#flying bark is given an order for 10 episodes so they make 10 episodes

[redysetdare]

Still thinking abt how huntsman never got a satisfying ending. Like ik a writer on the show said he did and that his whole arc was wrapped up in his decision to not leave but like... idk it did NOT seem like that AT ALL in the show.

Like when we see him looking at the tea bag???? that's supposed to be read as him deciding not to leave and THAT was our closure??? You gotta be fucking joking right???

Idk what i thought that scene was doing (and seems like a lot of ppl thought it was doing as well because someone had to actually ASK A WRITER ABOUT IT) was that him looking at the teabag was a jumping off point for a redemption arc. He had STARTED asking questions. He didn't show signs of being okay with the answers he got. It felt like a set up for MORE and then we just...didn't get it and we're supposed to just accept that?

And i get it. I get that not everything works out. sometimes shit goes wrong and not every character gets a happy ending...but then why even set up the possibility in the first place? we got ONE episode with him being like that and thennnn nothing? like usually this sort of thing is supposed to feel like a wrapped up arc y'know? cutting it short like this usually is never good unless you want ppl to be mad that a characters arc was cut short.

It just feels like the show didn't have enough episodes to explore everything they were setting up. It feels like if maybe there was more episodes we would've seen more of huntsman questioning everything that was happening and maybe even getting a redemption arc. But we'll never know because monkie kid is stuck to 10 episodes a season fsr and it kinda sucks that things just get dropped and never explored.

[junker-town]

Seven Worlds, One Planet: Episode 2, reviewed by how sports it is

Including a walrus massacre, volcano bears and snakes pretending that they’re spiders.

We continue our extremely important mission to conduct a scene-by-scene review of the BBC’s new nature documentary, Seven Worlds, One Planet, in order to see how sports it is. We determined that Episode 1, which focused on Antarctica, was reasonably sports. How fares Asia?

Episode 2 Asia

Scene 1: Walrus Massacre

Me on my work commute. #SevenWorldsOnePlanet pic.twitter.com/tZPZFsZTjl

— BBC One (@BBCOne) November 3, 2019

The Pacific walrus is not one of nature’s most appealing creations. They resemble nothing so much as socks left to rot in a garden and then stuffed full of blubber a few years later. And while on land, tusked animals are majestic — the eyes of an elephant convey a deep, thoughtful, almost platonic serenity — the walrus betrays its toothy compatriots, lurching about horribly on land and bringing to bear what is perhaps the animal kingdom’s beadiest stare. The sabre-tusks themselves (I seem to remember being taught that they are of use in rooting out clams, although exactly how was a mystery to me then and remains one now) are a perverse addition to the ensemble. “Well-armed” is hardly a sensible adjective for evolution to bestow upon what is essentially an enormous sausage.

The sausage-ness attracts exactly what you’d expect in the Arctic: polar bears. Both walrus and polar bear are creatures of the ice, and, as I expect you’ve seen from increasingly breathless news reports, there’s less of that around these days. Walruses need a flat surface upon which to rest, while polar bears need it as a platform from which to hunt. With no ice, walruses have to congregate on a few thin, rocky beaches, and that sort of gathering attracts hungry polar bears.

Packing maybe 100,000 tonnes of walrus on one beach sounds like a recipe for severe puncture wounds and indeed several dozen walruses attempt to escape the packed crowds by scaling the cliffs behind the beach. And here is where this scene turns from ominous to outright macabre.

Are walruses good at climbing? No, but they’re persistent enough to scale the cliffs, given enough time. If you’ve ever gone on a serious hike, however, you might have noticed that the descent is just as grueling as the ascent. Now imagine if you weighed as much as a small car, had flippers for limb and were trying to get down a large cliff in a hurry.

The ‘hurry’ is where the polar bears come in. Where a walrus can climb, so too can a bear, and when they reach the top of the cliffs, the walruses instinctively try to escape towards the sea, where they’re more mobile and thus better equipped to fend off attacks. So they race towards the sea, the fastest way possible: by hurling themselves off the cliff. A walrus might be ill-equipped to climb, but it’s even less capable of handling a 100-yard drop.

