She's the reason I'm starting to suck.

The new year is really looking good so far. I met a great girl recently. She's smart, beautiful, sexy, we have tons in common, and we get along wonderfully. All of this seems to be adding up to one very sobering truth: my comedy career is fucking over! See, I write jokes based on my own personal experiences, and heretofore that has relied heavily on a very specific level of misery. I don't know if I have it in me to be both happy and funny at the same time.

2009 squeaks by with a D+

As this year draws to a close, I can say with all certainty that 2009 was one of the worst years of my life, despite a sharp upturn for the better at the very end. I'm sorry, Universe, but you can't just skip out all year then ace the final and expect everything to be forgotten! It didn't work out for me in my eighth grade Civics class, so don't think I'm gonna let you slide, either!

The joys of cat ownership.

This morning I woke up to the sound of water hitting water. I got up, followed the sound and found my cat perched on the edge of the toilet, pee peeing in the potty like a big boy. I didn't even have to train him to do that, and needless to say, I was a proud poppa. That is, until I saw that he took a big ol' dump on my suede jacket i had left on the floor last night. Oh, well... Two steps forward, one step back.

Missed the mark a bit. If only I had better glasses.

I went and got a new pair of glasses today. Thick rimmed black frames, Elvis Costello style. After wearing them for a while, I think they must've thought I said, "I need glasses that make me look like an art professor that sleeps with his students and listens to a lot of Frank Zappa."

Audience Participation Caption Contest

Post your captions in the Heckler's section below.

Here are mine for the week:

1. And the Lord replied, "When you saw only one set of crab walk prints in the sand, that is when I carried you."

2. Bob always freaked the fuck out whenever he dropped a contact.

3. Don't look at him, Stacy. You'll only encourage him.

Any excuse to revert back to childhood

Lately, my cat has developed a weird phobia of the floor. He can't stand to be on the floor for more than two seconds before jumping up on the furniture. If I put him down on the floor, he immediately jumps back up into my arms. I know I should be somewhat concerned about this development, but what I really want to do is jump up on the furniture for an old school game of THE FLOOR IS LAVA!

All I want for Christmas is Schadenfreude

The best part about a winter snowstorm is the sight of all of the SUVs stuck in the ditch while I'm driving by with four bald tires in a car made of 90% duct tape.

Tis the reason for the season, after all

Last night as the snow moved in, there was a report on the news that holiday travelers all over the midwest were forced to stay at the airport overnight because local hotels were filled. Hmmm... Weary travelers with no room at the inn. This seems eerily familiar.

Fingers crossed

Looks like my year of WHAT THE HELL?!? isn't over just yet. Last night: Fender bender. I have a sneaking suspicion that on New Year's Eve, some guy will surprise me with a huge check and a camera crew, and inform me that this year has all been part of some freaky reality series. Yeah, the guy who stabbed me will pull off his mask to real it was really Zac Effron, my old boss will ask me to report to work on Monday, and I'll have to tell him I need a week in Hawaii to recharge first.

I'm dreaming of sweet retribution for Christmas

This is the time of year where we should really think of the more fortunate... and how we can bring them down to our level.

You mean insanity is a turn-off?

I learned too late in life that laughing maniacally doesn't fit into that "sense of humor" the ladies are always saying they're looking for.

Audience Participation Caption Contest

Post your captions in the Heckler's section below.

Here are mine for the week:

1. Ah, Mr. Goofy. You have a nasty habit of surviving.

2. When all legal means have failed, Disney's lawyers call in "The Fixer."

3. They told me there was no film in that camera!

Life, directed by Michael Bay

I think things are finally looking up for me... Much in the same way we all look up when it's raining flaming debris.

Violators will suffer my wrath.

I'm making a ruling right now. Before 9 a.m. on any weekend, I am not to be disturbed. That time is reserved for me saving the redhead from Mad Men from evil wizards with nunchucks.

Last Twilight joke of 2009, I swear

I see they have Twilight action figures, which is the only time those characters will have any dimension.

They should be more specific

They keep saying that we need creative solutions to fix the economy... Yet I set up one bum fight and suddenly I'm a social pariah.

Computer geek joke alert!

A while ago, I was watching a NASCAR race, and I was laughing at the car sponsored by Microsoft. Well, not the car per se, but the idea that Windows may have become so troublesome that the driver and his pit crew are actually wearing software patches.

She makes me want to renounce Carbon

I've come to a realization about Ann Coulter: Forget political ideology, forget my theory that she is the spawn of Skeletor and Secretariat, forget my bitter jealousy over the size of her Adam's apple... Whenever she speaks, no matter the subject matter, she manages to offend me on a molecular level.

