Have you heard of the new fad in social networking?  It’s called FourSquare, and it’s basically a more interactive Yelp.  How it works is when you’re out and about, you jump on FourSquare and check in, maybe write a little thing about what you think of the place.  Then your friends get a pop up on their phones letting you know where you are (weird!), and what you think of the place (who cares!).  The more you visit a place, the more points you get, resulting in you eventually becoming Mayor of a particular location (and owning that shit!).

Being a social networking slut (follow me on Twitter), of course I use it.  I’m often distracted by where my friends are visiting (one friend makes a daily trip to the bakery.  no judgement, I swear!), and enjoy catching them in little white lies (”I swear, I really have a sensitivity to gluten, I just go to that bakery for the coffee!”).

In my case, my check-in’s paint a unique and well rounded lifestyle.  Of course I have many points from comedy clubs, I’m very high up in attendance at Crunch gym locations, and I hold my own with the FourSquare bar lovers!  My day job is at a very popular AIDS service location in New York City.  It’s a wonderful job, I love it, and I check in there daily.  I’m so close to gaining Mayor status!

So what does this say about me to somebody who doesn’t know me?  Essentially they see me as an incredibly physically fit comedian with an alcohol problem who may or may not have AIDS.

Maybe I should rethink this FourSquare thing?

I was obsessed with Johnny Carson as a kid.  My parents tried to fight me staying up late to watch him, but quickly gave in.  I’d memorize as best I could his bits then perform them for friends and family.  If Bette Midler came on TV, I’d reenact one of her bits.  Ellen DeGeneres was another favorite, somebody I’d “steal” jokes from.  I still think the “Phone Call to God” is geniuous.

Clearly I was destined to become a comedian.  And gay.

These were my early inspirations.  I’m not sure how much of an impact they have had on my style, nor have I been doing this long enough to have a solid style of comedy.  As I grew up I came to respect Steve Martin, Whoopi Goldberg, Mike Nichols & Elaine May, Lily Tomlin, Woody Allen, and even Jay Leno.

I’m not too familiar with the newer popular comedians, I respect where they’ve gotten to professionally, but I’m just so focused on my own work that I don’t take the time to see what many others are up to (this is something I’m trying to change!).

Influences are good, they give me direction, and hope after a bad set (I often will YouTube great comedians after I bomb, just to get back on the comedy highway).  What’s telling is that even after I fail miserably, totally bomb, I’ll still get up the very next night and do it again.

A great up-an-coming comedian, John F. O’Donnell, said at Fifty First Jokes in 2008, “Comedians are the bathroom attendants of the artistic community.”  This is true, to a degree.  But I kind of like it, if we were totally respected as peers in the arts community, would we still be able to make fun of them with a straight face?  We say what other’s often don’t, and that’s amazing!  We allow an audience to relate to us on a level that they rarely are ever able to relate to anybody else, even if it makes them think or a little uncomfortable.

I don’t think anybody who is seriously pursuing comedy is in it to get famous.  Everyone I know is in it to make it their life, their living, what they do every day.  If fame is apart of that, great (really great!), but to just get paid to do what you love - wow!  That’s what I’m aiming for.  It’s going to take time, and be hard, but it wouldn’t be real if it weren’t.

I’ve arrived in sunny California!  Well, it’s not totally sunny at the moment, a bit overcast, but saying “I’ve arrived in overcast California” just doesn’t have a good ring to it.

One of the first events that happened when I got out here was Michael Jackson’s Memorial Service.  What a sight that was!  Black people know how to throw a funeral.  As my firend Lori said, it’s just one big jam session.  Nobody does a funeral better than black people.  Except, Lori noted, the Irish.  But they are kind of the blacks of Europe, no?

Did you see John Mayer at MJ’s funeral?  I was so confused with his presence.  I think he thought he was going to play, “Your Body is a Wonderland” in honor of Neverland Ranch, but then realized it might be taken the wrong way.  Tacky John, totes tacky!

It’s good to be back in the land of silicone.  I joined Crunch fitness, which was like a huge step for me.  Not because I need inspiration to work out, I’m pretty physical, but because I don’t like shelling out that kind of money every month for something that should be way cheaper (and thus more accessible to everybody).  The perk to having a membership at a high priced gym: they give you a small towel and a large towel, various soap options in the private showers, and skinny trainers you know are judging everything you do (because they think they know better, which is like beyond annoying,  I’m not the one having to work at a gym just to get a free gym membership - ZING!).

Here’s to setting goals and achieving them!

One of my favorite things about getting the Sunday edition of the NY Times is the wedding section.  Alright, please refrain from thinking, “How gay!,” it isn’t like that.  My interest does not lie in the pics of the dresses or the details, but the gay people announcing their commitments to one another.  For someone of my generation, have grown up in two worlds, one where being gay was okay just not publically accepted to one where being gay is actually fashionable, seeing two men announce their wedding plans in the newspaper is still pretty friggin exciting!

