The Second City

With the show in Casper behind us, we returned to Philly for a week to recharge. Our next city was Chicago - a city with a great reputation not only for standup but also improv and sketch. We arrived on the first day of Lollapalooza - meaning it was a goddamn shit show. Traffic was atrocious and we absolutely could not find parking anywhere.

First on our agenda was meeting one of Dan’s friends who worked in the center of the city, which made traditional parking impossible. To achieve our goal we had to exploit the van’s look. Spotting a side alley full of Amazon, USPS, and various other delivery trucks unloading items, we figured we could act like we were one of them.

Multiple signs were plastered to the walls all cautioning ‘loading zone - all other vehicles towed at owners expense’, but we took the gamble. We came back 45 minutes later and there stood the van - unticketed. Nothing happened at all. At least if comedy doesn’t work out we’re set up for our next job.

Crazy insults

Parking in Chicago sucks so bad. After leaving the loading/unloading zone, we had to drive several miles into the suburbs, park the van, and uber back into the city. When we finally hopped out of the van a crazy, incoherent homeless man started jabbering at us.

He was babbling at a frenetic pace and was utterly unintelligible. We had zero hope of understanding what he was saying. He had a 1,000 yard stare and when he spoke (screamed), his pupils bounced around his eyes like those old dvd screensavers.

He realized, somehow, at the end of his diatribe that we hadn’t understood a single word. In that moment his cloudy eyes became crystal clear and he said to Dan with perfect enunciation “Allahu akbar lookin muhfucka’ and walked away.

The guy only had one remaining brain cell and he used it to roast Dan. He choked out one last coherent thought; one final burn. It was like the good guy in a movie who you think is dead, but when the villain turns him over he’s holding a grenade with the pin pulled out.

Body Negativity

As it was Lollapalooza, tons of young people were littered about the city -- many wearing little more than a handkerchief. Some had fit bodies and could pull off the skimpy look, but the rest should’ve put a shirt on. I’m getting sick and tired of young people's happiness and confidence.

Young people have grown up without shame. They’ve been told how great and beautiful they are for their whole lives, when in reality they suck. Back in the day if you weren’t good enough, people told you about it. I grew up fat and there was never any shortage of people reminding me. See below.

Everyone would tease me - even adults. When I walked down streets or rode my bike, people driving by would shout from their vehicles “FATASS!” or something similar. Crossing the street in front of cars was always the worst - it felt like walking directly into a snipers crosshair. I’d try to cross quickly before they could bark out a cutting insult.

Now don’t say “Awww, you poor thing”. Criticism forced me to make changes and lose weight. It solidified a habit of exercise that I'll have for life and ultimately made me stronger. Aside from unending feelings of shame, inadequacy, and drinking obscene amounts of hard liquor to suppress tides of rage, I’m TOTALLY FINE, STOP ASKING ME ABOUT IT.

Seriously though - the point of that story was not to gain sympathy; it was to talk shit on people with unearned confidence and positive body image. When they cross in front of cars they not only walk slowly, but waddle along with this smug attitude of “I’m the hottest motherfucker on the planet”.

Being severely overweight and still thinking you’re hot shit is completely delusional, yet it’s totally accepted -- probably because beauty is subjective (not really). If people showed that level of delusion in anything objective, It’d be a totally different story. Imagine someone strolling into a calculus class saying “My math is beautiful. 4 + 4 is 11. I don’t care if you like it, it’s still great. My math my business”. You’d think the person was insane.

It’s just a whole generation of people that refuse to face reality. I saw an interview with a popular female rapper that really drove this point home. She was criticised for her semiliterate tweets and moronic speaking voice. Her response was something like “Juz becuz I cain’t talk guud or read guud or spell guud don’t mean I’m stupit”. YES IT DOES. That’s EXACTLY what that means.

Back to basics

We did a bar mic in Chicago and it was a stark reminder of a little-known facet of standup: It’s extremely variable. You can run the same set to two different audiences and have entirely different reactions. Comedians can slaughter a crowd at 8 p.m. and bomb at 10 p.m. with the exact same material.

This shit doesn’t happen in music. When Queen played ‘We Will Rock You’, energy crackled through the room as everyone chanted and stomped along. But in comedy you sometimes get audiences that seem like they don’t even want to be there (e.g. every single all-comic mic).

Our last show was in Casper and we crushed a room with 200 + people. Now at a comics mic in Chicago using the exact same material, we barely raised a pulse.

Hey, that’s your job!

Some may say “There’s no such thing as a bad audience. Any comedian worth his salt can turn a room”. That’s an idealistic notion, but it’s not always possible. Some crowds just don’t laugh regardless of how good your material is. Top-level comics face this shit too.

We saw Hannibal Burress perform once to a crowd that really sucked. He was nailing them with his surefire bits and getting nothing. After a while he just said “Y’all not laughing is your own fault. This shit works. It’s tested”. It was hilarious to see a pro deal with something that every comic has gone through.

Showtime

We tried some new and old stuff, got a few laughs, and got out of there. To comics, we did well. To outsiders, we bombed horribly.

We had a busy week ahead of us. In seven days we had yet to cover Madison, Detroit, and Burlington.