Audience participation caption contest

Post your captions in the Heckler's Section below.

Here are mine for the week:

1. Later that night, when the duck was inside the fortress walls, the most adorable invasion ever began.

2. It was their last hope to defeat the 50 foot Ernie before all of Sesame Street was lost.

3. This is what happens when you put Marshmallow Peeps in the microwave.

God Bless America, foo!

I think we should make the theme from The A-Team the new national anthem. People would be much more willing to do more for their country if they had kick-ass background music like that.

Now to find a way to put this on my resumé

Being unemployed has more than prepared me for working in advertising, because now I can put a positive spin on everything in my life. I don't tell people that I'm too broke to buy new razors, I just say I'm growing a beard. That mess in my kitchen? That's my penicillin research. Sure, these are the same clothes I wore yesterday, but I'm saving water, and that's good for the environment!

It's about time that naughty list got some finer print.

There's no greater proof of our society being a bunch of spoiled rotten pricks than all of the Christmas commercials on TV. Almost every retailer has at least one ad depicting Santa asking a clerk for help finding the best price on high-end products. Forgiving the fact that every clerk in these ads is completely buying into the idea that a mythical being is at their store, but they never question why a man who possesses the power to visit every house in the world in ONE NIGHT needs to find the best price on a 60" HDTV.

They do the same thing when I get in a fight...weird.

Winter: that time of year that I really regret my wardrobe consisting mainly of loose, breathable cotton. I take one step outside, and my balls go, "I don't know about you, but I'm going back inside!" Then, they retract like a scared turtle.

Kinda like a member of the glee club drinking Mad Dog

I was at the mall the other day, and I couldn't stop laughing at the sight of this one Emo kid eating a Happy Meal. Da-da-da-da-daaaaa... I'm loving the irony!

Read the sign, dipshit!

I think it's funny when people come to the comedy club, walk in and ask "So, having a comedy show tonight?" No, we're doing tragedy tonight. We're having a slide show on the Holocaust, a fund raiser for abused animals, and a poetry recital: Haikus from the Homeless.

All out of Boone's Farm.
The pigeons talk about me.
One day they'll all pay.

Audience participation caption contest

Post your captions in the Heckler's section below.Here are mine for the week:

1. Hell, it ain't any dumber looking than a Bluetooth.

2. "Doc says I have to wear this so I don't chew on my stitches."

3. Every time I go to the movies, some jackass like this always sits in front of me.

At least that pothole I hit tried its best

The road to Hell is paved with good intentions. Timeless proverb, or the motto of the Oklahoma Department of Transportation? You be the judge.

The heels aren't helping, either

The biggest problem for an artist in this economy is we're all reaching that point where we must go against our creative ideals and wind up whoring ourselves out to whomever will pay us. Plus, December is one miserable month to be standing on that street corner.

I'm lying back down. Its just safer that way.

I've been limping around the past couple of days after hurting my heel on the coffee table. Leave it to me to injure myself getting off the damn couch.

Other qualifications: Breakout and Pole Position

I recently applied for a job running a teleprompter. Essentially, the job requires carefully and precisely turning a knob. They asked me what makes me qualified, and I gave a one word answer: Pong.

Stupid people and technology... bad mix

Why is it every time I have to wait in line somewhere for something simple like swapping out a DVR remote, I always get stuck in line behind someone who has lived in a cave for the past twenty years, and their first act in joining society is getting a digital cable package? This lady ahead of me actually said to the customer service rep, "I get all of these channels? I'm not gonna be able to watch all of these!" Like it's mandatory!

When they told her someone will need to be at her house between 10 and 2 tomorrow, she asked, "Someone besides me?"

She also signed up for the internet package, which I suspect will lead to the discovery that her laptop is, in fact, an Etch-a-sketch.

When you get to the bottom you go back to the top...

It seems that there are way too many people nowadays doing outrageous and sometimes felonious things for no other reason than to get famous. The Octomom, Balloon Boy's parents, the White House party crashers, etc. Look, I understand the need for attention. I am a stand-up comic, after all. But in seeing some of the news stories over the past year, it makes me pine for the good ol' days of Charles Manson. Now, that was a guy who could sell crazy!

Audience participation caption contest

Post your captions in the Heckler's section below:Here are mine for the week:

1. Did you drop a contact, or is this a glitch in the Matrix?

2. I have a sneaking suspicion that the tuna rolls were not dolphin safe.

3. This restaurant kinda gives a whole new meaning to the phrase "You got served!"

Oh, so many reasons

Perhaps I'm jinxing myself for Christmas, but at least I made it through Thanksgiving without a single family member asking me why I'm not married yet. I guess they all have accepted the idea that at my age if a man is still single, there's probably a good reason why.