This rain of soon-to-be-former-walruses rather naturally spooks their fellows, creating a stampede in which many other walruses are crushed or slashed to death by flailing tusks. The Odobenid Vespers — more than 200 walruses die — conclude with a delighted polar bear surveying a pile of corpses, clearly stunned by its good fortune.

NB: This scene is shocking. I’m not trying to celebrate it by writing so much about; it’s just been weighing on my mind since I saw it. The knowledge that anthropogenic climate change is at least partially responsible for these events (Attenborough assures us that they’re still relatively rare) brings the horror home even further.

Aesthetics 9/10

As I’ve mentioned, walruses are hideous animals. But this category necessarily includes atmosphere, and the oppressive grimness of this awful scene carries too much weight to ignore. A bouncing walrus might not have any conventional aesthetic value, but there’s no way we can give this tragic, moving scene any less than high marks here.

Difficulty 10/10

I think that the difficulty of this one is adequately illustrated by the body count.

Competitiveness 3/10

Apart from the early scuffle between a walrus and a bear (in the water, the walrus has the advantage), this is all about walrus versus ground, at speed, and is therefore not competitive.

Overall 22/30

Walrus-diving is sports. Not the sort of sports I want to actually watch, but definitely sports.

Scene 2: Volcano Bears

When you’re desperate to get greens into your diet at any cost. #SevenWorldsOnePlanet #saladwoe pic.twitter.com/mignAvLIbv

— BBC Earth (@BBCEarth) November 3, 2019

Bears are incredible animals. Sometimes they’re ferocious, brutal predators, able to rip you basically in half with a swipe of the paw. Sometimes they’re fisherbears. Sometimes they’re honey thieves. And sometimes they perch daintily on top of a volcano, eating grass.

Go find the Kamchatka Peninsula on Google Maps. It’s the thing attached like a stubby tail to the east coast of Siberia. A winter there, you might imagine, is a cold, unpleasant thing. However, Kamchatka is also blessed by a surprising abundance of volcanos, which create unusually dangerous oases in the barren desert of snow.

And so we meet our volcano bears. These bears, who emerge from hibernation hungry, converge on the only snow-free spots around. To find greenery, they must conduct some precarious scrambles above volcanic vents, and some bears have been known to get too close or to slip and fall. Those bears do not have a good lunch.

Aesthetics 7/10

The true beauty of a bear comes mostly in comparison to other animals, and unfortunately we don’t get that here. Instead we have some scruffy-looking critters doing an ungainly shuffling to eat some grass. But ...

Difficulty 10/10

... it’s metal as fuck because they’re shuffling around eating grass that’s growing over volcanic springs which would kill them if they fell in. It’s so metal, in fact, that I’m giving some bonus points in aesthetics.

Competitiveness 2/10

Bear vs. grass? Enh. Bear vs. volcano? Also one sided (and, fortunately, we don’t see that).

Overall 19/30

All sports would be improved, at least hypothetically, if conducted over a volcano. In this case, the aggressive geology upgrades ‘skinny bears eat some grass’ from ‘definitely not a sport’ to ‘possibly sports’.

Scene 3: The Battle of Little Bigfoot

Hearing your parents car in the driveway but you’ve done zero chores.#SevenWorldsOnePlanet #runningforcover pic.twitter.com/Hghyh23hIo

— BBC Earth (@BBCEarth) November 3, 2019

The forest of Shennongjia, in Hubei Province, China, is home to some very strange creatures. Himalayan lore is rife with rumours of man-sized, furry apes, averse to human contact. And, well, here they are. Maybe. These are blue-faced, golden-coated, snub-nosed snow monkeys. They’re rare, mountain-dwelling, mostly-bipedal and overly-hyphenated primates whom you could quite happily build that sort of myth off if you were snowblind and suffering from the altitude. Granted, they’re not that much over 2’ tall, but let’s have some artistic license here. Where’s your sense of mystery?

