Madison, My Aim is True

When I was about 19 or 20, I spent a January in Madison Wisconsin.  I was going to be a comedian and my friend Jeff, who was going to the University, said I should go up there and do some comedy.  They had lots of comedy clubs and plenty of fun open mike nights I could go to and learn how to be funny.

I didn’t do much in the way of comedy while I was up there, but I learned a few important things about myself that I could take with me the rest of my life. 

One.   I was pretty good at darts.  I had no idea. 

Two.  Quarters.  I had a knack for quarters.  I won several quarters championships in Madison.  Strangely I could not really bounce the quarter into the glass that well.  I could drink a lot of light beer though.

Three.  I don’t really enjoy standing up in front of people trying to make them laugh.  I suppose if I went through the pain and trouble it would take to perfect the act, there might be some rewarding prize at the end.  But no.  When I started learning about computer programming, I found it way more interesting.  I like to solve puzzles.  I always have.  Writing code is often similar to solving logic puzzles.  At that time, around 1984 or so, Stand-up comedy was basically making observations about how dogs and cats differ. 

Here’s a transcript from my third performance in Madison, at the club called “The Four C’s” or “4 Seasons” or “for Seas.”  I was never sure:

“Hey ladies and germs, I just flew in from Omaha and boy, are my arms tired from carrying my luggage from baggage claim to the taxi.      So did you ever notice that dogs and cats are different?  What the fuck!”  (My act was pretty edgy) “Yeah, ok.  Anyone here from out of town?  Oh I guess the flashlight operator is from out of town.  No?  Oh yeah, the flashlight.  Well you folks have been great.  I’m going to go pursue a career in Computer programming now.” (Huge laugh).  “Goodnight everybody. Tip your servers and shit.”  (edgy)

So that wasn’t very fun.  My friend Jeff was a painfully honest critic with incredible instinct.  He gave me notes with each performance and the thing got somewhat better.  But still, it wasn’t really that fun for me.  I would usually slam 3 shots of tequila before going on the stage just to make the fear go away.  It worked.  I was never really nervous up there.  But I sensed there could be a problem with my method if I had any level of success.

Incidentally, when I went to college years later in pursuit of a degree in Computer Science, I had to take a speech class.  I was terrified.  I would not eat the night before a speech because my stomach was all knotted up with nerves.  I couldn’t eat until after the speech was over.  If I’d have thought back to the “comedy” days, I would have just taken some alcohol and been right as rain.  Cuervo Rain.

Hey – that reminds me.  Last spring I was on a little bike ride with Shim and Leah and PB (Patrick).  We were going up a hill and he (PB) was suffering.  He said “I’m in a spot of bother.”  I don’t know if I’ll ever come back from hearing that coming from a mouth that’s not Phil Leggett’s.  Hey – that reminds me.  Does anyone else think Phil Leggett sounds exactly like Eric Idle?  Me too.

Ok so yeah, Madison WI.  On the campus, where I was not a student, was The Student Center.  We had one of those at UNO too.  But this one served beer.  Well, if you were a student.  And you were 21.  Or you borrowed a Student I.D. from someone who had roughly the same color of hair as you and was 21.

So anyway, I borrowed James’ (one of Jeff's roommates)  I.D. and headed up to the Student center with my little notebook full of jokes, “Dogs and Cats Vol. IV”.  I figured I’d get a beer and try to notice funny things to tell people later. “The Student Center.  Am I right?”

While I was sitting there, I was absentmindedly watching these guys play darts.  I didn’t understand the game they were playing, but I knew I could throw darts way more accurately than they were.  They’d throw at some seemingly random spot on the board and then mark lines, x’s or o’s on the chalkboard.  Sometimes they’d write numbers next to these symbols.  Some sort of score or something.  I was completely stumped.

But you thought you could throw better than these guys?

I knew I could.  All through High school, I did not do my homework.  Until the second semester of my senior year, I did nothing.  I just turned in as little as possible, took the tests and failed a bunch of classes.  With my grades as low as they were, I was sent to my room every night to study.  I was really not allowed to leave my room until all of my homework was finished.  Which never happened.

So I’d spend about 2 or 3 hours every night throwing darts at the board in my room.  Every once in a while, I missed the board.  My dad would hear it and yell at me to stop playing darts and get to my homework.  So lesson learned.  Don’t miss the board.  I didn’t know any games.  I would just try to hit certain spots on the board.  I had seen the occasional world championship highlights on tv, and knew that those guys were better than me.

But I was better than these guys.  They had their own darts.  I mean – expensive darts.  I had darts at home too.  The same red and yellow darts that came with the board.  The flight and shaft was all one plastic piece.  These guys had fancy shiny narrow metal darts with aluminum shafts and some sort of thin plastic flights.  Very pro.

So I walked up and asked if they could explain the game to me.  Turns out, they were playing “Cricket”

After they explained it to me, I said I didn’t understand, but I thought I could hit the board pretty well if they could tell me what part to hit.  Well they thought this was pretty funny so I wrote it down in my notebook just in case.  There were 3 of them playing and they needed another guy to make teams, so the “best” said I should join them and I could be on his team since he was better than the other 2.  Oh yeah – and the losers bought the next round of beers.  I had just spent my last 2 bucks on my beer, so I said, “That works.”

Six games later (and a teammate switch) I had three empty pints and three full pints at the table.  Also, I understood how to play cricket.  Somebody suggested we play 301. I knew how to play 301.  It was in the instructions that came with the board I owned.  I verified that it was double-in/double-out and almost got my skinny little ass kicked.  They were all like, “I knew this guy was some kind of hustler.”  And I’m all, “Woah there.  301 was in the instructions to my dart board.  Cricket wasn’t.”  Big laughs all around.  More writing in the notebook.

Well, after that, I went up there every day to play darts with whoever was there.  That is where I developed my incredible tolerance for light beer and cultivated my skill at outlasting many opponents in a game of quarters.  I really had a difficult time getting the coin to drop into the glass.  But I was very thirsty, so.

After a particular quarters victory one night, I was walking the 14 blocks back to the house where I was staying.  I was very drunk.  I started to get really hot and sweaty.  I unbuttoned my coat.  Not enough.  I took my coat off and removed my sweatshirt.  Nope.  Still too warm.  I took my shirt off and put my coat back on, leaving it unbuttoned.  Perfect.  Feel the cool refreshing breeze blowing the sweat from my brow.  Mmm.  Oh yeah.  It was 27 below zero (Fahrenheit) in Madison WI that night.  When I woke up the next day and remembered that I had briefly considered laying down on the nice cool ground for a while to get some rest, I knew it was time to leave comedy, darts, beer and Wisconsin.  Except for the beer.  Well, and the darts.  

Never mind.  I didn’t learn anything.

When I got back to Omaha and did some comedy, I met Shim’s friend.  I don’t know if Shim’s friend was Pat Hazell or Craig Anton.  But I met them both, so.

The important thing is I mentioned Shim.  Sometimes I forget to do that.