Phone home

February 7th, 2012

Last night I was doing a set at an open mic, placed my phone on the table in front of the stage to record the audio of my set and half way through my set, noticed my phone was gone. Someone stole my phone! We ransacked the bar, called it, had the bouncer pat down remaining patrons to no avail. The phone battery had died or the phone had been shut off. We had a pretty good idea who took it and I could see a lynch mob forming.

I mourned my phone all day, changed passwords, filed a police report, initiated GPS tracking on it; it sucked. I had a show tonight, but after, I was going to go back to the bar and hope and pray someone found it and turned it in. People reminded me that thieves don’t typically return the items they steal.

I walked into the bar, said hi to the employee at the door, Luke, nice guy. Explained the situation to him and he searched the back of the bar. No phone. I fight back tears, succumb to the fact that I have to pay for a new phone and almost leave. Luke asks me what happened. I start to tell him the story and about the guy we suspected of stealing the phone and how he seemed very drunk. Luke says it’s funny how that guy seems to be there every night in a different body and how you really can’t trust people anymore.

A guy kind of bumps into me and as I turn to see who it is I see the face of the man who stole my phone. It was him! I try to gesture to Luke “omg that’s him, get him!” but for the first time in a long time I’m speechless! I can’t get words to leave my face! Ninja skills, react! Take him down… nothing… I’m in utter shock. Then I hear the perp say “hey I was here for comedy last night and somehow ended up with this phone…” and he pulls my phone out of his pocket.

Serendipitous that I was there just as he arrived to return it. After he left, Luke and I looked at each other like, no way that totally just happened! My faith in humanity is restored and omg I got my phone back, yay!

Now to go change all my passwords back to something I remember.

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Rudeness

January 22nd, 2012

A short run to the store between football games today should have been quick and easy. However, a jerk from Utah made it frustrating.

The parking lot was packed, I saw a man walking to his car, 3rd space from the door, woohoo! I wait patiently. I see a car speed up to my bumper in my review mirror, and hope he doesn’t hit me. Just as he pulls up a car in the space right next to me begins to back up, I press my horn to say hey “Im behind you.” But I can’t back up and take that spot because fly boy is right on my bumper.

It’s at that very moment the guy I was waiting for pulls out, oh good, problem solved. Just then fly boy speeds around me, Sheesh impatient much, I’d be out of his way in one second. Then he pulls INTO the spot I was waiting for, what?

My head may exploded, if I hadn’t had my son with me, I would have lost it!! I roll down my window and yell out “Hey, I was waiting for that spot!” He yells back “Make up your mind.” There was no way I could have parked in the other spot, my front bumper was way beyond the spot and fly boy was on my ass. I yell back “Thats fine, karma will give you yours.” And look at the girl he’s with and say “Real winner you have there.” A guy who witnessed it all tells me “Go let the air out of his tires.” And if I didn’t have my son with me, I would have. But instead took the opportunity to share a lesson in being a better person with my son.

Inside the store, after waiting forever for prescriptions, we started to head to the exit, when who almost hits me with his cart? You guessed it, fly boy. I look at him with disgust and say “you going to cut me off again?” To which he replies “May as well.” Oh sir, your wit is astounding. I reply with “of course you would, because you’re rude and that’s how rude people behave.” Shoot the girl a deafening look and leave the store. Hard pressed not to let the the air out of his tires, I walk past his car a second time, while silently cursing him.

This is why people eventually snap. Good people get the short end of the stick and after years of assholes taking advantage of things like being rude not being illegal, its wears on a person. It’s frustrating.

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Going mobile

October 11th, 2011

I seem to be away from my computer more often than not. So, I have an amazing pocket computer, aka smart phone. I haven’t blogged lately because well, I’m not home to write. But, I just downloaded an ap to my phone and whala! Blogging galore will now ensue.

Did I mention I love my smart phone? Email, work email, text, calendars, pictures of my boys, Facebook, gas milage tracking, soooo many more. If all your phone does is make phone calls, you’re missing out!

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Observations of a Mom

October 1st, 2011

Other people’s kids bug me; actually, it’s their parents. [pause to note the 2nd blog entry in as many days, yay me and goals]

I was at my son’s soccer game today and “that” parent was there with his kids again. This man has two children on the same team. Only one is ever playing, while the other is on the side lines being completely irritating. I know how much we paid to have the kids play, if my son thought he was going to sit on the sidelines after I paid good money, no, wouldn’t happen. My kid (at 5) knows better.

