I got my first real hate mail recently. Who knew an off the cuff remark made in Mississauga, could piss off a 57 year old man in Texas? I made a joke the day after the second "friendly fire" incident happened in Afghanistan.

I thought it to be ironic that we are fighting an enemy that doesn't have any planes, yet we still get bombed. How did we manage to get bombed, when the enemy has no planes? Simple, our friends, the Americans bombed us.

A couple of guys in army uniform came into the club in Mississauga that night, still wearing the uniform hours after their "shift" or whatever military euphemism you use to describe what reservists do in an airplane hanger in Oakville Thursday night after the day job at the car lot lets out. They of course were wearing the uniform for the same reason 25 year old girls dress like whores under the guise of "Halloween", to get laid, or at least be admired. I filmed the exchange I had with the guys and put a very small part of it up on Youtube. You can watch it yourself, here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YixOkF_LTv4

This is the EXACT comment I received in a private e-mail sent to me. He didn't even have the balls to put it where everybody could see it. I have cut and paste, so grammar and spelling are in the original form.

 "and your countrys perfect i suppose ? there is friendly fire throughout history its not good people should know who there shooting at . but in my view in this time and place in history . if you hate us americains than your the enemy wheather your up north south east or west . if i was president and im glad im not . id pull all our troops and bring them home and let the world go to all the crazy dictators including you because im sick of the commies hating america and always putting us down . so yes huh was correct no matter your acts are not funny . just you wait your country will have some terriost attack you and than you will understand us a little better . be careful throwing stones it may bite you in the butt someday"

I'm proud I was able to shake somebody half a continent away with less then 15 seconds of words, jokes no less, but it saddens me to see in black and white, my suspicion of who votes what way and why in middle America, verified.

Comedians will make fun of their parents, siblings, bosses, friends and even the guy in the front row of the show without hesitation, and if you take offense to anything, the defense is usually, "These are all just jokes. It's comedy night."

I will be the first person to say, ANYTHING, can be made fun of, provided the target or exageration of the joke is good. Unfortunately, the average person's idea of a funny exageration is a big chair or a big beer bottle, both found at this year's Just For Laugh's comedy festival in Montreal.

"I get it, its a chair, only really big, but you can sit in it. Funny"

I won't start explaining jokes, because that gets into spoon feeding people and they get enough of the kid gloves treatment from our talk show, self help book, sensitivity trained culture as it is. My point is, you would think comedians, the very people that write and perform jokes night after night, would have a better sense of humor about themselves. You can make fun of anything except them.

I did a show about 6 months ago with three other comedians. I was on third, right before the headliner, and right after a person I was about to unintentionally offend to their very soul.

The comedian did OK. Not a kill, not a bomb. Nothing to be embarrased about and nothing to write home about. The comic in question is a school teacher by day and did some jokes about it. I came to the stage and did a joke I do about poor spelling habits of high school students. At that point, I said the teacher comic's name followed by, "Quit comedy, we need teachers." In my head I was thinking, put as many hours into teaching as possible. The exageration was supposed to be how stupid kids are, but from the audience's reaction of laughing and clapping, I quickly realized they saw it differently. The comic then yelled from the back of the room, that I would not be getting a ride home. I guess he interpreted the joke the same way the audience did. They believed the emphasis or exageration was that the comic should quit comedy. In retrospect, if I was in the audience, I would have taken the comment the same way they did, but so what? Even George Carlin has bad jokes, bad nights and in my opinion his latest CD was weak compared to the other 13 recordings of his I own.

Making fun of a weak performance (not a weak performer) or the poor choice somebody makes is no more of a personal attack then when you make fun of the guy in the front row for working for the government or wearing an ugly shirt. COMEDIANS of all people should know that.

