Hello, People.
Today try to take a minute and reflect on the sacrifice the people in the armed forces have made over the years doing their duty.
Then eat some food.
I want to thank the people of Madison, WI for coming out to Comedy on State over the weekend. I had five sold out shows. They were great. Really fun, productive and, I believe, entertaining shows. Dina Hashem did a great job opening and the club itself is really one of the best, if not the best, in the country.
It’s not always clear what makes a club better than others. Could be the sound system, low ceilings, how the stage is situated, how it is seated, how big it is. The Comedy on State club is just a beautiful, intimate venue and the staff and owners are great. They give a shit. They treat comics well and just run a tight ship. Great green room, too. That matters.
Doing clubs is the real work. Refining bits. Up close with the people. One mind. Push the envelope a bit.
A confluence of seemingly karmic events kind of humbled me over the weekend. Having just read Fantasyland by Kurt Andersen, I was in the middle of an advance copy of a book called It Came from Something Awful by Dale Beran. The first was about magical thinking in America and the second was about the evolution of 4chan and the internet communities of toxic nerdom and how it contributed to political clusterfuck we are living in. It also covers the struggle between toxic and progressive nerd culture.
I recently got into a twitter spat with some of the hate nerds about Game of Thrones and before that I pissed off the non-hate nerds with my take on Marvel movies. Through all that, and up until the other day, I never really thought about the women nerds. They just didn’t fit into my limited conception of the culture. Dale Beran’s book laid it out in its entirety and just by coincidence the hotel I as staying at was hosting WisCon, a feminist science fiction convention.
There were all kinds of people there. Many races, many genders. All seemed sort of touched, in their own time zone, on the fantasy spectrum. Outside of the norm for sure. Being around them made me a bit giddy. I felt like the weirdo. It was moving somehow. It humbled me. It blew my mind. Reintroduced me to a sensitivity for the unique people. The brilliant ones that don’t fit in and have to live with that and then embrace it. It was just nice to see them all in one place. Enjoying each other. I have a bully in me. I have to make sure it stays in check. The only way to do that is respect others. Understand. Empathize.
Today on the show I talk to Timothy Olyphant. Good guy. Good actor. Good talk. On Thursday, after spending years of my life trying get on (and then get back on) his show, David Letterman sits with me for a chat about his early days as a comic. Things he really doesn’t generally talk about. Great talk.
Enjoy!
Boomer lives!
Love,
Maron