rational and good for them. i know that makes me an insufferable, judgmental cunt basically. but i don't care. and to clarify, that behavior doesn't make me not like people who do that. it makes me crazy, yes, but they are still people i care about and i try to remain an 'objective' friend to them. unless they weren't people i cared about to begin with, in which case i then find their behavior an excuse to be warmly and smugly condescending of them. ha ha!

croissant update: i ate most of it. things are looking up, world!

oh right. i need to play make up, that will make me feel better. thank you for the reminder, mr. izzard!

moving

is terrible. i am just moving at work, not out of my sweet east harlem palace, but it's still terrible. they were on my ass all day yesterday to get moved out for this morning. SO 10:20 comes around today, and i am all moved out, except for one folder and my computer (because my brief stint in corporate america has taught me that you hold on to the internet until the last possible second). everything else is balanced precariously on a shelf next to my soon-to-be (shudder) cubicle, or in a cart next to said cubicle. BUT, not as you might think, IN this particular cubicle. no. because there are 3 people ahead of me who were supposed to move out of their cubicles into different cubicles by this morning, and who have NOT because they are awful. so i persist in being stuck in this limbo between my gorgeous office overlooking 57th street, with a decent view of the sky and interesting windows to spy on people through, and a shitty cubicle with no sound privacy right next to a damn fax machine AND 3 printers. grumblecakes.

also, my speakers are packed up so i can't even listen to music while fucking around on the internet.

if you came out to my show, the lorelei, on sunday, thanks so much! it was a really fun time, and totally packed, which is always awesome. i ended up writing some stand up jokes at like 6:30 that night, to perform that night, since my original hosting bit fell through. i think most of the material went over pretty well. email me if you have any specific thoughts on ma jokes.

the three improv teams were great too! i kind of wish i hadn't gotten a second whiskey and coke, since i was totally too tipsy by the end of the night. good thing i wasn't also responsible for blacking out any of the shows. i can tell that it would have been 'a halfway through a non-game move incidental sentence' black out, i think... had there been one. er. TIME BANDIT, AWAY!

bad blogger, i am one

hello, internets. i have been pretty bad at updating this since august. ugh. a bunch of stuff did happen in that next month... and in the months following. my not-entirely-successful excuse follows.

in early august, i got an interview through a connection from a friend of mine for a new, REAL job. one that required actual professional work, and not just sitting at a computer answering the phones like a little bitch. which i ended up getting offered and subsquently accepting. i really like it alot, despite it requiring actual work which consumes my thoughts and energy, and paying a little bit less than my old bullshit job. it feels goo to do something where i am gaining tangible career skills. i have mixed feelings about devoting energy to NOT-comedy, but i feel good about it most of the time. my parents are very supportive of my performance dreams, but sometimes i feel like a crappy adult, and at least this job gives me a tangible, non-comedy angle from which to view my life and future.

basically, as a result, i have had significantly less time to fuck around on the internet... yet i somehow manage to keep with various forums... unfortunately, forums are easier to keep track of and make a quick comment on than trying to consistently work on well crafted (or not) blog entry, while at the same time being generally less constructive.

also, improv totally and completely ate my life. RECAP MOTHA UCKAS!
my improv practice group became an improv PERFORMING team! and promptly afterwards we had two people decide they couldn't devote the time to a performing team, then a line up addition, and then a few weeks after that, a line-up detraction. however, we've a hit a great stride with the 6 members in the group: kim ferguson, patrick clair, jess wyant, brett white, melanie hamlett and myself. we are known as 'Bad Data', and have been performing regularly mostly around the independent (non-theatre) nyc circuit since september. we've had good shows, and a couple great shows, and fair few shitty ass shows. the good and the bad (and the very good and the very bad) seem to even out though. if we were to chart the quality of our shows, and eliminate the exceptional outliers, i would still say we are pretty good, and getting better. brett actually informed me that our show last night was actually our 18th show. not bad for a buncha n00bs, huh? we even applied to be a cagematch team this year! fancy!