It happened again on Thursday at Club54 in Burlington Ontario, but with much better results. I watched a comedian take the stage for 20min and do what felt like an hour of complete silence. I was the headliner on this show and had to take the stage to face 80 people who were bored, offended, or tired. I opened with " I was at the back of the room watching the show and growing very frustrated, because I can't make a living at stand up, and you have seen my competition." It got big laughs waking up the room and relaxed the tension. The target was very obvious this time. Everybody in the room felt the awkward tension and just wanted it to be aknowledged.

He was a stripper for 13 years and he was still in great shape. My flabby, skinny hairy body would have looked as out of place dancing for women as he looked on a comedy stage telling jokes. We have different strengths. We have different weaknesses. Imagine how awkward it would be if I took the stage to dance for women, with a serious look on my face. It wasn't a joke, I was a member of the troupe. When the host comes out, he better say something before he brings out the next dancer. The whole time the next guy is on stage, they would be thinking, was that last guy for real? Was it a joke? Will he be back? Does he get paid? Let's say something about it, so we can move on with the show.

I don't go out of my way to make comments like these. In 5 years I have only made these two on stage. The first was misunderstood, and the second was needed to relieve an awkward tension and reestablish the show.

This night I got lucky, he found my comments funny and even asked where I would be performing next, but I always feel like I'm walking on eggshells when I'm around other performers.

Comedians have THE WORST SENSE OF HUMOR!

On a bright note, I regained a little faith after recently listening to the Unbookables CD "Morbid Obscenity" It features Doug Stanhope, Andy Andrist, Lynn Shawcroft, Sean Rouse and Arthur Hinty. It was a CD put together as a fundraiser for Arthur Hinty, a friend of Stanhope's because he needed money for a gastric bypass. (stomach stapling) During that show, the comics made fun of the very person the fundraiser was for. Doug Stanhope, after returning to emcee the show, said, "That was a solid 10 minutes of comedy in a 20 minute set" about Andy Andrist. Sean Rouse a comedian and an arthritic cripple complained there was no fundraiser for him.

This is how comedy is supposed to be. FUN! They bagged on each other all night. They love each other and respect each other, but they say some nasty things at each other's expense for the sake of a laugh.

Often a comic who makes fun of another comic onstage will be called "unprofessional". As I see it, the profession, is getting laughs. The one getting the laughs, is the professional.

I can't wait to see how I will have to defend myself on the comment section.

This past week has reminded me how lucky I am to be doing comedy.  Comedy has given me opportunities I never would have had otherwise.  It has taken me places I normally don't go, and allowed me to meet people I would normally not meet. In the last week, I drove to a beautiful part of Ontario known as Gananoque for the first time with two other comedians to do a show on a St Lawrence River boat cruise, and 5 days later I did a show with 4 different comedians, some of which I hadn't seen in a while, at a seniors residence.

How many people can say they have been paid to hang out on a cruise ship one night and then be paid to get drunk with old people in a seniors residence 5 days later?

We were told at the seniors residence not to make fun of mental illness.  An odd request to say the least, especially considering most mentally ill people I know are comedians. 

Show time is 7pm, so we get in an elevator in the lobby at 6:45pm.  It must have been a big night at the old folks home because our elevator was crammed with 5 comedians, 5 residents, and 2 walkers. We made stops at every floor between the lobby and the 12^th, where we met people that would have to wait for the next elevator.  We arrive on the 12^th floor to see the fitness room/dining room/stand up club, crammed with about 60, under-stimulated old people waiting for us.  Some aren't going to understand the jokes even with both hearing aids cranked to the max, because they speak Portugese or Spanish, but lucky for us, Margaret, a roughly 70 year old woman with the wear of an 85 year old, sat right up front.  She used her completely toothless, smokers laugh liberally, laughing at both the correct and incorrect times.

