This is probably the busiest week I've had since I was at ISU. My direct superior at work is taking the week off, so I'm pretty much running the entire traffic/billing department. Frankly, I'm a little nervous; that might sound like an incredible vote of confidence for someone who's been on the job a mere two months, but there's just the two of us. I'm also battling a nasty cold, which is odd since I tend to battle hay fever symptoms during the Spring and Fall. One of my colleagues suggested that it's because the air conditioning is running at a balmy 60 degrees, and I don't disagree. On the bright side, the extra money should come in handy with all the Kleenex I'm plowing through...

I found it odd that nobody commented on the Ed Koch editorial last week, given the recent suggestion of a possible pullout from Iraq in 2010. The prime minister seems pretty keen on the idea, and Senator Obama is more or less making the withdrawal the center of his campaign. Funny thing is, the surge that everyone bemoaned eighteen months ago actually worked just fine, but Senator McCain believes we should stay the course anyway. I'd probably give more credit to Secretary of Defense Gates than President Bush, but at least the warhawks have finally found their focus. If the pullout pulls through, I wouldn't see as a victory for either party but rather a revival of the lost art of bipartisanship.

Finally, many thanks to Hoeech for pointing out that E-Company is a reference to the HBO miniseries "Band of Brothers." I'll make a mental note to watch the show on DVD before the summer's through...

+ I've been reading The New Yorker for several years now, and even though their choices for topical covers are generally quite irreverent, this week's Obama cover pushes the limits of good taste. You'd have to be some sort of uninformed racist idiot to actually believe Senator Obama is Muslim (or for that matter, a terrorist) just because his middle name is Hussein. Sure, it's an understatement but you'd be surprised how many braindead hicks actually fall for that foolhardiness, than declare their beliefs online. On the other hand, I doubt many of these dunderpates have ever read The New Yorker, much less "Hop on Pop." Thinking the literary world would be in on the joke was quite foolish, especially considering the role of race and religion in Obama's campaign. This is a very rare misfire from Eustice Tilley and company, and in spite of good intentions they really missed the mark.

+ Elsewhere in the political world, former New York Mayor Ed Koch is still alive and well and has something to say about the US pulling out of Iraq.

+ Apparently Michael Jackson's health has gotten so bad, he only sleeps with little boys that share his blood type.

+ One Final Note: It's nice to see that I made it to Level 59, though I'm confused about my "E-Company" status. I'm not sure what sort of TV reference that is (Combat? Black Sheep Squadron? A History Channel special from ten years ago?), but points to CNet for choosing the most obscure titles from the far reaches of our pop culture consciousness.

A few thoughts on the first three months of the baseball season:

+ Looking back at my predictions from April, in some aspects was right on the money but in other ways I was dead, dead wrong. The very concept of prognosticating is generally hit-and-miss, but this year has been something else. Nobody expected Seattle to be this bad or Cleveland to be so shiftless, and for the most part Tampa and the White Sox have been pleasant surprises. I knew the NL West was wide open, but I didn't expect to see all five teams barely playing .500. I definitely missed the mark on my award winners (though CC Sabathia might win the NL Cy Young, who knows); Chase Ultey and Josh Hamilton are probably the more deserving MVPs.

+ Nothing made me wince like Jon Lester's no-hitter against KC in May, but nothing made me laugh harder than Jered Weaver pulling an Andy Hawkins during interleague play last month.

+ Looking at the All-Star Game rosters, I think there's about two Cubs too many, the Yankees are over-represented, and there aren't enough Rays. As much as I like the possibility of two Royals All-Stars, I could make a better case for David Dejesus (.316 average as of July 7th) over Jose Guillen (decent power numbers, but there's the steroid stigma). As for Joakim Soria, he's gonna be the next Jeff Montgomery, just wait and see.

+ It would've really helped us fantasy baseball owners had the Marlins told us that Dan Uggla was going to sit out for two weeks. If a player has a leg injury that bad, wouldn't it make sense to put him on the disabled list?

+ Six Cooperstown-caliber pitchers might retire by the end of this season (Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine, John Smoltz, Randy Johnson, Curt Schilling, and Pedro Martinez) and possibly two more in 2009 (Mariano Rivera and Trevor Hoffman). No bones about it, the 2014 and 2015 Hall of Fame ballots are going to be a Sophie's Choice.

+ To revise my playoff picks: in the AL, I'll go with Boston, Chicago, and Los Angeles with Tampa Bay as the wild card. Over in the senior circuit, I'll put my money on Philly, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Milwaukee as the top second-place finisher. In the World Series, I'll take the Halos over the Phillies in five games. Chicago teams always find a way to choke, just wait and see.