Back to “that” parent. Last week the other child sat out of the game because he was scared of the wind. We don’t live in tornado alley, this wasn’t some life threatening big scary wind. It was a nice breeze. Well, it was nice until this kid screamed through the rest of the game. Yes, the rest of the game, on the sidelines, next to me. It didn’t bother his ears either (I’m not totally heartless). Nope, just big scary, not barely even there, traumatizing wind. “That” parent just sat there with the screaming kid, asking him all sorts of investigative questions about the big scary wind, gently talking him through it, calmly listening to the screaming. First of all, how can the kid even hear you over his screaming? Okay, enough about last week.

This week, the other brother is on the sidelines. Coach is calling the brother playing by the wrong name and “that” parent is upset about it. He’s actually taking to the brother on the sidelines, telling him the coach has so many kids to learn that it must be hard. Well, get your kids to play regularly and at the same time, he might learn their names. My kid is a superstar (no really, and not to knock his talents, but on this team, superstar isn’t saying much) and coach knows his name. He’s also never been on the sidelines for a whole game.

Playless child then claims to need to go to the bathroom. “That” parent is irritated that playless child has asked, as he now has to walk to the port-a-potty and is upset that he didn’t go before leaving. I’m guessing, Dad didn’t ask him. He’s highly irritated with his child when they come back as apparently playless child didn’t have to go. If you made that big a deal out of me having to go potty, I wouldn’t be able to go either, jerk. Playless child asks again to go 10 minutes later, Dad is not very nice about it; they go and come back seemingly successful as “that” parent is not visibly frustrated. He is very short with the child the rest of the game.

My question, what happened to this Dad the week prior who sat and listened to a child scream the whole game? Where is the same patience for this playless child? Maybe he’s closer to the edge? Maybe he favors the other child. I don’t know but next week, I may not be able to bite my tongue and may come unglued on “that” parent. Stay tuned.

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Funnier lately

September 30th, 2011

I feel funnier lately. Not in a weird way, but in an actual laughter ha ha funnier way. I’m more comfortable on stage, less concerned about saying something the exact way I want to say it. Delving into retelling a story and trying to bring the audience along with me. I’ve had a few comics tell me “that was a really good set”. Comics don’t usually give nice feedback freely. Either they say something generic like “nice job” or they don’t say anything.

I’ve always felt funny along these lines; with friends, at parties, meeting new people. But somehow when I first came to the stage it didn’t come out naturally. I cared a lot about what people thought of my comedy. I really enjoy making people laugh and the fear that they wouldn’t just took over and consumed me. I still care about making people laugh, but somehow it’s different.

I think about that woman out there that has a couple of kids, a full time job and a ton of stress who just wants a fun night out, who wants to laugh. That was me, I want to make me laugh. So I share my mishaps, life events, crazy thoughts and if it makes you laugh, great! If not, you suck lol

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Digital diet

June 29th, 2011

My Mom gave me an article to read, she still has subscriptions to periodicals that print on paper, fitting for this particular article. It was about your digital mass index (kind of like body mass index). Taking into account all your digital and technological devices and how much of your life if spent interacting with pixels instead of people.

I grew up on electronics from atari & our first Tandy 1000 to the first laser disc player in our neighborhood. Technology has always been a part of my life. My thrill at Christmas was finding out how it all worked. But now, according to this article, I’ve indulged a bit too much in digitizing my world. My MMO characters, facebook & twitter accounts, text, email, IM, cell phone, ipod, anything with a charger is compromising my ability to connect with my fleshy friends.

I guess I sort of see his point, I notice at the grocery store that no one makes eye contact anymore. But a part of me feels like because of this technology I have more interactions with people. In my MMO world I have made friends around the world and get to learn first hand cultural information about places I’ve never been. Like a digital pen pal, if you will, but it’s real time and we get to kill orcs while discussing it.

I know more about my friend’s lives than I sometimes care to, but I don’t let that replace the face to face fun we have. Because I am caught up on their lives I can ask intelligent questions about how they felt about something that happened rather than use that time together to get the facts and then find out how they feel.

I guess it’s like anything else, use it for good, not evil. Everything in moderation can be a good thing, right?

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Being a single Mom-post divorce

December 5th, 2010

Single Mom has many meanings to it. Could have been widowed, divorced, abandoned, the one in charge while the other is off fighting our war, chose to have a baby on your own… what ever your circumstances, single Mom doesn’t define you. None of us are truly alone in this parenting thing. Yes, you get to make the rules in your house (hey that’s a bonus in my mind), but you’re not single, meaning one and alone.

