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While spending a few hours on Facebook the other day I stumbled on to a discussion on my friend and comedian Nick Cobb’s page.  He was asking for a new show recommendation and friends of his were offering suggestions as to what they thought the best show of the last decade was and what the best show currently on is.  There were some sensible answers and some real awful answers.   Here are some examples and shows that did not make the cut:

THE LOSERS

House – who are you my parents?

Lost – you are too stupid to appreciate the list I am putting together

Rome and Deadwood – these are the people that in a music discussion of the best band of all time would ignore the obvious rule that you MUST say Rolling Stones or Beatles (my favorite band is Guns N Roses, but my answer would be Rolling Stones).  Those who drop Rome and Deadwood – a good and a very good show, respectively – are the people who drop Nirvana in a “best band” discussion.  Shut your mouths and just accept that sometimes, like a broken clock, American culture gets it right.

John Adams – it’s a miniseries. read Nick Cobb’s question.

The Mentalist – seriously?  CBS is the network that produces dramas to make Jay Leno fans feel smart.

True Blood – a show that like Glee, seemed to realize that their main demographics were women and gays and decided – to hell with writing – we’ll just get everyone on this show in a gym, skimp on story and consistency and still draw ratings as long as we amp up the sex, gore and campiness.  Headed down a path of awfulness this season.  The real shame is that Alan Ball, who created a television masterpiece in Six Feet Under, is also listed as a creator of True Blood.  My guess is that after Six Feet Under he made a ton of money, found himself a trophy wife/husband (no idea what his sexuality is) and after season 1 of True Blood said – “Hey, you are shallow and pretty dumb – wanna write this show for me? Most of it is written in a book already – you will just have to add more breasts, blood and campiness?  What’s campiness?  Well you know when you think something is good? Right, like Paul Walker or Dexter – just write it with that same feeling.”

Dexter – I made it through one season.  Some of the worst acting I have ever seen.  Michael C Hall should die poor and be remembered for David Fisher than collect paychecks with that cast of nothings (though I hear John Lithgow was good in later seasons – too bad I give a show one full season to at least entice me.  It didn’t).

Special Note – Why I have no faith in Showtime – You may notice that Dexter is the only Showtime show even mentioned by me.  That is because Showtime is stupid.  Their shows are made with the following concept – can we write one character, line up one credible actor or actress and surround him or her with mediocre writing and acting?  Yes, well then we want to make your show!  Even USA at least says “CharacterS welcome.” Showtime’s phrase should be “Character welcome as long as long as character brings mediocre humor, drama and/or co-stars.”  I hate Showtime in all its forms – Lakers, Cable Television, etc.  If HBO, AMC, USA and Showtime all went to school together, HBO would be the Harvard bound quarterback, AMC would be the slightly arrogant and nerdy valedictorian, USA would be the guy who chicks inexplicably liked and Showtime would be a Goth kid.  No, it would be the girl that dates the goth kid, but is not goth herself.  Loser.

Treme – wake me up from my coma – have they cancelled it yet?

Mad Men– Mad Men to me is once again, like sushi – it is something that lots of people like, but also something that lots of people like to say they like because they want to be people who like things like sushi and jazz and other overrated things.  Mad Men is a well done show.  But like Treme, Mad Men sometimes feels like a documentary on early 1960s life, which can be somewhat boring.  I found Season 3 of Mad Men (until an admittedly great finale) to be an excruciatingly boring endeavor.  I often defend shows like The Wire by praising its authenticity, but it helps that there is actually some intriguing plot development to go with the realism.

So here for all of you is the definitive list of what shows from the last 10 years you should watch.  It is objectively correct.

1) Six Feet Under – Funny, moving and the most realistic look at relationships and human fears of any show ever made, by far.  if the show feels “too gay” for you, rent Queer As Folk, watch it and then re-start Six Feet Under.  f the show is too troubling or upsetting for you then it is working.  And it is widely and justly considered to have the greatest finale in television history – take that MASH!

2) The Wire– Would be number one, but Six Feet Under is just more personal.  If this show is too slow for you, then watch The Shield and consider yourself ignorant.  If the show is too black for you, watch Southland and consider yourself slightly racist.

3) Arrested Development – The best comedy I have ever seen.  Nothing is actually close, especially this decade.  So naturally it only made it three seasons on television.  I blame the South.

