SOMETHING STUPID + SOMETHING STUPID

I once danced with a lonely woman in Tijuana out of kindness. As she said she loved me snot and spit poured down her chin. She hugged me for ten minutes and wouldn’t let go. My friend had to pry her off of me and she fell ass first onto the ground when she finally lost her grip around my hips. I looked at her as she laid on the floor, drunk, sweaty, drooling and I thought to myself, “No woman will ever love me as much as she does.” And no woman ever has.

MY HUMBLE BEGINNINGS

The guy before me on the list introduces himself when I first get to the bar. He seems like a nice person. I watch him perform. He says he just got out of a mental institution. His entire set is about having sex with animals. Then they call my name. This is the first time I ever perform stand up comedy. 1/31/08. A bringer show in New York City. The guy after me has an afro and rainbow suspenders. He pretends to fuck the microphone stand for the entirety of his eight minute set. When the show ends these two maniacs and the twelve other comedians that performed bombard me with their contact information. They tell me how great I was and I actually believe them. Then I go home and watch the tape I foolishly paid $50 for. I was just as bad as they were. Well, maybe not as bad. But still pretty bad.

I moved to Los Angeles a few months after that. My intention: To be a professional comedy writer. What better way to achieve this goal than through stand up comedy, right? I attend the first open mic of my life April 2008 at The Hollywood Improv. One performer is an overweight black woman donning a single roller skate on her left foot. She claims she couldn’t afford the whole pair. This woman also has a cheap cell phone strapped to her head by a sporty headband. She claims she couldn’t afford a Bluetooth. THESE ARE HER JOKES. Another comedian is a Mexican man donning only an undershirt and jeans. He tells his first joke. It is the worst joke I have ever heard in my life. No one laughs. He screams, “COMEDY IS FUCKING ME IN THE ASS!” and rips off his undershirt. He stares at the crowd, half naked and crying.

I decide that stand up comedy probably isn’t for me. 

MY BIG FUCKING JOKE OF A BIG BREAK

I work meager jobs in the television industry, waiting for my big break. Two years later that big break finally comes. Or at least that’s what I believed at the time. I’m an office production assistant on Children’s Hospital. I’ll be working with some of my idols: Rob Corddry, David Wain, Rob Huebel. The list goes on. My first day on the job I meet Rob Corddry. He gives me the nickname “Calhoun.” In the beginning this nickname is associated with the cool kid, the funny kid, the kid the producers will befriend and take under their wing. A few weeks later this nickname becomes associated with incompetence, stupidity and apathy.

For those of you that don’t know an office production assistant is somewhere between an overpaid janitor and an underpaid file clerk. A producer once called me at my desk and asked that I bring them something from the shared printer. Their office was 5 feet away from said printer. One of the actors had me clean out the waste basket they had “accidentally” dumped an uneaten salad into before adding a new plastic trash bag. Another producer made me unclog a piece of plastic that had somehow become lodged into their disgusting bathroom sink. It felt like everyone was getting off on it, making me do these degrading tasks all for the mere reward of being in their presence. I wondered if they jerked off or fingered themselves in their offices to the thought of me cleaning a toilet they just went diarrhea in. After a few weeks of this I wasn’t stupid or incompetent, but I did become apathetic. These were my heroes and here they were, embodying everything I despise about fame and being paid tons of money to do something I so longed to be a part of: Comedy. I was jealous, spiteful and most of all disappointed. So I stopped doing a good job.

MY INTERNS, THE SAVIORS

The last day of shooting there was a wrap party at a nearby dive bar. At this point I was 100 percent jaded and 95 percent depressed. My big break was a big fucking joke. I avoided talking to anyone in a position above me. They were good people, but I just couldn’t relate to them anymore. They felt privileged to work for the people they admired. I didn’t want to be like them. I didn’t even want to be like the people they admired. I just wanted to be some nameless writer for some stupid show. But I was right back where I started. I had accomplished absolutely, positively nothing. At my lowest point, when I couldn’t even muster enough energy within myself to have a drink two interns approached me and asked if I wanted to join them. I accepted as I had selfishly not taken the time to get to know them as well as I should have during the production because of the fact that they were lower on the food chain than me and therefore not worth talking to. I guess that was one thing I had in common with my idols.

