Last Night...

The set went over pretty well, at least for the 10% of the crowd that actually listened. Apparently the sound was not good in the back, which I only found out afterwards. Oh well. The Evil Dead II bit (sexual implications of having a possessed hand - you can figure it out) was the only bit I had done before, and it worked again. The poems were a new addition, and they were what I got the most compliments on.

Uh oh - I have a schtick.

Johnny Shaw, an EIU senior trying his hand at stand-up, had to suffer through a drunk Abercrombie & Fitch sweater wearing frat boy heckler who actually ended up ON STAGE with him. I felt for the guy, but the thing to have done was not let him up there in the first place. The host should have headed him off, and Johnny should have not handed him the mic. To Shaw's credit, his comebacks were good, and he didn't let himself get too flustered.

Open Mic

Tonight's set list:

Stacked (Pam Anderson's show, boob jobs)
Poem: Meth (see below)
Price of Gas
Price of Bottled H2O
Bottled Air (it's coming)
Poem: Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll (see yesterday's post)
Wolf Blitzer (the coolest name on TV)
Laid
Evil Dead II (the hand)
Poem: After the Frat Party


Meth

A leprechaun
on cocaine
trapped
in an elevator


After the Frat Party

I'm sorry
Let me get you
a towel

I signed up for an early spot so I can defuse the hippie vibe.

Today, a Poem

Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll


sex and drugs

and rock and roll

hepatitis


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Crackers

I'll get 3 minutes at the Crackers (Broad Ripple) open-mic on Tuesday May 3, for any of you folks who live in Indy and like amateur comedy.

foetry

This whole Foetry.com thing is fairly amusing. I'm on the fence with regards to poetry contests. I recognize that nepotism is going to happen (poetry is a small world), but I hate it when I send my $25 to a press for a contest whose winner turns out to have been predetermined. But my main problem is not the judging - it's the numbers. The lowest number of entrants in any contest I entered last year was just under 600, and that was a small press. I just don't see how that many manuscripts can be fairly judged.

I think it perfectly fitting that someone call presses on their selection processes, so long as they do it fairly. Alan Cordle may have shot himself in the foot by making a few tenuous claims, but the attention he recently got from the NY Times and NPR will only draw more attention, which will hopefully make the foetry forums a hot spot for entertaining rants and flames, at least for a while.

Hell hath no fury like an angry poet.

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I Hate Bongos

Friends & Co., 4/20/05 - The "host" decided it was fitting to do some extended jams with his hippie ensemble and set the whole night off by more than an hour. It's just an open-mic, but it was still unprofessional and not a little arrogant. Three bongo players plus a drummer plus a guitar doing your favs from the 70's. By the time 12:30 came around, I was tired and still sober (drinking before a set takes my edge off) and had no interest in trying to capture the attention of the drunken students who had been noodling for an hour.

I Suck

Did the Funny Bone in Springfield last night for the third time. I won third place. There were four of us. The room is a bit tough, being a mix of middle-aged adults having an after work drink, many not even aware that they've wandered into an open-mic, but looking at the video I realize just how little of an impact even a 6'2", 240 lb. guy can have when his delivery isn't honed. Among the many flaws, I used too many filler words and allowed lines to trail into questions in that I'm-interacting-with-the-audience kind of way. My instinct has been - and my writing has leaned toward - attacking the audience, not bonding with them. Which means I should also ditch the dress-shirt/sport jacket comedian uniform and go back to my original t-shirt/denim jacket. But more importantly, I should re-think some of my bits that lend themselves to talkiness and transitions and questions. Anyway, Pamela Anderson's sit-com debuted last night. Her character works in a bookstore. The show is called "Stacked."

















What? That needs a punchline?















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But Seriously...

Today's post by Ron Silliman, in which he shares a piece of hate mail from another (Pulitzer Prize winning) poet, reminds me why I have allowed myself to drift out of the po'biz loop these past several years: what often passes for a "literary community" is really a mutual agreement to acknowledge each other's sense of self-worth, to participate in one another's fantasy of literary immortality. When you're young, this can be fun and encouraging - after all, you're immortal already, your art simply a logical and natural extension of your divine ass self. But it soon gives way to fear of being forgotten among too many who stay in the game. Ron's correspondent clearly feels the need to fill some britches.

Death Week and a Day

As it turns out, my colleague appears to have taken his own life. There were a few details to suggest this right away, but I had dismissed them as after-the-fact interpretations, circumstantial evidence, etc. And the rumor mill in a college town never stops turning. But new details of his last day seem to confirm that his death was indeed a suicide. I won't bore you with those. There were other matters with which his friends were already familiar, such as some recent bad news from the doctor.

I was strangely relieved that this was the case, knowing now that he himself had determined when his last breath would be and how he would spend his last day. I was also more depressed than I have been these past several days, finding it difficult to think of someone being in that situation, coming to that decision, and following through with it - alone. He spent that night doing what he loved doing, playing his songs with and for his friends at our local haunt. He said good night and left with a smile on his face, as usual.

Friends & Co. 4.06.05

Didn't go up this week. I probably should have but was not in a very comedic mood. Tomorrow is the service for Marty Scott (see below). Apparently his ex-wife, a psychotic pain in the ass no who swooped down on his few possessions before he even grew cold, has insisted on being at the service, which will probably make it tense at best.

Death Week

Haven't felt much like posting these past few days. On top of all the televised death last week, we had an unexpected death in our department here last Thursday, one of those "it just isn't fair" kind of deaths where a guy leaves the bar, says good night, wanders out with a smile on his face then gets found face down in his hallway the next day. Martin Scott was a poet, essayist, and musician as well as a respected teacher here at Eastern Illinois University. A collection of his essays, Stealing Books, is due from Water Press & Media any time now.

He was 45 years old.