It's Everyone Can Bite Me Friday!

I'm over at Uproarious today making inappropriate comments and flashing my boobs at the 3rd season winner of Last Comic Standing.

Let the bitching begin:

Merriam-Webster's online dictionary has now decided to charge money for the use of their service. Is this the beginning of the Internet turning on us? $4.95 a month or $29.95 a year. $29.95? Well, this was surely a smart move because the housing market is stable and gas is a steal. Goodbye Merriam-Webster, hello real dictionary sitting next to me that is so heavy it takes two people to lift.

Who is going to win the battle of the box office this weekend? Mamma Mia or The Dark Knight? I think the Mamma Mia Machine was smart to open on the same day as the Batman Franchise. This way they're going to get spillage. Overflow. And really pissed-off men. Men who couldn't get tickets to TDK but whose girlfriend is making them "Take me out, come on honey, it'll be fun!" Sorry guys, and by guys I mean the Hets. The Mos may be all aboard the ABBA train.

The only thing I care about is they STOP running that annoying Mamma Mia commercial piggyback. A piggyback is when they run a commercial, run another unrelated commercial and then run the first one again, all in the space of 90 seconds. It should be punishable by death. I will selflessly volunteer to kill the Mamma Mia commercial.

I've got THE WORST ALLERGIES IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD. I've taken so much Benadryl that I'm pissing pink. I'm exhausted from the pills, still have no feeling in my finger tips and am walking with crutches and Gigantor the Boot. Ask me how many things I drop? And leave where they are. If I die suddenly, CSI will be able to piece together the last 48 hours of my life just by following the trail of detritus that litters the floor.

The Learning Annex must die. They got into serious trouble over the Donald Trump Seminars that were held in Southern California a while back. They turned out to be seminars to get people to spend money, not make money. People were pissed and demanded their money back. They didn't get it.

I signed up for a class over a year and a half ago. They cancelled it. Twice. Now they don't return calls or refund my money. Here is what I don't understand. Do they think I would ever recommend them to anyone? What's the adage? If it's a success you tell one person and if it's a failure you tell everyone? Consider yourselves everyone.

Kaiser Permanente is a whore. Remember the nose bleed that wouldn't stop last year? They ended up charging me over a thousand dollars for four and a half hours of NOT making it stop. I paid them $465 and then wrote them a Cease And Desist For The Rest Or I Will Sue Your Asses letter. Twice. It's times like this I wish that instead of going into comedy I had taken my dad's advice and gone into litigation. I could always talk my way out of trouble. Ask some of my previous audiences.

End of chat.

The Learning Annex Is A Big Ripoff Kaiser Permanente Is A Big Rip Off

Bye Bye Love

Bye bye love,
Bye bye happiness,
hello loneliness
I think I'm-a gonna cry-y.
Bye bye love,
bye bye sweet caress,
hello emptiness
I feel like I could di-ie.
Bye bye my love goodby-eye.
~The Everly Brothers

That's Dave from Footsteps taking my boyfriend of three and a half MONTHS back to the stables. If you live in Southern California and need help like I did, please call Dave. Not only is he the nicest guy in the world but he's not a ripoff artist, like the rest of the doctors vendors in L.A. And he did me a solid on the rental so there's that. And because people have asked about it in the comments:

End of my scooter waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Men Fake Foreplay Winner Is....

So many correct answers this time. Mrs. K, Anne, Jami, Pam, Erin, Beckie, Susan, Traci, Heather, Janet, Melly196, Aerin, Eileen, Chandler in Las Vegas (who even got the play right), Allison (also got the play right) and Lannalee. It was MARIO LOPEZ!

All the names went into a bowl and I drew out the winner.

Congratulations Heather! Send me your snail mail and Mike will get an autographed copy out to you.

For those of you who live in the Los Angeles area, you can catch Mike's show of Men Fake Foreplay opening on Friday July 25th and running every Saturday at 8 PM through August 23 at the Actors Art Theater on Wilshire near Fairfax.

I'm back at Uproarious today talking about my favorite female comic. She confused me with a TV and stage star, which I was not happy about.

Coming in August! Another shoe contest for one of The Debs. Remember these past books? Driving Sideways by Jess Riley and Unpredictable by Eileen Cook? Another Deb has written a book you're all going to love, Sleeping with Ward Cleaver, by Jenny Gardiner. They have just announced the 2009 Debs so if you're looking for fun reads bookmark their website since they have lots of interesting writers over there. And I'm pimping them out in a total selfless manner because I DO NOT have a book for sale and I'm the Mother Teresa of blogging. Shut Up.