additionally, i finished level 301 with the amazing Joe Wengert and enrolled and completed level 401 with the infamous Charlie Todd. i am set to start 501 with insert adjective here Anthony King in february, cause apparently i just can't get enough reuben williams in my life. i don't know why i said it like that, it's true. RW 4 lyfe, amirite? 301 ended well, although our class show was not nearly as fun as the class as a whole had been. i wasn't too pleased with my scenes, but i made some good moves in the show over all that i liked... the show never really came together though. 401 was tough at first, i was pretty overwhelmed being a class with 15 other loud and agressive players. i had gotten really used to my little 6 person team, and being one of the more aggressive players there. however, it really smoothed out after the 3rd week. i started being more proactive when i felt overwhelmed, and taking the notes i was given and HAVING FUN. we did a 4 minute harold structure that really pushed us into having as much stripped down, fun game play as possible and it was AWESOME. really drove home that improv is supposed to be fun, and i vowed to always 'play' and have fun on stage. and both class shows were both a blast as well, especially the last show where the great cory brown pimped me into being a retarded elf, which i had already stared playing like a 30's mobster. it was obviously awesome. i even got to use the line 'i don't have the mental capacity think that i'm drowin!' onstage. funk yeah.

in the midst of 401, i happened to be selected to be on one of the 3 on 3 wild card teams. my teammates were the bombastic ari scott; musician, photographer and improvisor extraordinare, and the joyous josh, one of my 401 classmates! it was thrilling to say the least. we warmed up back stage, and decided to use our 7 minute slot to do a monoscene, which is just one long scene, with generally the same characters and location throughout. it was a pretty bold choice, considering i was the only one of the three of us who had ever done it before onstage. however, i must say we ROCKED it. performing to a packed house at the UCB theatre, and hearing a real roar of laughter at you or your teammate's move is a sensation that i won't ever forget. as the pugilistic ben schwartz wisely told me 'yeah, you're going to chase that.' and he's right. our show was a fucking BLAST, and i was really proud of what we had done. the most notable highlight was probably josh pulling out an actual douchebag after i had been calling him a douchebag the whole show, and demand stridently that we look at an actual douche bag. to which ari and i both nonchanantly acknowledged before discussing the danger of douching and the ph-balance affects of the process on the lady parts. it was really fun. we were one of 4 teams that night to move to the semi-finals on the saturday after thanksgiving. we were up against some huge names that night, and while our show wasn't as good as our first show, we still pulled it out and had fun and ended well. we didn't move to the finals, which were later that night, but that's okay, it was a really fun night. i felt proud that we were the only wildcard team to advance to the semi-finals that had no UCB harold team people on it, and, in fact, one of the few teams in the tournament that wasn't comprised partly or wholly of ucb or other theatre's house team members. again, not bad for a bunch of n00bs.

bad data also started hosting a free monthly show with two other groups, L, D & the scientist and 'thank you, robot'. it was the gossip-mongering ben whitehouse's (http://www.improvoker.com/) idea back before we even started performing, because the three of us have nerdy team names, so the show is called SYSTEM ERROR (binary optional). it's really a lot of fun. we switch off hosting and producing duties (not true, but in theory someone else will book one someday), with two hosting teams and one guest team. we've worked hard to give the show a relaxed, fun vibe, which i love. i've done a lot of event and show production, and a professional yet relaxed vibe is something i try hard to maintain. plus we all perform better in that environment.

so that about wraps it up for improv + my life. one of my few resolutions this year is to not neglect my writing and stand up, which i definitely had been in the last quarter of 2007. i love stand up a lot, i just need to work harder at it, and push myself more. however, late one night at some bar, the interminable will hines and i were discussing comedy (shock) and comparing stand up and improv, and he said something to the effect of 'stand up is better for your career [sic], but improv is much better for your personality', which is a sentiment with which i whole-heartedly agree! har har har, more brandy for the gentleman! and more moustache wax, on the double!

