Spotlight on Joe Wong

This is Joe Wong. I've been REALLY fortunate to have worked with him a few times. Joe is probably the nicest person I've ever met in comedy. PS - He's an incredible comic and believe me, this Letterman appearance is just a taste. As incredible as this set is (count the applause breaks yourself) I think the thing I like most about him is that English is his second language and he's a better comic in his second language than most of the comics I know who do it in their first language. Well done, Joe. Well done.

Check out Joe's site and then go see him live. http://www.joewongcomedy.com/

Totally Unacceptable

John is that Christmas stuff in the supermarket? Yes, dear friend. Yes it is. I took this photo on Saturday. That is more than two full months before Christmas and they're selling this stuff already. Unacceptable.

If you're reading this and you already bought your Christmas stuff, just know that somewhere in my heart there is a little bit of acidic hatred for you because you're a douchebag. You're probably the same person who bought their kid a Halloween costume BEFORE school was back in session.

"Guess what I'm bein' for Halloween?"

"Nobody cares Randall. It's the first day of school and you're a douche."

See? Douchey parents raise douchey kids. So return all of your Christmas stuff, enjoy Halloween, and THEN go ahead and buy some stuff in November or December. October Christmas stuff? Jesus. If I knew you, I'd buy you a December Valentine's day card that let you know we were breaking up.

PS - Enjoy the anti-douche anthrax I put in that Valentine's Day card.

He's Going The Distance

John, is that a Nintendo cake? You're goddamn right it's a Nintendo cake! My friends Greg and Mal were kind enough to make this for my birthday on Thursday. I'm not going to brag about it, but I just would like to say that none of you guys have a Nintendo cake and I am much better at life than you are. How can you even argue that statement? You can't! Do YOU have a Nintendo cake? No? OK then. You LOSE! You lose and I win and that's just the way this goes. I'm sorry, but you've been beaten. The Nintendo Cake of Mightiness has conquered all and you can mark another victory on the scorecard o' Porch!

OK maybe not. But sincerely, I really do have better friends and family than I deserve. I'm incredibly lucky and I had a great birthday and if any of my friends are reading this, thanks very much for it. It was a great day.

Spotlight on Mitch Hedberg

Mitch Hedberg was my favorite comedian. Sometimes I still listen to his CD's or watch his videos and I'm still blown away by the guy. He was one of those few guys whose material was so incredible, that every time I watched him I'd just sit there with a slack-jawed half-grin wondering how he possibly came up with it. He had it all. He was instantly likeable, he was original and inventive, and he had a delivery that was unparalleled.

Unfortunately, Mitch passed away in March of 2005. Sometimes I selfishly think of all of the great material I am missing out on because he's gone, but mostly, I am just saddened because he was someone I really admired and I'll never get the chance to tell him or thank him.

Since you can't go see him, you should go buy his CD's, watch some clips (I've attached one from one of his 8 billion Letterman appearances), and just enjoy the great comedy that he gave us. He was really amazing and he still inspires me.

Thanks, Mitch. Hope all is well wherever you are.

Down & Out

I realized today just what a totally insignificant piece of shit I am. I can't begin to describe to you how depressed I am lately and most of that has to do with my job.

Today I had a manager at work ask me to check in with someone to see if they had any questions about our Office Golf event.

I work for an investment company, and the person who asked me easily makes 50 grand a year and the person I had to ask easily makes 100 grand a year. Keeping that in mind, let me just repeat that.

Today I had a manager at work ask me to check in with someone to see if they had any questions about our Office Golf event.

If you're still reading this I commend you, because when this was asked of me, I almost killed myself right there in front of everyone.

That's how corporate America works, kids. They take 20 minutes worth of work that one person could easily blow through and then chop that into about 50 little pieces. Then they assign other people to complete the pieces, thereby absolving themselves of any wrongdoing should any of the people assigned to the pieces happen to mess up. It also makes them look like they've coordinated something when they haven't coordinated anything except for the coordination of needlessly complicating easily remedied problems. It's bullshit and it makes my soul convulse like a genetically mutated lab rat, cry like an orphaned Jewish kid on Christmas, and bleed blue sadness blood, but it's how you look good at an investment firm.

Think about it. Someone took the time to actually formulate an idea that so-and-so needs to be asked if they have questions. Then they took the time to add that idea to an agenda and asked if anyone would mind taking that task. Now something which could have been handled by simply walking 100 feet to a person's office and having a 20 second conversation is a line item that needs to be checked off of a list. Or an email. That would have worked at any time of the day from any connected computer in the world.

So since it was my task and since we needed to make sure this was done, I did it via email. I did that instead of walking to the person's office because I figured, "Fuck it. Why not waste the most time humanly possible to ask this one ridiculous question?" I actually wished we had some homing pigeons to delay it further. And not even good ones either. I'm talking disreputable, illiterate homing pigeons with drinking problems.

My all-important email went like this:

"I have been asked by the Office Golf Committee to reach out to you to ensure that you don't have any questions about Office Golf.


Lisa, do you have any questions about Office Golf? The drafted rules are attached. Thanks."

That's what my life has somehow become. The grown adult who makes at least 50 grand a year wants you to check to see if the grown adult that makes over 100 grand a year understands the office golf rules.

I should have just done the world a favor and killed myself right then. I mean a big mess too. I mean like Desert Eagle .50 to the temple. Brains all over the wall and stuff. That would have fucked up their whole office golf thing. Mrs. 100K-Per-Year would be doing CRAZY stuff like pissing in the golf holes and
telling the other contestants they are pussies and maybe she'd flick a few of the gents in the penis or something. People would think, "Jesus. If Porch hadn't blown his brains out, this could have been avoided and she would have just putted like a normal person who makes 100 K a year and gets asked questions that a retarded, blind, drunken, retarded gorilla knows the answers to. Too bad that now she flicks dicks, calls people pussies, and pisses all willy-nilly."

On top of that, I found out that the dog in the picture is way cooler than I am. That's demoralizing.

Spotlight on Andy Kindler

Andy Kindler is one of the funniest comics out there, yet outside of the comedy community, I don't know anybody that's ever heard of him. That pisses me off because he's great and you should know about him. So I'm gonna tell you about him.

Andy Kindler is an incredibly funny comic and is vastly underrated. So don't be a douche. Make sure you watch the clip and then go see him live. OK? Jesus.