End of chat.

Men Fake Foreplay Contest!

Remember when I told you I knew a man who wrote a funny book?

Well here it is! It's the new shoe contest starring Men Fake Foreplay , an extremely funny book by comedian and Emmy award winning writer Mike Dugan.

It's the perfect read for both women and men. Doesn't matter if you're married or single, you'll love it. Here are some of my favorite quotes and after you read those, go to the bottom for the picture of men's shoes. And let me just say upfront that it was no mean feat (ahem) to find men's shoes I could use.

When I was single I had nine lamps in my house. At one point I waited till I got down to one bulb that I'd carry from room to room. And it would waste a lot of time because you gotta sit there in the dark waiting for it to cool down. That's why men leave their socks lying around - we need them for oven mitts.

Women have an intelligence network that rivals the CIA. They make the Internet look like two tin cans with string tied between them. I guarantee if you screw over a woman tonight, by tomorrow morning you'll be on a shit list in Afghanistan. Women are basically researchers. Especially in bed. That only looks like a negligee; it's really a lab coat.

Here's another great example of how single men will cut corners. I bought a set of dishes for the first time when I was 32. I had owned the bachelor cereal bowls before but this time I left the store with eight place settings. Because I took a woman along with me to help me pick them out. This should give you an idea of how women think differently than men. She said, "Definitely get eight place settings...you'll want to entertain, you know, have people over for dinner. What was I thinking? "Eight meals in a row without doing the dishes." Not including eating the cereal out of the coffee cups.

When a woman asks you to open up and share your feelings with her, it's important to understand that "I'd like to have sex with you and your best friend" isn't a feeling. It's a mistake.

I wish men were a little more aware of the damage they create when they talk about a woman behind her back. The damage I'm talking about, of course, is that women would be much more inclined to have sex with us if we would just shut the fuck up.

And speaking of oral sex-don't you think they should make beds about three feet longer so your legs don't dangle off the end of the bed? Or make your knees bend the other way or something...I've been looking for a bed with leaves that fold out like a dining room table.

So here's the contest picture:
Which one of these Broadway stars do these shoes belong to?

A. Clay Aiken

B. Kevin Kline

C. Mario Lopez

Same rules as always. Contest will be open for two days and you get one vote. Then I'll take the correct answers, put them in a bowl and pick the winner who will be announced on Wednesday. Then Mike will send you an autographed copy. For those of you who don't win but who want a great bargain on the book, go here and he'll sell the book for only $9.95 INCLUDING shipping and handling! And then go to his website and read all his amazing reviews.

It's Everyone Can Bite Me Friday!

MAMMA MIA.

KILL IT, KILL IT NOW. If I hear that commercial one more time I'm getting a rifle and limping up a tower and shooting at every motherfucker in Hollywood. Especially the ones who made this movie. Oh, and in case you didn't know, and you probably don't, all analog TVs will be obsolete next February. The 18th of February. Of 2009. In case you haven't heard, which you probably haven't.

Hey, look at my banner. The colon is back! When I registered it for trademark status I didn't have the colon on all the merchandise so I had to take it off this site until it went through.

I'm over at Uproarious today, talking about one of my favorite comics EVAH. I've added their widget to my sidebar. It will take you directly to the blog and can also be used as an ATM machine.

And I'm walking.

It's amazing all the things you take for granted in life. Like walking. Even though I'm doing it on crutches and the boot is a doppelganger for the Empire State building, it makes me feel human again. And for those of you who know me, I am not often called human. And in case you're wondering, I have no idea how to make an umlaut on the keyboard.

The night anxieties have come back. It means restless leg syndrome, eating late at night with no hunger required, carbs only bien sur, and an inability to fall asleep before 5 a.m. I have no idea what triggers this and have suffered from it since I moved to California during the Gold Rush. GOD MAKE IT STOP.

And speaking of things you take for granted.

When I lived in NYC, we had a super(intendant) named Victor. He was Peurto Rican, very handsome and a Ford model who had just gone past his prime modeling years a twee.

An ex-Viet Nam vet, he was also a hero in our neighborhood on the Upper East Side. This was back in the 80's, before gentrification popped our hood on its ass. We were at 90th and York, just north of the richest part of the Upper East Side. I had a kickass view of the East River and all the behemoth tankers that used to glide by, slowly and gracefully. Gracie Mansion, where the Mayor lives, was right across the street surrounded by a beautiful park and boardwalk.

