Recently, I applied for an interactive writer position at Jellyvision, the company best known for the computer trivia game You Don’t Know Jack.  Part of the application process was to write a humorous essay about how electricity works.  You were to “be funny and informative, and write like you’re writing to a bright seventh-grader.” 

I’ve since gotten a rejection e-mail.  No big deal, I get rejected all the time.  But I don’t think what I wrote was too bad – though I suppose it could be wittier.  I’d like to see an essay that made the cut.

Here’s what I submitted:

ELECTRICITY: IT’S REALLY SHOCKINGLY SIMPLE

You probably think of electricity as the magical stuff in your walls that makes all the cool things in your house work, like Call of Duty on the PS3.  Well, it IS sort of magical – in the sense that it’s energy produced by the movement of negatively-charged particles in an atom, called electrons.

These electrons move rapidly in what’s called a current, which runs along a circuit, which usually consists of wires.  These electrons run through the current and circuit like a hyperactive dog after a caffeinated rabbit.  The source of these enthusiastic electrons comes from a power plant generated by nuclear fission, water, wind, oil, or coal.

The cool electricity in your house is called alternating current, or AC, and it flows rapidly back and forth.  The electricity generated from batteries – like in your laptop or the old Game Boy lost somewhere under your bed – is direct current, or DC, which only runs one way.

There’s also static electricity, in which electrons emit a charge in nature but do not flow through a current.  Lightning is a perfect example, as is the charge that occurs when you shuffle your feet across the carpet, touch your roommate, and shock the hell out of him.

Current (AC or DC) electricity can only flow through a continuous circuit, or connected series of conductors.  When you flip a light or any “off” switch, it breaks the circuit, and the electricity is cut off.  Conductors are substances through which electricity can easily flow, like salt, water, wool, and metal.  So if you don’t want to be an electrical conductor, it’s best not to stand in salt water wearing wool underpants and a lot of bling.

So: the electricity in your house is courtesy of stimulated electrons generated by a power plant, and travels through conductors (metal wires) in a continuous circuit (until you switch it off).  It then provides power to make your toast, heat your cold soup in a microwave, and allow you to post rude comments on YouTube.

Now that you know all about how electricity works, go enjoy Call of Duty.  Just remember to thank your invisible friends: electrons.

THE WORST CROWD I EVER HAD: 

In Charleston, IL, bar name forgotten.  I was the emcee and drove downstate with the feature act.  It was a big bar/restaurant and was packed.  I came onstage, made a few announcements, and began.

After about a minute I realized: nobody is paying attention.  All 80 or so people were chatting with each other.  I didn’t see a single person looking at me, and I could barely hear myself over the din of conversation.  I switched to autopilot, finished my 10 minutes, and brought up the feature act.

They were still restless until about 10 minutes into his set, then the show went well.  The headliner was strong, and killed.

On the way back in the car the next day, I was sullen.  I couldn’t believe how much I sucked at that show.  The feature act said, “What’s the matter?”  I said, “That’s the worst show I ever had.”  He was shocked.  “THAT’S the worst show you ever had?  I’ve had people stand up and say, ‘You SUCK! Get off the STAGE!’”  He then proceeded to tell me his horror stories.

Suddenly I didn’t feel so bad.

THE BEST CROWD I EVER HAD: 

In Lyons, IL, Comedy Womb.  Strangely enough, probably the smallest crowd I ever had: 5 people at one table, right up front.  As I recall, three guys and two women.  The Womb’s show structure was a little different – instead of 3 comics, they’d have about 8 to 10 doing smaller amounts of time.

I think I was the 3^rd or 4^th guy on stage.  Have you ever seen a truly, truly drunk person…or been there yourself?  All 5 people were what you just imagined.

They were bellowing at setups.  I’d have to stop and say, “Wait, guys, that’s not the funny part.”  During one song a guy literally fell out of his chair.  I was semi-concerned for his health.

MORAL OF THE STORY: Lots of alcohol makes goofy people with guitars really, really funny.

BRUSHES WITH FAME:

I worked with Lewis Black during a showcase in Naperville in 1994.  I vaguely knew him from The Daily Show.  He was a very cool guy; quite calm offstage, unlike his onstage personae.

Also worked with Adam Ferarra in Milwaukee.  He’s a regular on Rescue Me.  A real fun guy to hit bars with after shows.  He has a lock on the whole sheepish Italian New York Tony Danza thing.

My favorite Chicago comedian to work with was Steve Seagren.  He’s since moved to L.A. and has appeared in cameos in The Office and Curb Your Enthusiasm.  The guy was as hilarious offstage as onstage.

I’ll relate this because it’s the story most requested by my friends.

In 1996, my wife (let’s call her Angelina Jolie) and I went to Interlaken, Switzerland, to visit her parents.  Her dad, a long-time employee of McDonnell Douglas, had been temporarily placed there as a consultant to the Swiss Air Force.

Neither of us had been to Europe, and it was beautiful.  We even went paragliding off the Alps.

One day, we drove north to Bavaria and took a day to visit Munich.  We later checked into a hotel in Garmisch, Germany.

That night, Angelina and I decided we needed a break from her parents and went out to find some bars.  We had no idea where we were going and just walked around.  We found a couple of taverns, but they didn’t seem to have the right “feel.”

Then we found a pretty cool place.  They were playing decent rock; the crowd was younger and most of them spoke English.