These interns were Barbara Gray and Brandie Posey. They probably don’t remember this, but we talked about comedy for nearly three hours. I found out they were stand up comedians. This blew my mind. They weren’t racist. They weren’t sexist. They were smart, witty and extremely down to Earth. How could these two be stand up comedians? They told me I was a pretty funny guy. They said I should consider stand up comedy. So I started going to their shows. I went to Space Boners. I went to Trick (RIP). I went to Holy Fuck. I went to Tiger Lily. I went to everything they invited me to and more. I secretly stalked them through Facebook’s incredibly creepy “Friend’s Events” option, now with the more appetizing title, “Suggested Events.” I saw headliners like Demetri Martin and Maria Bamford perform for free. I discovered fantastic new comedians I had never heard of before like Natasha Leggero and Rory Scovel. It was amazing. There were intelligent people performing sophisticated humor on stage and actually making people laugh. I became addicted instantly. Sure my dreams were never going to come true, I was unemployed, I was selling all of my possessions just to pay my rent and I was on the verge of moving back in with my parents and going to San Jose State to get my CPA license, but did you hear that one girl tell that one joke about babies taking a shower? It was hilarious!

At Barbara’s show One Two Punch I mustered up the courage to talk to my favorite performer of the night, Dave Ross. I told him I was interested in doing stand up comedy. I told him I was a little nervous about trying it again and, to be frank, terrified of bombing on stage. He said, “You know what man when I first decided to do stand up I just accepted the fact that I was going to eat shit for a year and then I only ended up eating shit for like half a year.” It was funny, but it also inspired me. I started writing jokes again for the first time in a while. One night while hanging out with Barbara she asked me why I had not tried stand up yet. I told her I was still scared. “You’re an asshole,” she eloquently said as she took a rip from the bong we were sharing. I don’t know what it was about her saying that, but it worked.

MY SECOND BIGGEST FEAR (MY FIRST BIGGEST FEAR IS GRAVITY NOT EXISTING AND STARVING TO DEATH AS I FLOAT HELPLESSLY IN THE SKY)

In my few and far between open mic beginnings I made some fatal mistakes. Sal’s Comedy Hole was the first place I ever performed stand up comedy in Los Angeles. That was my first mistake. Most of the comedians were crass fame whores destined to tell the same offensive 10 minute set every night at The Comedy Store for eternity. It was almost as bad as the Hollywood Improv open mic had been. This time was different though. This time I had the support of Barbara, a comedian I admired greatly. I took to the stage and told my flawed, amateur-hour jokes. They were overwritten and I was shaking from nerves. I was bombing. All of my worst nightmares were coming true. Then something odd happened. A self-deprecating line in one of my jokes that I had completely made up on the spot was met with laughs. This is the moment that changed everything. I said something on stage into a microphone and it made the people watching me uncontrollably belt out those periodic noises we call laughter. It was like crack. No it was better. It was like cocaine. I never looked back. From here on out I could only look forward.

I went to The Spot where Brandie, another comedian I greatly admired, would be there to support me through the sounds of crickets. Only she wasn’t there. Allen Strickland Williams was there taking the place of Brandie as host that night. The dude who I just saw kill on the same show Louis CK had been on. The dude who as far as I was concerned was just as talented as any professional comedian touring the country. In short he was the last dude I wanted my third ever stand up performance to be in front of. My name was drawn from the lottery hat fifth. I wrote my name last on the list. This was my second mistake. When I finally got on stage there were five people left in the audience: The two friends I had dragged with me to Culver City, the ten year old black girl who went on stage before me and told everyone she was going to rob them, her father and Allen. I bombed. Dave Ross’ earlier advice ringed in my ears. Prepare to eat shit. I held onto the crumb of laughter I got at Sal’s Comedy Hole and treated that night at The Spot as a character building experience.

Then I didn’t perform for two months. This was the biggest mistake of them all. Every Friday Brandie and Barbara would invite me to come join them at Silverlake Lounge and every Friday I would intentionally arrive five minutes too late. That night at The Spot was just too devastating to experience again. I would lurk alone in the back watching others eat shit and watching others destroy the room. As I met more people it finally began to dawn on me. The people eating shit had just started doing stand up comedy. The people destroying had been doing stand up comedy for at least a year if not more. It just took practice. It just took time. It just took some shit eating. That’s when I made my New Year’s resolution for 2011. I was going to do stand up comedy a minimum of four nights a week for an entire year. If at the end of that year I was no better than I had been starting out I would quit. If however I had greatly improved then I would continue doing stand up indefinitely. I was pretty much saying to myself, “I’ll do this for a year and quit.” And I kept that thought in my subconscious for the first 6 months.