4) The West Wing– If this show is too political for you, then you are dumb.  As impressive as the dialogue, plot and acting is, the details of the show are incredible. To say nothing of the fact that they basically predicted the election of Barack Obama before he had even announced his candidacy.

5) The Sopranos – The first of the Big Three for HBO (Seriously in an 8 year period HBO dropped Six Feet Under, The Wire and The Sopranos on America – to me that will go down as the greatest accomplishment in original television programming).  Sopranos, unlike The Wire and Six Feet Under did not quite end in a way that met with its overall impact and quality.

6) Breaking Bad– the best show on television right now by a mile.  It is dark, filled with tension and excitement, well acted and yet feels incredibly plausible and realistic at the same time.  This is the first drama I have seen that clearly indicates that HBO has dropped the ball recently.  Mad Men gets mentioned as the one HBO let get away (especially because that might have meant naked Joan!), but Breaking Bad is so superior to Mad Men it’s a joke.  More entertaining without sacrificing anything in terms of writing or acting quality.  If the show can finish with way its first three seasons began then it may move towards the top of this list.

I feel I must mention Eastbound and Down (but only 1 six episode season to show so far) and I have not seen In Treatment – an HBO show that has been highly recommended to me.  Other than that those 6 shows above will entertain you and raise your expectations for what television can do.  Then when you are done with them you will look down on most other people’s television show opinions like only a condescending six-foot-seven comedian can.

Last night was an interesting night to be performing in Ohio.  The pending “decision” of LeBron James at 9 pm was perfectly preceded by a show at the Toledo Funny Bone.  But the day was just full of perplexing and disappointing news.

Glee was nominated for 19 Emmys.  That number of Emmy nominations is usually reserved for shows like Six Feet Under (what I believe is the best show ever made) or, in an alternate universe where white people are not afraid to nominate shows full of nuanced black characters, The Wire.  But Glee?  Between Twilight and Glee I am starting to think that perhaps teenage girls and gay men should not be having quite the influence on our pop culture as once seemed desirable.  The show had a couple of promising episodes to start the show, but veered so far off into a cheap and campy format (I am not including the outstanding Jane Lynch in this analysis) that it became unbearable.  I feel Glee is sort of like sushi – plenty of people genuinely like it, but many people just like being the type of people who say they like sushi.  The show is not good.  I hope Modern Family (Arrested Development Jr.) wins.

In the drama category Breaking Bad must win or I will be forced to dedicate an entire blog to its greatness.

(My top shows of all time, in no certain order are Six Feet Under, The Sopranos, The West Wing, Arrested Development and Breaking Bad).

So with bad news already beginning with Glee’s dominance of the Emmy nominations and the clouds ominously gathering in Ohio (literally and metaphorically) I headed to the Toledo Funny Bone.

I noticed that the audience was about 93% white and suburban, which sometimes (almost always) is a bad omen.  But things started turning around immediately as I was brought on stage to Rick Astley’s “Never gonna give you up.”  The crowd turned out to be excellent.  So with Glee scoring an early win for crap entertainment and me scoring a win for mediocre entertainment it was up to the main event – where would LeBron go?

And LeBron announced that he was taking his talents to South Beach.  Here are the repercussions of this decision:

1) Mass suicide in Cleveland – seriously Cleveland is a nice city with good people that gets dumped on all the time.  Now their own son has spit on them.  It is very sad.

2) Making Me a Kobe Bryant fan versus the Heat.  I never thought I could root for Kobe in any situation, but like a pro wrestling move there has been an instant realignment.

3) A lot of unjustified hatred from Knick and Bulls fans.  You would have been villains lite if he had gone to your team and you had no other claim to him other than an unjustified feeling of entitlement.  Cleveland is the only town with a legitimate gripe here.

4) Pat Riley is now the Suge Knight of the NBA and will be played by Gordon Gecko in a biopic (Michael Douglas is not good enough).  I expect to see Dwyane Wade and LeBron to throw cash at a video camera with Chris Bosh dancing in the background while Pat Riley, a la Suge Knight, calls out Dan Gilbert.

5) Led to a Twitter explosion of creativity by me on possible names for the new Miami trio.  I came up with Miami Pound Machine because a) it is a clever pun; b) this team will crush the competition and c) it captures the homoerotic undertones of this bizarre reality show episode.

