Surprise, surprise

My 50th post!
I've only been to Fairview Heights a handful of times, and the majority of the times were not too great... The first time I went on a Monday, and they had cancelled the show due to lack of audience. The second time was for the Club Pick portion of the Las Vegas Comedy Compitition; that was a fun night. On the next day, I drove out to compete in the Las Vegas Comedy Compitition and I was the first performer on stage that morning (that's not exactly pleasant). The last time I was at the Fairview Heights Funny Bone, I did a spot light while Kevin Patterson was MC-ing. Frankly I was WAY TOO nervous and I wasn't too good; also my spotlight was on a wednedsay, notoriously the worst day of the week for comedy. Now, having set the stage for what to expect for my Wednesday show at Fairviwe last night, I was blown away when I walked in the door. There were AT LEAST 1 hundred people there an hour before the show. And MORE kept coming in. I started chugging the coffee and getting ready, and if I do say so myself, I did well. I didn't screw up the announcements (guys from Westport stressed this) and I was on stage for about 10 minutes up front (including an announcement or two) so I guess I have about 10 minutes of material. Anyway, last night was awesome. Karith Foster featured, and Ron Morey headlined, and both were super nice and I am sure I'll enjoy working with them for the rest of the week.

Real Quick, I want to mention some advice I got this week; Chad Huff said it was the best advice he'd ever gotten, and I'd have to aggree. Simply what he told me about comedy was "don't look at it like a job".

That picture is just a coincidence

Yesterday before the my ritual going-to-the-Funny-Bone, I had to do Laundy, eat, and get a form from my condo association saying it's OK for the cable guy (who was scheduled for Wednesday 8am-12pm) to do work on my condo. I accomplished all three, I now have clean socks, shirts and underwear, I ate a medium BIG MONTANA combo from Arby's, and I got the form (and today I got internet and cable at my condo). Afterwards I went to Westport, where Pam graciously made me a pot of coffee, which I drank pretty much by myself. I was number three in the line-up, Keith Cissel MC-ed, Janine Brito lead off, followed by John Garrison, then ME! It was probably the coffee because I was SUPER HYPER on stage. I talked really fast but was coherent, I even spit a little when I talked, which was embarrasing, but it got a laugh. I did [TETRIS] at mach speeds, and threw in some unexpected facial features and hand gestures during my blackout/shampoo bit. Anyway, I had an absolute BLAST last night, which goes to show that I guess it is cyclical; or at least I was motivated by last weeks utter failure. Keith Cissel said that I was improving, which is a huge compliment, I thanked him and tried to seem sincere, but I am afraid I just came off as super hyper. Then I drank ANOTHER POT of coffee (THANKS, PAM!). Kevin Patterson said that last night was a great way to lead into my week at Fairview Heights; since I'll be doing more shows this week than I have ever done before, I am going to try to write what happened after every show, or within 24 hours at least. That way I have an entire week in my blog that progressively shows what it's like to do comedy almost everyday. Also, in regards to the coffee, I barely slept at all last night, but that doesn't matter, because I've drank a TON again today. Man, when I come down, I'm going to sleep for days...

Zero for Two

I somehow forgot to look at the list for the Funny Bone this week, and so when I showed up I had no idea whether I would be going on stage or not. It turns out that I did make the list and went up FIRST! (after the MC, Dano Sullivan, of course) and my stage time was not what you would call 'good'. Originally I chalked up my lack of quality to simply being first (it's really hard to be the first guy up, which doens't bode well since I am MC-ing at Fairview Heights next week) and some new material I did.
Last night was Wednesday so I showed up at the Red Sea wearing my Adidas ball cap, (I hardly ever wear hats because it feels funny being bald and all) and a leather jacket that I got from a thrift store about 4 years ago. It was like being in disguise. But I couldn't hide from not being funny. Sadly I failed to bring the funny last night as well.
I know that everyone has "off" days, but I have to say I am slightly concerned because I have that job at Fairview next week, and Wednesday is apparenly a tough night over there. I need all the confidence I can get going into that. Then again, my very best sets have often come within a week after some of my not so great sets. I really need to work on a static order for my jokes, such as my lab rat jokes always follow my pharmacy jokes, and tetris and phonesex always go together...
I seriously can't wait for the Las Vegas Comedy Festival because I am pretty sure I'll learn something extremely important. Also, and I hate to admit this, I'm not getting on stage with the same excitement as I used to, I used to get butterflies, a rush, nervous, whatever; but now, it's like "hmm guess I'll get on stage now". Now during a good set, I usually get excited, because of the energy from the crowd. I hate to blame the crowd for my performance; I know they have a lot to do with how a comedian does on stage, but I like to take responcibility for my own whatever.

M.C.M.R.

Last night was the show at Louie's (in the Holiday Inn Select in St. Peters). John Garrison invited me to M.C. the show. The line up was: Me (Marcus Robinson), John Garrison, Jammer Bicks, and Johnny Kavanaugh. I've never really MCd a show before (I did once in Minneapolis last summer, but I was horrible). Last night I wasn't much better, but Johnny Kavanaugh did give me some great advice on how to bring people up and other things I wouldn't have thought of. Anyway, special thanks to April, Dori and Jeremy, Millie and EJ, Kathy L. and Terry S. for all coming out to the show and to John for letting me M.C.

I got better

I guess the theme song was just the beginning, because I recieved a phone call today from Joey at the Fairview Heights Funny Bone and she offered me a job MC-ing in Illinois from Wednesday Sept 29th to Sundayd October 3rd. I am super excited, because it's roughly 7 minutes a show, with 7 shows. And the shows are so close, I'll definately be able to recognized changes in audience reaction (typically, if I do 2 shows in 2 days, I feel better about the delivery at the second show). Oh yeah, and it pays!

