F*ckin' A Right Doggie!!!
-I will be hosting a show of college students at the DC Improv on Tuesday, March 7th. It should be fun. Email me if you want tickets and I’ll see what I can do… ryanconner@gmail.com
-Here is what has happened in the last 2 weeks. On Friday, 2/24, I judged and did a set on a show at UMD that was part of The DC Improv’s District’s Funniest College series. It was a packed show, around 300 people. Fun was had by all.
-Saturday I had a show in Carlisle, PA. It was at a place called Red Devil Pizza. I figured it was a big place that sells pizza and has live comedy. So, I drove up there and went to the Motel 6 (no joke) where they were supposed to have a room for me. Nope. They said they didn’t. So, I called the booker, who wrote the contract that I happened to have with me. He said, “Oh yeah… we don’t book the rooms for comics anymore.”
“Well it’s in the contract.”
“Yeah, but we don’t do it.”
“Why is it in the contract then?”
“I don’t know. Just get a room and I’ll reimburse you.”
That’s how the conversation went down. He didn’t know why his contract was wrong. So, I took a little nap before the show, which was supposed to be at 9. At 8:05, my phone rang. It was the booker. “Ryan, are you at Red Devil Pizza?”
I now realize how stupid this question is, as Red Devil Pizza seats about 25 people.
“No, I’m at the Motel 6. I’m leaving for the show in about 15 minutes.”
“Well the show starts at 8.”
“I have the contract here, and it says 9.”
“It starts at 8 though.”
“The contract says 9. You wrote the contract, right?”
“The show is at 8. We changed it. It used to be 9.”
This burst of idiocy forced me to hang up. Basically, there were three facts in my contract; pay, accommodations and show time. Two of them were wrong, and the booker acted like I was supposed to know that he changed them.
I’m not even going to address the show itself, other than to say it was horrific. If you scroll to the bottom of my previous entry, you can read a joke that the headliner did. Atrocious.
-Sunday night, I was part of Larry Poon’s Belated St. Valentine’s Day Poonanza and Wet T-Shirt Contest, at Staccato Lounge in Adams Morgan. It was the most fun show I’ve ever been a part of. I did four sketches, which will be posted on my site very soon. They all went over very well. I wrote my favorite sketch, in which I play a horrible hypnotist, an hour before the show. It was essentially a Satellite show, plus a couple people, and minus Justin Schlegel, who cancelled at the last minute for a private gig that paid $5,000,000. It should be known that Jon Mumma stood in the balcony, naked, watching the show, for about 10 minutes.
-In contrast to the UMD show, Tuesday night, I did another Improv college show; this time at Johns Hopkins. Jon Mumma hosted and Frank Hong and I did time at the end. I had high expectations for this show, because I knew that Hopkins doesn’t accept dumb people. Little did I know, they also don’t accept people who are socially “normal” and know how to have “conversations.” There were about 50 people in the crowd and about 40 were awkward freaks (minus the comics). It seemed like their parents decided for them that they would be pre-med some time between their 4th or 5th birthday, and they took the aggression from that out on us.
Jon’s set was going okay, but not great. Then he came to a point where he had a choice. He could either turn it up and do his Gay Motorcycle joke. Or, he could make the crowd feel as awkward as they made us feel. Luckily, Jon went with the latter. Jon stared at the crowd for 30 seconds. I’m not exaggerating. Stop reading this and watch a clock for 30 seconds. Imagine someone staring at you for that long while holding a microphone. Now that’s awkward.
The whole show was weird. I pretty much bombed at the end. Only the student comics were laughing. The other people were offended because I said that if your walls are lined with anime posters, then you’re weird. That isn’t a controversial statement anywhere else in the world. At Johns Hopkins, it’s like saying that Jesus is gay in a Southern Baptist church.