6) Miami fans are about to become the worst people on Earth.  LeBron reminds me of private school girls from NYC , though this type exist in lots of places (and I even dated one once).  You take a hot shallow chick (the Miami scene) and add to it a talented, wealthy career driven person that is ugly (LeBron) and they have kids that are not as smart or talented as the Dad because he married a shallow hot chick, but not as attractive as the Mom because she married a wealthy ogre.  Their offspring is demanding, insecure and shallow all at the same time.  And now they will populate the stands of the Miami Heat.  Good luck the rest of the NBA.  49 other states are rooting for you.

For every sports fan or fan of athletic black men, for whatever reason, the LeBron James Reality Show is set to end tomorrow night when he announces on ESPN at 9pm where he will play next year.  I’m just surprised he did not select the Bravo Network to make his announcement.

Thanks to magazines like Maxim, men began slowly creeping into women’s dominion over fashion, grooming and sexual insecurity over a decade ago.  In the interest of full disclosure I occasionally get manicures and do tear up at the movie Dead Poets’ Society, but it is starting to feel like there are no differences between women and men.  I think in work and other areas where equality is needed that is great, but in general society I think it is important to have differences and embrace and enjoy them.  But thanks to LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and the impressively annoying Chris Bosh, the differences have been obliterated.  LeBron, Wade and Bosh are supposed to be alpha males and caricatures of male virility as elite professional athletes; so why have they become The Real Housewives of Miami?

First let’s start with Bosh.  Has a man ever sent more mixed messages?  His hair and imposing presence make me think he is hunting Arnold Schwarzenegger in a jungle, but his Tweets make me think he is one Cosmo from tweeting, “Miami is totes fab, having a quick vacay before heading to training camp with the ladies!”  Thank you Twitter for taking the position made famous by Kevin McHale, Karl Malone and Kevin Garnett and turning it into something Joel McHale can discuss on The Soup!  And if you think this is overblown, Bosh does have a documentary crew following him around.  I guess so future generations can actually witness the moment when a guy who looked like Predator became Bethany Frankel (even that I know who Bethany Frankel is is a personal crisis for me).  And all this for a player who has no business being considered a top 3 free agent.

Then there is Dwyane Wade, who has the man street cred of having given a woman VD (not his ex-wife), but who also has a documentary crew following him.  Seriously is Oxygen or Bravo going to pick this up?  This has been like a bizarre romance between D-Wade and Bosh.  I can see them doing Real World confessionals with Wade saying, “If Chris wants me he can come to me,” and Bosh tearing up, “I just want him to want me.”  Oh wait, they may have already done that in their respective documentaries.

Then there is LeBron.  The alpha male of alpha males.  He is announcing his decision tomorrow night on ESPN.  I’m pretty sure that gay guy that does the Housewives reunion shows will be hosting it.  Where is Simon Cowell to call this “incredibly self-indulgent?”  Even Alex Rodriguez had a standard press conference when he came to the Yankees (Derek Jeter probably required it) and that guy is a cologne ad and a Men’s Health cover all in one (as in Metrosexual to the point of occasional exploration).  And A-Rod fu*ked Bethany Frankel, he did not become her.  But LeBron (and the media circus which have been willing co-conspirators) have turned this into drama that only reality show dregs can match.

And what reality show would be complete without tears and tomorrow night I expect them to be flowing from LeBron.  He can stay in Cleveland, which is his home, where he is the favorite son or he can go to one of the bigger glamorous cities.  Wait, wasn’t that the “plot” of The Hills?  See, I hate these shows and yet I am so inundated with the crap that I think I know what they are.  But I never expected the NBA to be this.  Now I may have to watch the WNBA for a more masculine version of the NBA, albeit, one with lots of layups.

But LeBron’s other options are New York, Chicago and Miami, all great cities.  If he goes to Miami I hear that Natasha Bedingfield has been commissioned to write a theme song.

I hope he stays in Cleveland because I don’t think those other cities deserve him or will genuinely appreciate him the way that Cleveland will.  But this process has already done it’s damage.  Not just because it has turned NBA stars into trite starlets, but because it has forced me to further respect a player I do not particularly like: Kobe Bryant.  Hey, at least he’s still a man.  And if LeBron leaves Cleveland to form the Spice Girls in Miami I will do something I have never done – I’ll be rooting for Kobe in the Finals.