Another joke I'll have to answer for someday

I was asked to lead everyone in saying grace before Thanksgiving dinner, because if anyone is qualified, it's someone who hasn't voluntarily entered a church in twenty years:

"OK, I guess we should all join hands... Or not. Alright, let's do this. Um, Lord, God, Yahweh, whatever you're going by these days, we just want to thank you for this bountiful feast before us today. However, most of this food is heavily processed which probably isn't your thing, but I suppose we can thank you for granting Reasor's Foods the wisdom to accept coupons.

Thank you for bringing all of us together on this day. And please forgive us for the judgmental behavior we are all sure to bear witness to. We know that technically, You are the only one allowed to pass judgment. We're just building up a defense strategy down here... Let's face it, it's not like you've got lawyers up there.

Based on the way Grandma is looking at me right now, I personally want to thank you for designing lightning in just such a way that prohibits it from striking through the roof of this two-story house. And please let the turkey put us all in enough of a catatonic state that my little speech here will be quickly forgotten. Rub a dub dub, ectos domine, habeas corpus, deux ex machina. Amen."

Explain that, Darwin!

Every year at Thanksgiving, animal rights organizations start their push for people to stop killing turkeys. Look, I love animals as much as anyone, but the fact remains that turkeys that are one of the only animals so stupid that they can drown in a rainstorm. Turkey farmers don't even chop their heads off any more. They just turn on the sprinklers. Hell, I'm surprised Creationists don't use them as an argument against Natural Selection.

OK, I'll have some dessert, but then I gotta do lift some weights.

This year, my family used a Cajun Injector on the turkey. For a split second, I thought they had invited up a porn star from New Orleans. But it's this giant syringe used to inject the marinade directly into the meat. Again, I didn't know this. All I knew was when I walked into the kitchen, it looked like my stepdad was giving the turkey steroids. "You know that only works when the turkey is still alive, right? That'll have more effect on us than it will the bird." Although that would be funny. Everyone at dinner and suddenly all their voices drop an octave. Everyone starts arm wrestling over who gets the last crescent roll. My sweet little grandmother turns to me and demands to know how much I can bench press.

More food jokes for Thanksgiving!

I was at a pot luck Thanksgiving dinner a couple years ago and someone brought this casserole that was made with elbow macaroni, shredded potatoes and rice, all baked on a bed of bread crumbs. That, my friends, was the complex carbohydrate hat trick! All that was missing was a layer of powdered sugar on top! Ordinarily, one cannot make a dish containing that much starch without it first becoming a low-grade explosive.

Enjoy the salmonella!

One of the most searched recipes on the web around Thanksgiving is for mashed potatoes. Look, if the person making your Thanksgiving dinner is too stupid to make mashed potatoes, why are you trusting them with turkey?

Audience participation caption contest

Post your captions in the Hecklers section below.

Here are mine for the week:

1. Some say the secret ingredient is love... and Angel Dust.

2. Sure, it's a bit crazy, but they're just psyching themselves up to shop at Best Buy at 4 a.m.

3. Yet another reason to regret my mother getting a Facebook account, a scanner and a need to remember the "good ol' days."

We could call it the Kenmore lobe

A recent estimate states that over 1,000 house fires and over 10,000 severe bodily burns every year are caused by incorrectly deep-frying a turkey. If evolution worked the way it should, within a generation or two, the human brain would be hard wired to instinctively use the damn oven!

A shitty night, in more than one way

I had a horrible experience with an irate heckler at the club last night. Even after he had left the club, he proceeded to repeatedly call the box office to complain about me, getting angrier and more threatening with each call. This was the first time I have left a comedy club fearing death. When I got home, I thought some TV would help me take my mind off things, but the first thing that came up when I turned on the TV was AMC showing Cape Fear. I turned it on just in time to hear Deniro screaming "COME OUT, COME OUT, WHEREVER YOU ARE!!!"

So, I shit my pants and went to bed.

Dark turn in three, two, one...

At the beginning of the year, my mantra was "Failure is NOT and option!"

By April, my new mantra was, "OK, occasional failure is forgivable."

When August rolled around, that all changed to "At least you're trying."

As I roll into December, the new mantra is apparently, "The number for suicide prevention is on the fridge."

And they sting a lot.

Ive learned so much working the door at the comedy club. The key to dealing with customers is to simply be nice. I didn't need to be told that for the job. I learned that in the late eighties from a little film called Road House. Doesn't make it any less true, though. Not that you get the same kindness in return every time. You can catch more flies with honey than you can with vinegar. But you know what else you catch with honey? Bees. Deadly, deadly, pissed off bees.