We sat at the bar. I was drinking local brews and Angelina was drinking vodka tonics.  One guy asked where we were from.  When I told him, he said, “Ah, America.  In America they have Budweiser.”  Everyone around the bar laughed.  I always suspected Bud was an international joke.

We drank.  A lot.  And laughed.  A lot.

Several hours passed, and we were hammered.  I was having trouble focusing.  Angelina rushed off to the bathroom and puked.  We finally left the place and stumbled back to the hotel.

In the lobby, she again rushed to the john and vomited. We made it upstairs to the room, where her parents were sleeping (the room had two queen-sized beds).  We weren’t too quiet when we entered.  Angelina kept rambling to her mom about how she had to buy tampons the next day.  I stripped off my clothes, threw them in the corner, and passed out in the bed.

The next thing I heard was my ultra-conservative really-uptight mother-in-law’s shrill voice:

“Gary!  Gary, goddammit, you’re pissing all over your clothes!”

I snapped awake.  Sure enough, I was standing in the corner of the room, pissing all over my pile of clothes.  I guess I thought I was in the bathroom.

I staggered to the toilet, finished my business, and crashed back into bed.

I don’t know what was worse the next morning – my debilitating hangover or having to hear what a drunken idiot I was the entire ride back to Interlaken.

Sometimes I wish I were gay.  Don’t get me wrong, I love women, but y’all can make life way more difficult than it needs to be.  Here’s a typical online chat between a man and woman in a relationship, both at their respective places of employment:

MAN: Can you pick up my suit?  It’s $50, and they only take cash

WOMAN: Why don’t they take credit cards?  I don’t think that’s legal.  They should take credit cards

MAN: I don’t know.  They just take cash

WOMAN: Well that’s stupid.  I only have $40 right now and Janie and me are going out for lunch.  Do you remember Janie?  She was at Steve’s party.  I might be able to go to the ATM on Hamilton Street but that’s kind of far away

MAN: Are you picking up my suit?

WOMAN: Well I got out of my car this morning and I noticed the tire was kind of low.  I had a few people come out and look at it and they said I should get it checked out

MAN: I just called and it’s not ready.  Forget it

Ya gotta ditch on that conversation.  It’s going nowhere.

The same chat sequence if you’re gay:

MAN: Can you pick up my suit?

OTHER MAN: Sure.  Blowjobs later?

MAN: Great

Conversation over.  You get the suit AND the blowjob.  It’s win-win.

THE BEGINNING:

In 1991, I decided I wanted to go onstage and do comedy at open mic nights.  I was 27 and had moved from a small town in Missouri to the Chicago suburbs the year before.

I should preface this with the fact that in 1982 I had won sixth place In Illinois state high school speech, original comedy.  So I’d had some experience making crowds laugh.  I wanted to see if I could do it for actual comedy club crowds.

I had no idea how to go about it, so as a stab in the dark, I bought Chicago magazine.  In the back were the major comedy club listings.  I called them all to see if they had open mics.  A few did.

The closest one was in Elmhurst, about 25 minutes away.  The place was called Who’s On First.  It was an actual club that held about 150 people.  The owner, Ted Holum, was a comic.  On Sundays, they had open mic before the scheduled improve group.

The first time I went up, I didn’t take my guitar.  I did about 6 minutes in front of about 20 people, and it went well.

I knew I wanted to go up the next week.  Then I thought:  “I know some funny stuff on the guitar, why not bring that up?” So the next week, I did.

It went even better.  I went back every week, always trying new songs and material in 6-minute bursts.  Other comics were supportive and offered advice on tweaking jokes.  After about 3 months, one comic said, “Why don’t you ask Ted if you can emcee here sometime?”  It had never occurred to me that I might get paid to perform.

So I came up to Ted after a show one night and asked.  He immediately pulled out his schedule book and said, “When do you have open?”

THE MIDDLE:

So my first paying gig ($50) was emceeing at Who’s On First.  It was great, and I was there every six weeks or so.  Ted knew the owner of The Comedy Womb in Lyons, and I started appearing there whenever possible.

Then you meet folks: comics, agents, people who know people.  Before long I was booked as an emcee pretty much every weekend.  It was great.  I got to write whatever stupid shit came to mind (okay, not ALL of it worked), I got paid (a pittance, granted), and the audiences liked it.

After about a year, an agent called and said, “I need a feature act next weekend.  Can you do a solid 25 – 30?”  I said, “I think I can do that.”  So I started featuring, and was still getting booked every weekend.  The best part was that I rarely had to look for work – they always called me.

The act got tighter, and I did topical songs about O.J., Waco, Bill Clinton, etc.  I had a great creative outlet.  I only had what I considered a “bad” show every once in a while.  Life was good.

THE END:

But it got to get old.  I’d been a feature act for about 3 years, and my next natural step was to headline – 45 minutes to an hour.  I knew I couldn’t come up with that much new material to keep an act of that length fresh.  I barely thought of 5 good new minutes every couple of months.  And driving 3 hours to Indiana for $75 was getting tiresome.

Plus, I was gone from my (fairly) new bride every weekend.  And despite all the easy skanky ho comedy poontang, I was a faithful lad.

(SIDE NOTE:  98% of all married comics cheat whenever they can.  Don’t let them tell you differently.)

The final straw was in 1996.  I was on my way to Eau Claire WI.  At about Madison, a huge blizzard hit.  Long story short, I thought I was going to die, and (very) luckily got out of it.

I took that as a sign to chuck the comedy trade.