Assholes Anonymous

As of late it has come to my attention that I am an asshole. Albeit a well-meaning unintentional asshole. Apparently it is impolite to say 'Isn't that a salami?' in response to someone's reference to their girlfriend Genoa. I still believe my defense of wit/satire, elevating the mundane and making light of the situation is valid, but I concede. Someone please drop a banana peel in front of me and smack me with a frying pan.

In an effort to quell this social evilness I have signed up for improv. I am not a fan of canned humor, granted the nature of improv is essentially the exact opposite, but it still contains elements of unnaturalness. Improv = comedy = stand up = Louie Anderson = no thanks. Louie Anderson or not I have been in search of a stabbing or such to restart my dead-car battery of a life. And my social disgraces must be tamed.

My initial fears centered around public speaking and being the center of attention, but I would wow them with impeccable timing and my secret bag of hilarity. In everyday life the slightest touch of a delicate butterfly imperceptibly landing on my shoulder would elicit a 3-act comedy routine. Yet under the rules of improv I was transformed into ultraviolence stuttering and developed a pain in my gulliver. I had heard of actors taking improv like boxers taking ballet. I learned that it is neither about the comedy or the tutu.

The initial class focused on split second gut reaction decision making and building of scenes. The former gives great insight into your personality. The subconscious takes over and things occur such as giving all of your characters Latino male names, which reveals much more than you had wanted. The latter is difficult in that all instincts to add irony or genius one-liners could not be used and instead the focus was on the time/place/person/low light level that you needed to imagine and keep in order to interact with your partner and continue the scene.

There is a specific visual mnemonic device, the name I forget, in which to remember the desired object or idea you associate it with a chain of objects that you will encounter daily. By using the transitive-like property, one link will remind you of the next which leads you to your final destination. The device, I do remember, was illustrated in a rube goldberg manner as such:

I want to remember to take my book to work, which is in my room. Therefore , the bread on the counter reminds me of the knife on the coffee table. The coffee table reminds me of the mail on the floor. The floored mail is next to the chair holding my keychain. My keychain contains my bike key. My bike key is used to unlock my bike...which is in my room...next to my book...in which I was just sleeping! Amazing and so easy!

Point being, this is also how my brain digresses and speaks and interacts with the outside world. It is difficult for me to remain within that scene in a semi-realistic manner. Therefore, the scene where I was dissecting a cadaver reminded me of of organs that reminded me of hypertension and I shouted "I think he ate a lot of potato chips", whereas I should have said something involving a doctor or something relating to the other person. There are no wrong answers, but I think that was one of them. Either way, hopefully I was successfully able to humorously convey the angst and inner turmoil of Juan the cadaver.