I am on last out of the group of five.  The show has been pretty good so far despite the sound system, which was essentially a fisher price microphone plugged into a 20 year old ghetto blaster.  I start my show and Margaret, right on cue laughs at everything until I tell a joke about hunting ducks.  This is the first time all night we dont hear the front row cackle.  It really threw me off, so I ask her why she didn't laugh.  With conviction she says, "I didn't like that one, I'm an animal rights activist."  I then ask how she is active in the fight for animal rights.  She says, "I wear shirts with designs on them."  I tell her it sounds like she takes it pretty seriously.  With astonishing authority she says, "Yes.  I don't like the elimination of animals."  I then ask her about the plate of chicken wing bones on the table in front of her.   It looks like you did a pretty good job eliminating them. It takes a level of commitment to remove every last thread of meat from a chicken wing when you don't have teeth.  Everybody in the room began laughing including Margaret.  I guess she didn't think her morals through all the way.  The conversation ended there and she allowed me to continue with my show that had already met its premature pinnacle.

I had never had so many compliments after a show before. Some telling me I was funny, some telling me good job, and some, just glad I got a good one in on Margaret.

How often do you get the chance to put a 70 year old woman in her place in front of her peers and get paid for it?  Boy scouts like to help them cross the street, I like taking them down a peg.

My first trip to Ottawa to perform at the much talked about Absolute Comedy Club.

It is a great club, and on a Thursday they had 100 people.  In a club this size, it just about fills it out. 

 They are there for a good time. Great laughers and lots of fun, but at the end of the show, its over.  They leave like there is 5 min left in a Senators playoff game or they're photographers at a Stephen Harper press conference. 

 Does everybody work at 6am in a government position?  Even the other comics left the club by 11pm.  Free pool, cheap booze and the comics are gone?

I was promised PSSs or "post show sluts".  Where were they?  I thought I was going to get rowdy with some of the other local comics and nurse a hangover with a shitty piece of pizza from an out of the way 24hr restaurant. 

I have taken 2 vacation days from my day job. I want to get drunk, I want to see the town, I want to eat, drink, and have rude but interesting conversations with other comics, transients, or recently released mental patients.

This is a plea to anyone living in Ottawa to please save the image I am about to leave your town with.  Please somebody somewhere show me a good time.  Live a little, stay out past your bedtime so I can feel like I did something while I was here.

I want to come back to Toronto with at least 1 story!

I feel like I am in a trading spaces nightmare.  The worst thing that could happen to somebody here is if they had their walls painted eggshell white instead of snow white.

If you are reading this and know somebody in Ottawa,  tell them to find me, and show me that this city is something more than beauracrats, politicians, vegans and well maintained lawns.

Get somebody to show me that there is an underbelly, or at least a pulse here somewhere.

HELP!!!

Dove soap has started a self esteem building campaign aimed at women who feel alienated by the traditionally celebrated idea of beauty.

They call it the Campaign for Real Beauty.  They have billboards, and posters all over celebrating over weight women to sell firming cream.  Granted, the girls in the ads are not obese, but make no mistake about it, the obese are the people these ads are for.  There is even one ad that says %50 FAT %50 FAB So in the eyes of the Dove company, real beauty can be fat, but it can't include loose skin. 

According to the Center for Disease Control, being overweight increases your risk to the following health problems:

• Hypertension
• Dyslipidemia (for example, high total cholesterol or high levels of triglycerides)
• Type 2 diabetes
• Coronary heart disease
• Stroke
• Gallbladder disease
• Osteoarthritis
• Sleep apnea and respiratory problems
• Some cancers (endometrial, breast, and colon)

I can't find a single health risk associated with loose skin, except maybe getting it caught in a zipper.

Why would Dove be so irresponsable as to promote a potential health risk?  Because they have done their research.  Aprox 60 million Americans are overweight. That is a large market segment the rest of the cosmetic companies have alienated for years. 

All Dove needs to do is make those people respect you for making you feel good about yourself, the way I respected my hockey coach when he made me feel good by giving me the most sportsmanlike award.  That award always goes to the worst player, so they have something to feel good about after a season of no goals and no friends. If Dove can do that, they can sell more firming cream and hair gel, which by the way are just BEAUTY products. 

They are telling you not to feel bad about being overweight (which is a health risk and in my country, a huge cost to the socialized medical system) but you should feel bad because your skin is loose and your hair is shapeless.  Here is another reason they do it.  They don't sell weight loss products.