Victor used to wrangle all the juvies in our part of the jungle and make them do physical activities to keep trouble at bay. Everyone loved him.

Turns out the reason Victor lived with only his Doberman Pinscher Sukie and became a super was because he had recently separated from his wife and child. He was, unfortunately, a cheat. He had affairs left and right and even ended up with one of my friends, which they both tried to keep from me. FAT CHANCE.

Finally Victor cleaned up his act. And wanted his wife back. He called her over and over and she refused. He had just abused her trust too many times. So one day he locked the Dobie in the bedroom, called his wife, begged her to take him back, and when she once again refused, shot himself in the chest, in the heart. Over the phone.

He survived the Viet Nam war but not his marriage.

We lived in front of a bus stop, the first one on the 86 crosstown line. We all knew the bus dispatchers by name. Victor's wife had called 911 and they sent cars and an ambulance over but everyone was afraid to go in because of the Dobie. No one knew the dog had been locked up so they assumed he was standing guard over poor Victor. The police decided to send in Vinnie, one of the dispatchers, since he at least had had contact with the dog.

Later on Vinnie told us what the apartment looked like and said no one should ever have to see something like that.

The next day I took the 86 bus over to the West Side. I got off at Central Park West, which I never did. There are no shops on that street, just apartment buildings. But I needed to walk, my usual refuge for when I need to think things over. I looked up at the trees in the park. I couldn't believe how beautiful they were and how supremely gorgeous the park appeared. I was so happy to be living in the most fabulous city in the world and I just stood there, awestruck. New York and all its beauty overwhelmed me.

And then I thought, "I can't believe Victor would leave all this."

A park and a city I knew like the back of my hand, including where all the bathrooms were in all the major hotels. I had never seen them before like I did that day. Not really.

End of chat.

Today Is The Day I Hope I Don't Get Fired

UPDATE 2:30 PM in LaLa Land:

The registration requirement for leaving a comment over at Uproarious has been lifted. Thanks to all the bizzotches who bizzotched. Like me.

Head over to Uproar Entertainment's new blog, Uproarious, and join me in dissecting and saluting some of the best comedy CDs on the market today.

This week I'll be there today and Friday. I'm taking questions in the comments section and I want to hear what you guys are listening to and watching these days. I mean besides porn.

But leave me a comment anyway so I don't have to ask IS THIS THING ON?

Uproar Entertainment Uproarious Blog Comedy CDs on the Web

I Hate Gwyneth Paltrow

Gwyneth had some surgery on her knee last year. I read a magazine interview where she was answering questions holding her son Moses, who in turn was holding his tablets, in her arms and hopping around the kitchen on one leg making lunch and scuba diving while doing brain surgery. How annoying is she while I'm still all Sally Scooter?

Look at this travesty below.

Sidebar: And no I'm not talking about the blurry picture. It's a DIGITAL camera, why can't I take a non-blurry picture? What was wrong with analog cameras again? Oh yes, I know. YOU COULDN'T SEE OUR LINES AND WRINKLES.

I borrowed this boot from Tony, a guy in my building who is a man's size 10 and I'm a woman's size 8. BUT STILL. And can we discuss Velcro?
Yes I know it's one of the by-products of us having gone to the moon. Or wherever in the fuck we went wasting taxpayer's money instead of, oh I don't know, HERE ON THE GROUND where the homeless and the uninsured live.

Velcro is all over that boot. And God forbid you take it off and those straps, there are about 57 of them, attach to another strap. Because if that happens, just take some C-4 and prepare to blow it up. It picks up hair that fell off my head in 2006 and there's clearly no need to vacuum anymore. EVER.

End of chat.

Gidget And Pootie Tang

I came across the Gidget TV marathon on July 4th. I've always been a Sally Field fan and even on that show, she could act her way around a corner. I also love her show Brothers and Sisters and can't wait to find out WHO THE HELL RYAN IS.

On one of the shows I watched, she was supposed to be 15 and a half and getting a job. Her dad thought she went to work at the Tom Kat Club instead of at the malt shop where she was actually working. At one point the father turns to his other daughter and son-in-law and says he's "Going to give her a spanking."