People ask me how I do it. How do I raise 3 rowdy boys by myself. Don’t kid yourself folks if I had to do this by myself, I’d have gone insane by now. So would you. I have family, friends, coworkers, teachers, doctors (no shrinks yet maybe someday, but her I’m referring to their awesome pediatrician), and countless others that help me in some large or small way.

My ex-husband and I share a unique relationship. We’re friends. I know scary right? We realized that as we grew older our needs from our relationship changed (see future post of getting married too young) and we had grown apart as people. It wasn’t that we didn’t talk, we just grew up into the people we were meant to become. Different political views, social views, priorities, plans for fun, hobbies, you name it. Yes, we had our past, our kids and some interests but fundamentally we had changed.

One could argue that we could have made it work, compromised and gone into eternity settling. However, we only have one life. We only have this one body in this one lifetime to do what we were put here to do. If you compromise on what you want out of life, then what’s the point? We agreed on this point and agreed to be friends.

Don’t get me wrong it wasn’t skipping through the daisies all the way to divorce court. It was a long, tiring road, filled with emotional hurt, spattered with arguments and fights, but our long term goal was to be friends and be there together as parents for our kids. We both agreed that when you love someone enough to be married and have children and build a life together for 15 years, it would be a disservice to all that was good to trash it with nasty words and bitterness that may have felt a tiny bit good in the moment but long term would hurt us, or worse, our kids.

People don’t know how to take a friendly divorced couple. If it’s a nasty divorce you pick a side and together you bash the ex. People in our lives looked at us funny. People from both sides of our lives shunned the other person because that’s what you’re supposed to do right? Wrong. It’s funny how some people can be totally uncomfortable about your divorce even when you’re fine with it.

People ask me if I’m happier now that I’m divorced or if I’m better off. There’s no happier or better off, there just is. There’s no more fights, but there’s loneliness. I never knew this kind of loneliness before. It’s not just the quiet nights in the house when the boys are with their Dad, it’s the loss of people in my life. First there’s his family. Yes, they are great people and they didn’t shun me out of their lives, but it’s not like I go to all of their events anymore. People feel uncomfortable, I think you get a social plague when you get divorced. People want to give you your space. That space is quiet and empty. Your married friends with family don’t spend as much time with you because they think you’ll feel awkward now that you’re alone. Maybe it’s just me, but I prefer to be around people.

People ask me if I’d do it all over again. All of it? Maybe not. But yes, I’d still get divorced. My ex found and married a wonderful woman. They are extremely happy and perfect for each other. She’s a great Step-Mom to my kids and as someone with a great Mom and Step-Mom, I know how important it is to have many loving people in your life. It still takes a village to raise kids. I know my heart will find happiness again someday and until then, I write jokes :)

It takes strength to look inside yourself and ask yourself what you truly want out of life. If you do this and you’re not currently doing what you want, fix it. Change your life, you only get one. If you’re living your life to please someone else, then in the long run you’ll only hurt each other. But do it with dignity, respect and honesty. Cherish the people in your lives, they enrich your life for the better. Even the crazy ones. After all I bet some of the best times in your life came from knowing one of the crazy ones.

Signed,
One of the crazy ones

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Comedy Fame and Fortune

December 2nd, 2010

Well not quite yet, but if I say it enough maybe it will happen. I did win a contest on November 18th. My first win and my first money for being funny. As a comedian who finds the laughter in the pain I try to justify to myself that it was a small contest, that it was only the first round of the contest, that the other comedians present had less experience… what ever I can come up with that takes the win and makes a less bigger deal of it. Yeah, self deprecation, I may take it too far.

It’s funny, people think when you do comedy that you’re out living the life of a star, making money left and right, laughter goes with you everywhere. That is so not what happens. It’s long nights in a dingy bar waiting for your turn to silence the room with your new bad joke. People telling you what they think would be a funny joke, how they have always been told they should be on stage doing comedy but they just can’t seem to get on the stage, people telling you why they did or didn’t like your joke as they assume the role of the newest and brightest comedy critic on the scene. Yep, comedy fame and fortune, here I come.