I remember a discussion from an English class in high school where we were discussing if Man invented God to fulfill a human need, or if God actually exists.  Now, most comedians I know range from ambivalent to hostile towards God and religion, which if you have seen and heard a lot of comedians seems to be pretty justified on their parts.   But if humans did invent the concept of God I think the most compelling evidence of this may be the Twitter and Facebook explosion on the Internet.  It is clear that humans, at least Americans, like the idea of some larger presence observing their actions and thoughts to give them relevance.  Now politically we cry out for privacy and independence, but Twitter and Facebook seem to reveal our true nature, at least the nature of the shallow and enlightened people we have become.  We still need relevance bigger than ourselves, so if God and religion cannot provide it, we will simply invent something to give us that sense of cosmic community.  Of course I think this is incredibly stupid and would prefer to believe in an invisible man or force than in the insecurities of people, sublimated into social networking and technology, but to each his own.

So with that in mind I propose a 10 Facebook/Twitter Commandments:

1) Thou shall not put RIP messages on social networking.  I remember George Carlin talking about how our culture is obsessed with death and he was probably right.  Funerals may be entirely useless, but at least they have more gravitas than a Tweet or a Facebook status.   When people write RIP messages on social networking sites I really believe what they are saying, perhaps subconsciously, “I’m a thoughtful and caring person and I need people to know this about me, even if it involves a modest exploitation of the loss of a loved one.”  Stop doing it, your deceased cannot read anymore, so your thoughts and/or prayers are sufficient.  And if you write messages on Facebook pages of deceased people (seen it a few times) the only dignified thing to do is have the page taken down – he/she cannot “like” you comments anymore.  And lastly, a website where I describe movies and masturbating probably isn’t a sanctified enough place to honor someone.

2) Thou shall stop telling people how the weather is. Pretty self explanatory, but next time you think of updating something mundane like that, stop, think and try to appreciate it and feel it without looking for validation or to feel like people out there now know how you feel so you have some increased validity.

3) Thou shall not make awful jokes.  There are some really awful jokes being shared on these websites.   Compounding the problem is that there seems to be no shortage of stupid people willing to “like” or comment with a “brilliant” on these jokes.  You probably don’t know who you are, but perhaps I will let you know in the future.  Here’s a hint – if your jokes read like a mediocre joke for Jay Leno, stop.

4) Thou shall not observe the sabbath.   “Follow Friday” is a huge circle jerk on Twitter.  It is where people tell other people to follow certain people that they are friends with or find funny.  It is the prosthelytizing of social networking.

5) Thou shall not demean compliments.  I always enjoy when I see the news feed on Facebook and someone has wished 8 people in a row Happy Birthday.  It somehow manages to demean the insignificant wishing of a happy birthday on the Internet.  Another one, specific to comedians, is when someone who runs a show rattles off “great set” to every comic on the lineup.  Thanks for that – now I know that I am equally as great as everyone who did you show.  Greatness and quality are relative terms and although I have been part of some great shows, not every show taking place in every bar of NYC is “great.”

6) Thou shall step aside on the sidewalk when you are using your mobile device.  A year ago if someone walked into me while staring at their Blackberry they would apologize.  Today they look at me as if to say, “huh?”  In another year I assume they will say (imagine bitchy NYC 20-something, “What the fack?”  I will be in the wrong for not getting out of their way while they send LOLs.  Your tweets, bbms, etc. can wait.  You are not that important, at least not important enough to walk slowly through crowded streets slowing down pedestrian traffic and walking into people.

7) Thou shall treat photograph-taking with the same importance that you did when you needed to actually get photos developed.  For selfish reasons I carve out a comedy exception to this (in Catholic terms think of it as a dispensation), but can people stop using every moment of the day as a moment worthy of preservation?  We have already managed to cheapen dead people and birthdays and compliments through social media, and now we have cheapened nostalgia.  “Grandma, do you have any photos of your friends when you were younger?” “Why yes in fact I have 4,566 photos – here are the 97 of us drinking Smirnoff Ice.” Awful.

8) Thou shall not say “hit me up on Facebook” – self explanatory.