This to me is like a billboard of ugly, overweight, cigar smoking men being used to sell Rogaine.  If you just had hair, you would be sexy again.  All that matters is hair.

When you are a 30 year old single man who lives in a stranger's basement down by the lake, you need to find a way to amuse yourself between drunken naps and Seinfeld reruns.

I often find its just not enough to be in a life going nowhere, so I have to prove it to myself.

It all started when my day job boss and I started a competition with each other.  Who could go the longest without shaving?  trimming was not allowed.  If you trim it, you may as well shave it.

My beard got to me when I started to eat some of it at every meal, so I figured buying the boss a coffee was well worth the freedom of eating a hairless meal.

It was much worse than it looks here:

I wanted to audition for a Keith's beer commercial....

Then I heard what the last guy who did those commercials did, and I put a big boot in his face instead.

Should I be a cop, or a porn star?

No, if I can't be a silent movie star or a dictator, I don't want to do anything.

  I am a relic of sorts, one of the few left that doesn't have an Ipod and rarely downloads any music files.  I still go into the music store to shop.  There are a couple of reasons why.

 I like the artwork and the information given on a store bought CD and DVD.  I enjoy knowing at a glance who produced and mixed the music, who session players or guest artists are.  I like to see a list of people an artist may thank for their help or influence.  I enjoy reading a short history on the production or a biography.   I think the artwork works with the music to define an overall "feel" to a release.  It helps communicate a certain vision.   I like having the real lyrics, not the ones somebody posted on the net incorrectly.

This could all soon come to a crashing end for me.  I find myself in a music store no less than twice a month.  The last few DVD's I have bought, don't come with anything other than 1 cover picture.  No track listings, no thank yous, no background information at all, just a DVD.  There is becoming less reason for me to buy from the store, and the stores aren't helping the cause any.

Everytime I go into a store, I  head right for the section I want, usually the comedy or heavy metal section.  The problem?  The section is in a different spot everytime I go in!  Where the fuck are the comedy CDs this week?  It was here. It used to be George Carlin and Bill Hicks, now its the soundtrack to CATS and Phantom of the Opera. 

These corporate assholes have done "research" to find out that we may buy more product if we get lost.  If you can't find what you were looking for right away, you may stumble accross something else to buy as well.

This irritates me to no end.  I know what I want.  I don't want a collection of songs from CATS.  I want a Lewis Black CD.  That is it!  I'm not buying anything else. All that is happening is that I'm getting annoyed because I'm forced to spend more time looking for what I really want in a store frequented by "tweens" clogging up the already narrow aisles looking for the latest Hillary Duff album, that they too can't find, because they moved the latest piece of mind numbing shit section also.

Now I'm stuck in a sea of green haired simpletons, forced to listen to the latest uber hip garbage from an obscure German punk band because Seth is the man in charge behind the counter today and he wants to impress said green haired simpletons by knowing everything there is to know about a band nobody has ever heard of.

The corporation wants me to get lost and buy more than I planned to when I came in. What usually happens is that I end up yelling at  "EMO" counterhelp.

I know its not his fault that the store does this, but head office doesn't care that I'm upset, because "research" shows my complaints are statistically insignificant and that net profits are up since they started fucking with the shelves.

If head office doesn't care, and they don't care because I don't make a big enough difference to their bottom line, I'm going to take a different approach. I encourage anybody who is reading this to do the same.

I'm going to make working at  HMV as counterhelp so miserable that HMV has a hard time keeping employees.  They are an easy target, mostly kids who still live at home who will quickly abandon the $7 an hour if it comes with caustic complaints and mental abuse everytime they try to help a customer. 

