Sometimes I find myself scrolling through my phone contacts for one reason or another thinking, “If I quit comedy, I could delete about 75% of these numbers.” Honestly, I could delete close to that and it wouldn’t even matter. I’ll never call them again. A good chunk of them are comics who I worked with before 2008 when I was out on the road a lot more. I’m not sure if it’s because I’m married and not lonely/bored or because of Facebook, but I don’t stay in touch with those out of the blue phone calls anymore. I rarely even get a comic’s phone number these days. Either I’ve worked with them enough to know I’ll see them within a year, or I don’t feel like talking to them anymore, we just don’t exchange numbers like we used to. I’m not sure if it’s just me…or maybe it was just me doing it in the first place (that can’t be true), or maybe we’ve all gotten lazy because of social networking…I’ve let it get to the point that if I called some of these comics it would be weird. It’s unfortunate because that’s one of my favorite things about the job. I like making new friends (which is hard to do after 25), and it was a perfect excuse to add a buddy. Some of it might be that I work with headliners who are older now. I don’t know, but I let a lot of good connections slip away and unless they work one of the four clubs (okay, three) I work on a regular basis, I probably won’t see them for years if ever again at all. So…call me. It’s okay.
Here’s something I don’t miss…fellow comics lying to me. The first week I MCed on the road the feature act felt the need to tell me about all his crazy escapades including his 4-way with three other women (one was in Playboy). The lies went on from there and I learned to catch on to these types of storytellers. How lonely is the road that you need to impress the MC? Was my conversation that bad? (to be fair, it may have been at that age.)
So this week’s tips: Stay in touch via phone and don’t lie. For other not so common yet helpful tips order my book here.
And Missouri residents, I’ve got some shows in St. Louis and Columbia you can check out here for this month (January). I know what you’re thinking…Does it include one at an Elk’s Lodge? Of course.
Don't Wear Shorts on Stage 