9)Thou shall not give more weight to texting donations, Twitter rumors and Facebook groups/Friends than is appropriate.  The real story about the millions of dollars that texting raised for Haiti after the Earthquake is whether or not young people would have been nearly as involved for a tragedy if t had not been so easy to donate.  Technology like that allows us to do some good, but more importantly it has removed the desire or need to be proactive and actually be involved or care.  I know dozens of people who texted donations, but it was a middle aged couple I met in Cleveland who were headed to Haiti to voulnteer.  And let’s not forget the most important thing Facebook has accomplished was to get a woman near death a chance to host a television show that died 7 years ago.

I should mention that I have almost 1600 Facebook friends, but a relatively small group of actual friends.  I have been tempted when my cell phone contract is up next year to get rid of my blackberry.  I now have a land line phone in my apartment because I don’t want brain cancer and I told a friend of mine – how many pithy conversations, flirtations and communications would there be if people had to call my home phone.  He responded, “then most people would not have contact with you.”  And he is right, the question is – have we already become a society that values quantity of contact and “friends” over actual quality of friendship.

10) Thou shall follow me on Twitter.  www.Twitter.com/JLCauvin  I am a comedian and not famous so I am forced to play the game.   But rest assured, 95% of the time I obey the Commandments.

Now I have not worked every club in America, but I have seen or worked a majority of the major clubs and there is a clear number one in my mind – Chicago Improv.  Not much else to say about my 24 hours in Chicago except that their audiences are the closest to New York in the country (DC has great crowds as well) and that this club is literally the best club I have seen by a lot. 

Have a nice weekend.

A trip that went overall went well ended on a sour note.  Here is the recap;

Wednesday June 16th afternoon – find out I will be headlining the Sunday night show at The Punchline (fu*king great)

Thursday June 17th morning – see that Joe Rogan has been booked to perform Sunday night. Oh well, feature for Joe Rogan ain’t bad (not too fu*king bad)

Friday June 18th evening – find out that I will be doing guest spots on Joe Rogan’s shows (a second one added because of his popularity) (oh fu*k)

Sunday June 20th – 28 minutes before showtime – Bumped off of the show because Joe Rogan (who by the way has fingers the size of Joe Torre – look it up, no wonder this guy was a world class fighter) has a two man show (fu*k Fear Factor and MMA)

Sunday June 20th 17 minutes into showtime – asked to get out of my seat at the bar so customers can sit (fu*k me)

Sunday June 20th 40 minutes into showtime – I walked outside and saw a member of The Punchline staff looking at one of my cards that I hand out (really nice, not just a business card) after shows.  I asked him where he got it and he said it was just sitting there.  So my last moment at the club was seeing one of my cards from Saturday night discarded like it was a free ticket to HA! Comedy Club (NYC reference).

Of course the Joe Rogan shows were sold out and the average age was 27 as opposed to the shows I worked this weekend which were 2/3 and 3/4 full and the average age was 47.  But them’s the breaks.  Other than that good time in Atlanta. See ya next year.

Saw Jonah Hex yesterday.  A not good movie, but it had the decency to be only 80 minutes long.

3 shows last night.  Very tiring.  Felt like I did extremely well on the 7 pm and 11 pm shows (the 11 pm show was nice enough to laugh hard when I told them “I have to practically skullfu*k myself to fit into an airline seat.”  The 9 pm show was pretty good and with a couple of Asians, several black people and a couple of “what the fu*k are you’s” it was by far the most diverse show of the weekend. Ironically with that explosion of diversity I did not feel it went as well as the other two.

Tonight – 2 shows with Joe Rogan.  Turns out I will just be doing guest spots (he brings his own feature), so the good news is I will be able to catch the replay of True Blood in my hotel room at 11 pm and then fall asleep to the replay of the season finale of Treme.  The bad news is I will only be doing guest spots.  But I will use them to film TV audition reels (full house pumped up at a big club is a good time to do this).  Then I will just have to find a member of the tribe in LA or NYC to vouch for me when I send them to television bookers. 

Back in NYC tomorrow.

One of the great joys of comedy is that it is not legal work.  The legal profession may be the largest group of people who have quit or given up on dreams, outside of the New York Knicks’ organization.  So naturally it is always a fun experience (it has happened more than once) when after a show, during wich I mention having been an attorney, to have audience members come up to me afterwards and ask me about the law, being a lawyer or some awkward legal question.  So I have traded a life of being a funny person at legal jobs to being a legal advisor (yikes) to comedy show audience members.  I’ll get to that in a few.

