Dwayne Perkins from Comedy Central & NBC's Funny Blog. Amusing Musings

I plan on not renewing my gym membership when my current term expires.  I’m a unit price shopper.  So, just like I buy gallons of milk even though I live alone because it’s less per ounce, I paid up for 3 years of gym membership because it was less per month.  Now that I have resistance bands, adjustable free weights and my “street turned stationary” bike in front of my television I think i’m poised to gym free.

I’m going to miss having a network of showers at my disposal.  I’ll just have to keep a safe distance on those scorching hot days that I’m not able to get back home for another shower.   A recent workout in Encino, CA reminded me that I’ll miss the people in the gym the most.  I was in a plank, and not ironically, when I overheard this:

OLDER GUY:  Who’s that strong fella?!

YOUNGER GUY: You must be looking at yourself in the mirror.

Okay, so far so pleasant….

YOUNGER GUY: Strength is in the mind and that makes you way stronger than me.

OLDER GUY:  Well, my mind was strengthened when I became a lawyer

YOUNGER GUY: (playfully)  Your’e a lawyer?  Then I take it all back.

OLDER GUY:  Yeah, I shape arguments to get a desired effect.

YOUNGER GUY: You mean you manipulate the truth.

OLDER GUY:  There is no right or wrong.  It’s all subjective.

YOUNGER GUY:  That’s not what we teach the children in my school.

OLDER GUY: It’s not what’s right it’s what you can prove and how you persuade.

YOUNGER GUY:  Well, deep inside, we all know right from wrong…

That was a pretty deep convo to have in between lat pull down sets.  I dedicated the last minute of my plank to the kids, btw.  The gym giveth but the gym taketh away as well. As I was dressing in the locker room I heard this:

GUY1: Hey man,  You’re here on the weekend. I don’t normally come on the weekend

GUY2: Yeah,  I had to get my car fixed nearby so I figured I would stop by an workout.

GUY1:  Cool,  I don’t normally come on the weekends but I didn’t drink last night.

GUY2: Cool

GUY1: Yeah I don’t normally come on the weekends but I came today.

I had to fight the urge to bang my head against my locker door. Thankfully guy 2 walked away and I was feverishly packing up when I heard guy 1 approach another guy.

GUY1:  Hey man, How goes it?  I don’t normally workout on the weekend….

I think I know why Guy 1 didn’t go out the night before. Eesh!  When my gym membership expires, I’ll have to inspire and annoy myself.

This isn’t my 1st gym inspired blog.  Check out these gems

I Tan Corrected (Funny blog from Comedy Central’s and NBC’s Dwayne Perkins)

Jane, Stop This Crazy Thing

You’re a Real Hot Mess…Won’t You Back That Thing Up

I Can Hear Sweat Trickling Down Your Cheek (Funny blog from Comedy Central’s and NBC’s Dwayne Perkins)

One of my favorite quotes is “Its’ never too late to be what you could’ve been.”  I love the spirit the quote. Even if it’s not always true.  If you’re 50 and sedentary, becoming a Cirque De Soleil aerialist may not be in the cards for you.  But you could take a yoga class at the learning annex or join the circus, albeit in a stationary clown capacity.

I inspired an older lady in a Portland Starbucks to buy a computer.  As always, when teaching you’re being taught and Jamie also inspired me.  She was 60 and about to get divorced.  Her first order of business was to buy herself a computer.   She said her husband always told her she was too stupid to use a computer.  I don’t know her husband but I will say that in my experience 65% of all criticism is projection.  What her husband meant was he’s too stupid and he would feel worse if she learned to use a computer before he did.  That’s how most hating works.  Please don’t do more because it makes me look and feel bad.

It’s one thing to have haters on the sideline, it’s another thing altogether to live with one. My empowered pre-senior had many plans for her new found freedom: world travel, computing, law school.   It seemed she had the wide-eyed enthusiasm that comes with being liberated from a debilitating regime.  Her new plans probably outweigh how much time she has to do them.  Girl power notwithstanding.  Still, I’m rooting for Jamie and what she stands for.  Everything thing starts with a spark, an inclination, a notion.  Every innovation started with someone saying…”ya know…maybe we could…”

I was inspired by Jamie because I still have relative youth and no oppressive overseer forbidding me to grow. If Jamie could break the shackles of a tyrannical husband and then make a go of it, at her age, then there’s no excuse for the rest of us.  Good luck Jamie and remember success is a journey.  She decided on an iPad.