MY YEAR OF STAND UP

Brandie recommended I start performing in December to avoid the New Years resolution crowd. I finally arrived at Silverlake Lounge on time. She was hosting so I had someone to support me even if I ate shit. I told all new jokes. A few of them actually got laughs. As I got off stage Dave Ross approached me and told me that I had a good set. I told him it was the 4th time I had ever performed. “Really? Well that was better than the 4th time I ever performed.” That was the most comforting thing any comedian had said to me up until that point. Then Monique Moreau, who I had never met before, came up to me right after Dave and said the most discomforting thing any comedian had said to me up until that point. “When you first got on stage I was like who the fuck is this guy, but then you were funny.” All of my worst fears were confirmed. Comedians only respect talent and I had to earn their respect by actually acquiring some. That night would prove to be beginner’s luck.

Everyone tells you that the first few months of doing stand up suck. That’s obviously an understatement. The first few months of doing stand up comedy at open mics is like going to work every day in a dark coal mine where all of your co-workers don’t talk to you and secretly wish you would leave and never come back. And it’s a dark fucking coal mine. It’s also a lot like a high school cafeteria. There’s the cool kid table everyone secretly wants to be a part of (the alt comedians), the jock and cheerleader table everyone secretly despises (the club comedians), the ESL table everyone ignores (the new comedians) and then there’s you, alone. Completely and utterly alone. You know what though? It’s your own goddamn fault if you’re alone.

When I finally mustered up the courage to tell someone I really enjoyed their set they were extremely inviting and friendly. I discovered the best tool any up and coming comedian has in their arsenal is a compliment. Think about it. You are dealing with people who go on stage every night pleading for everyone’s attention, hoping desperately to obtain happiness in the form of laughter. What better way to grab that person’s attention than by saying, “Hey, I really liked your jokes.” Of course when you dish out compliments they better be sincere because if there’s one person that can detect insincerity it’s a comedian. Luckily I don’t flatter people when I need something from them. I flatter people when they deserve it. I can safely say I have never kissed anyone’s ass in my entire life and it has brought me nothing but pain, misery and unemployment. With comedians it has gained me nothing but respect. Maybe this is where I belonged.

Every stand up can say that you will see some crazy ass shit going to open mics every night. I’ve seen female comedians get hit on by drunk senior citizens. I’ve seen adultery played out before my very eyes. I’ve seen a British comedian tell a story about how he beat the shit out of his girlfriend and get laughs because he sounded so damn whimsical saying it in that accent. I’ve seen a guy openly admit that he wants to fuck children and not get arrested because he was “telling a joke.” I’ve heard every curse word, racial slur and slang word for genitals in the history of language itself. I’ve seen a white man call a white woman “Honky” and mean it. I’ve seen fully naked men. I’ve seen camel toes. I’ve seen Mr. TV. I’ve seen male comedians make women in the audience cry. I’ve seen male comedians cry. You know what’s still the craziest thing I’ll see at an open mic any given night though? When someone kills. When someone tells a joke that I quote to my friends. Through the overwhelmingly toxic dark coal mine atmosphere that is an open mic they prevailed and made people laugh. Now that’s some crazy ass shit to see.

When you finally tell your first good joke you can’t wait to tell it again. It took me about three months to write mine. Three months later it was still the only good joke I had. I would start my set with it to get people’s attention only to lose it shortly after. I started going to new open mics because the joke had worn thin to the crowd I usually performed for. Then halfway through my year of stand up something happened. Something that changed the way I performed, the way I write jokes, even the way I act in real life.

I just stopped giving a fuck.

I didn’t care about impressing any of the comedians I looked up to. I didn’t care if no one laughed. The only thing I cared about was saying something I thought was great. I wrote a new five minute set every Sunday and told it until Friday. On Friday I would throw away anything that did not get laughs. Anything I kept I would rewrite and retell. If the rewrites did not inspire more laughter I would throw the joke away. I became ruthless. After several months of this work ethic I had written and thrown away around 100 paragraph long jokes and had kept two of them, maybe three. After you see comedians tell the same joke every night for six months you start to realize you’re doing the same thing and you make a choice: Do the same or do better. I tried to do better.