non-comedy news: the formidable takacs, my old roommate and one of my best friends from college moved out to chicago to get his ph D and be smart for a living. i am really excited for him, and i miss him. we had a lot of excellently retarded conversations in our east harlem pad. if you don't have someone in your life who can and will take any silly conversation or comedy show to it's intellectual extreme with little to no provocation... well, i highly recommend you find someone like that, because it's great. fortunately he came to nyc for xmas ans new years, so we were able to hang out and catch up. i see other hamilton people a lot less with him not around, which is too bad, but i am trying to be better about it.

but that means i got a new roommate! the incredible, edible tay moved here from kansas. he's a former arena football player and looks it. for 2 months, he was looking for a job, but finally he found a job working the door and merch for the new bowery venue, terminal 5. that led to him PA-ing on a couple music videos, and now working full-time on the production staff for a full-length feature. he has loooong hours, and only has one day off a week. it's quite the difference, he used to be home all the time and now i am lucky if i see him twice a week. tay's pretty great, and is a big comedy and music fan, which, of course, we discuss ad naseum. it's pretty fun.

2008:
i am going to try to push myself to 1) be more frugal (i've alread cut WAY back on starbucks starting in august; two lattes during the week and one each on sat and sunday), 2) write a lot more. i am working on some sketch shows write now, and i am trying to get back into the swing of writing intelligently on a semi-regular basis. 3) date. i actually dated a teeny bit in 2007, so maybe i might actually become a somewhat normal adult in say, 2-3 years. i am still not totally sure if all that relationship stuff is for me, but i might as well try, right? 4) be nicer and more positive. also, somewhat counter-intuitively, be more direct about stuff that bothers me. i have been 1-1 for this year. i almost got into a bar fight because i felt the need to explain to some barwhore exactly how rude she had been to a friend of mine, but i also didn't stick up for myself when i was being treated without respect (to be as obfuscatory as possible). so i am going to work on that.

the lorelei! this sunday! who hoo!

the lorelei is this sunday! are you excited! i sure am! i am showing it by eating through the post-del close marathon depression! it's pretty great you guys!

DETAILS: 8 PM, AUGUST 5th, THE PARKSIDE LOUNGE, FREE, BUY DRINKS PLEASE!

this next installment of the lorelei is pretty phenomenal, i am totally excited about the line up:

John Mulaney: my favorite stand up performer in new york city. easily. this guy is so ridiculously talented it makes my teeth ache. if you haven't seen him perform yet, please come to the show, you owe it to yourself.

Nick Stevens: one of the quickest wits i have ever seen in action, for serious. he hosts the shark show every saturday night with his posse of (mostly) bostonians, has a video blog starring the totally fahking awesome Paul 'Fitzy' Fitzgerald and basically does the boston area proud.

Will Hines: i am going to gush for a minute (cause i haven't been already)... will is awesome. one of the funniest people i have ever met in my life. he is an incredibly talented, committed and clever improviser who has been around the UCB scene forever. he also teaches classes and performs with several independent teams in addition to the House Team he is on, 1985. His stand up is smart and witty and bell-achingly funny and i am so excited to have him up.

Emily Epstein: Emily is one of the funniest people i have seen in NYC. she is extremely talented and really knows how to exploit a story or a joke for it's best comedic value. i am extremely envious of her awesome delivery and super-funny brain. she's great, you guys are gonna love her.

Dan Cartwright: This guy has wry indignation down to a science. he is ridiculously funny and really knows how to craft a joke fully. he's also one of the most professional and committed comics i know, and a funny guy to be around. he always puts on a great show, and i am very excited to finally have him on the show!

i hope you guys can make it out, it will be a really fun show. watch me host and wrangle these hyper-talented people as i become progessively tipsier by the end of the night. it's a sight to see, i promise.