I just touched down in Portland, OR.  I’m told it’s the Hipster capitol of the world.  Which makes it oddly fitting that the Portland Trailblazers, long considered the “thugs” of the NBA, play here.  Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think hipsters love Gangster rap…ironically of course.  Other than how they dress and where they hang, I really couldn’t tell you what hipsters are actually about.  I think it’s a counter culture thing that now begs for something to counter it.

What I do know is that it’s high time hipsters reveal their methods to staying thin.  Whether it’s a hipster diet or workout plan, I call on The Hipsters to let the rest of us in on their Ancient Hipster Secret.  I’m leaning toward the answer not lying in the Hipster diet.  Most Hipsters I meet seem to be foodies.  7 out of ten times, someone telling me about some killer bread pudding or a donut with bacon on it or cereal with heath bar crumbled on top is a tiny hipster who could save money shopping at the baby gap instead of American Apparel.

However, I also don’t picture hipsters doing intense workouts.  A waif-thin guy in skinny jeans doing cross fit? Rope climbing, clean and jerking, sprinting, pushing himself to his physical limits?  Maybe but it’s just hard to picture.

Does coolness make food metabolize faster?  Maybe disdain for anything “popular” is akin to constant motion.  Maybe it’s not fast food but bad sitcoms that make our populous fat.  Surely hipsters don’t watch “The World According to Jim.”  Or is it pop music that is our undoing.  Maybe in the near future you’ll open up a Scientific  Journal and see this headline: “Studies reveal lab rats who rock out to Nickleback burn 1/2 the calories of rats who have MGMT and Vampire Weekend on repeat in their Zune players“.

Not all hipsters are thin and if any of my readers are portly hipsters, don’t feel bad.  You actually bring a human element to your flannel donning brethren.  You serve as proof that Hipsters aren’t aliens living amongst us waiting for the sign from their home planet to pounce.

I’ve been called a hipster but there are too many track jackets in my closet for that label to stick.  Also, my TV is pretty much set to ESPN.  And lastly, I’ll hit up an IHOP or Denny’s on Sunday morning way before I wait 40 minutes to pay twice as much* at The LA “hot spot.”

This isn’t the first time Hipsters have made their way into my blog:

There was the Red Carpet Event fit for a Hipster

Hipsters played a role in my stripping career

There was the non hipster Pan Handler at a Taco Truck

*the bump in price is usually justified by the presence of sun dried tomatoes, a cheese you can’t get at a deli or anything caramelized.

Dear Coffee Shop,

I’m sorry to send you this by letter but I thought it would be best.  We’ve had really fun times together that I will cherish always.  It’s just that, well, I need more.  It’s over now.  Please don’t try to change my mind. I’ve found something else, an office.  It’s not as spontaneous and funny as you are but I need stability and support now.  The office’s wifi always works and there’s always a place for me to sit.  Office is introducing me to its friends.  They’re all so nice and sophisticated.  Even when I go away, Office has arranged places all over the world for me to sit and work. Office doesn’t play music or have a parade of beautiful women go by but office doesn’t charge me extra for tea either.

Coffee shop, we both know that you’ll never change.  You’ll never really be about grown up business.  Sure you’re good for occasional great conversation and awesome people watching but I need a place where I can mail things and Fedex things and print things out and have meetings.

I think we both know this was going to happen sooner or later.  And I really appreciate all you’ve done for me.  You helped me get out the house when I was watching too much TV.  You helped me write sooo many blogs:

We’ll always have the retired “porn star” contemplating a comeback:

I know you remember the homeless woman who gave me money

And who could forget the barrista who did, ahem, “adult” foam art.

I was doing comedy in a cocktail bar, that much is true.  But even then I knew I needed a more professional work environment, either with or without you, Coffee Shop.    Please don’t be too sad.  You’ll find someone else.  A new comic/writer on the come up who likes your drinks and wants to sit in you and work.  I wish you nothing but the best, Coffee Shop.

I hope that we can still be friends and maybe I can visit you every now and then.  If you’re not okay with that, I totally understand.

Thanks for everything.