Compliments can only get you so far and you can only give them so many times before they start to become insincere. The next tool you have to acquire in your arsenal is a show. If you run a show that comedians want to perform on it gets your foot in the door, even if that door opens up to a new closed door you need to get your foot in. It takes a lot of hard work to get people to come to a comedy show too. Most people treat stand up comedy as a low brow art form, something drunks and blue collar types attend on a Friday night because they’ve never seen a painting or know what the word “pretentious” really means. I treat it as the highest of all art forms when it’s done right. Think about it. How many people make a movie? 300. And a television show? 100. A play? 50. Improv? At least 5. Stand up? 1. 1 person. 1 person writing, 1 person practicing, 1 person directing, 1 person performing. Stand up is one of the only art forms where you can actually attribute everything you enjoy about it to one person (most of the time). People don’t respect that though. Maybe it has something to do with all the dick jokes?

The first show I ever did was Rest in Peace. Granted it was a show that happened at The Hollywood Hotel in the same room that had held an open mic not more than ten minutes prior, but it was a turning point for me nonetheless. At the open mic I had a great set for the first time in my short career as a comedian. All five minutes I was getting laughs. From friends, from comedians, from strangers that had accidentally walked into the room, from people I looked up to. It was one of the best feelings I’ve ever had and one of the best nights of my life. I stayed for Rest in Peace afterwards as I usually did. Then something even better happened. The hosts, Allen Strickland Williams and Eric Dadourian, had a segment in which they picked someone from the audience to perform on the show. And they picked me. Two comedians I desperately wanted to be as talented as picked me to perform on their show. And I had a great set again. This was the moment I knew my New Years resolution was no longer just a resolution. I wasn’t going to do this for a year and then quit. I was here to stay.

Above everything else you have to be funny. You can give out all the compliments you want and you can produce all the shows you want. When it comes down to it though if you’re not funny you’re not getting past the dark coal mines. I figured out that I might be funny when I visited San Francisco for a week with my two former interns/current heroes Barb and Brandie. I thought it might be better to fail miserably somewhere far enough away so that no one in LA would hear about it. The first night there we all did an open mic together and I surprisingly did pretty well. This made me wonder if I had made a mistake not asking to be on any shows while in town. I did a few more open mics and it went just as well as that night at The Hollywood Hotel had gone. Our last night there we ended the trip performing on a show in my hometown of San Jose that I had put together with the help of Brandie, Barbara and the hilarious Chris Thayer, a comedian from the Bay Area. I performed in front of my family. I performed in front of everyone I had grown up with. I even performed in front of the girl I took to prom. And I made them all laugh. Turned out I might be a little talented after all.

I came home thinking I was the bee’s knees. I finally had enough of an inflated ego to audaciously ask someone in LA to be on their show. That show was Power Violence, one of my favorites in town. And they said yes. I couldn’t believe it. I had prepared myself for them to say no. Now I had to prepare myself to have a good set. I waited and practiced for two months and then the day finally came. I completely freaked out. For eight hours I rehearsed my jokes, told myself I wasn’t good enough, questioned all of my life choices, reassured myself, and repeat, and repeat, and repeat. I arrived on the verge of pissing myself from anxiety and remained that way until the zany and comically gifted host Whitmer Thomas brought me on stage. You know what there’s no humble way to say it. I killed it. I killed it in front of Rory Scovel, one of the comedians that made me want to do stand up comedy. It was my best performance ever, even to this day. I’m not used to succeeding. In fact I don’t think I can say I had ever really succeeded at anything before then. This weird notion overtook my brain, a notion that maybe I had some worth on this planet. That’s when I felt something I had never felt before. It wasn’t arrogance. It wasn’t pride. It wasn’t even happiness. It was confidence.

MY ENDING TO THIS BLOG POST

Several months ago I went to a party full of lawyers with one of my best friends from high school. Someone asked me what I did. I said that I worked in reality television. It didn’t even cross my mind to say “I’m a comedian.” My friend did it for me. “He also does stand up comedy every night.” This got everyone’s attention. “Tell us a joke.” I told them what I tell anyone who asks that of me. “No.” It doesn’t work that way. There had to be a stage. There had to be a microphone. They turned around and went on with their casual conversations, unimpressed. My friend asked me how comedy was going. I told him it was going all right. I had greatly improved and had some really good performances here and there, but I was still a total amateur. Maybe I should have just went to law school, made money and tried to live a stable life like these people. Then maybe I wouldn’t be single. Then maybe I wouldn’t be poor. “Are you kidding me?” He couldn’t believe what I was saying. “You realize that these people hate their lives right? They work 18 hours a day and spend most of their free time sleeping. When they do have a party it’s like this (totally boring). You are having the time of your life with a huge community of people that try to make each other laugh every single night. Never become THESE people. Never quit.”