Think of the 13 year old out there right now, reading his parents newspaper, coming across the announcement of two men’s wedding plans, thinking, “Alright, these feelings aren’t so bad, this is normal, maybe I can tell Mom I’m gay.” (Cause we always tell Mom first, right?)

The other couple announcements are fine, I’m sure they will live long and happy lives together.  But there is a bit of cynicism attributed to the straight couples, something like you-have-it-so-easy type of emotion, do they even realize this?  Straight people take for granted that they can file mutual taxes, receive federal benefits for their marriage, and adopt without having to explain why they share the same bed.  It isn’t their fault they’re straight and have it so easy, but I will always remind them of it.  It’s the older Jewish woman inside of me.

Will I announce my wedding plans in the NY Times?  Um, do you know what I do?  I’m a comic, which loosely translates to “attention whore”  I’m going for the front page!

What a fun show!

Download the podcast here!

The Chinese are overreacting - again! Due to the outbreak of the swine flu (or H1N1, as the smarty pants are calling it), they are taking extraordinary precautions in order to contain the virus. They have quarantined Mexican citizens in China and canceled all air travel between the two countries.  The Mexican government is angry, but fear taking aggressive action against the country.  One wrong move and half of the products sold in Mexico won’t be produced.  How will they push their Chinese made sombrero’s on unsuspecting American tourists on holiday in Cancun?

I’ll admit it, I fear the swine flu.  It’s in New York City!  A bunch kids in Queens caught it, they are fine.  I mean, thank God it was Queens, but it’s still scary!

My Mexican is coming from Los Angeles tomorrow!  I worry about him traveling on a plane during this pandemic scare.  Everyone on the plane will undoubtedly be staring at him because he’s a Mexican traveling on a plane.  If anybody coughs they are going to look to him.  I advised him to take percautionary DayQuill and turn down any offers of bacon.  Godspeed Miggy!

New York Magazine has this great feature in its current issue about noteworthy people’s arrival in NYC.  I consider myself noteworthy, so I’m sure the invitation to take part in the article from NY Mag got lost in the mail.  In any case, I shall share my story here.

I moved to NYC on Wednesday, November 17, 2004, however I didn’t know it at the time.  I worked in politics and I had just concluded a failed U.S. Senate race in Missouri.  Before my anticipated move back to Chicago, I planned on visiting my friend Lori in Philadelphia, and then my friend Dylan (and future roommate) in NYC.

I took the Chinatown bus up from Philadelphia.  Dylan told me to find the Q train, but didn’t give directions through Chinatown.  After many failed attempts at asking for directions (FYI - never ask for directions in Chinatown, everyone is either Chinese or a tourist), I finally stumbled upon the Q train.

It was late afternoon, the sun was just setting.  The Q train came out onto the Manhattan bridge.  The view of lower Manhattan took my breath away.   There was no way I was going back to Chicago.

A week later I moved into a 4-bedroom apartment overlooking Prospect Park in the Flatbush neighborhood of Brooklyn.  It was a total culture shock for me.  Here I was, a fat, gay, white, man moving into a predominantly black and Hasidic Jewish neighborhood with 3 straight guys from Little Rock, Arkansas.  I wasn’t in Boystown anymore!

I took a job with a closeted gay man running for Manhattan Borough President, but didn’t really do anything at the job.  I hated it, and the only reason I took it was because it paid well, I got my own office and it was in Midtown.  For the first few months in NYC all I did was work and watch marathons of TV on DVD.  Eventually I put down the pizza slice, discovered the benefits of living right on a park, and lost 100 lbs.

I owe NYC so much.  Without it, I probably never would have lost the weight or have shifted from politics to comedy.  NYC is my inspiration.

And now the American Express commercial can begin!

I’m loving what’s going on in Vermont, Iowa and Washington, DC.  Go team, GO!

This morning I overheard somebody talk about the opponents to gay marriage.  One of the first things you hear when somebody is opposed to gay marriage is, “okay, now that they can get married, what’s next, sheep?!?”  Why do they always bring up animals?  Is there a secretly large population of people who wish to marry an animal?  No judgments, I guess, but I’m going to venture to say that the number is small in comparison to gay couples.

The next group of people to oppose gay marriage is the Mormons.  I overheard a gay man saying that Mormons should not have the right to an opinion on marriage, seeing that they marry multiple partners.  Come on people, this is not true.  I am Mormon, and I am the last person to defend the religion, but if you’re going to argue a point, you shouldn’t do so based on a falsehood.  The people who marry multiple partners in the Mormon faith are radicals, not members of the current Mormon church and most have already been excommunicated.

So HA!