Yes, a poop joke.

Tonight, I thought I'd treat myself to a hot fudge sundae. What I had was a dessert so rich it may have retroactively given me lactose intolerance. Which brings me to my next point: Whomever designed the motion sensor toilet flushing system have overlooked a minor detail... The courtesy flush.

I'm not denying the fact that pineapples make bad housing.

I believe that instead of ranking board games by age, they should really do it by IQ. Particularly if it's a trivia game. Seriously, there's nothing more frustrating than getting in a heated argument over who lives in a pineapple under the sea.

Audience participation caption contest

Post your captions in the Heckler's section below.

Here are mine for the week:

1. I'm making a ruling right now: Heath Ledger impersonations have officially jumped the shark.

2. Officer, anything you might be tempted to do is perfectly justifiable. Besides, who's gonna convince a mime to testify?

3. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say, honk, squirt out of a flower, shape out of a balloon, etc. will be held against you...

I'd hate to see the trail... ANY trail.

I reached a special level of broke and lazy when I decided to pour the last remnants of bags of pretzels, potato chips, Doritos and animal crackers (with frosting) into a bowl and when a friend asked me what I was eating, I simply said, "trail mix."

There's always a bigger pain

I think I've figured out how I've managed to cope with all of the weird shit that has happened to me this year. You see, if you have a lot of stressful situations happen to you all at once, it can be overwhelming, and if they happen well spaced apart, you can get burned out. However, if it happens in quick succession like it happened to me, then each new crisis will distract you from the ones before it. Let me put it another way:

Have you ever gotten an itch in the middle of your back right where you can't reach it? Drives you nuts, doesn't it? Well, imagine you now notice that you are developing a hangnail. Your back still itches, but the hangnail is now taking priority. It hurts like hell the more you play with it, and it distracts you to the point that some sort of accident happens and BOOM! You break your arm! The pain is excruciating! But it's small potatoes compared to you suddenly getting your foot caught in a bear trap! And you now look down at your mangled leg, thinking, "I really need to do something about this... but for some reason my hair is now on fire!"

And so on, and so forth.

Need a mint?

Today I saw the worst advertisement possible for a restaurant: A woman outside in the bushes puking. I asked her if she was alright, but what I really wanted to ask was what menu item to avoid.

Who am I kidding? He can't get arrested these days.

When Steve Miller gets arrested, do you think his list of aliases include Space Cowboy, Gangster of Love, Maurice, The Joker, The Smoker and the Midnight Toker?

Not likely to pass

Today is Veteran's Day, and in honor of this day, I would like to propose legislation that would require all members of Congress, during any public appearance honoring the troops, to wear a sign listing their voting record on veteran's issues. What the hell... Let's make it interesting: send their security details home for the day as well.

Further adventures of owning a passive aggressive cat

When reaching for some change to do my laundry, I made the horrific discovery that my cat had pissed in my change dish. I guess it was just Chuckles' little way of telling me that I care more about money than I do about him.

Audience participation caption contest

Post your captions in the helcker's section below.


Here are mine for the week:

1. Every girl I've dated has described their ex-boyfriend to be just like this.

2. Wallace Shawn's Playgirl spread was the worst selling issue ever!

3. Look, just tell us where the truffles are and we'll let you go!

I't gotta be like drawing the aliens from the movie Cocoon

Tonight, I modeled for a life drawing class. Given my lily white skin and lack of muscular definition, I can't imagine there were a lot of students working on their shading skills.

Perhaps if she would've flashed some nipple

I read a news article about a university student in Brazil being expelled for wearing a short dress. Brazil claiming something being immoral? Seriously? If she plans a lawsuit, might I suggest her lawyers cite the landmark case of Carnivale v. NOBODY!

If you want your Big Mac to be clean, then be nice.

I think the FDA should loosen the rules for human tampering in fast food. Those that can't place their drive-thru order in twenty words or less should not be surprised if their food tastes like maliciously dispensed bodily fluids. The more words they use, the further south the origin of the contaminants.

It's the Discover Card of higher education

I applied at a community college today. Let me get this straight... Community college has an approval process?!? What, are they just checking that I'm human?

I hear the Blair Witch Project looks amazing

While browsing the DVD's at Best Buy yesterday, I couldn't help but chuckle when I saw a Blu-ray copy of Cloverfield. Because if there's any movie you want high definition picture quality, it's one that was filmed with hand-held camcorders.

Tough call

Taco Bueno has just introduced the Cheeseburger Taco, and I don't know whether to weep or hit the drive-thru.