That kind of dialogue no longer exists on TV unless it's on Bernie Mac and I think his show got canceled. Maybe on My Wife and Kids they joke about it too. What I'm trying to say is white people seem to have lost their minds while the black community is still holding it together, just like Gidget's dad. You never actually see any spanking on TV, except on old I Love Lucy reruns when Ricky would take Lucy over his knee and whack her behind. Did men spank their wives in the 1950's? And if they did, why weren't more women indicted for murder?

When I first began doing standup I was often the MC at a lot of downtown New York clubs and the 2 a.m. late show on Saturday night at the Improv on West 44th Street. White men in the audience were harder on me than black men. I used to do this bit where I'd ask for a wallet from any guy in front and go through it. Then I'd ask the guy, "Who is this girl in the picture with you?" And then I'd turn to the woman he was sitting with and say "Honey, it's not you." Then I'd ask, "How old is this condom?" I was a regular laugh riot.

White men would get SO mad at me. Of course the audience would scream because the more annoyed the man would get, the more I would point out that he was sweating and clearly lying and wasn't his date just a little young for him? But black men would laugh and often lead the audience in the group howl. Unlike the white men, they never glared at me and always offered up their wallets quickly, effortlessly. They GOT the joke. Although to be fair, you don't want to be at any show that I emcee and sit up front. Seriously. I'm trouble.

One night at Comedy U Grand in the village, Lance Crouther was on the bill with me. You know Lance as Pootie Tang if you're a Louis CK fan. He's also a funny comic and gifted writer from The Chris Rock Show, where he and Louis both won Emmys. I mentioned to Lance that white men didn't like me when I Emceed but black men did.

"Black people respect their mothers. White people respect their fathers. When you were a kid and saw your father walking towards you with that Look On His Face, I'll bet you straighted up. Well, we did the same thing with our mothers. You don't want a spanking from your mama. So when certain white men see you holding that microphone, they don't necessarily give you their respect but black men have no trouble with you being in charge."

Sidebar: As to the midget thumbnail pictures that can only be seen if you have three eyes? The Internets are cracking down and making it harder to save a bigger file. I tried. I did.

End of chat.

Gidget Pootie Tang Spanking I Love Lucy Lance Crouther Louis CK

It's Everyone Can Bite Me Friday!

Today is the anniversary of the day my French mother married my American father. They not only married on the 4th of July but had their honeymoon in Niagara Falls. Welcome to America.

Dad must have thought this would be a good introduction to Mom's new life. Of course she didn't know the part about him being frugal and intimidating, not to mention taciturn for most of our lives. My mother tried to leave him when she discovered she was pregnant with me and only got as far as the front door with her cloth suitcase before he caught her.

"Where do you think you're going?"
"Back to France."
"How are you going to get there?"

Silence.

"It takes money to travel; do you have any money?"
"No."

As I am fond of saying, end of chat.

My mother told me that story a long, long time ago. Then many years later I brought it up and she denied it. Then many more years later she said it was true. My Mom is one of those people who puts a happy face on a train wreck. But if you don't acknowledge your pain you can't get past it. It has to come out somewhere, all that misery. She didn't have a happy life as a child, living under Nazi Occupation for four years. Her mother favored her younger sister and the family lost three more children to diphtheria. It was my mother who found her 4 year old sister dead in the bed with her. My mother was 5. How do you paint a smile on that?

So Mom married my father because her mother made her leave the guy she was seeing. That man came from a wealthy family and my grandmother said he would never marry my mother because they were poor. She told her to marry my rich American father. Only he wasn't rich but Mom didn't discover that until she arrived in the United States.

My parents never talked about splitting up. They never exchanged one hostile word between them. I remember my father raising his voice to my mother once and then never again.

Then one year my Dad ran into an old high school friend at a reunion while my Mom, sister and I were in Paris for the summer. He asked my mother for a divorce and married wife #3.

And eventually that wealthy French boy married my mother, in the late 1980's. My stepfather told me the first time he heard my mother had moved to the U.S. he had to be restrained by his friends from throwing himself in front of an oncoming metro.

I've always felt enormous sadness for my parents. Neither was happy yet neither had the courage to leave. Which is worse? To stay miserable or to start your life over not knowing what lies ahead? And the even bigger question for me was why does the Universe keep two people apart for 40 years, only to have them find each other again? They never lost touch over the 40 year span. Never. I wouldn't have been born if not for their separation. Sometimes I wonder if my life trumped their great love. It would explain a lot about how my mother treats me.

