Oh no! I forgot to post by Saturday and it's 1:04 AM now so technically that makes this blog post two days late and all this by a mere day and one hour.

In any case, I'd like to apologize to all of my fans for not performing last Tuesday at Parkview Coffeehouse. To begin with, I'd like to assume that the whole world revolves around me so please don't consider me arrogant for apologizing to my fans. Hopefully, I will have actual fans to apologize to soon but until then, a healthy imagination will have to do. But really, the whole world does revolve around me or at least, it seems to and that's not just a fat joke. I guess that's why I decided to not perform. I didn't want gravity to somehow experience technical difficulties and then have to witness my whole world crash and burn around me. A little dramatic? I pride myself on my flair for the dramatic. I thrive on it. Some call it flamboyantly gay but I just call it life.

Making jokes to ease the tension, another day in the life of Lil Biju. But seriously, I really do regret not being able to perform last Tuesday. I thought I had an entire act ready. So ready in fact that I attempted to perform it in front of friends on Monday only to get disappointing reviews. The thing is, I was only 3 minutes into my act before they thought my act was funnier than my jokes, and not in a good funny way but rather in a "you're funny looking" kind of way. The book that I read last week explained how self confidence in both oneself and one's jokes are the most important parts of stand up comedy and I'm sad to say that I lost confidence in my jokes that day. Thankfully, they're not in AP Lit (dummies) so I won't have to worry about them reading this blog post.

So what have I been doing after this tragic defeat? Have I been depressed to the point that my creative juices returned to the Caribbean? Unfortunately so. However, Friday was the pitch for our 20% time project, and I was rejuvenated and out of the ashes rose a brown phoenix ready to soar once more (yes boi swag). Not that I was soaring before but nevertheless, my wings were flapping and I was cruising on the currents of the Caribbean. This Saturday, I sat down and looked at my notes and wrote an act about my insecurities which I think is pretty decent but also too long but that may just be my insecurities talking. Hopefully, my friends will think it's good.

Looking back, this week hasn't been that great in terms of real progress but I think it was the most important week so far. I learned a lesson this week that will be valuable to remember throughout this journey, no matter how long it lasts. Failure is okay as long as the Caribbean currents remain strong. Furthermore, there is no need to worry if one does not feel such currents moving their wings for some time because eventually, it will come out of nowhere and boost us all heavenward.

P.S. My main man, Duane, who I only knew of until last Sunday agreed to by my mentor so ladies and gentleman, this flight is ready to lift off.

I'm nervous. I checked out a book, Careers in Comedy by Sharon Menzel-Gerrie, which explains much of the struggles of stand up comedy. It explores stand up comedy as a career and it was clear for me that stand up comedy just wasn't for me. Stand up comedy basically involves a lot of travel and rejection. What really got me was the rejection part. I can't even get girls because of my irrational fear of rejection. Besides the rejection of club owners, the book talks about what happens when the audience doesn't laugh.The book details experiences of stand up comics who tells jokes to audiences who simply grunt at the punch lines. Apparently, the key is self confidence, a key I've never been able to turn.
Coffeehouse is in 3 days and I'm not confident in my jokes. The book reassures me with examples of famous comedians who bombed their first performance. The thing is, though, I can't deal with rejection as I already said. I'm really nervous that I'll go up there and just nervously laugh at the audience and say, "your turn." None of my friends understand my dilemma either which should be a comfort, I guess. They assume I'll be funny up there. Practicing in front of friends is a good idea apparently but I don't wanna ruin their expectations. I'll wait for Tuesday to do that.
There is a lot of negative energy here and it's really messing up the feng shui of this blog post. A big part of self confidence is positive energy and  I need to remain positive because I've literally been dreaming about this career since 8th grade. That's a long time and I have to be at least mediocre for the sake of my dignity, if nothing else.
So moving on from my overwhelming stage fright, I've actually accomplished quite a lot this week. As I already said, I checked out that book. Besides its depressing elements, it really does have a lot of good information. Like the author discusses different ways to find material for one's act which was really helpful to me. I've already been doing the notebook thing that she suggests but new ideas like just watching people (a little creepy but apparently effective) energized me. There's an entire section titled "Have Patience, Persistence, and Faith in Yourself." It's important to remember that at the end of the day, I'm still funny and this should be my driving motivator.
I've also narrowed down my act to about 7 minutes. The one thing I haven't been able to do is organize my act. I just have a couple of developed jokes here and there but they're not connected. I remember Russell Peters used to make his act seem like he was just thinking of it at that very moment. That's the kind of act that I've always wanted. That requires practice and some more practice and practice is what I'm really lacking. Speaking in front of a mirror just seems narcissistic to me but I need to get over myself and practice my act over and over again. Self-confidence comes with practice so I guess that's what my weekends gonna be about.
A short word about mentors before I close. Friday was the deadline to find a mentor and sadly, I have nobody to present. I messaged somebody really funny who graduated last year but I haven't gotten a response yet so I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

