The "What the Hell Made You Decide to do this" Story

Everybody has one of these stories. Nobody just wakes up one day, grabs a mic, riffs on a few ideas and has no tale to tell about how they got there. This is mine, complete with random tangents, digressions and ranting.

I'd like to start off by saying that I never saw myself as a Comedian. Sure, I've had funny things to say on many occasions and I can usually manage to get a laugh out of an uncomfortable situation...but none of that necessarily translates to being funny on stage. I've had respect for the art of Comedy and the role of the Comedian for a long time. I grew up watching George Carlin, Richard Pryor, Bill Hicks, Dennis Miller, Eddie Murphy, Chris Rock and numerous others. What struck me immediately was the ability of the Comedian to turn an uncomfortable idea into something hilarious. There's a sort of magic to that and it's amazing to watch it happen. I never thought I'd be able to do this myself.

This all started for me about a year ago. My friend Brian Douglas had just started doing stand up and I had checked out his videos of his performances and liked a lot of what I saw. One night we were hanging out at a dive bar in Alphabet City having a rather animated conversation over several $5 PBR and Whiskey shot combos and the subject of what makes a bit funny came up. If I remember correctly, Brian had a bit about gay marriage and the "slippery slope" argument many Christian Right fruit loops like to put forward that says if we allow same sex marriage, eventually people will be marrying their doberman pinschers. This bit eventually progresses to the point where it discusses how we'll then need special divorce lawyers to handle cases involving the separation of canine and human. We drunkenly went about talking about punching up the bit and I blurted out something like this:

"I think the Conservatives have the wrong idea: they should support gay marriage because gay marriage would be a great deterrent for gay sex."

Brian and I both laughed our asses off (the fact that we're both divorced possibly being a large factor in this) and then the question came from Brian:

"That's awesome...can I use that?"

My answer?

"Fuck no, man."

The response?

"Ok then, smartass. I do an Open Mic on Thursdays in the Lower East Side regularly. You have two weeks. If I don't see you get up there and give it a shot, that joke is mine."

I ordered another beer and a shot, thought about it for a second and responded:

"You're on."

Over the next two weeks I wrote about ten minutes of material and went out for the audience test. Something totally unexpected happened: I killed. I didn't just get polite laughter. I really nailed it...and it was the best feeling in the world. I'd found something new and dangerous and gratifying. I'm still doing it and I still love it.

Thus, a monster was created.