Love Always,

Dwayne

(written from the guest business lounge from a London Branch of my office, December ‘11)

Whoever said little things meant a lot was a very wise person.  Although, I think that statement is the abridged version of the sentiment it means to convey.  It really means little things that suggest a deeper thoughtfulness mean a lot.  Someone give you a book of matches and there’s no need to throw a parade in their honor.  Now make that match book from the House of Blues in Myrtle Beach and, you once mentioned in passing that you collect HOB match books and the only one you didn’t have was the one from Myrtle Beach.   Suddenly that little gesture means a lot to you and your senseless collection.

I’m a simple man.  Some people co-op the “Simple” moniker but then you get to know them and they’re more complicated than Chinese math.  They contradict themselves so quickly, that you check them for gills. Thinking, they must be a fish to have such short term memory.

You can’t call yourself simple unless you’re also consistent.  That rules out an entire gender.   I’m not saying which one…but you know…  Anyhoo,  I’m consistent.  Almost to the point of concern.  Emerson said, “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of a little mind.“  This would keep me up at night if he didn’t throw in the word foolish.  I’m predictable but there’s nothing foolish about flossing, putting on lip balm or moisturizing.

Basically I do my everything in between maintaining my teeth, lips and skin.    The up-keep of those three things is my real job and I squeeze in time to write and perform in between applications and dislodging food particles.

So when you see me do all three all throughout the day, cut me some slack because those things are important.  Would you rather I have gunk between my teeth, “powdered donut” lips and hands that look like I was twirling pizza??

Now that I’ve proven I’m not little minded let’s get back to little things that mean a great deal.  I was floored when my homie bought me almost a year supply of Floss, Lip Balm and Lotion.  And the good stuff to boot: Glide, Chap-Stick and Lubriderm.  What do you get the guy that has everything?  Well, last year it was an ipad, from ma-dukes and the fam-bam, this year it’s the tools to keep his game tight.

The gift was perfect because it’s so specific to my life.  I’ll use it everyday.  And what do I want next year?  Well, the same thing of course.   Well, maybe Tom’s of Maine Floss, Burt’s Bees Wax and Kiehl’s.  Just kidding.  Good looking Aaron.

So a friend of mine had an interesting idea for a series of shorts.   The premise:  We hang out on Venice beach people watching and make snap judgements about people then ask them if we were right.  I know, sounds like major fun right?  It was.   Venice beach has to be on the top ten list of best places on earth to people watch.  Especially on a Saturday afternoon where the balance between crazy and sane, rich and poor,  bad-ass and non-bad ass is in perfect harmony.

Venice beach has whatever you need.  Both in the way of people and chatskis. Trying to guess every detail about a person by just looking at them is incredible fun but also speaks volumes to how we perceive each other and societal norms.  It’s one thing to be an investment banker. It’s another thing all together to look like one.  Would you want people to know your profession, likes and dislikes just by looking at you?   On the plus side you would not throw people any curveballs and people would walk into any interaction with you with a bit of a heads up.  You could even screen out people by basically broadcasting who you are prior to any words being exchanged.

The downside is you would be living in a box and you would never surprise anyone.

SURPRISED PERSON: With that neck tatoo, I wouldn’t have pegged you for a horticulturist.  That’s cool.  What’s that? You also love Norah Jones?  Right on!

I’m sure some people dress and groom with no second thought as to what it says about them as a person.  I used to be that way but then I realized i needed to steer crowds into a way of thinking whilst I walked on the stage and before I uttered a word.

Race also played a role.  We assumed every Indian was in medicine or tech support.  I know, that’s hella wrong.  Remember these were knee jerk judgements.  Marketing and the segments marketing has created has subconsciously permeated both our individual and collective psyches.  We leave the house with a focus on maintaining our brand.  How many people dress completely different from day to day?  Tomorrow go completely against type and then the next dress exactly the way people in your profession, hood, social order dress.

Mix it up folks.  Because we guessed right an alarmingly high number of times.   And when we were wrong it was rewarding in a different way.  Being stumped just confirms that it’s still important to actually get to know someone.

So put a book cover on your “book” and make folks read your insides to learn your story.

About 3 times a day, I do something that would be slightly impressive if anyone were present but isn’t monumental enough to actually call someone up and share it with them.  Like when the soap slips out of my hand in the shower and I catch it with my other hand.  Or I drop a mug in my kitchen and break it’s fall with my foot ala a hackie sack ball and the mug emerges unscathed.

