Back to Basics
I haven’t really been working on my comedy very much lately. I don’t know what it is, but it’s just that I feel like I have some sort of block in my head when it comes to thinking up funny stuff all the time. I have come up with a few jokes, but they haven’t been that spectacular, but I thought one of them was pretty good, I guess: “Whenever someone sees a baby, they like to talk to it with some crazy high pitched voice, ‘Oh, did you have a good nap?’ I’m not like that. I just talk to it. ‘When are you gonna get a job?’” I guess it’s a little misleading, but whatever. I’m not here to impress anyone, just to get all these thoughts out. I also came up with another joke yesterday, but I’m sure it won’t strike a chord with many audiences, as most people don’t know what an astral projection is. But here it goes anyway: “I used to have a job on the astral plane. It was a bitch to get there. The traffic…”
These are jokes in their rawest form. I actually thought of a joke in a dream. I don’t know if i wrote about it yet, as I don’t even read my own blog. No, I haven’t, I’m pretty sure. It goes something like this. “I had a dream that I thought of a really funny joke. Here’s how it went. ‘Sometimes I like to wander around aimlessly for days, even months. One time I ended up in Montana and I didn’t know how to get home. So I called 911. She asked me ‘Where are you?’ I said, ‘I don’t know.” Well, it was funny in my dream.” It went something to that effect. But I’m working on another joke of some sort about work and how when it’s check day, you have like this feeling that if you don’t get your check that moment that it’s suddenly going to disappear into thin air. It’s like you walk into work and you ask if you can have your check and they say, “Wait a minute.” So you do, but while you’re waiting, you’re thinking, “This is taking too long. I need my check now.” And you keep waiting, but you start getting more nervous. And then they finally start looking for it, but they can’t seem to find it right away, so youget more and more nervous. “Maybe it’s not in there. Maybe those bastards forgot to mail my check.” And eventually they find it and everything’s okay. Except your state of mind.
Maybe something like that, but I can’t be sure. I write all of these ideas on scraps of paper while I either work or just sit around. I catalogue them in my word processor in a category called New Jokes Excellent. Then I color code them for how good I think they are, but I feel like whenever I come up with a new joke, I usually think that it’s really good right away, but then my liking for it fades over time. I have trouble organizing them or making a set list. I don’t know what it is, but I feel like organization is not one of my strong points, but that’s kind of good for the ADD age. People will forget what you were talking about a minute ago anyway, so what’s the point in going into any type of story? I like to create jokes that exist in time and space and expand, like the universe. I don’t tell long jokes because I feel like they kind of have too many filler words and filler jokes to get to the last joke. Besides, I’m not that good at act-outs. I’m better at explaining things through my descriptive nature. Although detail isn’t wnat people always want, I feel like I can use words and gestures to completely explain my state of being.
But I feel like I am in the minority when it comes to fear of public speaking. It doesn’t really trouble me too much. I know there is no real danger, especially if I’m in a crowd of people I’ve never met before. They’re not going to ever see me again, for the most part, so if I totally piss them off, no big deal ,right? But coming up with a logical sequence of jokes has been a real challenge for me. The problem is that if I have some sort of sequence where joeks that follow one another are like each other, I can sort of remember them better. but if I just have these absract thoughts coming one after another, it becomes increasing harder to remember which jokes goes where, which will ultimately add to significantly more rehearsal time.
People have compared me to Steven Wright and Jerry Seinfeld, but I don’t really think I fall into those categories. I certainly think a lot like Wright and have some other thoughts sort of like Jerry, but I am my own unique entity. I have separate and distinct thought patterns from them. I don’t really think on the same wavelength as them, but my styles are similar in some way.
The biggest thing I want to preach in comedy is honesty. I will only tell jokes that I honestly think are funny to both me and a supposed audience. Sure, the audience in my imagination is usually much more open than the one I will naturally come in contact with. They also tend to alugh a bit more, but there’s no denying their existence, eventually. I really wish I could do stand-up in the morning though because I feel I’m at my best for on-the-fly jokes, as I can naturally bring a progression of thoughts much better. I just don’t know any comedy club that would have a sufficient audience at that hour.
Comedy is really an exercise is self-exploration. All the jokes I tell come from deep inside of me. I don’t know where they come from exactly, but the factory that makes them can sometimes be defective, but I have ways to rectify the problem. But the neurons in my brain that work so hard to connect seemingly unrelated objects into pure hilarity sure deserve some credit. The rest of the credit is due to external things and just general observations. I’ve been working really hard at what I do and performing, even to a small group of ten to fifteen people is a joy. I sometimes even perform for my family.
I know I’m funny. All my friends in college would tell other people my jokes when i wasn’t around, and they’d tell me about it. And I’m pretty protective of my jokes, so I asked them, “Did you use a works cited page linked to me?” I would have friends who would use my catchphrases and other things. One of the saying I would often use is, “This is why we can’t have nice things.” Another one was “deliciously” describing things like “deliciously evil, decliciously absurd, etc.” But it was the spirit of everything. I always had something to say and for the most part it was funny. I would often make up things on the spot, as I pretty much felt that it was my duty to do so.
But now I feel like it’s too limited just to be funny. I also want to be intelligent. I’ve decided to go back to college on a semi-regular basis. Possibly three to four classes and working towards a degree. I probably think the degree with be in mathematics, but it doesn’t really matter to me. As long as I have a degree, I guess. Then I may go for a masters in communication. I don’t know. It all depends what happens with this whole comedy thing. I will always love comedy and I will always write comedy, not to mention, I will always write, period. So no matter what I end up doing, be it comedy or writing, or some crazy math job, I’m always going to work on my passion, whether or not it generates income for me. Generating income from my passion would be nice, as I will be in total control of my life, unlike working for an evil bovine master. So with all respect, it would ba amazing to be able to leverage my ability to make people laught, but I’m not all about that. Part of me is that. But the rest of me wants to stimulate the mind and I do that in my comedy, but I feel like I have more to give as well, so bear withme if this blog isn’t always funny or always making you laugh because I feel that just making people laugh will make you become one of those one-dimensional people. Until next time, peace.