Recently a friend of mine, also a child of divorce, said that he didn't believe in it. He's married with one child and believes a couple should try and stick it out for the children. I didn't agree. The entire time my parents were married, my sister and I knew they weren't happy. I wrote my friend saying it was far worse for children to see covert unhappiness. That it would take its toll on them because it took its toll on us. Neither my sister nor I married. The bottom line is that children know when something isn't right. And it will mess them up far more than a divorce.

So the moral of this story is never marry on an important holiday because your children will always remember it, especially in the case of divorce. Even in death my father's memory looms. And I no longer speak to my mother. But on this day every year I think of them both and what was, and what might have been.

End of chat.

4th Of July Wedding Anniversary Divorce

Uproarious

I've been hired by a comedy website to blog for them twice a week. The blog hasn't launched yet but it's coming verrrrrrrrrrrry soon. They sell CD's of the hottest comics and I'll be reviewing them and telling you other things about what's going on in standup comedy. Since people ask me about standup all the time, I might as well get paid to answer. They've given me free reign to talk about it as I see it so who thinks I won't last more than a month?

I'll really be looking forward to your comments because I know a lot of you are comedy fans. I'll also take questions about comics who aren't on the website, comics you like and comics you love to hate. Hello Dane Cook Is The Antichrist fans!

If you love people like John Pinette, Alonzo Bodden, Brian Regan, Margaret Cho, Kathleen Madigan, Pablo Francisco, John Heffron or Bobby Collins, among others, check out my new blog.

End of chat.

I Was A Very Bad Girl Today

If you're eating food, finish it before you read this post.

I took the boot off. I just totally freaked out and couldn't take it anymore. Then I tried to get the dead skin off.

There's a sore on the front of the calf bone, which I'm pretty sure is not the medical name for it, that I got when I first was put into the cast. It came from bearing down on the leg while I was on the scooter. By the time I noticed it had eaten through layers of skin and was raw. The rawness is gone but the red mark is still there. After three months. Very comforting.

YES KYDDRYN I'LL DRINK ALL NASTY HERBAL REMEDIES THAT WILL HEAL THE BONES. Because I can't take my usual amount of Advil because it retards bone healing. GREAT.

I left the bandage on my foot because even though I wanted to take it off, turns out I'm a chicken shit. I can look at your gross open wound but the idea of looking at my own is less appealing. Maybe that will change. The bandage is tight but yes Heidi I can feel the tips of my toes. Although at first I couldn't and freaked out until I remembered that I have no feeling in my fingertips. But I could feel them with the palm of my hand. The toes are swollen but I can sorta wiggle them. When the cast came off the foot was numb and not very bendy. I asked the doctor why and he said, "Because you had a cast on for a long time." Gee, why didn't I think of that?

I can't believe all the Bonanza fans out there. Some personal trivia on Little Joe, Michael Landon. My sister auditioned for a Highway to Heaven episode and he was so taken with her that not only did he cast her, he let the camera linger on her STIRRING A PITCHER OF COCKTAILS. Which we all know is so riveting in real life. They became friends and after he died we went to a charity event at his home. His wife looked just like my sister.

End of chat.

A Whole New Level Of Depression

I didn't sleep one wink Sunday night. I checked the clock every hour and kept saying, Well, 5 hours of sleep will be enough, then Well, 2 hours of sleep will be enough and I kept pushing the alarm further and further back until I just gave up and got up.

So Monday morning I got McLoserstene and Mike, her friend from Sydney, and we drove to the doctor for my 10:45 am appointment.

Only the appointment was for 1:45 pm because someone can't remember to look in her date book that she carries in her purse so she'll never forget stuff only she never uses it because isn't it better to just guess where you're going to be on what day and at what time?

As we're sitting in the waiting room deciding to stay the 3 hours, it occurs to me the valet parking will be about 400 dollars so we leave and go to Starbucks. Coffee doesn't help and I'm melting into my chair. I realize everyone is looking at my yellow cast. Mike had written I Heart Cock on it. Mike is not gay. Well, maybe just a little. And I had written a very tasteful message on it as well: Get This Motherfucker Off Me, Dr. Bob. Suzy Soro + Australians = Not very subtle.

I was so looking forward to this day. I just wanted my freedom back. So now is a good time to mention I never thought I'd miss the cast.

My foot looks so grotesque and bloody and my calf is half the size of the other one.

I had taken pics of my feet before the surgery because I have pretty feet and wanted to remember them as they were. I've won CONTESTS with my feet. OK, I didn't but I could have.