Monkeys are not usually associated with snowy conditions. These ones have a hard time of it in the winter, surviving by huddling together for warmth (given their beautiful, plush coats, this doesn’t seem like the worst thing in the world) and feeding on what looks like a miserable diet of bark, moss and associated grime.

So desperate are they for food that when families collide at the edge of their territories we get what this hitherto serene scene desperately needed: a huge monkey fight. We begin with the dominant males baring their teeth and punching the shit out of each other and then descend into a general melee of kicking, scratching and biting.

Fight over, the scattered band must regroup for warmth, so we get another heart-rending monkey hug. Awwww.

Aesthetics 9/10

The snub nose is ugly and the blue skin is very Game of Thrones, but fortunately those considerations are overwhelmed by a) the really lovely golden fur and b) the flying hugs and c) MONKEY BABIES. These snowmen are extremely bominable.

Difficulty 9/10

I assume nobody reading this has ever tried to punch a monkey in the face. Readers, please do not try punching a monkey in the face, even if you have a monkey to hand. It would be cruel, for one, but also I imagine it would be extremely bad news for you, because monkeys are agile, strong, and mean, and seem more than capable of biting off that hand.

Now make this a small army of very hungry, oversized monkeys punching each other in the face. And it’s also freezing. They would kick your ass.

Competitiveness 9/10

The male monkeys looked well matched, and when you add the general chaos of the melee to that you get an intense, hard-fought battle.

Overall 27/30

MMMA is 100 percent sports and I will have these monkeys fight you if you don’t agree.

Scene 4: Spider-Snake

Everyone: Snakes and spiders are scary, but at least they’re mutually exclusive. Nature: Hold my beer…#SevenWorldsOnePlanet pic.twitter.com/gXpJFQ74yM

— BBC Earth (@BBCEarth) November 3, 2019

Many people are terrified of spiders. Many people are terrified of snakes. What this scene asks is: what if we COMBINED THE TWO? Here is a special guest review of the above GIF, by my good friend Harry Lyles:

f

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But let’s back up.

The Dasht-e Lut, in Iran, is not a fun place to hang out. It’s one of the driest places in the world. It’s also one of the hottest. There is no earthly reason to live here, except by accident.

When mishap or sheer bloody-mindedness places critters in these sorts of environments, evolution gets to work. And given long enough, evolution can come up with some absolutely wild shit. The Dasht-e Lut is on the flight path of migratory birds, which provide a rare food source — if they can be got.

Perhaps the best way of catching birds is to get them to come to you, which is the trick used by the spider-tailed horned viper. The scales on the tip of its tail have been formed perfectly to look like a plump, juicy spider with wriggling legs, and when the viper flicks back and forth it really does look like a tasty morsel (if you’re a bird) is sitting there just waiting to be plucked.

But no! It’s a snake, and now it’s going to try to bite you in the head. Have fun!

Aesthetics 8/10

Another relatively ugly scene — the shot of the shrike hovering in astonishment is a particularly cool exception — redeemed by the sheer insanity of what we’re seeing. SPIDER-SNAKE!

Difficulty 9/10

You try catching a bird with your teeth. You can draw a spider on your hand (or hold a spider model, or a real spider). I don’t care. Not happening.

Competitiveness 7/10

Some birds get away, which suggests that this is not as one-sided a match as it might appear.

Overall 24/30

Imitating a spider so that you can catch birds with your face is sports.

Scene 5: Sure, Let’s Watch a Tiny Lizard Fight

Run Forrest, run! #SevenWorldsOnePlanet pic.twitter.com/DiFZXio2Qb

— BBC Earth (@BBCEarth) November 3, 2019

Lizards will go to great lengths for love. In the breeding season, male sarada lizards strut their stuff on the open plains of northern India. They’re brightly coloured and beautiful, and have a dazzling blue and red fan on their throat they unfurl to catch the attention of those lovely lizard ladies. But there’s a problem: saradas are not very big lizards.

