Raw Comedy Quest Final

In a much-needed break from self-obsession, I present two posts showing that I occasionally do leave my room of an evening and venture out in to the town:

It was with some trepidation that I ascended the stairs to my beloved Indigo last night. Like the time my brown-eyed Maori friend wore blue contact lenses, the place just looked different. The dancefloor had vanished beneath a sea of tables, there was no backline on stage and the whole vibe was altered - it was a whole 'nother scene.

All the seats were taken. The tables were all filled, and any seats appearing to be empty were on second glance closely guarded. Then we saw - two spaces on the couches in the front. Sweet! No way could I be assed standing up through eight stand-up performances.

Yeah, you saw it a mile off, didn't ya. The front row, at a comedy show. We had it coming.

I hate it when they ask what you do. I'm not quick to lie, and admitting I'm a lawyer is bait fair and square. But this time I was lucky. The MC was doing his thing, I was nuzzling my beer, and when I realised the focus of attention was in my vicinity, my beer needed tending and I managed to avoid eye contact.

Comedy. Not entertainment to which I'm accustomed, unless you count as much of The Simpsons as I can get. There were some repeated motifs throughout the evening - the new Pope, for one. Now, I don't find the new Pope very amusing, but then I don't pay a lot of attention to current affairs. Neither do I find it amusing that the previous Pope had been quite old and poorly before he died. Retail stupidity - that was a popular one. Suicide bombers. Race, religion and sex.

The blurb on the Indigo site has this to say about the evening:

Some stand-ups and sketch comics are lazy b@stards. They do their seven minutes, get their laughs (or not), stay up late, scribble on napkins, drink, eat, gossip and sleep in, or go to their day jobs where they think they're above it all. Others take part in the Raw Comedy Quest where they stretch moral taboos and social faux pas to hilarious lengths. This is the final so come and laugh at the ones that made it.

On the walk home, Amelia and I discussed what makes some things funny and others not. We decided that it comes down to delivery. Give two people a joke to tell and one makes it the funniest thing evs, while the other is merely awkward. While there's no accounting for taste, generally speaking some people will make anything sound funny, even stuff that simply comes off as inappropriate from your average joker. Even so, some things will always be bad taste. Some bodily functions do not need to be discussed nor visualised. Similarly, misogyny is not something I want to laugh at.

No punch line.