Don’t get me wrong, I treasure ever moment in the bar hanging out with the funniest and brightest upcoming stars of tomorrow. My brethren in pain and laughter. Nobody gets you quite like a comic. I take in and enjoy the audience members after a show that want to come up to you and tell you how they are a single Mom too and laughed at every thing you said. That makes me all warm and fuzzy inside. I love being able to make people laugh. It gives me purpose beyond being a Mom, a daughter, a sister, a friend, an employee… it’s something that goes beyond a relationship dependent on another person. My comedy is for me which is intrinsically cool because it happens to benefit others. Comedy fame and fortune, here I come.

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Renewed Purpose

September 27th, 2010

When contemplating my weekend, I never once decided on “self reflection and renewed purpose” but that’s what I got from the last two days. I had planned on doing a set Friday night at Gennaro’s, random happenings on Saturday and football on Sunday. That was the extent of my big goals this weekend. It didn’t go to plan at all.

I did my set Friday night at Gennaro’s; was my first time there. Met some new comics, now have new friends on facebook from it. Observed people talking through most of the comedians. This has to be hard for the hard core bar goers. People trying to create laughter while they are drowning their sorrows in alcohol. But we try anyway. I was to be the 4th comic. Sweet. I love going 4th. Not first, but not dead last. Yay. My goal, be as perverted as possible. Lots of drunk old men, get their attention so they listen to the rest of the comics by being perverted as possible. Fail. YES I failed at being perverted.

Couldn’t do it, forgot to tell my raunchiest joke (which is actually pretty damn clean I’ve learned) because I was connecting with 3 people sitting in a booth next to the stage and 3 people at the bar and two comedians. Was telling them stories about my kids, because the instant I mentioned kids they were into it. Imagine that. A bar, where perverted was going well up until the 4th comic, then I start talking kids and they were there with me.

Oddly enough, after my set they became very chatty again. The analyst in me wants to go “well self, maybe you didn’t do enough to make them interested in everyone coming up after you as you did yourself, way to be selfish”. Or maybe that was the anti-narcissist side of me yelling at myself.

Any who, afterward got hit on by a very drunk high dude. I’m not usually very good at picking up signals when guys are hitting on me, I just assume everyone is being nice to me. This guy had obvious written all over him. And by obvious I mean he asked me if I’d go back to his place and suck him off. Um, no thank you and berate him with witty comebacks until I went over and hid behind Josh, a fellow comedian. This is not where I found renewed purpose.

I did however, find out that Kyle Cease was going to be doing some work at Comedy Works and invited us all to come watch him go over stage fright during the day. I had planned to try to see one of Kyle’s shows while he was in town, so after Gennaro’s I headed to Comedy Works. Met some new fans in line and sat with them to watch the show. What a great night, was hilarious. All the comics were awesome. Vic Alejandro, Jake Sharon, Diego Attanasio, Troy Walker, Kyle Cease, were all awesome. My laugh bones hurt.

Some of us hung out afterward and it reminded me how much comedy means to me. I decided I needed to be at Comedy Works all weekend and get re-jazzed. That’s not bejazzled… it’s more about finding my renewed purpose. So for the last two days, it was like a mini-boot camp. Submersed in comedy, reminding myself why I’m doing comedy and thirsting for getting up there and getting it done. Making people laugh so hard they forget their own shit for a few minutes. That’s what comedy always did for me and I want to pay it forward. Pay the laugh forward. Hmmm potential CD name.

Tonight I thought long and hard about my choices in this life and about what’s important to me. My kids, my comedy and my happiness. That those things aren’t independent of each other. They all intermingle. I have to get out of my head and just start doing it. I’m going to start by doing something for those that have done something for me. Don’t you dare all start calling me and telling me how I can do shit for you; if I’m not cleaning my toilet, certainly not doing yours.

But I am going to give back, have some ideas, gotta get them out of la la land and into my car. (That’s a really old song reference… get outta my dreams… if you’re old, you’re finishing it in your head right now). More to come on that subject. Shout outs to my peeps from this weekend; Heather, Melanie, Drew, Bobby, Stephen, Kyle, Diego, Brett, and the new people I met – you’re awesome and thank you for putting up with my insanity :)

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Full Moon

September 23rd, 2010

Why does a full moon bring out the crazy people? And by “the crazy people” I mean me. The last two days have been an emotional roller coaster and for seemingly small items. Work here, kid there, family issue there, but it all happened near a full moon. Do I truly believe in a “Full Moon” curse? If I do, then do I have to believe in a Blue Moon curse (this is now a mental visual of smurf sized Blue Man Group mooning people). Why isn’t there a half moon incident where we only lose part of our minds?

Something to ponder, I need sleep and I’m going to bed.

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