Standing (and their gait is quite something when they do) at all of three inches tall, male saradas need some environmental help to be seen. And so battles commence over the small rocks which dot the landscape. Throat-fans are waved with menace, and then the fight begins. Jaws snap, legs flex, and these little lizards go flying through the air, a blaze of shrieking colour.

Aesthetics 9/10

They lose a point for their ridiculous waddle, but these lizards know how to put on a show. Beautiful colours and a surprisingly acrobatic fight scene.

Difficulty 4/10

You might get a nasty bite or two but I’m pretty confident anyone reading this would clean up against a three-inch lizard if they had to.

Competitiveness 10/10

A well-matched fight between two lizards at the top of their game. It’s a shame one had to lose: he left everything on the rock out there.

Overall 23/30

Miniature sports are still sports.

Scene 6: Orang-utans

You...are...the love of my life, and I’ve never felt this way before. #SevenWorldsOnePlanet pic.twitter.com/RFaosm6JAa

— BBC Earth (@BBCEarth) November 3, 2019

Here we get to watch a baby orang-utan try to eat termites (not tasty!), struggle to climb a tree, give up after nearly getting all the way up to the top, and then take a nap on his mother. Then he eats some mangos.

Nothing else happens. It rules.

Aesthetics 10/10

Look at the little floof! I can’t stand how cute the little guy is. The nap absolutely kills me.

Difficulty 5/10

That tree looks like a very annoying but definitely possible climb.

Competitiveness 0/10

A) mother is always there to help out if he needs it and b) nothing actually happens, which is totally fine.

Overall 15/30

It’s adorable, but it’s not sports.

Scene 7: A Miniature Singing Rhino

I’m ashamed to admit that I didn’t know these critters existed until I watched this episode. Sumatran rhinoceros are the smallest rhinos in the world, standing around 4’ tall and covered in red hair. They also sing little songs to one another. Or they would, if there was still a ‘one another’ to sing to: Sumatran rhinos are critically endangered, with less than 100 individuals left. So that’s depressing.

Attenborough uses the plight of the rhinos to segue into an illustration of the annihilation of the Southeast Asian rainforest. They contain valuable timber, and that land can also be used to grow oil palm plantations, which produce additives to be used in processed food and biofuels. That last note is particularly depressing: even supposedly eco-friendly technologies and techniques can lead to habitat destruction.

“Huge areas were initially stripped for timber and then a very different type of tree was planted. Oil Palm.” #SevenWorldsOnePlanet pic.twitter.com/reSWTBBfNW

— BBC Earth (@BBCEarth) November 3, 2019

Asian land is increasingly valuable as the population expands, but the growth of its cities, while substantial, cannot possibly account for the scale of habitat loss. In the battered forests of Indonesia and Malaysia, we have monuments to one of the oldest of human foibles: near-sighted greed.

Aesthetics 2/10

The rhino is ugly enough before we pivot into scenes of forests being bulldozed.

Difficulty 10/10

It’s easy to feel smug about one’s environmental footprint when the damage being done on your behalf is conducted out of sight. But we should never forget that while cheap goods come at a cost we might not feel now, the real price will be revealed soon enough.

I’m not trying to guilt trip anyone here: I live in England, and so simply by existing I am personally responsible for titanic levels of carbon generation and general destruction. But the first step in fixing the problem is recognising that there’s a problem.

Competitiveness 0/10

Pretty much beating a dead horse at this point.

Overall 12/30

Just because it’s depressing doesn’t mean it’s sports.

Scene 8: Whale sharks

Whale sharks are the largest fish in the sea. They are slow-moving, friendly filter feeders, and are absolutely enormous — the largest recorded are nearly 60-feet long. As one might imagine, they are easy to catch, and as they have so much meat that they’re extremely valuable. Unsurprisingly, there are not many whale sharks left. In this scene, a whale shark cruises near the surface, edging up to a waiting fishing boat ...

