Jay's Interest: December 2016

Back when I was younger (circa 1980’s) I used to frequent A LOT of comedy clubs. One of my favorites was Déjà vu in Columbia, MO. It was this quaint little bar/pool hall/college town hangout that featured some of the best comedians in the world. But what I really liked about Déjà vu (and most other comedy clubs around) was that they would always have an open mic night where wannabe comedians could get up on stage and give it their best shot. It didn’t matter if your material was funny because the crowd didn’t expect you to be funny. You were an amateur and everyone in the crowd just appreciated the fact that you were brave enough to get up in front of a bunch of complete strangers and live your dream. One of my biggest regrets in life is that I never had the courage to get up in front of a crowd and see if I could make them laugh. It’s easy to make people laugh behind a keyboard because there is this little button that says ‘delete’ on it. Almost everything I write in this newsletter is written and deleted at least 4 times before I think it’s just the right amount of funny without offending too many people. Unfortunately, in this crazy new world of instantane-ous videos and social media, often times our mouths spout off and our fingers hit the ‘send’ button before that little area of our brain reserved for common sense has a chance to kick in.

Which brings me to our newly elected president. And no, I’m not here to question his qualifications to be president. We have the greatest democracy in the world and he was elected fair and square. What I’m worried about is that Donald Trump does not have a person shadowing him 24 hours a day making sure that he doesn’t say (or Tweet) something that is going to offend certain groups of people. I’m sure Mr. Trump is a relatively smart guy, but he is the most dangerous person in the world when it comes to his mouth and his access to social media. And trust me on this one – if you’ve lost your filter and nobody has taken away your computer or phone, bad things are going to happen. It’s the same reason we take away the car keys from our parents when some of their skills start to deteriorate. We do it not just to protect our parents, but to protect everyone else from our parents. So hopefully the new administration will add one new position where that person is responsible for nothing more than hiding President Trump’s phone from 6:00 p.m. until 8:00 a.m. every single day for 4 years. I even have a name for that new person….Melania.

And finally, our buddy Mr. Stephen Hawking is at it again. A few months ago he warned that artificial intelligence will eventually take over the world, and now he says that we only have 1,000 years left on earth because apparently we humans have a small problem with driving our cars and heating our homes and whatever else it is we’re doing wrong. Now granted, this won’t affect me or anyone reading this newsletter, but I have to admit that it’s kind of cool to think that future generations may someday wake up to a beautiful sunrise on Uranus.

Man, I could have really used that one back in 1989 :)

Have a great Holiday season and we’ll talk next year!!

Jay