Yes the calf will re-build and the scars will fade but I'm so full of scars already that it really upset me. My stress levels are so off the charts that I walk around with my shoulders up to my ears which has pinched a nerve and made my fingertips permanently numb. I can't write very well; it's just a scrawl at this point. I'm sure it will eventually go away but it's a constant reminder of what a wreck I am. Three months alone in this apartment has taken its toll on my sanity. I'm depressed, which two people who've gone through the same thing and some bloggers have told me they went through as well. I want to do my laundry. (not really) I want to take a shower. (really)

The Dr. told me I can put 10% of my weight on the bad foot when I walk with crutches. Remember when it was 20%? He said I was healing well but that 10% just set me back in my already-full-of-shot-nerves head. He said I could get a pedicure. Yeah, well first I have to drive there and unwrap and rewrap. That will add hours to the pedicure.

Dr. Bob's technician showed me how to walk properly but I couldn't do it. Every time I tried, the bad foot automatically went into the air, like it's been doing for 3 months. The technician had to HOLD my foot down while I leaned on crutches with my forearms and hands and leaped like a bunny on the good foot. Place bad foot. Move crutches forward. Jump on good foot to line up with bad foot. Most people think you can use crutches to lean on but it's your arms that move you forward. If you end up with sore armpits, your crutches aren't custom-fitted and you're doing it wrong.

A guy in my building had given me his black boot and saved me the $125 the Doctor was going to charge me for a new one so that was a huge relief. They started preparing my foot by wrapping it in an ace bandage, being sure to tighten the crap out of it. The technician told me to pay attention. Due to having no sleep I couldn't remember who he was much less what he was saying. Then came the black boot. I thought it was something you could take off before bed, or when you were sitting watching a movie. But it's not. It's another full month of claustrophobic incarceration. I'm just glad I didn't know this before I had the surgery.

Again, if I didn't live alone on the second floor, this wouldn't be such a huge issue. It now only takes one person to get me down the stairs but it still takes two people to get me back up. I learned by falling over a chair that I can't be on crutches and talk on the phone. So the fear of what could happen has immobilized me because the only person here to pick me up is me.

I do not look like this except for the boot part. Bitch.

I came home and tried to sleep. The boot goes all the way to my knee and is lined with a Siberian Husky. Because it's so big it creates a pup tent under the covers. And if I turn my leg on the side the foot starts to throb and ache and pain shoots through it. The scar over the area where they scraped off the bone spur is extremely sore. I got up and attempted to remove the boot but couldn't because I don't have a degree in engineering. By the time I figured it out I decided that could destroy the surgery so I leave the Eiffel Tower on my foot. I figure it's just better to try and get used to it. If the pain continues I'll have to get more pain pills. Suddenly Steven Tyler's rehab makes a lot more sense to me. I thought he was exaggerating because I had a foot operated on and I had no pain. As the saying goes, Never judge until you've walked a mile in someone else's high heels.

I lay in bed and channel surfed but had no attention span. I finally fell upon on a rerun of Bonanza and started to watch it. I noticed that Hoss really was such a kind person only he never got the girl because the chicks preferred Little Joe. Finally I realized GOOD GRIEF I'M WATCHING BONANZA and got up to read emails.

I didn't go back to sleep until after midnight-thirty after I tried everything. Benadryl, Advil, sleeping pills. NOTHING. I slept about 7 hours, finally. But I feel like crap and I'm depressed. Thanks for all the emails, the ecards and the phone calls. I wish I had the energy to return them but don't.

End of chat.

Today Was

Not a good day.

It's Everyone Can Bite Me Friday!

UPDATE RE GEORGE CARLIN at 2:00 pm LA time. After George's daughter left a comment on this blog about youtube and his estate I talked to a lot of people about it because I felt bad that I might have incorrectly summed up the incident. McLoserstene called it when she reminded me that networks routinely bar youtube embeds so that you will watch their network and not the internet. Yeah, the networks are so batting at an invisible pitcher here but whatever. So she guessed that HBO did the banning. And yes, they're running George's specials so it does make sense. I just want to apologize to Kelly, George's daughter, for my haste at slamming their estate. I've written her privately and said the same thing but I did want you to know that once again, I'm part of the problem, not the solution.

