{"id":2385,"date":"2005-02-09T18:02:36","date_gmt":"2005-02-09T23:02:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=2385"},"modified":"2022-10-09T15:54:10","modified_gmt":"2022-10-09T19:54:10","slug":"the-funnies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/?p=2385","title":{"rendered":"The Funnies"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last night, Siobhan and I went to go see our friend Nate perform with his improv group at Upright Citizens Brigade<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Now. In contrast to the un-funnies, last night was one of those nights of improv (and believe me, I have had 1001 nights of improv) when you laugh from beginning to end. Sometimes improv comedy can be iffy, for obvious reasons. Er … it’s improv. And if the “team” is bad, then you’re out of luck as an audience member. But that’s kind of the fun, for me, in going to see improv on occasion. You just never know what’s going to happen. You walk in having NO IDEA.<\/p>\n

Siobhan and I sat there, and laughed like maniacs, from beginning to end. If anyone out there is a fan of improv comedy, then you will know how difficult it is to DESCRIBE it to someone who isn’t there. Like … how things happen, spontaneously, how the group suddenly all appears to have the same idea at the same time, how something randomly HILARIOUS will happen … but it’s impossible to describe. It is the definition of “you had to be there”.<\/p>\n

To give you just an example:<\/p>\n

The evening ended with a guy playing a sinister Michael Eisner, tied up in a chair, laughing evilly, and saying to another guy, “EAT IT.”<\/p>\n

Now … it all made COMPLETE sense in the moment … but … to explain how this particular improv group arrived at this? Much more difficult. I can assure you that the entire joint ERUPTED into laughter. heh heh heh<\/p>\n

(Ann Marie: I am sure you STILL remember some of the funny lines from those improv shows we always used to go to YEARS ago. “What in carnation is he talking about?” “I’m saying this very badly …” And … something about hiding a moose?)<\/p>\n

But it was a raucous and fun night. Something I truly needed. To sit back and laugh so hard I cried. It was awesome.<\/p>\n

I made my way home afterwards, to my apartment, it was 11:15 pm or so … so the Empire State Building still had its lights on. (The lights on top, I mean, the ones that change colors to reflect different holidays and stuff.) Those lights go off after midnight, so you can figure out what time it is (generally – and I mean REALLY generally – like: “Huh. So it’s after midnight then!”) by the top of the Empire State Building.<\/p>\n

When I got home, I stood at the end of my street for a bit, staring across the river at the city – one of my favorite things to do. You just don’t get perspective – like THAT – when you’re actually in the city. You can look up, of course, but stuff gets foreshortened – you can’t ever see the whole thing. You can’t look up and down the length of the island, when you’re actually on the island. My view is one of the best things about where I live. The quiet ain’t too bad either.<\/p>\n

The night was mild, dark, the Hudson moved by darkly below, and the Empire State Building was lit up – bright yellow and red. I have no idea what for. Sometimes the color choices are obvious (red white and blue on July 4, red and green on Christmas … but there are many many more. They change almost every day!) – but I didn’t know what the yellow and the red was for. It was beautiful – especially because the yellow and red were reflected, blackly, in the Hudson below.<\/p>\n

Yeah. My view don’t suck. I’m proud of it.<\/p>\n

It was a beautiful night. Beautiful to just laugh and laugh and laugh …<\/p>\n

And I liked the yellow-and-red reflection in the Hudson, too. Simple pleasures, you know.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last night, Siobhan and I went to go see our friend Nate perform with his improv group at Upright Citizens Brigade. Now. In contrast to the un-funnies, last night was one of those nights of improv (and believe me, I … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[600],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2385"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2385"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2385\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":178268,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2385\/revisions\/178268"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2385"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2385"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sheilaomalley.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2385"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}