A TITLE!

awesome. i can now enter a title on my blog entries. my computer and blogspot are clearly conspiring to convince me that i have gone psychotic, but very slowly over a long period of time. but that would be my own fault for letting a silly little thing like not being able to aptly (possibly cleverly) title a blog entry cause my precarious mental balance to slip and crash into the sea of insanity. good thing it doesn't bother me in the slightest! >too wide grin/darting eyes/white knuckle grip on the mouse<



anyway, i did have something to blog about. i wanted to blog about my general lack of facial accessories. and yes, that is the punchline to an excellent mitch hedberg joke. i always feel surrounded by people who get to wear totally awesome and trendy and sexy glasses. last night i decided to rectify that by putting on the total of my companions' three pairs of glasses at the same time in a poor impersonation of my art professor from college. it was pretty dumb. then i decided to explain what mung was to the table. i am pretty sure i was using hand motions and doing my impression of jumping off of a gravestone. also, i am pretty sure i used the word fermented more than once. later i was pretending i had a mustache by holding a lock of hair over my top lip to simulate what a luxuorious golden 'stache would look like on my tiny imp-face.

that i am saying is this:
sometimes alcohol reveals a person's true personality.
and sometimes it makes them act silly and incredibly inappropriate... while revealing their person's true personality.

i promise to write something worthy later, and possibly review all the kick-ass shows i went to this week.

(so i don't forget: tuesday: harold night, wednesday: 7 fights with decoster and hines & invite them up with patton oswalt, thursday: an open mic & cagematch, friday: now that's what i call rogue elephant! & rogue elephant host a night of improv)

i am so bad at blogging! oh noes!

and apparently i still type like a cat! double oh noes! EN EE WAI, i apologize for my extended e-absence. sometimes i become overwhelmed by all the non-responsibility i put on myself which matters (ultimately) not at all that i can't even bear to think about doing something that is so easy i can answer 3204 to 4298280930982323089 calls while doing it. it's ennui, but it is totally stupid ennui. 'totally stupid ennui' would be a great band name.

so yeah, sorry. arby's sucks donkey dick & duck cloaca because they charged me 50 cents for a seedless bun AND THEN taxed me extra on that 50 cent extra charge. never mind that the button for 'exchange seedless' costs 0.00 on the register; they feel they can fuck me in the ass for not being able to eat seeds AND THEN hand my waiting, already raw anus to the new york government for some sweet 8.75 sales-taxing ass-raping. too far, readers? or not far enough?

other than brief forays into fast food-originated rage-induced psychosis, i had a good rest-of-june. the july installment of 'the lorelei' came together well. the line up was pretty fucking great, i am very proud of the shows these people have helped me do so far. the original line up was nick kroll, max silvestri, dan upham (i love that d00d), merritt gurley and sean donnelly; HOWEVER, i ran into hannibal burress the wednesday before the show and offered him a spot because he was in town from chicago through the weekend and is hilarious and awesome. you will be seeing that name a lot more soon, he is a very smart and and funny guy. so the lorelei ended up being 6 (instead of 5) comics plus me hosting, so i did shorter bits and gave everyone a couple minutes less just so we could get out of the room in time for the 9:30 band; we were still a little late and they hated us. OH WELL. i love doing the show, it is a great opportunity for me and it is alot of fun. and comedians really seem to enjoy doing it, which is great.

improv through june: june was a pretty fantastic month for me, improv-wise. i was taking a 'special' class with ari voukydis. i want to marry his vision of improv. it's pretty awesome. the class was about getting out of your head and it was great. i felt so fucking energized and excited by what we did in class, and the crazy shit we messed around with, just playing with the conventions of the 'new york' form and it was unbelievably cool. i am so sad it was only a month long. i wish i had 3 hours of improv with ari every week. it would make my life pretty much 93% better, overall. unfortunately, i don't really have a venue for playing around with a lot of the stuff we played with in that class. my improv group... well, we are still pretty new and a lot of coaches feel more comfortable not 'pushing the envelope'. the thing i LOVED about ari's class was that it was like 'yeah, you aren't super experienced at long form or harold, but fuck learning ALL about the form first, have fun and respect the SPIRIT of improv first'. literally tossing us in the deeeep end of the improv pool first... uh, metaphorically. i am waxing poetic about something i can barely articulate, on a subject that very few people understand the context for... so i apologize. suffice it to say, i have another new passion, and it is going to be annoying for you all.

