it's been 6 months since you laughed at me...

Stupid open mic. Stupid contest. Stupid picking #1. Stupid 3rd place! *pout* Yeah? Fuck you! I will whine and pout if I want to.

December 19^th marks my six-month anniversary of doing stand-up comedy.

I guess I thought it’d come easier. I thought I could just get up, be funny – but man, there is TONS of work to be done. I think the hardest thing is the writing. I just want to write down things that are funny – but, believe it or not, it’s best to write down un-funny things and work your way to why things are funny.

The act of writing seems counterintuitive – because I don’t write that close to how I talk – though, maybe I’m closer than I think. Friends often tell me when they read my blog they hear my voice saying it – so maybe it’s closer than I think.

So, looking back at the past 6 months – here are some thoughts about how far I have come and what I regret:

I’m glad I took Dean Lewis’ workshop. I’d have NEVER tried stand up if not for paying and forcing myself.

I’m so thankful for the friends I’ve made. Kim remains really dear to me and is tearing it up in Dallas. It was cool having a bunch of folks at my house every Saturday AM to work on material. While I hate mornings, I used to look forward to getting up and prepping for the onslaught of hilarity. And now, I’m slowly trying to build a group here in Springfield. Michael Brown and I are pretty tight, and it’s nice to have a comic friend who is honest and talks me out of doing crazy things, like that overly-racist Chinese food bit I contemplated trying out.

I regret not taking better advantage of Dallas when I was there. Dallas offered an opportunity to get up and on stage AT LEAST once a week. I was often too, well, lazy to go more than one night. It was just plain lazy not to take every advantage to be on stage I was offered. Now, I go up once a month.

I miss Backdoor Comedy in Dallas. I think the thing I miss the most is that Linda and the other comics didn’t put up with HACK – at all. You didn’t get away with it – plain and simple. Here, if you hack half of your open mic set, you get rewarded and declared the winner.

I have sworn off using notes! Thanks to Todd Yohn, I vowed never to use notes on stage again – and I haven’t since then.

I still need to write more. I tried some new stuff out, and have let myself ad-lib a bit more during my past few sets – and the payoff has been great. I may not have funny, funny, funny throughout the set yet, but I’m getting closer – and I’m proud of doing my own material. I’m proud of not going for the easy laugh – because hack or dropping the f-bomb is really enticing when you’re up in front of 25 uninterested people. But I’ve stuck fairly true to being real.

I’m proud that I have had a chance to open for 2 headliners. Both experiences were very positive. Todd and Mike Lukas were both very complimentary and encouraging to me.

I’m glad I haven’t given up, yet. I’m not saying I will – but it’s just frustrating to feel like you’re working hard, and not being rewarded or noticed. Coming in 3^rd out of 7 comics (and 2 of them were brand new), isn’t too good for the ego. It’s a bit of a boys club here, though.

What it comes down to is that I want to be famous NOW!

*pouts*