... but this scene is not so depressing as the last. Fishing for whale sharks has been banned in Indonesian waters, and instead of hunting the giants, they throw them their bycatch, causing the gentlest shark feeding frenzy ever captured on film.

Me: Oh no, I’m on a diet. Also me: ... #SevenWorldsOnePlanet pic.twitter.com/V3lB0GoTFP

— BBC Earth (@BBCEarth) November 3, 2019

Just slurping those little fish right in. Yum!

Aesthetics 6/10

Whale sharks are undeniably cool fish. But they are in fact so cool they barely do anything apart from sucking smaller fish into their hungry maws.

Difficulty 6/10

I appreciate the choice of the fishermen have made not to defy laws and go for the easy, hefty catch.

Competitiveness 0/10

Whale sharks against little fish isn’t even fair when the little fish are alive to begin with.

Overall 12/30

Not sports. Cool whale sharks, though.

Overall sports tally: Quite a lot of sports

Four definitely-sports, one probably-sports, and three nos. BBC did a nice job stepping up the sportsiness this episode.

[martywurst]

YEAR 2: The Worst Comedian (Part 2)

I had an encounter with former Comedy Store talent coordinator, Tommy, who was fired just months prior and was working on developing another home base where he could still play comedy godfather. The Vaucluse Lounge was a mere two blocks away from the Comedy Store and now Tommy was recruiting comics that were still loyal to him and putting on shows. They were calling this place Chaplin's House, but I don't think there was anything historic about it.

It really was an impressive bar/lounge, but management was falling apart. It was a ghost town. I ordered their onion rings and got a pile of American cheese on a couple of turd circles (psst, I'm not really a writer). I ordered something disgusting and got so much more.

"Ooh, that looks good, I'm gonna get that!" one comic said, pinching and stretching some cheese off my plate.

A couple of nights the place was locked up unannounced, black curtains drawn, even though a show was supposed to be going on. Headliners were bailing before their sets.

There were a couple of open mics going on there, too. Tommy would play some acoustic guitar for 30 minutes to get the room warmed up. He played the same three songs over and over. Or maybe it was just the same three chords, I can't remember. He was like one of those dudes that destroy a party by forcing us to listen to a cover of Hotel California. Strictly Hollywood Blvd quality. Then he would hang out for the mic and occasionally give advice to some lucky comic.

After one of my sets, he was suddenly next to me, talking into my ear like David Blaine.

"There's something that's still missing, but I don't know what it is."

"I'm not connecting with the audience?" I asked.

"There was just something missing. Try sitting on a stool and just saying your material, so it's not so (in-your-face gesture) forced. Your material is good, it had an intelligence and you have a good look. It's not about how you look on stage, it's about how you look on camera....really. But I think you just need to say what you have to say- I took it in. You'll get there, I enjoyed it."

Then he patted me on the shoulder and walked away.

Maybe if I worked hard enough I could become a Vaucluse regular! I honestly thought it was cool to get advice from Tommy, despite him being a reputed racist douchebag. I mean, he was once the apprentice of The Comedy Store owner Mitzi Shore, so his opinion has to count for something, right? A racist's opinion is still an opinion. Plus, he really wailed on the guitar!

One night at Vaucluse I waited around for 2 hours to do a 10 minute set. That's actually a good set for that kind of wait, but this night was excruciating. There was a line-up of all male comics that had plenty to say about the opposite sex: Stories varied from "This bitch was sucking my dick," to "I wanted to give her brown eye a black eye!" and so forth. I remember hearing the bartender making pained noises behind the counter, like some victim of a stabbing. left for dead. She had to just stand there and take it...every worthless comedian. Worst of all, EVERYONE got 10 minutes. When the first 30 seconds are torture, the next 9 1/2 feel like a lifetime. When they finally got to me the host said,

"Uhh, you get 2 minutes."

I've never been that pissed at an open mic before. Mother...FUCKER. They were letting the worst people host, nothing ever started on time, the food was godawful, the bartender wanted to kill herself, and no one seemed to give a shit that the place was falling apart. I was mentally trying to stay positive and tune out all the negative shit I'd been listening to, but now I wanted to douse myself in gasoline and tackle the host into the fireplace--that would be such a great closer. My stomach was turning from the onion rings, so I opted for my shitty set instead.