i also started my level 301 class with joe wengert. i would link to his blog but it hasn't been updated since february, so eff that guy, amirite? just kidding, joe is totally awesome. i have watched him perform more than i have watched any of my other improv teachers or coaches i have worked with, and he is a brilliantly funny guy. he is also extremely smart and gives excellent notes in class. he really pays attention to scenes and remembers the little details that tend to run together for instructors. he is always 'on point' in class. it's a great learning experience. my class is also REALLY small and there are some ridiculously funny ladies in it, it's fantastic.

mmm what else? my sister alexis came to visit, that was really fun. she wasn't able to stay for a day that i wasn't totally fucking swamped and busy though, which was too bad. hopefully she will be able to visit again this summer. we have had houseguests steadily since last week, and will continue to have them for the next couple weeks. which is tough, but also fun. it also makes me realize just how much i use listening to my ipod to deal with shit emotionally. it's pretty fucked up. in other news, my marriage to my ipod (mozart, after a bit from 'the office') will take place late next fall. watch your mail for an invitation!

well, i am sure there was other bullshit i was going to write about, but fuck it for now. and FUCK YOU, ARBY'S!

blogging about comedy.

a lot of comedians mention blogs during their set 'nowadays', especially if something silly or unusual happens; apparently people see shows and then tell the internet about them. that is pretty cool, because my friends are definitely tired of being told about the comedy shows i go to, and maybe the internet cares a little bit more. so here are some (brief (ya right) highlights of) kickass shows i saw recently:



robin ince: british comedian, effing brilliant. i saw him do a quick set last week to close out bobby tisdale and eugene mirman's excellent 'invite them up'. he was great, he has a very endearing stage presence; nerdy, moral, earnest and just a little bit mean. his hour long show was equally solid, he won the audience over very quickly with his silly asides and very sharp intellectualist 'philosophy'. i definitely left out of chelsea chanting "AH I WANT TO BE THAT GOOD!" however, i am an admitted sucker for british comedy, but all the british stand up i have seen in new york has been phenomenal; josie long and jon oliver are the other stand outs. josie has some of the most creative and hilarious bits i have ever seen, and she is adorable and sweet. so yeah, you can friend robin ince and josie long on myspace and check out their stuff. i don't believe jon oliver is on there (he wasn't the first time i looked ~6 months ago, maybe he is now), but you can see him almost every night on the daily show. sexy.



harold night: UCB mutha effers. i am at that theatre... a lot lately. tuesday used to be my free night during the week, but now i go and watch long-form improv for ~3 hours because i am a nerd. a lot of the 'younger' teams are coming into their own lately, i have been seeing some amazing harolds lately. two weeks ago, bastian and creep both had phenomenal shows, and last week T.R.U.C.K.S. brought the damn house down. i haven't been able to get the image of nate smith as a retarded sperm cell out of my head all week, i keep thinking of it while i am on the train and lol-ing to myself. 1985 and fwand are always amazing, they fight off for my favorite team most weeks. no 1985 last week, but they are on the line-up for tonight. improv is a very satisfying art form for the audience; the patterns that emerge feel 'right' to the brain, and it is almost always crazy and hilarious. something sexually inappropriate will take place at least once, and at least two members of fwand will almost break their faces, you will love it. best part is, it's 5 dollars whenever you arrive. if you get there at 8 (recommended, otherwise you will wait outside for 30 minutes), you get 5 harolds for the price of one! UCB doesn't really need my help in promoting, but it's what i have been doing lately. my friend seth herzog has a show on tuesdays at the slipper room which is fantastic, as well. check that out if you are in the mood for stand-up, also 5 dollars.