I'll have to keep it short this week; my work hours at Salem have been consolidated because of the holiday. To make up for my brevity, here's the first installment of a new feature I'd like to call "HelloStuart Recommends."

I've realized that I don't watch a lot of TV over the summer, or at least not anymore; that might be because 90% of summer programming is reality TV, but also because there's nothing on that suits my interests. On that note, I've been spending a lot more time listening to the radio. One discovery I made last summer is "The Deep End with Nick Michaels," a nationally syndicated radio show with a specific focus on "the greatest music ever made" (i.e. claszic rock, old-school soul and R&B). In Chicago, it airs Saturday nights from 11 PM to 1 AM, and it makes for a good listen on weeks when I'm not obligated to watch and review SNL. Michaels has a naturally honeyed narrator's voice, which makes for good white noise if I'm reading a magazine or a newspaper. It's kind of a shame that it only airs for two hours, since in some markets the show runs twice that long. For more information, visit his web site at http://www.thedeependwithnickmichaels.com/main.htm.

Before I go- to add upon my personal essay from last week, I might be performing again sometime before the end of this month. Later tonight, I'm e-mailing the guy who organizes that open mic I attended a few weeks back.

Happy Canada Day and Happy Independence Day!

For the last 36 hours or so, I've been reeling from the passing of George Carlin. This is not convinient sentimentality in any way, shape, or form; I was a Carlin fan and have been since the mid-1990s. It's very unusual for me to actually mourn a public figure like this (the only other instances I can think of are Phil Hartman and Dan Quisenberry) but it's not like I'm having an existential conflict to figure out why I'm reacting this way.

I started performing stand-up comedy about 4 1/2 years ago. As a comedy geek, I'd always had an interest in performing and writing my own material. Ever since I was in grade school, I noticed that there was nothing that made me feel better than when I made somebody laugh (intentionally, anyway). It was late 2003, and I was working for the Prairie Light Review (the College of DuPage literary magazine) at the time; there was going to be an open mic following one of our poetry readings, so I finally gave it a shot. The hardest lesson I've learned about stand-up is that your first time up is guaranteed to suck. There's no way around it, really; you're working with unproven material and you don't have a feel for the audience. Make no mistake, my first performance was stilted and awkward but I was too excited to finally be performing onstage to actually notice that. The feedback I got that evening was generally positive, but I know now that my audience was just trying to be polite. It wasn't until the next PLR meeting that my colleagues confronted me and gave me the cold, hard truth.

Nevertheless, I kept going. I started paying closer attention to the stand-ups that performed on the late night talk shows. I developed a new appreciation for the comedians that I listened to and watched when I grew up, Carlin included. One of my bosses at WDCB (my other job) suggested that I check out Bill Hicks, which proved to be quite beneficial and influential to my material. Every time an open mic was held on campus, I took another shot. I made a mental note to always perform new material, then use these relatively small community college crowds as my own personal Skinner Box to see what worked and what didn't. After a few more performances that I would describe as being only marginally better than my rookie outing, 12 months after my inauspicous debut I returned to that same stage and put on a decent show.

Strangely, that's also how I first got derailed. My attempts at comedy had divided my PLR peers. Some of my colleagues thought my comedy was a palate-cleanser to the melancholy and often mediocre poems and short stories that generally dominated these open mics, while others thought doing stand-up didn't fit in with the tone and nature of these recitals and I was wasting everyone's time. Gradually that latter group won out, and after performing seven times in 2004 I only did stand-up four times in 2005. Soon after, I transferred to Illinois State; on my third week of campus, I caught wind of a monthly open mic at the student union and signed up. This is where history repeats itself; after being out of practice for several months, my first performance at ISU was a decidedly uneven affair. My material was about 80% new and it died, but the older stuff got a decent response. I made a note of performing when my school schedule allotted, which was about once every other month. I also had the distinction of being the last comedian to perform at an ISU Comic Rollaround, as the student program board discontinued the shows following the Fall 2007 semester.

Since graduating from Illinois State, I've pretty much put my fledging "career" on hold. It wasn't by choice, though; my primary concern out of school was finding a steady job and asserting my independence. On top of that, there aren't too many local comedy hotspots, unless you want to take two long train rides to and from Chicago. Luckily, I just discovered a comedy club two towns over that's holding open mics throughout the summer. After attending one show just to get the feel of the place, I hope to perform there at least once before the season ends. Seven months is a damn long time between shows.

I conclude my blog by stating if not for George Carlin and several other guiding spirits, I never would've had the courage to do stand-up comedy. It's one thing to be funny, but it's another thing to actually walk onstage and perform material that you've written. It's as hard as all hell, so may advice to any other wannabe comics out there is to be patient and keep practicing. You're only as good as your material, but the satisfaction of making somebody laugh is irresistable.