As we were leaving, we passed by The Chess Club. The chess boards were hot, and surrounded by seemingly thousands of students. It was like that scene in The Ninja Turtles movie, when they go to the Shredder’s underground lair… half pipes, talking rhinos, the whole deal… Allyson Jaffe, manager of the Improv, looked in the room, said, “Yep.” And we left. It was a perfect ending to a horrible night.
-I hate people who count how many beers they drink at bars or parties. There is nothing more obnoxious in that setting than walking in, and having a guy hold up his beer and say, “I’m on number six. You?”
“This is my first.”
“You better catch up. I’m already halfway to drunkville. Ya hear me? Okay…”
“I don’t really drink.”
Then the guy laughs, like he’s exposed you as being a loser, which proves that he’s a loser.
It’s even worse with the guys who exaggerate. “Holy shit, dude. I’m on number 46… got a pretty good buzz going… see that girl in the corner? Yeah, she wants me. Once I hit 50, I’ll probably go talk to her.”
No you won’t.
-I read that last week a kid got kicked out of a theatre for laughing too loud at The Pink Panther. Normally, I think it’s a good policy to punish people for laughing at stuff like that… but the kid was retarded. That’s why he was laughing at it. People punished a kid because his retardation was preventing them from enjoying a Beyonce movie. That’s one of those “Wow” moments where you can’t believe how selfish people can be.
That’s like when you’re in a car with someone and there’s a huge accident which has caused traffic to be at a standstill. And they’re like, “Man, all this traffic… what the hell… now I’m going to be late… I’m going to miss American Idol because of some idiot… this is the worst day I’ve ever had.” Your worst day? What about the guy who was in the car accident who may not be alive? Shut up, you jerk.
-My brother, Jasper, has introduced me to a band called Cursive. They are amazing. Buy their album, The Ugly Organ.
-I was at The DC Improv with Bill Burr last week. It was a lot of fun. Bill is hilarious. Dawan Owens hosted and did a great job as usual.
A couple weird things happened when I was selling t-shirts, which I must say I felt awkward doing all weekend.
1) A guy came up to me and yelled, “Fuckin’ A Right Doggie.” Then he said the exact same thing to Dawan and Bill, at 5 second intervals. That was his default greeting. What wrong turn does a life have to take for someone to start greeting people like that? That’s an open question. He was nice though.
2) A lot of people asked me if I sold CDs. I told them I won’t do that for at least a few years. They couldn’t understand why. After asking me, one guy actually said, “I mean, you have t-shirts. T-shirts are… t-shirts. CDs are… you know… you listen…” It was profound. I think he did steal that line from Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, but I applaud his ability to recall the line and apply it so perfectly.
-This section is just for comics
A lot of DC area comics have been filling their blogs with advice on comedy and opinions on what they think is good comedy. I think it’s hilarious because one person did it and meant nothing by it, and now a lot of people are going back and forth about it on their blogs. The odd thing is that since they’re all comics, and all know each other, they probably could be having this argument by email or phone, but have opted for the blog.
So, I’ve decided to join the discussion.
Here’s my opinion on comedy. If you don’t have any jokes about the differences between black and white people, credit, drugs, crime shows, traffic, construction, hypocritical organized religion, roofies/drugging a girl in general, “big girls”, white girls are freaky, songs about sleeping with porn stars/old people, what’s going on with those crazy news anchors, cell phones are crazy, Oprah and her ever-changing size, Michel Jackson, OJ, waiting for the stop sign to turn green, girlfriend saying that you don’t listen, shopping, masturbating, gay marriage (the hack variety), ménage trios (don’t want to let two people down) or how people should beat their kids…you should write some. They’re highly original. I don’t think anyone has ever touched on those topics. You write one joke for each of those topics and you’re going to the top. Try to keep it as impersonal as possible too. That way it’s easy for someone to steal the joke.
There it was; the worst advice and comedy opinion ever. I’m not referring to anyone in DC, because DC has very few hacks, especially compared to other cities. I just wanted in on the debate.