under st. mark's: oooh this one is pretty elite and *seeecret*. so there is a theatre space (read: basement with risers and a small stage, done in black) under the st. mark's theatre, located in all places, on st. marks (btwn 2nd and 1st avenues). on some friday nights (i think alternating ones, i don't know) independent improv team Rogue Elephant hosts some kick ass improv-ing. you will probably recognize the members of rogue elephant from a variety of other harold teams; silvija from the step-fathers, jim santangelli from 1985, gavin from 1985, nate smith from T.R.U.C.K.S., susannah from beverly hills, eddie from beverly hills, and tim curcio from beverly hills. the last time i went the AC was either broken, or its existence was a figment of my imagination, because it was pretty much exactly a billion degrees in there. but the space is really cool and fun, and the show was really great as well. apparently tantrum and fwand host improv at the space on the other friday nights, but i haven't been down to see that show... YET. great show, one of the most fun ones i have ever seen, for serious. however, i would delete the troupe of drunken 18 year olds from the experience, who were for some reason at an underground improv show, when they should have been home practicing for their mtv reality series debut, or whatever it is that priveledged 18 year olds in manhattan spend their time and youth pursuing.



quick bathroom review:

rififi's(/cinema classic): i saw robin ince at rififi's initially; there are three bathrooms at rififi's. the one in the front bar area is sometimes the only one available, and pretty small and cramped. there is actually more room than there used to be though, and a small, cloudy mirror above the sink. however it is usually clean and there is always soap and toilet paper, so it's fine with me, even if you have bend awkwardly to get your pants down. the two bathrooms in the back are much bigger and nicer, and i will use them for preference, although not during a show (usually) because the comedians will usually make fun of you. even the nice ones. and there have been horrifying bug-sightings in the back so i always keep a strong vigil when i am momentarily de-pantsed. sometimes the back bathrooms are not stocked with soap/tp though, so you end up waiting in line for 8 minutes and then realizing you have to go try and get the sole bartender's attention, no fun. but the bathrooms are all private, which is nice.



UCB: always packed. almost always, at least. there are two tiny stalls and a small sink area and there are quite often 8 people trying to wait in the bathroom instead of lining up outside. it sucks. the interns keep it well stocked with soap/tp and it is a fine bathroom, but definitely not a favorite. the toilet seat in the second stall slips every time you move and you feel like you are falling into the bowl. i do hate that.



under st. marks: the bathroom is back stage and you have to walk along the front of the stage to get back there. the door is sliding and it's pretty small, but comfortable and well stocked nonetheless. just weird to have to go backstage. it reminds me of every cabin bathroom i have ever been in, only much dirtier and weird water on the floor. my butt only touches the toilet paper i put on the seat though, i don't care about the rest. NUTS TO YOU, OCD!

comedy is serious business.

i go to quite a few comedy shows around manhattan. it's pretty evenly split between stand up performances and improv shows. i am considering trying to review them, but i don't know if i could be an effective or objective reviewer, so i might just list my favorites and what i like about them. i am not sure yet. however, i am sure that i will write up a list of my favorite bars ranked according to how nice their bathrooms are.

so some more about comedy... and me :) ME ME ME, right?! i am a comedian (i prefer 'comic' because it sounds like 'dick' and i am... kind of a dick) in new york. i try to perform stand up a couple times a week, and long form improv about the same. i have been taking classes at the upright citizen's brigade theatre for about 9 months now, and it is super fun and very challenging. i was in an improv troupe in college called 'yodapez'.

i also produce and host a monthly show at the Parkside Lounge on the lower east side (LES). the show is called the lorelei, after the german rock that lured Romantic poets to their watery graves (OBVIOUSLY) and it is pretty fun. last month we had leo allen, gabe and jenny (a duo), joe mande, eudi paz and evan jacobs on the bill and it was great. the next show is june 3rd, and will feature john mulaney, merritt gurley, matt ruby, noah garfinkle and TBA! the format is stand up for now, but it's definitely open to other formats if people are interested in it. oh and it's FREE, just buy a couple drinks from the sexy cocktail waitress, karen! so yeah.

i will keep this up to date with my trials, and other things that begin with 'tri', read and enjoy!