Friday, July 30, 2004  

Just a Test

This is a test. This is only a test. In the event of an actual audio posting, interesting content would have been included.

Greetings from the Video Blogosphere

Hey, gang...

My favorite auteur malcontent Steve Garfield coaxed me away from the bar at Remington's last night long enough to tape his seventh report from the DNC.

Check it out, and then go check him out.  He's got a video blog, and a blog blog, and both rock.

(Interesting side note - I actually fell asleep backstage before my show last night.  Seems video blogging really takes it out of a fella.)

Open Letter to John Mathias

John --

The Red Sox are coming to Minnesota; Minnesota makes me wonder what you're doing and where you are.  Email me.

Oh, and the Sox have stolen my heart.  While I enjoyed my time as a Twins fan, this is true love.  I felt you should know.

The Don Martin Dictionary -- Alphabetical Listing

This is fucking brilliant! Someone's collected an alphabetical list of all of Don Martin's great sounds from his Mad Magazine cartoons.

One of my favorite jokes of all time was Mr. Troy Baxley pointing at his shoes: "You like these? They're fake Doc Martens. They're Don Martins. SPLORT!!!"

Fitness Tip

This morning I learned that one must not listen to The Wildhearts while one is on the elliptical trainer or one will explode one's heart.

Comedy Studio This Weekend

Comedy importer/exporter Rick Jenkins is up at the Montreal Comedy Festival this weekend, so I will be at the Comedy Studio doing my level best to ratchet up the chaos and fun and wreck everything he's accomplished in 48 hours.  We have great comics and the run of the place.   Come on down and join us.  8:00 Friday and Saturday.

 

Satori

I just listened to Jerry Remy talk at Wordsworths and had him sign a copy of his book for Jude, ate a chorizo burrito with extra guac, and am listening to Motorhead sing God Save the Queen.

Heaven, baby.  Heaven.

Great and Secret

So tomorrow night, at 10:00 pm, I will be at ImprovBoston, performing on Chris and Dave Walsh's Great and Secret Show.  Except I'm not sure if that's what they call it anymore.  Anyway, it's a really experimental venue, and I've really, really, really been trying to suck it up and have the balls to go up and really just let loose and freestyle and get away from the pressure of headlining and having to do really well every time with polished material (shut up).  So they're giving me 20 minutes to see what I can do.  Which is great...I figured I could go and experiment and chomp it if necessary in relative anonymity.

Then two days ago, they got named the Best in Boston by the Improper Bostonian.  So now I'll probably suck horribly in a room full of blinking yuppies.  Awesome.

Seriously, though.  It's a GREAT show, my angst notwithstanding, and the Brothers Walsh deserve all the kudos they get.  Come out and see us...if I pussy out and do old* bits, you can kick my ass.

 

*Herein defined as anything from the CD or the Holy Fucking Fuck bit.

Stinkbomb

So I haven't posted jack in a while, though I must say, that I think my David Ortiz BPU joke is pretty fucking funny, and if someone doesn't email it to Bill James, I'll do it my own goddamn self.

Last Saturday, at Bambridge's in Chelmsford, I had one of the strangest things I've had happen in 11 years of comedy (pause while I weep over my life choices).  Good crowd, though small, great room, the whole nine.  About 20 minutes into the show, I start seeing this sort of ripple of distraction wash through the room.  As a comic, you can feel it when attention is suddenly not on you anymore, and it really wasn't on me anymore.  I looked for waitresses dropping checks, which is usually the culprit, but no dice.  People were just suddenly rustling in their chairs and making faces and whispering and then it hit me square in the face:  the rankest wave of fecal stench.  It smelled like someone pooped on a dead guy, man.  And no one knew where it was coming from.  The bathrooms were on the other side of the building, and it was way too bad to be a fart.  Just this incredible stink.  I figured it was just someone taking heckling to a whole new level.  After about 5 minutes of me trying to compete with the smell, it just disappeared, and the show went on from there.

What the fuck?

David Ortiz

Jude saw the replay of David Ortiz's temper tantrum in Anaheim and is now calling him the "big black naughty man."



On the plus side, Ortiz's BPU* is through the roof!















*Bats Per Umpire

Chelmsford

I will be performing tonight in Chelmsford, MA at Bainbridge's.  Showtime is 9:00.  I'm working with three comics I've never met before, so it will be fun to see some new blood.  Hope to see you there.
 