-I love you so much.
-Here is what has happened in the last 2 weeks. On Friday, 2/24, I judged and did a set on a show at UMD that was part of The DC Improv’s District’s Funniest College series. It was a packed show, around 300 people. Fun was had by all.
-Saturday I had a show in Carlisle, PA. It was at a place called Red Devil Pizza. I figured it was a big place that sells pizza and has live comedy. So, I drove up there and went to the Motel 6 (no joke) where they were supposed to have a room for me. Nope. They said they didn’t. So, I called the booker, who wrote the contract that I happened to have with me. He said, “Oh yeah… we don’t book the rooms for comics anymore.”
“Well it’s in the contract.”
“Yeah, but we don’t do it.”
“Why is it in the contract then?”
“I don’t know. Just get a room and I’ll reimburse you.”
That’s how the conversation went down. He didn’t know why his contract was wrong. So, I took a little nap before the show, which was supposed to be at 9. At 8:05, my phone rang. It was the booker. “Ryan, are you at Red Devil Pizza?”
I now realize how stupid this question is, as Red Devil Pizza seats about 25 people.
“No, I’m at the Motel 6. I’m leaving for the show in about 15 minutes.”
“Well the show starts at 8.”
“I have the contract here, and it says 9.”
“It starts at 8 though.”
“The contract says 9. You wrote the contract, right?”
“The show is at 8. We changed it. It used to be 9.”
This burst of idiocy forced me to hang up. Basically, there were three facts in my contract; pay, accommodations and show time. Two of them were wrong, and the booker acted like I was supposed to know that he changed them.
I’m not even going to address the show itself, other than to say it was horrific. If you scroll to the bottom of my previous entry, you can read a joke that the headliner did. Atrocious.
-Sunday night, I was part of Larry Poon’s Belated St. Valentine’s Day Poonanza and Wet T-Shirt Contest, at Staccato Lounge in Adams Morgan. It was the most fun show I’ve ever been a part of. I did four sketches, which will be posted on my site very soon. They all went over very well. I wrote my favorite sketch, in which I play a horrible hypnotist, an hour before the show. It was essentially a Satellite show, plus a couple people, and minus Justin Schlegel, who cancelled at the last minute for a private gig that paid $5,000,000. It should be known that Jon Mumma stood in the balcony, naked, watching the show, for about 10 minutes.
-In contrast to the UMD show, Tuesday night, I did another Improv college show; this time at Johns Hopkins. Jon Mumma hosted and Frank Hong and I did time at the end. I had high expectations for this show, because I knew that Hopkins doesn’t accept dumb people. Little did I know, they also don’t accept people who are socially “normal” and know how to have “conversations.” There were about 50 people in the crowd and about 40 were awkward freaks (minus the comics). It seemed like their parents decided for them that they would be pre-med some time between their 4th or 5th birthday, and they took the aggression from that out on us.
Jon’s set was going okay, but not great. Then he came to a point where he had a choice. He could either turn it up and do his Gay Motorcycle joke. Or, he could make the crowd feel as awkward as they made us feel. Luckily, Jon went with the latter. Jon stared at the crowd for 30 seconds. I’m not exaggerating. Stop reading this and watch a clock for 30 seconds. Imagine someone staring at you for that long while holding a microphone. Now that’s awkward.
The whole show was weird. I pretty much bombed at the end. Only the student comics were laughing. The other people were offended because I said that if your walls are lined with anime posters, then you’re weird. That isn’t a controversial statement anywhere else in the world. At Johns Hopkins, it’s like saying that Jesus is gay in a Southern Baptist church.
As we were leaving, we passed by The Chess Club. The chess boards were hot, and surrounded by seemingly thousands of students. It was like that scene in The Ninja Turtles movie, when they go to the Shredder’s underground lair… half pipes, talking rhinos, the whole deal… Allyson Jaffe, manager of the Improv, looked in the room, said, “Yep.” And we left. It was a perfect ending to a horrible night.