This week seems to have been shorter than others. Maybe because of Labor day? Basically what I'm trying to say, though, is I just did not have the time to concentrate on this project. I had other things to do like catch up on sleep and Scandal. Pretty soon though, this blog will have to move on from a list of excuses to actual work. It scares me how much I procrastinate sometimes. Like I was walking down the hall and noticed that Parkview Coffeehouse, where I plan on performing my first act, is on September 16 and (gasp) that's in 11 days!
It's not that I'm purposely just forgetting about this though. I watched stand up routines of Louis C.K. and Russell Peters as well as a couple of ehow articles, of all things, about how to perform a stand up act and write jokes. Frankly, I was just overwhelmed by the challenge I had taken on. There's a big difference between cracking a joke once and trying to entertain a crowd for 10 minutes. This epiphany rocked my world harder than your mom last night which leads me to my next problem. Performing stand up in school forces one to censor themselves and sometimes when the individual in question is a teenagers with way too many hormones coursing through their veins, it can be tough.
A quote I have always loved is about how one shouldn't focus on the problem but the possible solutions. Improv seems like a good idea but I'm not sure if that's the best thing for me. I want to focus on the kind of observational comedy that made Louis C.K. famous. Maybe even ethnicity jokes but that might be too far? Or maybe the story telling techniques used by Dane Cook and Kevin Hart?
So far in the act I have written, it focuses on mainly my experiences with being funny and funny encounters that I have had. I want to find a real zinger, though, that will make my act worth my audience's time. This week, I'll have to focus. I'm going to try contacting famous comedians to be my mentor but I'm scared. What if I don't find a mentor that does stand up comedy? I don't know anybody like that. Hopefully I'll find one by next week. I will also have to finalize my act by next week. So far I only have a rough draft done. I also need to start practicing in front of a mirror because apparently it has helped a lot of famous comedians. I think that's about it for this week. Tom? What's the weather going to be like this week?

Procrastinating

We all want to funny. It's part of our never ending effort to be accepted. In fact, I'm pretty sure the only reason I have friends is because occasionally I can make others laugh.
Being funny is fun. Once in a while, you come up with a joke out of nowhere and suddenly you know you're the man. This doesn't happen too often for me though.
Laughing is also fun. Beginning around 8th grade, I became obsessed with stand up comedy and soon, I was ravenous for new stand up comics. They were so funny. I'm sure they would have had tons of friends at school. But unlike me, they're the man everyday in front of thousands of people. An ambition to be like them began to slowly grow but the question that ate at me was always, "What if they don't laugh?' Everybody has their own personal definition of what's funny and that's scary because you're never sure if what you think is funny is actually going to that funny. When the subject of 20% time came up in class, our teacher explained how it should be something we've always wanted to do but have always been scared to try. She stressed how failure was okay as long you could tell yourself, you had done the best you could do.
So here I am, trying to be funny and really, isn't that what we're all trying to be? We all go through life waiting for our next big joke that will be funny enough to be retold one day.
I haven't done much as far as learning how to do stand up. My teacher found a couple of improv books that I'm sure will help. I have about half of my act thought out. I have yet to write it down on paper but I have taken note of various jokes that might be worthy of my act. Parkview Coffeehouse is coming up soon and it will be best to keep this in mind and stop any further acts of procrastination.