I can't believe I just spent 3 months cloistered in my apartment. I've left it exactly 4 times, which is also the amount of times I've wanted to saw this cast off my leg and throw it into the pool. I've developed restless cast syndrome and it's screwed up my sleeping big time. It's enough already. It comes off on Monday. Three days.

In the good news department someone from Sydney, Australia wrote I Heart Cock on my cast. How embarrassed are all the people at the doctor's office going to be when I show up with that? Why am I not embarrassed? BECAUSE MAKING FUN OF MY LIFE IS ALL I HAVE LEFT.

A lot of comics have sent me emails and called to talk about Carlin. I went to one of the youtube links my friend Matt sent me. While I was watching I noticed the embed had been disabled upon request. I'm guessing George's estate stepped in to stop the world from downloading, embedding etc. George would have fucking died (again) over that. He was so not that guy. If he could come back for 4 minutes the first 3 would be him yelling at youtube and his estate. He wanted you to hear what he was saying and he didn't care how you heard it. If you got it for free he would consider you a genius.

One of my commenters, Maureen, mentioned that SNL was rerunning the 1975 show that Carlin hosted. As happy as I am about that, what pisses me off was that according to Comedy on the Edge, the definitive book by Richard Zoglin on the evolution of standup, George was the guest host on that show, their first one ever and yet never hosted again. 'Carlin remains the forgotten man in the oft-told tale of Saturday Night Live's birth. Michaels never asked him back and he was pretty much written out of SNL's seemingly endless retrospectives and tributes.'

I'm upset that it takes death to set the record straight. So NOW they're all on board the Carlin Express. First Stop? Fuck You, New York.

The last three months I've spent most of my time online reading articles. This one made me laugh out loud, about how much coinage people leave behind in airports.

The cash leader: Los Angeles International Airport, where passengers left behind $89,375 from Sept. 30, 2004 to Oct. 1, 2007, according to TSA reports. Las Vegas' McCarran International was a distant runner-up.

The cash laggard: Chattanooga (Tenn.) Metropolitan Airport, whose 300,000 departing passengers in 2007 left just $1.20.

Biggest underachiever: New York's Kennedy International Airport, the nation's sixth-busiest, which generated just $5,228 from 2004 to 2007, including a mere $607 last year.

When have you ever heard that New York has been an underachiever? All in all, in the U.S., over a million dollars was left behind.

Then there was this article about James Dyson and his vacuum machines.

James Dyson has made quite a name for himself with his bagless vacuum cleaners. Now the inventor is spending some of his $1.5 billion fortune working on a gasless car --specifically, one that runs completely on solar power.

His engineers in England are developing a lightweight electric motor that, according to Dyson, could power a family vehicle for hundreds of miles. The battery would be charged by solar panels mounted on the vehicle's roof, and/or on the roof of a garage where the car is stored. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the motor is actually based on those used in the company's vacuum cleaners and hand dryers.

Seriously, why isn't this guy in charge of the world? Have you seen his newest vacuum cleaner, the one that operates on a ball? It came out this year. 2008. How long did it take people to figure out that vacuums only operate in a straight line? 139 years. That's when the first one was invented, in 1869.

And finally, more motorists are buying locking gas caps for their vehicles.

The minute I read that, Will Smith's song Wild Wild West went through my head. I filled my car with gas before my surgery. I have no idea why since I wasn't going to be driving anytime soon. But three months ago gas was a lot cheaper so I'm glad I did. I fill my car 4 times a year. That's because I walk everywhere and even if I drive, my car gets great mileage. Oh, and I don't have a job, that helps. It's currently parked underground in a gated part of our building and the gas tank is flush with the wall. Unless the Druggertons have figured out a way to crawl under my car and siphon out the gas, I think I'm good to go.

MONDAY MONDAY. The Mamas and the Papas had that right.

End of chat.

RIP George Carlin

I only met Carlin once. We were both appearing at Bally's in Las Vegas. He was in the showroom; I was at the comedy club Catch A Rising Star.

I had just moved from New York City to Los Angeles in the hopes of pursuing a bigger career than New York offered. I had agents and an apartment by the Hollywood sign and I felt I was on the right track. One of my first gigs was in Las Vegas; how horrible could life be?