But hey, it's 2 minutes so I did it. I got through a joke-and-a-half. Once I left, I cursed and muttered angrily all the way to the bus, letting the "cocksuckers" and "motherfuckers" fly.

I went home and looked at their Facebook page and saw this ridiculous post,

"Chaplin's House is being called the New Comedy Store...no joke."

Nobody's laughing.

Anyway, that place folded and Tommy moved on to another space where he still occasionally gives out his comedy pointers.

Also in my second year I was doing fewer bringer shows, but I still got roped into a couple more at Flappers. I would quickly get stressed out again and moan to my girlfriend about why I put myself through this. Just reading the emails made me want to puke:

Respond to this email with a head count of how many audience you expect so that we can properly staff the room. 

It takes everyone involved to have epic shows--we do ask everyone to always aim to have at least 5 people per show.  If you are unable to get anyone out please let us know and we will re-schedule you for a date that is more convenient for you to support.

Like I said before, they only want me back when I make some fucking friends!

I decided to not show up at all and go to the Rebel Bite open mic in Long Beach instead. An open mic at a pizza joint was better than doing a bringer show, at least in my head. I wrote back:

Sorry for the delay,   I wanted to get a more accurate count of zero confirmed.    I think my friends tapped out months ago.  Let me know if you want to reschedule or give me the boot.  Or I'll audition again once I have a little fanbase I can depend on instead of wasting everybody's time. Nothing personal.  Thanks.

I shouldn't have felt bad about it anyway, since I bought 4 of my videotaped sets from them.

Then there was the Formosa Cafe. I did it because I was told it wasn't REALLY a bringer show...just sort of. Uggh. I won't mention the names. I can still hear the producer pretending to laugh at other people's sets--so forced and obvious, trying to get the crowd on our side. He'd be looking down at his phone and let out a

"BWAHAHAHAHA!"

Then I'd have to listen to some jerk-off host do his Family Guy impressions for 15 minutes. Then the producer would go up and do the most dated material--many of these bringer show people stick to their one routine. Anyway, what do I know, they're the ones cashing in, right?

I had friends show up for my first and second show, then the third time none of my friends came out and the producer stopped booking me. During past shows, he was blowing smoke up my ass and said all these nice things about my particular brand of humor, but he was only thinking about the head-count. He was a phony just like his forced laughter.

 There were some nice moments. My blues buddy, Street Slim invited me to do a set at The Rainbow Bar and Grill, a really cool rock bar on The Sunset Strip. Just to do something outside the ring of comedians that I was usually bumping heads with felt really special.

My friend Donald and I rented out a black box theater and produced a variety show. It ran 2 1/2 hours and half the audience left, but we had a great time.

I co-produced a comedy show with Jeanne Whitney and Timika Hall at Echoes Under Sunset. We only did 3 shows, but it was a fantastic experience.

I remember bombing at the new UCB on Sunset and when I was walking back to the car, a couple I've never seen before starts yelling at me from their car.

"Marty, you were funny!"

"What?"

"We were inside."

"Really? Thanks, it felt like death in there."

"We thought you were funny."

"Working on it, working on it."

That blew my mind. Who does that? And they remembered my name!

One time they moved a Comedy Store open mic into the Main Room and after we finished our sets, Bill Burr dropped in and did 15 minutes to an all-comic crowd. It was awesome.

Another time I was waiting around for Tony Bartolone's Hat Show to start and the great Rick Shapiro was outside with Rick Wood and Jeremy Bassett. Shapiro was making fun of the Oldtown Pasadena scene and he suddenly gets a glimmer in his eye and this evil grin,

"Let's go to the Mac Store and jerk off!"

It was said with such demented glee. Later we went to get him some Starbucks and he told the barista that his name was Johnny Two Chicks. He was so excited to hear the name called out, but it didn't get the reaction he wanted.

