Rule One

Blame yourself. (You are dumb and apathetic)

Rule Two

Blame the audience. (They are dumb and apathetic)

Rule Three

Get up at 3pm and smoke pot. Immediately. It’s cool if you take the time to prepare coffee, but try not to dawdle. No one likes a dawdler.

Rule Four

Dawdle.

Rule Fife

Play that videoed game you like so much. Yes, that’s the one.

Rule Six

Oh, what the hey. Six more rounds.

Rule Seven

Stare quizzically at a blank sheet of paper for no less than twenty minutes. Click your pen sporadically.

Rule Ate

Remember your creative mantra. Breath deeply and repeat it a number of times. A solid baker’s dozen at least. Do you have a creative mantra? Let’s get you one now. Skip ahead to Rule  Nien if you have already selected a Creative Mantra or, “CM”, for future reference. If not, take the name of your favorite band, and combine it with what you believe is your best physical attribute. For example, my “CM” is “Weezer Foreskin”. You see? Simple.

Rule Nein

Take your “CM”, and shove it right up your bottom. Are we learning, chomedy chomrades?

Which brings us to the final, most important rule of all…

*Rule Tent

If you are having troubles writing admirable, delightful, acceptable jokes that are ripe with laughter and good cheer, simply go on stage, muster all the courage that you have, and read a clever list aloud.

*Addendum to Rule Tien

People love impressions…?

Doing comedy in Portland, or maybe just everywhere, is a very rewarding/disheartening process.

On the one hand, good friends, good times.

On the other, GOOD FUCKING CHRIST WHY????

Here is a brief list of  “successful” jokes I have told throughout the first 2 years of doing stand up comedy.

1. Jon’s pancakes

2. The ol’ snake venom gag

3. Spooning your friends

Know how many of those work every time?

…

To emphasize how it feels to tell your favorite joke to a crowd of new faces, and have it get no reaction at all, I’mma quote Richard Bain!

“I told this girl ‘I love you’ the other day, and she didn’t say it back. I was like, yo, moms….”

For me, comedy is like water. Yes, I’d die without it, but it creates so many tears!

Here are some things I would find helpful if I were me reading this a year ago…

There’s a lot of pretty folks out there that like to sleep with comics, and they can be a lot of fun. Keep in mind though, the key word in that last sentence is, “comics”. Plural.

Be prepared to promote the shit out of yourself. Being funny means nothing if you don’t tell anybody about it. This is tough for me to say, because I am aware of this fact, yet do nothing about it. (Yes, self-promotion feels douche-y. It’s supposed to.)

Go out to every open mic possible and write jokes all the fucking time! If your shitty jokes aren’t working, don’t keep pushing them upon everyone hoping for a miracle. Write some new damn jokes!

If you see Jimmy Newstetter out and about, but that guy a drink. He deserves it!

DON’T be sad onstage. The most cleverly written sad joke is still just sad to the audience. Be silly, be fun. I know I have a hard time adhering to this one myself, which makes it extra important.

If you are asked to host or take the bullet, get rid of your ego. Your job is to be energy, not jokes. Lift up your fellow comics and help out the SHOW. And just suck it up and take the bullet, you weasel. It’s invaluable experience for later shows. Did I mention I am a theater fag?

In the beginning, people don’t have the patience for your long stories with no punchline. No one starts as a rant comic.

That’s All! Wave Bye!

I am writing to you today to preach of comedy. Of the standing up variety, in-partic-ular.

Oh, my babies, honeys, and sweeties, long have I ached for your laughter like the warm touch of a fun loving uncle. Or criminal, for that matter. But, I have a thorn in my side, friends. Yea! , a real bee in my bonnet.

You see, as a stand-up comic, I feel it is my duty to “stand up” to injustice, and expose some of the misconceptions about our craft (Misconceptions not unlike those in the animated feature film, The Craft).

I think that sometimes, due to dark subject matter, people view us as a bunch of abortion obsessed, racist rapers. Well, I’m here to tell you-to flush that infantile assumption right down the toilet. I don’t chink you’re giving us a fair shake. You need to slip something in the drink of that line of thinking, and finger it into open-mindedness. Apartheid  me,  if you don’t want to delve into the darkieness of these issues, but I think they need to be undressed. Wop out, world, as I dego into non-consensual territories you’ve only dreamed about digging at with a clothes hanger. Hang her. Faggot.

Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, I want to talk about a ka-raze-y little thing called love. Here’s the thing, Love, FUCK YOU! I don’t know who you think you’re fooling, but KNOCK IT OFF.

Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, fart. The word, not the action. So, let me rephrase. DON’T fart. It’s rude, and there’s a bathroom. Or, you can hold it. This means you, bus dwellers. Phil Busdweller.

What does it mean to be passive-aggressive? See, passive-aggression comes from being made to feel really small and insignificant when you are younger, (Not to mention weak and useless!) and manifests itself in little bits of justice that get doled out through the day, that no one is ever aware of.

Did I ever tell you how great it is to be me? I can’t get enough. This guy. Numero Uno. The card game Uno. Earlier today, I was *expletive* in front of the bathroom mirror, and I got so excited looking at my *expletive* and *expletive*, that I *expletive* all over the *expletive*. Let’s try that again, in mad libs…

“Earlier today, I was _______ in front of the _______ mirror, and I got so _______, that I ____ ________ ____ ________ __________ __ _ ___ ________ __ ____ _____ _____ __ ____ Chinese girl.”

Did you hear Jude Law and Joaquin Phoenix are going to join as one to form a People’s Magazine Sexiest Man of the Year award that has no beginning or end? In other news, Jean Claude Van Damme touched himself in the past and the universe imploded. Or maybe it’s funnier to say he immediately exploded. Time Cop is a relevant reference, right? People these days watch talkies, correct? Sandwiches? Bologna. Cheese and pickles? Aw, garlic bread.

If you don’t have a good way of closing a thought, don’t keep trying, just non sequit.