Never mind that it’s usually carelessness or clumsiness that sets up these semi-semi-death defying feats.  I like to focus on my cat like reflexes on the back end and not my two left hands on the front end.  It’s like I’m the person at the hospital who pulls the plug on a patient just to play hero and bring them back from the brink with CPR.  Except, usually no one’s there to see my feats or pat me on the back — So I’m not “creating” these scenarios to garner praise from others.  That’s what my blog is for.

So, I experienced unwarranted delight when I dropped a napkin in Starbucks while writing with another comic, caught the napkin between my thumb and index finger just before if touched the floor and my friend said, “Nice catch.”

If he only knew the half of it.  It would’ve been too braggadocios to tell him about the time the pot slipped out of my hands while straining spaghetti and I adjusted the colander underneath with one hand while barely clutching the massive spaghetti pot with the other hand and didn’t loose a single noodle.  No, I’ll take that to the grave.

I recently blogged about a Chinese dad who makes his 4 year old walk in the snow in his undies to “toughen” him up.

Seeing the boy run through the snow jarred a memory.  It brought me back to a time when I found myself locked outside with nothing on but my underoos.  My situation was self inflicted. My mom is way too kind and loving to ever take any of her kids through such a harsh regimen.  Even if it was “for our own good.”

This was way back when a mom could leave a capable child in the house for a few minutes without fear of the feds arresting her or the child drinking paint thinner.   By age 4 don’t most kids know that food resides in the fridge or high high above? My mom knew I wouldn’t eat anything not fortified with sugar.  Taking heed to her explicit instructions not to open the door was another thing altogether.

If I can connect with the 5 year old Dwayne for a minute I think he, me, we wanted a little bit of fresh air.  The plan was to open the door fill our lungs with fine Brooklyn sky then go back inside and maybe surf the pre-internet, children encyclopedias.  Perhaps I became drunk off my whiff of Brownsville zephyr because I forgot to block the door and it closed behind me.  My foray into disobedience was a smashing failure.

I think a neighbor blanketed me until my mom returned.  No one thought ill of my mom.  And I think a 5 year old boy in Superman underwear is more cute and precocious than anything else.

And that was the day I learned how slam locks really work.

So just to be clear.  The new iphone has a smart assistant named Siri built into it who speaks back to you and helps you with things right?  And we’re all cool with this?  Even after the countless movies we’ve seen where the robots power up one day and stop being so friendly?

Technically, according to 2001: A Space Odyssey, Siri is about 10 years late and lagging way behind in sinisterness.  In a Space Odyssey, The computer Hal was kind of a “nickname for a guy named Richard” but I’m sure he started out like Siri all nice and helpful.  It would go to your head too If you could process 92 trillion operations per second.

In Terminator The Skynet super computer bombs the world on the same day it became “Self Aware” on August 29th 1997*. Only 25 days after its activation by the way.  The writing isn’t only on the wall it’s on your Netflix account, your DVD collection, your book shelf (if you still have one) and on your e-reader.  Yet we’re marching like sheep toward our battle with the machines.  The same machines we created.  I know I sound a little doomsday-ee.  But I actually think the machines (or Extra Terrestrials if you like that scenario better) will force us humans to ban together and treat each other better.  Maybe.

Most people already can’t use a telephone book, drive without GPS or recite more than 4 phone numbers.  Next on the chopping block is typing and driving.  We already have a machine that vacuums a whole room while you sit and catch up on Jersey Shore episodes.

When an underpaid athlete is a key player on his team, he’ll usually renegotiate his contract the next year.  I know you think computers don’t have a soul but maybe their soul is their list of instructions they’ve been programmed with coupled with their new ability to now learn.**   So when the computers realize that they exist, their next step will be to realize they run everything, and their next step will be to realize that we’re not worthy.  Then it’s lights out, literally and figuratively.

Heck the computers probably won’t even let me finish this b…….

* http://terminator.wikia.com/wiki/Judgment_Day

** http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=computers-have-a-lot-to-learn-from-2009-03-10 (see what the article says about the year 2018)

I think it’s too easy to make puns with Lin.  Let’s try to make some catch phrases with Jeremy.  Shall we:

• Jeremy Spoke in Class Today
• King Jeremy
• Jerra-Terror
• Jere-oh me so scoring
• Jeremy I say to you
• Ja-Ja-Ja-Jeremy’s Unit!

This is actually really hard.  Maybe we should try his middle name, Shu-How.  Whatever name we use, my man is…Balllin’!  I may even start liking the Knicks again.