Also, I lost my cell phone.  That blows.

Public Service Announcement

Attention! Please listen up! I say this for the good of my comic brothers and sisters. If you know, or meet, a comic, please, for the love of Christ, do NOT ask them why they are not on Last Comic Standing. Either they didn't want to be on it, or they did, and they didn't make it. Chances are, however, they don't give a good goddamn about it, and I promise you they don't want to talk about it with you.

That is all.

Politickin'

Hey, all...

Tonight I will be performing at the All Asia Cafe in Cambridge as part of Janet Cormier's DEAR JOHN Pre-Convention Political Comedy show. This is the first of several political shows I'll be a part of around the convention, and the first of about a hundred around town. 8:00.

Sorry for the lack of updates. Busy busy busy me.

Moral Question

Does it constitute a violation of one's wedding vows if one develops a crush on a woman based on nothing other than her Amazon reviews?

Weekend Shows

Shows this weekend:

Tonight (Friday): Dick Doherty's Comedy Vault, 9:00 pm
Tomorrow (Saturady): Dick Doherty's at the Mountainview Grant Resort, 9:30pm

May God Have Mercy On My Soul

Heads up, yo! I will be performing tonight at Mr. Goodbar's in Old Orchard Beach, Maine. I've never been here before, but my agent has described it thus: "Dude, just...they're kind of...I mean, bikers...just, look, it's a gig, okay?"

9:00 pm. God help me.

Permission

I just got a mass email from a guy who I barely know...we went to a mutual friend's bachelor party together. I'm not sure why he kept my name on his distribution list, but here's a sample of what he wrote:

Last month I started a new full-time job as a business solutions consultant for *******, a division of ***. ********* sells enterprise software to large retailers, such as customers ***** and *******, that facilitates their merchandising efforts. My role involves helping clients define their needs, designing a solution, implementing a customized system and training users. It utilizes all my broad skills from marketing to accounting and from project management to business process reengineering.

If I ever, EVER, send anything like this to any of you, you have my permission to shoot me right in the fucking head.

Show Schedule Update

Tonight, Ryan Murphy and I will stop in at The Comedy Studio and drop a couple of sets at the top of the show before heading out to Dick Doherty's Comedy Escape at the China Blossom in North Andover.

Fair to Middlin'

Very strange show in North Andover at the China Blossom last night. Working with some great comics: Winston Kidd, Tony Moschetto (my personal favorite Boston act), and my man Ryan Murphy from Montreal. I wasn't really feeling into it, due mostly to the Red Sox going into extra innings right before I hit stage and some Mongolian Beef that made me feel like I'd swallowed about six cups of spackle.

My general lethargy was exacerbated by a woman in the front row that kept, well, grunting at me. Seriously. After every joke...scratch that, after every pause...she'd let out a one second grunt that sounded a lot like the dude in Sling Blade. It wasn't terribly loud, but I could hear it, and it was driving me batshit. It started out just sort of fucking up my flow, but after about 10 minutes, it was making me mad. It was so weird. I couldn't say anything, though, because by all appearances, she was a very nice older woman, and I would have looked like a dick, especially in front of a crowd that never quite made up their minds about me anyway. It really got in my head. I just wanted to holler at her, "What IS THAT? What the FUCK DOES THAT NOISE MEAN? CAN YOU NOT HEAR YOURSELF? WHAT ARE YOU DOING?"

I thought she might be deaf, so I did a couple of minutes of jokes with my head turned so she couldn't see my lips. Didn't work. In the end, I struggled through, never really on top of my game. I did sell three CD's, though. Someday I will figure out the economics of comedy CD sales. Some nights, I crush, and I don't sell one. Then I have very blah nights where I sell 7 or 8.

What REALLY blows is that I met Ryan in Montreal, where I had very so-so sets...and then last night, he saw me have a very so-so set. I'm sure he must be wondering just who I'm fucking in Boston comedy to get these headliner spots.

Kevin Millar Makes My Bottom Hurt

I have a Red Sox hangover this morning. 13 innings and an incredibly disappointing loss. Why did I let myself get talked into caring about this team?

I swear to God, it's like I'm Jodie Foster, NESN is a pinball machine, and the Red Sox are a bunch of drunk horny rednecks.

This Drug Has a Serious Down, Man

Boy, I'd sure like to thank Sam Walters and Shizz for making me into a Red Sox fan. This is just fuckin' great, man.