streak busted

I'm almost a week late on this blog, because on last Monday (February 2nd) we did a show at Lloyd and Harry's that wasn't great. It seemed like the audience wasn't in to it, and Steve Poggi said that few of the other comics actually wanted to do the show. I didn't know that, but in hindsight I can kind of see it. Anyway, the show wasn't great and so I was nervous going into the Funny Bone open mic as the host.
I was hoping to make a good impression last week because James Johann is coming to Westport this week and I worked with him in Little Rock in November. I asked Matt if I could host that week and he said he'd like to watch me host the open mic. Long story short, the audience was rough last week and I didn't get the big laughs I wanted. HOWEVER, I didn't crack or show that the audience was tough, I went on with my material (and may have gone long by about 2 minutes, which REALLY bugs me). Anyway, Matt wasn't able to see my set. Something happened, I don't know what. So I think I dodged a bullet there maybe. It's too bad I didn't ask to host a week earlier...

Charity Show

Last night I did a Charity show with Joe Stewart, Mark Feigenbutz and Mike McGuire. For the life of me I don't know what charity it was exactly, though I am sure Joe will tell me if he reads this. Anyway, I forgot to ask off for the night, so I literally left work for an hour and a half (B-Rabbit style) so I could perform and then I went back to work. I even opened up my set talking about it and made some jokes like "they're still waiting for their Pepsi". It was funny to me because I was easily 15 miles away from my "section" and we don't serve Pepsi...
Anyway, my set was alright, I wouldn't score it as high as sets I've had in the past month, but I got enough laughs to call it a B or B+, so I'll settle for that. Right after the show, I had to leave and go back to work, so I did literally that (I even told the audience that's what was going to happen, because I didn't want them to think that on-the-clock-server was part of my shtick or something). The best part of the night came when I accidentally wrote a new lead-in for my skiing joke. I can't wait to try it again tonight and see if it's as comfortable as it felt last night.

The Sudoku joke.

Last night the Comedy Forum had a decent sized audience, and I ended up going up last out of about 13 comics. The beginning of my set was a little too cocky for my tastes, but I said it, and pulled it off, so there you go.

As soon as I got on stage, I asked Andy Faasen if he'd check my camera and see if it was recording. I then said "I plan on being hilarious in a minute". The crowd kind of laughed at that, I took it as disbelief and said "Oh no, I'm F****** funny". They laughed. I had kind of a blue set, but I killed. I did about 12 minutes and after the show people came up to me and told me I had a good set and it was really weird. Cause, I mean a LOT of people came up to me. Like 7 or so, but 7 out of an audience less than 30? It felt really weird, but I felt funny. 100% Bona Fida funny. One group in the front row also laughed at my "Improper" tag, which never happens. I also got an applause break on a new sudoku joke (line) I'm working on. I did curse during it, so I don't know it that's why they laughed. I hope not.
After the Forum, I picked up Poggi and we hit Lloyd and Harry's, where I emceed and has a less than stellar set. The show was good, we only had about 7 comics or so. I forgot to try my sudoku joke which sucks because I would have liked tonight to be its third time on stage. If I'm on the list, that is...

Milwaukee in 2 sentences

I had a great time, modified some new jokes and was holed-up in the condo for 5 days straight. The headliner and feature were both from Chicago so they weren't around much.