A comedy show with my college roommates

A few weeks ago my friend Derrick texted me and asked me what I was doing the week of April 3. I said nothing, outside of being a stay-at-home dad. My life is pretty free these days.

He asked me if I wanted to go to Houghton with him. I told them I would love to but $400-$500 is not something that I just had laying around these days or ever. He told me he would fly me out there and wanted me to open up for his standup comedy show. I replied to him that being funny when we hang out and doing standup was totally different and he should know that. He agreed but still thought I could do something to warm up the crowd. I have spoken to audiences all over the world and I usually made them laugh. But never in a standup routine type of deal.

I decided I would do something I have done many many times over the last 15 years. Improv! I started doing improv with a group at our church at a church function. After that one time we were asked to perform at several different events. Each time we would do an event someone else would ask if we could come to do their event. It became regular thing for us to do. 

We got really good at it and actually got a gig every Friday night at a restaurant. If I am totally honest, I would tell you that I have said many times that if the guys at Whose Line is it Anyway would have given me one shot I think they would let me be on their show. I love improv so much! Wayne Brady was always my hero when it comes improb. Particularly his ability to come up with songs on the spot. I love doing that.

As Derrick, Shoe and I sat in our old campus center that look very similar and very different at the same time, we planned the evening together. We walked through a few of the things that Derrick would be doing that night and then we talked through the different improv games I was planning. Landed on a game called freeze, and mannequins.

Freeze was the first improv game I ever did in my life and it was at my first week of college at a freshman orientation meeting. I thought it would be apropos doing that evening. Then in mannequins I had Shoe up with me and two students, who were the ones who moved us into position every time we were going to do something in the game.

Thanx to Amanda Salvatore for the pic

The last thing I did was ask for five words, grabbed a guitar and created a song on the spot using all five of those words. It was so much fun! Derrick got up and did his standup routine and we all laughed all night long. I cannot believe I got to do a comedy show with my two best friends from college at the college we graduated from!

A couple of side notes for my trip:

A few of our friends from college (Shelly, Amy and Dan and Amy's husband Chris.)
that work there now, came and had dinner with us and stayed for the show as well. It was also fun to get to meet their kids.

I also got to hang with Shelly and Christy, James and on top of that my friend Julie from high school! My old friend love tank was really filled this week! Honestly, I needed several more days to my friends just catch up on old stuff and new! We all had so much to share and we barely scratched the surface. It's things like that where I am thankful for Facebook and other forms of social media.

I also walked around the campus and saw all the new things that had changed. Of course, some things never change...like the gum tree!

AND

I remember walking through our campus bookstore when I was in college and seeing the "Houghton Author" section thinking, "One day I am going to have books in this section." Now I do! Y is for Youth Worker is the newest book on their bookshelves!!

My Trip to Cali

I am involved in our denomination's tri-annual high school conference called LIFE this summer. There will be about 7,000 people in attendance and I am on the program team. What that means is I have been part of the planning stuff for anything that goes on the main stage at each of our main sessions. My key part is actually the pre-session part. I get to do the upfront, get everyone up and involved, make them enjoy themselves portion before the session actually starts. This will include funny videos, games, dancing, etc. I don't know why they picked me to do this, I don't like the stage, being upfront, having my face on camera, or...wait...oops, yes I do. Haha.

Anyhow, we have some videos that need to be done before the conference actually starts so I flew into L.A. for the weekend to shoot some music videos. It was pretty funny to tell the guy who I was sitting next to on the plane that that's what I was doing. I had to confess that it was just for a conference and not MTV, but it was still fun to say. I met up with Kate, my partner for the pre-session stuff and John, our video guy and grand master of media at the conference.

We got together and planned a bunch of shoots and then spent all day Saturday shooting. It was a blast. It was really cool to see the film school where John works and shoot in their studio and then do fun crazy stuff outside. When shooting was done we went back and I was getting ready to get on the plane. I was really bummed because John thought I was staying another night and he had gotten us tickets to go see David spade and friends at the L.A. Improv that was a benefit deal for the Nashville flood victims. I was REALLY bummed. I love that kind of stuff. (the Hollywood, see famous people I "know" from TV, etc.) We had seen a few celebs we recognized, but weren't sure from where when we saw them at the movie theater restaurant the night before, but it wasn't quite what I was hoping for.

When it was time for me to head home, I was dropped off at the airport and went to the counter. I was going to ask if they needed any volunteers, but was informed theflight was delayed and they needed to check if I would make my connecting flight in San Francisco (Frrrancisssco - Buddy the Elf). I asked if they had any later flights and they had none that night but first thing in the morning! I said, "I'll take it." I was told that normally it would be $150 change fee plus whatever the difference of the ticket was (another $758) but that he would just do it!!! Can you believe it? He never told me if I would make my flight, so I assume it would not. John had told someone they could not have the ticket because he was believing that I wold be able to go! Kate had prayed for it! haha.

We went to the show after a quick drive to the Grove (this amazing outdoor mall and farmer's market place where I met Danney Gokey and Michael Sarver from American Idol last year). When we got there Sarah Silverman was outside getting her picture taken with an old high school friend. (not a fan). We went inside and had a great meal. As we were sitting there David Spade walked outside to talk to some friends and was about 2 feet from where I was sitting. I was not star struck in the way that some people make others idols of sorts, it was just a ton of fun. These people are just like you and me, they just live COMPLETELY different lives than we do. After dinner we were ushered to our seats where we literally were touching the center of the stage the comedians would be on. It's the same Improv I have seen MANY comics on TV from. It was pretty surreal.

Daniel Kinnow was the host for the evening and was pretty funny; Jeff Ross was on, he is the Roast Master for those Roasts they do of celebrities and has been on Last Comic Standing as a judge; Todd Glass went on; Kevin Nealon was next and then David Spade wrapped it up. I have to tell you, there was plenty of crassness throughout the evening and that was hard on my ears. There was also LOTS of funny stuff. I laughed until my jaw, throat and stomach hurt and had tears pouring down my face several times throughout the night. A few of the comics joked about having medicinal marijuana cards and I am pretty sure most if not all had partaken before they got on stage. What a totally different life than I live. Pretty weird. David Spade went on for the shortest amount of time (he may have had to because they were going late) and he also read most of his jokes, or at least looked at his list to remember which ones to do. I am not sure if it was because he is a "big star" and doesn't have time to memorize all his jokes or if it was the fact that it was a benefit and he wasn't getting paid that he wanted to try out some new material.


After the show we hung around for a little while and someone came up behind me and said, "Excuse me." I apologized and turned around to see Craig Robinson who plays Darrell on The Office and is hosting Last Comic Standing this summer. He was really cool and took some pictures with us as you can see below.

We headed back and hit the hay. Then it was off to the airport early in the morning. A flight to San Fransssssisssscoooo, then a quick stop at the Eugene airport (that was a first) and then back to Portland. I got home in time to hang with my family, go for a bike ride and host a Survivor Party Finale!

PS. I am working on putting together my next 90 second day in review video from that last day. I may include some of the day before as I thought about doing it part way through the day.