 Then there was the time that I was waiting in the green room for another possible Kill Tony episode at the Comedy Store. Dom Irrera comes in and sits down across from me. It's silent, it's uncomfortable, the guy is amazing, so I'm a little in awe. He asks me if I'm a comic and how long I've been doing it. Very friendly, but I just gave him short answers. Meanwhile, Pat Regan was on stage singing about how much he misses getting jacked off in San Francisco, and Dom and I are just sitting there while this song is in the background. Dom turns to me completely serious and says,

"This song brings back a lot of memories." I barked out a laugh.

I started making goofy set-lists and posting them online. Just a good way to vent about the shit I'd seen at open mics during the week. Here are a few of my favorites:

The usual variety of homophobic/misogynistic shit I'd hear on any given week.

 My second Kill Tony appearance went a little better, but only because I managed to get a few laughs. It was a unique situation because I brought my buddy Dakota Freeman with me, but he was under 21 and wouldn't be allowed inside the club unless he was called up to perform. So I stood outside with him, listening through the door every few minutes to see if we'd get called.

About 30 minutes into the show I got called, but I couldn't open the door from the outside. For a second, the hosts thought I had flaked, but a couple of my friends were in the audience, telling them I was behind the door because I was with a minor. They opened the door for me and at this point there was some confusion because the hosts were under the impression that I was the one underage. Then when it was cleared up Tony says,

"Oh, you're hanging out with underage boys. Ok!"

Before I've even started my set, another pedophile joke had been spiked over my head. You can probably see where this is going.

I didn't gain any Twitter followers this time--in fact, I think I lost a couple.  They probably thought I was really a pedophile.

 Gradually, I found some open mics down in Long Beach, where I had moved in with my girlfriend. There was the SOM open mic at the Rebel Bite pizzeria, The Library Coffeehouse, Blacklight District Lounge and Makai Coffee.

Now if I wasn't feeling the LA scene that week, I had the option to hit some mics in my neighborhood. Rebel Bite, Makai, and The Library were just a mile away. Long Beach was also calmer. I could do longer sets- I did my first 15 minute set at Rebel Bite. I met some nice people. It's funny how these two coffee shops were the polar opposite in terms of an audience--take a look below.

I was also hearing some positive feedback for a change. Sometimes my conceptual ideas would play well and even if they didn't, I'd still be writing the kind of stuff I wanted to try. The support I was getting from my new friends gave me the confidence to try bigger ideas. Showing up to mics and finally having a group of friends to talk to was a nice break. I was so used to being the creeper that was eavesdropping outside a circle of comedy nerds or asking Dean Delray stupid questions in the Comedy Store hallway. Complimenting comics on their podcasts, or a joke that I liked, thinking I always had to go in with a compliment or they'd hate my guts. Then I would fuck up their name anyway, which made the compliment null and void.

I'm still learning to relax, but I'm usually amped up whenever I'm in Los Angeles. I feel the cutthroat competition and that air of judgement. Mostly because I'm carrying it around with me--turn that shit off Wurst, these are your friends! I don't have to prove anything to these comics, we're all showing up to the same mic. Charles Disney was just saying how we ask questions that we want to be asked in return,

"You got any cool gigs coming up? No? NOW ASK ME IF I HAVE ANY COOL GIGS! THANK YOU, I DO! SLEEPAWAY CAMP BABY-MARGARET CHO HEADLINING! ENJOY YOUR SHOW AT P.F. CHANG'S, YA ASIAN FUSION COMIC! "

There's usually 4-5 standard questions (How you doing, got anything coming up, you hitting another mic after this, you ever go to Marty's?) and if there's no conversation beyond that, we're not really friends. It's just surface level pleasantries for insecure comics.

Then there are just genuinely great dudes like Spencer Kalendar, who's never putting on airs and makes me feel like I can just be myself. I think the very first thing he said to me was,

"I remember you from Kill Tony, you're the pedophile guy!"