Yesterday was like any other day on the road – I went to a movie – Toy Story 3.  Very enjoyable and a very empty theater, just me a black dude and a lesbian couple.  Pixar really unites the world.

I then ate at Chic-Fil-A, which is the best fast food in America.  And the restaurants are all clean and all the employees are friendly.  And the food is delicious.  Hoping for a sponsorship or an endorsement deal at some point.

Then it was time for comedy.

The first show was fun, if you consider performing for 35 judgmental old white Southerners fun.  My first joke, which did well at the same club at the same time one night earlier, fell flatter than flat – it fell concave.  “ESPN should realize that when abbreviating World Cup teams to three letters for the scoreboard, perhaps NGA is a bad abbreviation for Nigeria.”  Nothing – I felt like Daffy Duck following Bugs Bunny in a talent show. Crickets.

The second show of the night was really good and I was happy to finally feel like I had had a show I could be proud of down here.  As I got off stage I was approached by a late 20s/early 30s Asian man who, after hearing me tell jokes for 25 minutes engaged me in the following conversation:

“So are you really a lawyer?”

“I was.”

“Can I ask you a question?”

“Sure.”

“Are there laws against adultery in Georgia?”

“I’m licensed in NY, but I would not be surprised if there were.”

“Well, do you know if a man can sue another man for sleeping with his wife?”

“I don’t know. My guess is no, but I don’t know what the laws in Georgia are on the subject.”

What I really wanted to ask was, “Dude, did your wife fu*k a rich dude and you want to sue him?”

It must be frustrating for my Asian almost fan, but even more frustrating was having good show and the only reinforcement for that feeling was a guy asking me how to sue the guy who’s fu*king his wife.

3 shows tonight.  Report to follow.

The first obvious pleasure of my trip to Atlanta was the 25 minutes of turbulence flying down from NYC that required the flight attendants to sit.  That is always a reassuring moment for someone who dislikes flying.  “We know you are nervous, but don’t worry – you are not alone because the trained professionals are uncomfortable as well.”

Arriving in Atlanta’s airport, which is apparently in the city next to Atlanta because it is a 4 hour journey to baggage claim, which looks like something organized by someone from the 3rd World afflicted with ADD.

Got Wendy’s as my first meal in Atlanta’s airport and was asked by the woman if I would like a Coke to drink with my meal.  If Coca Cola were any more insecure they’d be Kobe Bryant’s daughters after Game 7 in front of the national media (one last shot before the off season).  Coca Cola – you are one of the most well known brands in the world and Atlanta is your home.  We get it.  You don’t have to force it on us like some athlete whose glory days were in high school, but still forces you to watch highlight tapes and look at his trophies fifteen years later.  Perhaps managers of restaurants in Atlanta are required to bitch slap employees who don’t properly pimp out Coca Cola.

I took the MARTA train, presumably named after the little blond girl in School of Rock and had only an 10 minute walk to the hotel.  Unfortunately Atlanta is very warm and that ten minute walk of dragging a suitcase in blue jeans transformed me into Patrick Ewing at the foul line by the time I arrived at check-in.

The first show at The Punchline was interesting. The emcee was half Jamaican, half white, from Canada.  Obviously, the crowd might have sensed some redundancy when a half-Haitian, half-white guy with a French name took the stage fifteen minutes later.  But I felt like I had a good set (B+), until the headliner Dale Jones got on stage and absolutely murdered.  So for the rest of the night I just kept repeating my mantra for Southern shows, “At least you are not getting booed at The Stardome, at least you are not getting booed at The Stardome.”

My favorite joke of the night, for the sole reason that it was the first time I’d told it was, “I’m 31 and HIV-negative, which means I have only a year left til I break Magic Johnson’s record.”

After the show was done I watched the rest of the Lakers-Celtics game a few people from the club, the result of which obviously pleased me to no end.

Aiming for two A performances tonight.  8 pm and 10 pm tonight.

Last night I watched the Boston Celtics get out-hustled and out-played by the Los Angeles Lakers.  As if it wasn’t enough to see Kobe Bryant have a solid game I was forced to swallow my own vomit several times as I watched Sasha Vujacic and Jordan Farmar make quality contributions.  Rumor has it in the off-season they will be filming a buddy cop flick called Euro Trash and Shrek Ears.  But as much as Kobe has played the villain in my NBA story for the last 4 years, last night it got personal.  Because of the Laker victory, they will now play Game 7 on Thursday, my first night in Atlanta at The Punchline.