If we all join forces and give them  unrelenting lectures about how getting 37 piercings  is just a way to assert your individuality in a way fit for small minded conformists.  If you wear fur coats when the vegans are working and tell them how proud you were to be able to club the seal yourself. If when asked at the checkout, "Did you find everything you were looking for today?", we say no and ask them to search in their computer for a Zamfir album that doesn't exist. As they are searching tell them how much better music was in Zamfir's day, and why she will never amount to anything in life worth while.  Get her to try a couple of different Zamfir spellings so you can talk to her longer, then tell her to try "master of the pan flute", tell her that you were blown in college by Zamfir and the nick name suits him. If we make their lives miserable everytime we go in the store, quitting and running back to the home that provided the physical and emotional abuse required for them to want the 37 piercings in the first place, will look like a mental oasis in comparison.  They will quit in droves, forcing HMV to give them danger pay and stress leave like Air Traffic Controllers because suicide has become so prevelant among its employees.  That will get them bad press and cost them enough money that they might actually LEAVE THE FUCKING SHELVES ALONE

Lets do it at Blockbuster too.  Anytime somebody in a blueshirt tries to make you feel welcome with a cheery "hello" as you're going through the metal detectors, say to them....Fuck You!  Everytime they say hello, they hear fuck you!  Wouldn't that be great?

Love Andrew

  Last Tuesday night I performed along with 5 other up and coming Canadian comedians and host Mike Bullard at Casino Nova Scotia.

  After years of dreaming about performing at the Halifax Comedy Fest in front of my hometown, it finally happened.

Although the show started at 8pm, we are asked to show up at 4pm for a sound check.  I go through a piece of my routine and I use the mic like a hammer on the stool. (BAM!)

"Ok, during showtime, can you do that on your hand instead of the stool?  I don't want you breaking my mic."

I say, "No, I have to do it this way, its important to the joke."

There was some grumbling and some moving around after my reply, but they said "Ok, we'll figure something out" 

I then go backstage where there is coffee, tea, donuts, muffins, sandwhiches, red bull, orange and apple juice, water and cheesecake.  We take turns eating like we're homeless and then watch the monitor while the other guys on the show go through their soundchecks.  I strike up a short and akward conversation with fellow comedian and ex-nun Jacquie O'keefe about her time in a convent and then head back to my hotel room to relax for an hour or so.

At about 6:30pm I show up for my make up call.  I haven't worn make-up since I was dracula for hallowe'en about 20 years ago.  I don't know how women do that everyday.

8pm comes and Mark Critch warms up the crowd and announces the fest sponsors, then he brings Mike Bullard on, who is as fast as anybody on his feet, saying to a man named "Ali" that he doesn't have to worry about security checks since he married a CanJet employee. 

I'm scheduled to be the first performer up. Mike wraps up while I'm waiting in the wings with the lady with a headset.  Mike announces my name, the crowd begins to applaud, but I am held up by the lady with the headset, because they don't want me to take the stage until they switch stools.  A stage hand has specially made a stool for me with a cushion top so I can smash it with the mic and not do any damage. This is great, but it takes him a good minute to make the switch, so by the time they let me take the stage, the audience has been silent for 15 seconds and thinks I got lost on the way to the show.

I finally take the stage, arms above my head, like an olympic athlete to a second, but smaller wave of applause.  I go through my7 min set, get the light and get off.  I did well, but with 4 and a half years worth of work invested into this moment, and 3 hours worth of make up, sound check, and waiting around, I was hoping for more.  7min went fast.  I just remember thinking my entire festival was already half over.

Everybody did well that night, but Jeff McEnery and Trevor Boris were the no doubt hits.

In Nova Scotia there are 2 main newspapers.  The Chronicle Herald, and the Daily News.  I checked the next day for a heading like "Hometown boy makes good as a Fresh Face in Canadian comedy!"   I was as blindly optimistic as a bride on the eve of her wedding to an NHL star.  The Chronicle Herald didn't mention anything and the Daily news put 2 lines of my jokes in a small article. For a brief moment I forgot about how apathetic the Canadian culture is.  If nobody in this country gives a shit about genocide, why did I expect them to care about 5min of jokes? 

Andrew Evans