My New Theme Song

OK, so I'm kind of in a bad mood, my weekend wasn't exactly great due to a number of reasons. Also I didn't get anywhere-near enough sleep last night. In anycase, today was shaping up to be pretty unpleasant; however, while listening to my iPod a song by Fatboy Slim came on, it's called "E.V.A." and it's off of the Norman Cook Collection. I highly recommend it. In fact, it's my new offical theme song. It was also featured in a Starburst commercial, I think… Anyways, it put me in a good mood, despite the past 72 hours and the crappiness within. I love music.

"The aim of the game is to feel real good"

Janken

Not that I've recieved any for about 10 days, but the submissions period for the Paper Rock Scissors tournament is officially over. I should have the results posted today, unless of course I get distracted by some City of Heroes. As it stands, I think I had between 5 and 10 people compete, which is pretty good. I think just for fun I am going to enter a "random" player and roll a die to determine the selections (ie 1,4 = rock 2,5 paper, 3,6 = scissors). We'll see how I (and the contestants) measure up to random chance and Murphy's Law.

By the way, I first learned of the word Janken playing Alex Kidd in Miricle World on the Sega Master System.

Go Virgo

Yesterday was my 25th birthday and my dad's 66th birthday. I celebrated by doing a spotlight at the Fairview Heights Funny Bone. I was pretty nervous, because I wanted to impress Joey, the manager. The crowd was kind of small, and not easily amused. At the end of the show, Joey got my contact information, which is a good sign, so I am excited. Being Wednesday, I went to the Red Sea, where the crowd was slightly more unforgiving. Anthony was taping for a class or something, so the place was well lit. During my set, Matt Wolff was at the bar talking to some girl, and I started narrating what he was doing because he wasn't paying attention to me. Eventually I did some of his set that he did earlier, which the crowd loved. The rest of my set went well, because the audience was paying attention to me.
Oh yeah, I got a digital camera for my birthday from my brother, Darin, so I'm hoping to throw up some pictures everyonce in a while. That'd be cool.
A special thanks to those who gave me stuff or wished me a happy birthday, and to those who haven't, you can still send me stuff. You can't get on the thanks page for nothing.

Today I attended funeral services for Msgr. Jacques Wenting. Msgr. Wenting taught me French and Latin while I was in High School. He was one of the hardest instructors I've ever studied under, which is probbaly why I liked him so much. I hated going to class, and feared what would happen when I inevitably fouled something up linguistically. Fr. Wenting (he was appointed a monsignor in 2000, after I graduated, so I am accustomed to calling him Fr. Wenting) gave me my first formal training in foreign languages, which lead to my eventual understanding of the English language. I graduated with an English Degree from Columbia College, so I would say Fr. (Msgr.) Wenting helped laid the foundation for that. I never really "enjoyed" French or Latin class with Fr. Wenting, this is not meant to sound disrespectful; however I did have a decent advantage over my classmates at Conception Seminary College when I took Latin with Br. Jerome. I thoroughly enjoyed Br. Jerome's class and that's eventually where I got the idea to start going by "Marcus" because it's the Latinate form of my legal name, Marc.
I think that Msgr. Wenting's influence, direct or indirect as it may be, is pretty substantial on me. I realized today that St. Thomas guys are now officially a dying bread (again, no disrespect intended). Since the school is closed, the number of of us who attended will only decrease over the years. Likewise, the number of faculty who tought us can only decrese. That's kind of what prompted me to write this today, because in the future, people might not know how much of an impact they had on me, and I'd like to make a note, not so much that they will know, but so I will remember.

Make it a double

Wednesday! Woo! Yeah. Man am I tired. I was up until midnight last night, which is far to late for an old man like me. Before I talk about last night, let's start at the begining of the week, or rather the end of last week.
Saturday:
John Garrison and I went over to the Fairview Heights Funny Bone Saturday night to check out the club picks for the Las Vegas Comedy Festival contest. Jimmy Rice competed against a bunch of non St. Louis comedians. He did extremely well, however, Jim Short ended up winning the coveted free trip to Vegas. The rest of the show was good, and I ate the first fast food I've had in almost a month. Mmmm Chilitos (that's a chili cheese burrito for you non Taco Bell freaks).
Sunday:
I woke up at 6:30am to go BACK to Fairview Heights for the 'amateur' portion of the Vegas competition. I was the first comic to get on stage, which sucks, but what can you do? I talked to Brett, who's the asst. manager at the Fairview Bone and he liked my set and said if I call up I can probably get a SpotLight on a slower night (Thursday or Sunday). That's awesome. I ate at McD's with Paul Harris and took a four hour nap at home.
Tuesday:
Was at the Funny Bone, Westport-style, and Kevin Patterson told me I look like Gollum from the Lord of the Rings movies. I said I need to acknowledge that on stage within my first 10 second on stage or so, he said it would be a good "throw away line". I worked for the rest of the show to find a way to use it, and came up with a decent idea that utalizes my resemblance to Moby and slides into my set about my nephew (Pokémon and Air Hockey).
Wednesday:
At the Forum, we had a sparce crowd (less than 30 or so) and only 11 comics. Jim Stout announced some new rules that will serve as incintives for comics to bring people. Since I don't know any non-comics, I'm probably going to have to pay to work at the Forum. Hey, if it's good enough for the California Guitar Trio, it's good enough for me.
At the Red Sea, Jeremy Essig, Matt Wolff and Chad Huff were waiting to go on, and Gabriel Kea had already gotten on stage when I showed up. I did pretty much the same set as the Forum, which included my new Gollum stuff, some jokes about my college spanish class with Señora Pringle at CC, some drinking jokes and I think I threw in Phone Sex somewhere in there. I took notes up this time, because I wanted to make sure I worked on the new stuff.