I’ve been doing stand up comedy consistently for a little over a year now and I can’t quit. I have my own show in San Jose every two months and I’m the new co-producer of a show I have attended religiously for the last year and a half. I’ve met some of the most wonderful people I have ever encountered in my entire life. Yes there are a few bad apples, but for the most part comedians are brilliant, clever, fun, hopelessly flawed, beautiful people. Comedy has changed my life in so many ways, all of them positive. One year ago I had no self esteem, no ambition and no goals. One year later and I’m a confident man with nowhere to go but up. Sure I may never “make it” and I also may never fully achieve my dreams, but as far as I’m concerned doing stand up is the best decision I have ever made in my entire life and I don’t plan on stopping any time soon.

Now when someone at a party asks me what I do I tell them the truth. “I’m a comedian.” And their reply is always the same: “Yeah, but I meant what do you do for money.”

picturesofmehavingsex:

HERE IS A PICTURE OF ME HAVING SEX WITH DYSLEXIA

Whenever another terrible reality or game show premieres on NBC or a shitty romantic action thriller comedy opens in theaters or a Ke$ha song is number one on the Billboard Top 100 every cynic I know calls it the first sign of the apocalypse, but honestly isn’t it normal for most things to be terrible? Wouldn’t it be more unusual if everything was great?

Imagine you’re watching the best football game of your life. If you don’t like football imagine you’re at a friend’s house and there is a football game on and you are forced to watch it. Now imagine all of the commercials in between the game are legitimately entertaining. It irks you a bit considering you have seen one, maybe two good commercials in your life and even then you felt ashamed of liking them and pointed out how dumb they were to the people around you to cover up the smile across your face.

Now imagine there’s a preview for a new TV show: “From the creators of Arrested Development, Freaks and Geeks, The Simpsons (season 3 through 8), South Park, The Sopranos, The Wire, Mad Men, The Golden Girls, Breaking Bad, The Wonder Years, Boardwalk Empire, Maury, Futurama, Three’s Company, Home Movies, Louie, Lost (until the last season), Battlestar Galactica, and Mama’s Family bring you a new drama/comedy (cause it’s too good to call a dramedy) starring Phillip Seymor Hoffman, Daniel Day Lewis, Christina Hendrick’s tits, Louis CK, Jim Carrey (from the 90’s), Buster Keaton (revived from the dead), Bill Murray, Meryl Streep’s tits, and a talking dog (or cat depending on your preference).” Okay…that is oddly awesome.

Right after there’s a movie preview only in title cards: “In 2012…every single movie…will be written…and directed…by PT Anderson…also…in 2012…the following people…will act…in zero movies…Sarah Jessica Parker…Cynthia Nixon…Kim Cattrall…and Kristin Davis…also…in 2012…Edward Norton…will be in good movies…once again…also…in 2012…there will be no CGI…only puppets…and claymation…and Muppets…well…maybe some CGI…but only James Cameron…can do the CGI…also…in 2012…there will be no opening credits…and no closing credits…cause movie credits are fucking stupid…also…” and it goes on for five more minutes, guaranteeing there will nothing you dislike in any of the movies being released next year. Things aren’t right. Something’s off.

At halftime a new band plays their brand new song on the field for the first time ever. Only this isn’t just some average American Idol contestant that created a soulless rock band. No. This isn’t even a mildly good indie band that you listen to in the background because it’s cool to like them, but in reality you could not recite a single verse of any of their songs. Oh no, no, no. This is a supergroup. The supergroup. Dave Grohl and John Bonham on dueling drums, Jack White, Jimi Hendrix (who didn’t actually die and has been in hiding for this moment) and John Mayer shredding on guitar (hey, John Mayer’s a damn good guitar player), Ray Charles and Elton John playing on the same bench and the same piano, Bob Dylan on the harmonica, Janis Joplin and the three girls from the Dirty Projectors as back up vocals, with lead vocals by every great vocalist ever, singing in unison at the same time…and a bass player. And they play the best song you have ever heard in your entire life. A song the Beatles wrote for Abbey Road, but never recorded. And when they hit that final note it dawns on you. This is it. Everything is great.

