Tweet
OK, the wife and I went with her sister and brother-in-law to see a comedy show the other night. Comedian was a guy by the name of Brian Regan, if any of you have ever heard of the guy. Evidently, he has quite a following, because the show was completely sold out.
My wife and I had pretty much the same reaction to the guy -- a decent number of funny moments, but on the whole it was a bunch of fairly obvious jokes, and we were underwhelmed. Her sister and brother-in-law, however -- along with the other dozen people they had in tow and the entire venue -- found this dude to be fucking hysterical, and were totally doubled over throughout the whole show. Regan got no less than three standing ovations during the show, in which we begrudingly participated because her family was so amped about the show, we didn't want to rain on their parade by tipping them off that we weren't as into it as they were.
A couple of days later, we were talking about it and wondering what happened. We were clearly the odd people out -- it wasn't as if a few people found it funny and everyone else was on the fence, people were in tears at this guy, and we just kinda shrugged and played along. What happened to us, I wondered. We had been to see Lewis Black about a year ago and laughed our asses off, and we love all things comedy, so it isn't as if we have no sense of humor.
My wife's family and friends are from a small town on the Illinois countryside, and are (and I say this with no disrespect intended) frankly fairly simple people. To give you an impression of what I mean, we introduced these two 30+ years olds to their first taste of bagels with cream cheese and lox over the weekend, and my brother-in-law took a pass because it was too weird. In contrast, we consider ourselves fairly cultured -- we are part of the charity function-attending, show-going, wine-tasting-hosting, yuppie population of St. Louis. We began to wonder if we had just become snobs and couldn't appreciate humor that was geared towards a less-sophisticated audience. And yes, I know how hauty that sounds, but stay tuned.
I asked aloud, "Have we become too sophisticated" You'll notice that there is no question mark at the end of that question, and the reason is this -- right after asking the question, my ass answered with a resounding "no" with a fart that would blow little birds out of their nests and, ironically, ended with a distinct upward note which made it sound like my butt was asking a question. It was like adding audible punctuation to my speech. I didn't even realize it was coming, but it surged to the surface right on cue to alert me that I wasn't half as cool as I thought I was.
Funny the way the universe works. We all need a reality check from time to time, regardless of the source. I wasn't expecting mine to come from between the cheeks, but hey, it's all good...
My wife and I had pretty much the same reaction to the guy -- a decent number of funny moments, but on the whole it was a bunch of fairly obvious jokes, and we were underwhelmed. Her sister and brother-in-law, however -- along with the other dozen people they had in tow and the entire venue -- found this dude to be fucking hysterical, and were totally doubled over throughout the whole show. Regan got no less than three standing ovations during the show, in which we begrudingly participated because her family was so amped about the show, we didn't want to rain on their parade by tipping them off that we weren't as into it as they were.
A couple of days later, we were talking about it and wondering what happened. We were clearly the odd people out -- it wasn't as if a few people found it funny and everyone else was on the fence, people were in tears at this guy, and we just kinda shrugged and played along. What happened to us, I wondered. We had been to see Lewis Black about a year ago and laughed our asses off, and we love all things comedy, so it isn't as if we have no sense of humor.
My wife's family and friends are from a small town on the Illinois countryside, and are (and I say this with no disrespect intended) frankly fairly simple people. To give you an impression of what I mean, we introduced these two 30+ years olds to their first taste of bagels with cream cheese and lox over the weekend, and my brother-in-law took a pass because it was too weird. In contrast, we consider ourselves fairly cultured -- we are part of the charity function-attending, show-going, wine-tasting-hosting, yuppie population of St. Louis. We began to wonder if we had just become snobs and couldn't appreciate humor that was geared towards a less-sophisticated audience. And yes, I know how hauty that sounds, but stay tuned.
I asked aloud, "Have we become too sophisticated" You'll notice that there is no question mark at the end of that question, and the reason is this -- right after asking the question, my ass answered with a resounding "no" with a fart that would blow little birds out of their nests and, ironically, ended with a distinct upward note which made it sound like my butt was asking a question. It was like adding audible punctuation to my speech. I didn't even realize it was coming, but it surged to the surface right on cue to alert me that I wasn't half as cool as I thought I was.
Funny the way the universe works. We all need a reality check from time to time, regardless of the source. I wasn't expecting mine to come from between the cheeks, but hey, it's all good...
Comment