-I hate people who count how many beers they drink at bars or parties. There is nothing more obnoxious in that setting than walking in, and having a guy hold up his beer and say, “I’m on number six. You?”
“This is my first.”
“You better catch up. I’m already halfway to drunkville. Ya hear me? Okay…”
“I don’t really drink.”
Then the guy laughs, like he’s exposed you as being a loser, which proves that he’s a loser.
It’s even worse with the guys who exaggerate. “Holy shit, dude. I’m on number 46… got a pretty good buzz going… see that girl in the corner? Yeah, she wants me. Once I hit 50, I’ll probably go talk to her.”
No you won’t.
-I read that last week a kid got kicked out of a theatre for laughing too loud at The Pink Panther. Normally, I think it’s a good policy to punish people for laughing at stuff like that… but the kid was retarded. That’s why he was laughing at it. People punished a kid because his retardation was preventing them from enjoying a Beyonce movie. That’s one of those “Wow” moments where you can’t believe how selfish people can be.
That’s like when you’re in a car with someone and there’s a huge accident which has caused traffic to be at a standstill. And they’re like, “Man, all this traffic… what the hell… now I’m going to be late… I’m going to miss American Idol because of some idiot… this is the worst day I’ve ever had.” Your worst day? What about the guy who was in the car accident who may not be alive? Shut up, you jerk.
-My brother, Jasper, has introduced me to a band called Cursive. They are amazing. Buy their album, The Ugly Organ.
-I was at The DC Improv with Bill Burr last week. It was a lot of fun. Bill is hilarious. Dawan Owens hosted and did a great job as usual.
A couple weird things happened when I was selling t-shirts, which I must say I felt awkward doing all weekend.
1) A guy came up to me and yelled, “Fuckin’ A Right Doggie.” Then he said the exact same thing to Dawan and Bill, at 5 second intervals. That was his default greeting. What wrong turn does a life have to take for someone to start greeting people like that? That’s an open question. He was nice though.
2) A lot of people asked me if I sold CDs. I told them I won’t do that for at least a few years. They couldn’t understand why. After asking me, one guy actually said, “I mean, you have t-shirts. T-shirts are… t-shirts. CDs are… you know… you listen…” It was profound. I think he did steal that line from Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, but I applaud his ability to recall the line and apply it so perfectly.
-This section is just for comics
A lot of DC area comics have been filling their blogs with advice on comedy and opinions on what they think is good comedy. I think it’s hilarious because one person did it and meant nothing by it, and now a lot of people are going back and forth about it on their blogs. The odd thing is that since they’re all comics, and all know each other, they probably could be having this argument by email or phone, but have opted for the blog.
So, I’ve decided to join the discussion.
Here’s my opinion on comedy. If you don’t have any jokes about the differences between black and white people, credit, drugs, crime shows, traffic, construction, hypocritical organized religion, roofies/drugging a girl in general, “big girls”, white girls are freaky, songs about sleeping with porn stars/old people, what’s going on with those crazy news anchors, cell phones are crazy, Oprah and her ever-changing size, Michel Jackson, OJ, waiting for the stop sign to turn green, girlfriend saying that you don’t listen, shopping, masturbating, gay marriage (the hack variety), ménage trios (don’t want to let two people down) or how people should beat their kids…you should write some. They’re highly original. I don’t think anyone has ever touched on those topics. You write one joke for each of those topics and you’re going to the top. Try to keep it as impersonal as possible too. That way it’s easy for someone to steal the joke.
There it was; the worst advice and comedy opinion ever. I’m not referring to anyone in DC, because DC has very few hacks, especially compared to other cities. I just wanted in on the debate.
-I love you so much.
posted by ryanconnercomedy at 1:39 PM
1 Comments:
You know that quote comes from Stiffler in American Pie, right?
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