It’s the first sign of the apocalypse.

When I was in Austin I met a leathery gentlemen that went by the name of Spamela Anderson.

Spamela approached me in an impish manner similar to that of someone simultaneously suffering from narcolepsy and alcohol poisoning. He sat down and bitterly crowed, “I just got out of jail today. It’s bullshit. I told the judge, yes, I did steal that wine from CVS, but I did not light those tires on fire in the parking lot. That was just a coincidence. The judge sentenced me anyway, but I only served 90 days, 90 days exactly. You know why? Cause if I served 91 days I could have sued them. If I was there one day longer then technically I wouldn’t be serving for stealing wine no more, I’d be serving for lighting the tires on fire, which I did not do and the judge knew that so that’s why they released me on the 90th day, but now I gotta do 50 hours of community service cause I got out of jail early and I’ll tell you what I’d rather have spent that extra time in jail past the 90 days and sued them cause doing community service against your will is just as bad as being in prison.”

I noticed he had a tattoo on his right arm that just simply said, “Spam.” I asked him why he got that tattoo. “Cause I like it. I like Spam. That was my nickname in prison as a matter of fact so you can call me Spam if you want, you can call me Spam-a-lam-a-ding-dong too, just don’t call me Spamela Anderson. Last guy that called me Spamela Anderson got his jaw broken off. So where y’all going later?”

And that’s the last I saw of Spamela Anderson.

barbaragray:

Feel like this deserves a re-post today.

brandieposey:

This is Rod Bentley AKA “Colostomy Coheitus”. He is my favorite open mic crazy that comes to The Spot, my mic in Culver City (Wednesdays at 7PM!). Last night, he MURDERED with a story about talking to a mouse about the safety pins holding up his underpants. He is also waving around a fake stick of dynamite, since he thought he might “bomb”.

Also, after the show he said thank you, like he always does, and told me that he needs those 3 minutes ever couple of months, it helps him more than I’ll ever know.

It was a genuine, touching moment with “an alcoholic postal worker from Watts” in a luchador mask.

Thanks, Comedy. I live for these moments.

(ALSO WHAT YOU CAN’T SEE IS THAT HE IS WEARING A BROADSWORD. HE DID NOT ACKNOWLEDGE IT DURING HIS ACT ONCE.) 

This keeps me alive

Hey everybody, I’m currently in the process of turning my ___friends into it’s own blog. Until then here’s the newest story of my despair.

A Sequel: What The Fuck Was That?

You may recall a girl I had to battle two French men dressed in sailor outfits for. This is what followed shortly after.

“What are you up to?” Two days after I received the phone number of a young, vibrant girl with similar interests I sent her that text. A hundred times out of a hundred that text would be sent out to the void of space, passing the satellite it was intended to bounce off of and heading into the dark unknown. Maybe trillions of light years away a girl in another universe would discover the text on her phone and think, “Did I give this guy my number when I was really drunk on Friday night?” This is how I handle rejection.

But I was not rejected. She texted back immediately, “Watching Harry Potter, how about you?” I was stunned. Not only had this girl texted me back, but she had also texted me probably the best thing a girl has ever texted me in my history of texting. We bantered back and forth about teenage wizards and whether or not there was a way to turn a wand into a vibrator. We had the same sense of humor and the same taste in children’s books. Things were looking up for the first time in a while. The next day she texted me first. To give you an idea of how rare this is in my life think about how many times you have seen a meteor shower. That’s how many times a girl texts me first. She said that she wanted to smoke me out. My place or yours? This is my Cinderella story people. I chose my place. She came over, dressed in something casual but sexy. We smoked weed, watched some cartoons and then we made out. One thing led to another and we ended up in my bedroom. She is currently my girlfriend.

Here’s what really happened. I chose her place. For some reason in my head choosing her place and not letting her see mine would add more mystery to my persona. I let her know I was on my way and headed to downtown Los Angeles. The closer I got to her apartment to more scared I became. I parked my car next to a community of street tents, making sure to hide my six-year-old iPod in my glove compartment. On the way to her building a homeless man ran past me like a smelly bullet. For me seeing a homeless person run is equivalent to seeing a zombie run. There is a direct correlation between the increase in a homeless person’s mobility and the increase of my terror. Finally I entered the lobby, a lobby, maybe her lobby? I wasn’t quite sure. Dirt, mold and age covered the tiled floor, walls and ceiling. A single flickering florescent light illuminated the security desk. The guard sat in a worn and torn computer chair he likely found on a street one day on his way to work. He stared into a corner where two walls met. He did not have a TV, a radio, an iPod, a Walkman, a book, a magazine, nothing. He just stared into that empty corner, completely brain dead.