Driving into Vegas and seeing Carlin's name on the marquee at Bally's and knowing I was going to be in the same place, doing the same thing made it seem like I had moved for all the right reasons. I immediately wrote him a note saying I was at Catch and that I wanted to see his show. I dropped it off at reception and wondered whether George would get it. He did and called me in my room to ask how many tickets I needed because it was Valentine's Day. He assumed I needed two. I had just started dating The Impotentate (GET OUT. RUN AWAY. YOU'RE GOING TO WASTE 7 YEARS OF YOUR LIFE WITH HIM.) but left him back in L.A. It was my first time playing Vegas and if I went down in flames I didn't need him to see that. So I asked George for one ticket and a fire extinguisher.

The first note pinned on the yellow sheet below is the message the operators at Catch A Rising Star took from George telling me to be at his 9 pm show. You know I'm the Queen of the Qeepsakes so I have this hanging in my Hall of Fame. You can't see it in this photo but it hangs down on the left, under the Muscle and Fitness magazine with my sister on the cover.
Valentine's Day in Vegas couldn't be more annoying if it tried. People running around all in love and shit and strangers looking at you with sad eyes because OMG you're alone! But I didn't care because I couldn't wait to see the guy that all comics put in their top 5 of best standups ever. If you don't get that, chances are you might not understand what makes great comedy. It's hard to explain if you're not in the business of making people laugh. You're just going to have to trust me and every other comic on the planet on this one. Can 20,000 of us be wrong? Uhhh. No.

Standing on a stage for over an hour trying to hustle an audience into laughing is not for the weak. It's so difficult that sometimes I look back on my younger self and wonder what convinced me that I could tackle such a job. How did I believe I had the wherewithal to make an audience love me? Or make them laugh or require them to think? Few of us will ever attain the rank of making an audience think. That requires enormous skill and I'd be the first to admit that I can't do it. I'm not that gifted. But Carlin had it in spades. Imagine trying to talk about religion, as George did in his bit on the Ten Commandments, and yet point out how ridiculous those Ten Commandments were. Who makes fun of that and wins? George. Because he was a master of comedy. My friend and fellow comic Matt Davis sent me an email that really summed up George's genius. He was a maestro with his words. He would start a premise or a story and he would zig and zag and weave and go off onto several different tangents (all of which were relevant and hilarious), and he would always come back and join it all together 10 or 20 minutes later and tie the end piece with a bow. It was amazing. It made me want to write more jokes and quit comedy forever at the same time.

That's really the hallmark of great anything. That it makes you want to do it better and yet quit because you don't think you'll ever be as good at it as the ones you admire the most. Comics can make a room full of strangers laugh. We don't know if it will work every time, and sometimes it doesn't, but we do know that most people can't do it and for some reason, that's why we keep doing it. And most of us hope we're one hundredth as good as Carlin. And know we're not.

The next night there was a message from George. "Want to know if you saw the show." I've had boyfriends who have dropped me off in front of my building and haven't waited to see if I made it inside alive. I have relatives who assume I'm dead because they never call. George was a real class act. And p.s., how many comics have you seen remain successful through their 60's and on until their 70's? Newhart. Cosby. Rivers. Carson. Believe me, we should all be so lucky.

Those of you who read me on a regular basis know I struggle with what I did with my life but when Carlin died I realized I'm grateful that I chose to be a comic, no matter how difficult the road. I remember once when my career was in the toilet and I didn't know what was going to happen to me and I called my Dad. I told him I had wasted my time flying around the world doing comedy and what did it bring me? And my Dad said "You made a lot of people laugh. Not many people can say that about their lives." And over the years I realized how right he was. Making people laugh is a lucky gift to have. It also reminds me of what The Laugh Factory here in L.A. puts up on their marquee when a comic dies. RIP George Carlin. Make God laugh. So if I can do that one day when I'm long gone and forgotten down here, make God laugh? Well, there will be no regrets. Except for this one: GET THIS CAST OFF MY FUCKING FOOT.

Another great comedian died the same day as Carlin but at 93, her heyday had come and gone. Dody Goodman was in both the Grease movies and played the mother in the hilarious sitcom Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman. But more importantly, she was a Johnny Carson and Jack Paar fave. And if those two guys didn't know great comedy, no one did. Dody also did Broadway in her later years. I came across this quote from the producer of one of her shows about her prowess on the New York stage:

"Dody had the most impeccable comic timing," Goggin said. "When we had her in the show Nunsense, she was the only person on Earth who could walk on stage and say, 'Are you ready to start?' and bring the house down."

It's all about timing in comedy. If you think you're funny, try saying that line when you walk into a room. Good luck with the crickets.

R.I.P. George. And Dody. We'll miss you.

George Carlin Dody Goodman Grease Jack Paar