Trying to find the grind

I’m sitting outside of a bar waiting to sign up for what will now be my third comedy performance and I’m thinking about doing this more. A lot more. Like four or five night’s a week more.

There’s four, scratch that, five other comics and we’re all trying to out funny each other while we’re waiting. It’s fun and interesting. There’s definitely an undercurrent of nerves and a desire to see who’s gonna be good. It’s like lions slowly circling a downed gazelle, waiting to see who moves first.

I just hope I’m not the gazelle.

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Mission (1) Accomplished

After taking a standup comedy class at the Improv Fort Lauderdale for the last five weeks, I got up on stage and made my debut. I was very pleased with the response I received and, as you’ll see in the video below, there were lots of laughs.

So, what’s next? More performances and the second part of the class. There’s an ‘advanced’ class that starts in a month that I’ve already signed up for and, in the meantime, I’m going to hit some open mic nights and get on stage as much as I can.

So, without further ado…

Today is the day

Live at the ImprovTonight, I do something for the first time. I get up on stage and perform a standup comedy routine for a live audience.  I’m more excited about this than you can know as I sit on the precipice of this new endeavor.

I’ve been told that I’m funny all of my life and have no doubt that it’s true from the reactions I’m able to illicit from the people I interact with. However, all my life I’ve said that I couldn’t be a standup comedian because, ‘I wasn’t that type of funny.’ I always considered myself to be situationally funny where I could make people laugh by building on things that were said or the situation we were in. I could never write a comedy routine or, at least, that’s what I thought.

It wasn’t until this past year that I decided to jot down the funny things I said. Before I knew it, I had pages upon pages of ‘material’. Looking at it far removed from the original situation, some of it is funny, at least in my opinion,  and some of it is inane. However, tonight I’ll find out if it truly is funny.  If I can get the audience to laugh in the way I think they will.

If nothing else, I gave it a go. This could be a point in my life that I remember fondly as something that I set out to do and accomplished or it could be a turning point that I remember as the moment everything changed. We’ll know by 8:30.