“Is this South 4^th Street?” He slowly lifted his head and raised his eyes to mine. “You’re in the right place.” “Um…thanks.” I got in the elevator as fast as I could. The walls within the elevator had either been ripped off or never installed because the interior was made of cardboard. I got off on her floor and navigated my way through the very narrow hallway. Her door was of course at the very end. I knocked. No answer. I texted. No answer. I called. No answer. I went back down. I told the security guard no one had answered. “How did you knock?” How did I knock? “Normally. It was a normal knock.” He shook his head. “No, no, no. They cannot hear you. You must knock like this.” The security guard proceeded to slam as hard as he could onto his desk, emanating the loudest “knock” I have ever heard in my life. It was the kind of knock a militant would give to the door of an unsuspecting peasant. “Now you do it.” I hesitated. “Come on, show me.” I knocked politely on his desk. “No, harder!” I knocked harder. “Harder!” I slammed my fist onto his desk repeatedly. I let out all of my pent up aggression. One knock for the girl that didn’t love me, one knock for all the bad drivers, one knock for the war in Iraq, one knock for Big Bang Theory being a popular show. “That’s good, that’s good. Now when you knock on the door you knock like this.”

I got in the elevator, breathing heavily and high on rage. At her door I prepared my fist for the knock. Then I heard her neighbors having a conversation. If I could hear them talking then surely this girl would hear my casual knock. I hesitated again, but then I remembered how long it had been since I kissed a girl and I knocked furiously. The neighbors stopped talking. I heard one of them ask the other, “What was that?” “I think it was someone knocking on the door.” They took a few seconds to analyze the situation. “Don’t answer it.” At this exact moment the door I had actually knocked on opened, only the girl I was there to see was not the person that answered. In front of me was a five-foot tall black girl who looked like she had not eaten in about two months. Did I just accidentally knock on the door of a recently immigrated Ethiopian family? “Are you here for Megan?” My brain let out a sigh of relief at the sound of her valley girl accent. “Yeah.” She turned back and yelled, “Megan, there’s some guy here for you.”

There’s some guy here for you. She didn’t even tell her roommate that I was coming over. I entered the apartment. It could have been a lost set from an Ingmar Bergman movie. It was a giant, empty loft completely painted white. The only furniture was a two person couch and a full screen television sitting on top of two cinder blocks and a piece of wood. “Kevin, is that you?” The roommate made her way into her room and I made my way into Megan’s room. There were no doors separating the bedrooms from the loft area, only three-foot long hallways. Megan was half asleep on an uncovered mattress that sat on the floor without a bed spring or a frame. Sleeping next to her was a punk girl sporting an uncouth amount of piercings. I had no idea what the fuck was going on. “I thought you were going to call me before you came.” “I did. Twice.” I also texted her when I left, when I got there and when no one answered the door. “You’re a liar.” She checked her phone. “Oh, I guess you did. Sorry dude.” She and her rebellious friend stretched and yawned. “Let’s go in the living room.”

I sat next to her on the two-person couch. The friend sat on the floor in front of us. As she packed a bowl I knew smoking it would be a mistake. The setting and situation desperately cried for me to remain sober, but alas my one weakness is free weed. I took several hits, hoping it would relax me and possibly be the spinach to boost my Popeye swagger. It didn’t. In fact it made things even worse. I began to see stationary objects move. Paranoia set in. The punk girl was feeling the effects too. “Your weed is so strong Megan.” They exchanged inside jokes and berated me with their quick wit. I could not respond with anything other than a squinted face and the words, “Oh yeah?” The punk girl went on about a reoccurring dream she had where all of her teeth fall out. She claimed she kept having this dream because a few years ago half of her teeth were in fact punched out of her mouth in the frenzy of a mosh pit for some shitty punk band. She showed off her fake teeth to me. It was then that I realized her legs were entirely covered in bruises. The only thing that was missing was the slits on her wrists.

