Tales from the Road: Oberlin College

On Friday Hampton Yount, Tim Miller, and I joined Mike Blejer in returning triumphantly to his alma mater, Oberlin College. Oberlin College, where no one is surprised by the number of students that are into men, but Tim is surprised by relatively high number of black people. I think they should definitely use that in their recruitment literature.

Seven hours each way, the whole trip took about a day and a half meaning most of the time was spent not agreeing on musical tastes and deciding which one of us was most racist, but isn't that what all road trips eventually devolve into?

Okay, on to the show, which was in a coffee shop/performance space that could probably hold a good 300 people if you were pushing it, or 40 people if you were putting on a comedy show last Friday. Despite the less than stellar numbers the Oberlin crowd was receptive and seemed to enjoy everything except PowerPoint presentations and Hampton's gay, incestuous suicide fantasy (which happens to be one of my favorite jokes in the world). We probably should have shortened our sets to account for the lack of audience but after seven hours in the car, no one is gonna tell no one that they can't do what they intended to do. Fuck you, English language!

Apparently, much of our problems stemmed from the bad word of mouth after the last stand up performance just one week prior from a bunch of racist, sexist New York stand ups (take that New York!) that we would love to know the names of for no reason in particular (**update** a review of the New Yorkers' show was found online. The last line tells you exactly why our crowd wasn't huge). At any rate, we did so well that we got invited to a rocking college party that we (suspiciously) weren't able to locate, thus ended up drinking at the local watering hole before going back to the hotel to watch my new favorite movie, Beer League. Also, Beer League is the worst movie I've ever seen.

All in all, despite minor setbacks that trip was a blast and would go back to Oberlin in a second, although I should probably wait for an invite.

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Tales from the Road: Kentuckian Jokes

Whenever I divulge that I am a comedian in a new group of people I inevitably get one of two responses; “Hey, tell me a joke” or “Hey, here is a joke for ya!” I heard this joke from a local at the Ramada Inn Bar and Lounge, off Exit 2 in Louisville, Kentucky over the weekend.

So, there is this [whisper] black guy and a Chinese guy on the opposite sides of a pond. Every notice when a racist really wants to say the N-Word he whispers “black guy” instead? The Chinese guy is skipping rocks and the Black Guy sees him from across the water there and says to him self “Hey, I don’t have a job. I think I am going to go over there and rob that Chinese guy.” Yes, that was the setup. Of course. Chinese guy skipping rocks and a Black guy with no business being there except to commit a crime. Continue please. So the Black guy goes over to sneak up on him, but notices that when ever the Chinese guy skips a rock to goes “Ching! Chang! Chong!”. Every time, without fail. When he throws a rock, same thing happens, “Ching! Chang! Chong!” The Black Guy doesn’t know what could be making those sounds, but he still needs the money so he decides to rob him anyways. Yeah, let’s not forget the Black Guy is a criminal. So he pulls out a knife and presses it against the Chinese’s guy’s throat and says ‘Give me your money!! But first…I keep hearing noises coming from the pond every time you skip a rock. How do you do that?” Yep, you read that right and it just as awkward when it was being told. The Black Guy engages in conversation about the fucking pond AS he is robbing the Chinese guy. Like that is the only what Black people know when to communicate, as they are committing a felony. The Chinese guy replies “Well, this is a magical pond and every time I skip a rock it tells me the names of my ancestors. Ching, chang and chong.” AND the Chinese Guy is so dumb he forgets there is a knife pressed against his throat! That is some sneaky racism. The Black Guy thinks to himself, “Well shit, I don’t know who my daddy is, so I am going to try this out myself.” Okay, he gets one more blatantly racist comment in before the punch line. Strap in, folks. Here comes a dozy. So he grabs a rock, skips it across the pond and hears “Chim! Pan! Zee!”

Now the reaction he receives is the correct one, complete silence. Now this fucking comedic genius does what any comic does when a joke bombs, he tries to save face. So he goes “That was a bad one, I know. That was a bad joke huh?” No, buddy. Bad Taste, yes. Bad joke, no. FUCKING HORRIBLE FUCKING JOKE. Not only was it blatantly racist, (where he tried to cram in 10 different racist jokes into one. I mean, stick to one and maybe we can have a good time here) he completely ditches the fact that the black guy is robbing the Chinese guy throughout the first part of the joke! No conclusion to that story. So does he get the money or not!?! Why bring it up!? Oh, yeah. This fucking hillbilly couldn’t figure out another way for these two characters to meet. I mean, could the Black Guy been fishing? OR just walking through the woods. Nope, he had to want to commit a crime. So I get it, the whole joke is to say that Black people are descended from monkeys, but he obviously took way to long to get there and distracted his audience with comments on the black guy’s criminal urges. I didn’t know what was supposed to be the joke. Black guys are criminals or they are monkeys. Let’s choose one for the sake of the joke. Plus, aren’t we all an evolution from primates? So his joke, needless to say, is a little inaccurate.

This led to several other tasteless jokes though out the night by him and several other locals around the bar. The highlights: salesmen mistakenly eat what they thought was buttered corn on the cob but was instead corn used to fuck an old lady. A Mexican mistakenly eating what he thought was buttered popcorn but was actually popcorn that had been pissed on. Assholes become larger after you go to prison and Vaginas look like doughnuts. Thank you Louisville!

I got some comedy gold here people! I plan on using them at the next open mic. But, please I know what you are going to say. Yes, I will tighten up the beginning to the Pond joke. Read more!