The Punchline is a big club and a chance for me to atone with Southern audiences for a minor debacle in Birmingham last Summer.

Backstory – Last Summer I featured at The Stardome, a huge club owned by some nice people.  6 of the seven shows went somewhere in the B- to B+ range, but one show, the Saturday show led to only the second time I have been boo’d on stage (the other time being Medgar Evers College in Brooklyn – a disgrace to higher education and the Civil Rights’ Leader’s memory, whose student attendees thought it was “boo every comedian that dares step on stage – like Amateur Night at The Apollo, without the credit of The Apollo. To put it in television analogies – if my comedy career was the show Homicide – Medgar Evers College would be Adeena Watson).  I said nothing offensive at The Stardome – I was just neither BET nor rednecky enough for the racially diverse, intellectual bottom feeders that occupied a few of the tables at the club that night.

So going to Atlanta was to be a bit of redemption for me and I actually booked the gig on the strength of my Always Be Funny/Glengary Glen Ross spoof video, which also restored my faith that YouTube was not entirely useless for my career.

But then the Lakers won because they seemed to finally discover that Rajon Rondo has the jumpshot of Shaquille O’Neal.  So that means Thursday night’s show will be empty of just about all basketball fans.  Now my routine has very fewbasketball references in it, but there is a correlation between people who are aware of basketball and people who enjoy my comedy.  Those people will not be there Thursday because Kobe & Co. won.  So who is going to be there Thursday night?  Southern comedy fans who do not like basketball.  Hmmmmmm, I just hope after the show I don’t have to tell anyone, “In New York they call me Missssster Cauvin!”

But the obvious point is that Kobe Bryant is to blame.  (I just wish LeBron James was at Game 6 and walked up to Kobe a la Maximus to Commodus in Gladiator and said, “The Time for honoring yourself will soon be at an end.” Because Kobe should know that when the LeBron James era will begin the moment LeBron gets a teammate(s) that is/are not terrible or fu*king his Mom…

Sidebar – For those of you that do not know – LeBron James mother is rumored (strong rumors) to have slept with LeBron’s bipolar, shotgun-carrying teammate Delonte West.  However, not a word has been uttered on this by ESPN , which is rather frightening.  My theory is that ESPN has marching orders from Nike not to say another word (what would ESPN be without Nike athletes and Nike advertising dollars?).  The story was discussed all over the Internet and on The Huffington Post, but not a peep from the premier sports news network in the world about one of the 10 most famous athletes on the planet?  Just makes you think if people including “The People’s Sports Reporter” Bill Simmons a/k/a The Sports Guy can be silenced (he gave a token – “absolutely false” comment on the story even though when I was in Cleveland everyone seemed to believe the story) by corporate titans (my friend Mike told me this has all the makings of a Michael Mann sports themed sequel to The Insider), what chance is there that news isn’t corrupted all the time by even bigger corporations (obviously it is).  And if you think this has nothing to do with sports – LeBron James disappeared against the Celtics after the rumors started flying, so unlike Tiger Woods’ Blasian fallace, LeBron’s story actually has sports-related salaciousness.

Back to Kobe- Is there anything more absurd than Kobe’s wife and future stripper daughters (when your Mom is a hot gold digger and your Dad is a wealthy rapist aren’t your employment prospects limited psychologically?) standing in the tunnel at halftime to greet him with adoration before he goes into the locker room?  “Look Nike and McDonald’s I am done with the butt rape and the cheating because here is my family right here.  But at the same time I am so driven to win that I take time out of halftime to greet my family?”  Anyone else’s wives or girlfriends meeting them in the tunnel?  Did Michael Jordan have Juanita waiting at halftime? No – he was too busy thinking about winning and killing the other team.  Now he might have had sex with his opponent’s wife in the tunnel as a competitive advantage, but he would never waste time to kiss his own wife mid-game.

So now for this horsesh*t I have to see potential fans not show up tot he first show in Atlanta.  It looks like me and the Celtics are going to have to put in a strong effort Thursday to make sure Kobe does not win.  Odds are the Celtics will have a tougher time than me.