“I feel like this is awkward right now.” No shit Megan. We decided to venture out for coffee. The two chose the most pretentious café in walking distance. I looked over the menu and found items like “spiced herb milk” and “full contact drip.” I asked if they had hot chocolate. They had hot drinking chocolate. What’s the difference? “Well it isn’t a hot chocolate mix. We put a chocolate bar into boiling water and let it melt.” “Whatever, just give me that.” I took one sip. “Tastes like hot chocolate to me.” The barista was not amused. The weed began to wear off. Now I could participate in the repertoire between Megan and the punk. My charming side blossomed and I had them back on my side of the court. We headed back to the apartment and ran into a film set. They had transformed a filthy street in downtown Los Angeles into 1940’s Hong Kong. I impressed them by audaciously walking up to the assistant director and making small talk about the production. “How do you know all of that stuff?” “I work in film and television.” “That’s so cool Kevin!” I understand if you want to punch me at this moment.

At the peak of getting my game back Megan led us down a dark alleyway. “Wait, why are we going down this way?” She said it was a shortcut. She always takes it. Don’t worry. Now this means one of two things. Either she does not think twice about walking down a dark alleyway where a rapist may or may not be waiting for a naïve girl to wander into his trap or the worst has already happened. Walking up the stairs of her apartment building the punk girl unleashed a secret I would have been better off not hearing. “Megan’s roommate is anorexic.” I couldn’t believe she would reveal something like that to me after knowing them for three days. “Why did you tell me that? I’m going to be thinking about it all night and now I might accidentally mention it.” Megan whipped around and pointed her index finger mere inches from my nose. “You better not,” she said sinisterly. The punk girl explained herself. “I only told you because she might be crying when we get back and I wanted you to know why she would be crying.” I wasn’t aware that crying was a symptom of anorexia.

When we got to Megan’s hallway I appreciated the punk girl being so candid. Why? Because all we could hear was the deafening sobs of Megan’s anorexic roommate. Just another reason the violent knocking from earlier seemed futile. Megan and the punk followed the wails and howls of the roommate into her “bedroom.” I stood outside, unsure of what to do. I distinctly overheard their conversation due to the lack of doors. “Heyyyyy. Don’t cry.” “WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH.” “We brought you some crepes. Eat some crepes.” “I…CAN’T…EAT…THAT…I…CAN’T…EAT…ANYTHING!….WAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH.” The punk girl joined me in the “living” room. “I can’t put up with girls and their drama,” the punk said. I agreed. It dawned on me at that moment that maybe I had made a mistake. Maybe I should have gone after the punk girl all along. Then I remembered that all of her front teeth were fake and glanced at her bruised legs once again.

I asked if I should go. The punk girl seemed to like this idea. “Yeah, I’ll just go tell Megan you want to leave.” “Don’t tell her I WANT to leave, just ask her if I should leave.” The punk girl rolled her eyes. She disappeared and reappeared with Megan. “Nice meeting you and stuff.” The punk girl went back into the “bedroom” to pretend to comfort the roommate. Megan apologized. We said our goodbyes and hugged. I could tell by the way she was looking at me that she wanted to kiss. “Why don’t I walk you to the door?” Great idea Megan. Maybe the sounds of your roommate having a nervous breakdown won’t drown out all of the sexuality of this moment if we walk farther away from it. Nope. Still heard the crying at the door. I hugged Megan a second time, knowing that I would never see her again. “Invite me to your next open mic,” she cried out as I walked away. To be honest this is the one time where an open mic as a second date would probably be a step up.

She closed her door. At the elevator I saw myself in an unclean mirror. My eyes were bloodshot and surrounded by a circular inch of red. I looked fucking crazy. It was then I realized the weed had never actually worn off and I was still high as shit. I pointed at myself in the mirror and said out loud, “You looked like that the whole night!” I ignored the doorman and headed straight for my car. The mobile homeless people I passed seemed normal in comparison to what I had just experienced. I drove home, recollected what had just happened and went to sleep with one thought: What the fuck was that?

Epilogue

Despite all of that I texted her again and invited her to my next open mic. She said she was flying to Chicago with her punk friend. I texted her again a week later. She never responded. That was the last I heard from her.

I can only assume she took the wrong dark alleyway shortcut one night and is now a corpse.

This is the karaoke world we live in. Sad times? OR THE BEST TIMES?! (Photo courtesy of Colin McCormick)