Time moves at an unrelenting pace and two whole weeks have passed since we last spoke. I hope it is coming across that I am excited and delighted by this and not scared out of my freaking mind.
Welcome to I shaved my legs for…THIS?! The newsletter exploring the theory that shaving your legs or putting in that bit of extra effort should translate to having an above-average day. To test this theory I critically review every shave and the subsequent day and give the entire day a rating out of 100. Any day that scores higher than a 75 was definitely worth the shave and hopefully worth you reading about.
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The Shave
A new razor and a nice clean shave. I was sitting on my couch one morning and the morning sun was streaming through the window in a way that gorgeously illuminated the hair I had missed on an entire side of my leg. I quickly abandoned everything to correct my shoddy shaving work and managed to catch those last few precious rays of light to confirm I had now most likely missed a new patch of hair.
Rating: 17/20 because of the sweet relief that comes from correcting a past wrong
The Content
A close friend gifted me Eat a Peach for Christmas, knowing that we both share a deep love for the work of Dave Chang (Lucky Peach, Ugly Delicious and The Dave Chang podcast all big highlights for me). I love Dave Change so much that going to Momofuku was one of my big items to tick off as soon as I got to Toronto. And yes, I didn’t rate it that highly, and sure it would have been easier to just go to the one in Sydney. But we live and learn friends, live and learn.
The book though has been the opposite of disappointed. I reached the point where I was reading it with a pen clenched tightly between my teeth so that I could underline passages like an obsessive mad man.
There were two sections in particular that really hit home for me, the first was Dave (yep, first name terms now) talking about how he used a consistent formula to make his dying restaurants successful - making food that chefs want to eat on their night off. This was a genius move for Dave and as a fan of ‘This is Marketing’ I appreciate the simplicity of the move. Unfortunately, not always a successful approach in Comedy, unless you want to be known for doing the most cooked comedy in town. Those dulled comedy tastebuds require too much spice to be useful for broad appeal.
The other section I loved was Dave talking about his rock bottom and meeting up with Anthony Bourdain to talk and hopefully get some advice. After a long night of good booze and food they parted ways without Dave feeling like he got the advice he needed. But an email was waiting for him from Anthony Bourdain reminding him to be a fool for the things you love and be damned with the cost or being sensible (paraphrased). This was totally inspiring and for a moment I felt like I could go all in on comedy. Until I looked at all the money I had made lately at my absolute busiest and it still wasn’t enough to pay much more than a months rent.
Rating: 16/20 because the insights were not applicable to my very specific life circumstances
The Food
I’ve been attempting to do more ‘meal prep’ lately as part of a soon to be launched project I am working on (oooo the mystery… no don’t panic of course, its a podcast). As part of this the other day I was inspired to make this Grossy Peloisi pasta salad after seeing it on someone else’s Instagram stories and naturally wanting to emulate those I see as better than myself.
The thing is, this pasta salad came together beautifully, but as it was food ‘prep’ and not food ‘eat right now’ it was left languishing in the fridge overnight. Or that was at least my intention. Except for every time I opened the fridge I couldn’t resist a little pasta salad bite, thinking no one will notice, just a little nibble while I am here. Oooo yeah, baby those flavours are playing together real nicely.
The siren call of the pasta salad was stronger than ever when I got in from a gig late at night and couldn’t help but fancy a little snack. The urge to eat post gig is something I work constantly to quell by having absolutely no food in the house. The problem is you always feel like you deserve a treat, either because you absolutely crushed (did good) or because you absolutely bombed (did very very bad). Sometimes I can even justify a treat for just doing fine because that hurts my ego the most.
Long story short, only the dregs of a pasta salad made it to the next night’s dinner.
Rating: 6/20 because snacking is evil and undid all my hard food prep work meaning I had to substitute my meal with the great hot chips I talked about last week
The Social Stuff
Really trying hard here to make this section only tangentially comedy-related so that I can hide even slightly the depths of my obsession.
So I was driving back to Melbourne from Ballarat late at night for…some reason. I was on my own and having a great time singing along to all the great songs I have saved on my phone from my teen years. I’m talking Fall Out Boy, Death Cab for Cutie, The Wombats. Real fun songs for a good ol sing.
Until the moment you realise that you are out on the road, with no other cars anywhere around, at midnight and any police car that pulls you over is probably a serial killer in disguise and SHOULD. NOT. BE. TRUSTED. So I spent a good portion of my drive, planning how I would handle that exact encounter. To the point where I felt I had nailed it so completely, I almost felt disappointed that I didn’t get a chance to test out my moves (keep car in drive, friend on the phone listening, window down just a crack, ask for credentials, if any funny business get the hell outta dodge and go back to singing The All American Rejects).
Next time I will probably just call a mate that lives overseas.
Rating: 10/20 because I genuinely freaked myself out for a while there.
The Miscellaneous Stuff
For some reason, I care about this candle DIY
Great profile of a youtube troll
Lets stop pretending the ‘ashamed of my smelly lunchbox’ is a ubiquitous experience for POC
Have been interested in the Japanese phenomenon of hikikomori ever since I read and loved Convenience Store Woman.
Everything I am and everything I can be hinges on the power of an afternoon walk.
The article I needed to read this fortnight.
PROMO TIME
You got some money burning a hole in your pocket and a drive to support the arts? Time to buy tickets to my Melbourne International Comedy Festival shows!
Stand up fans! Come see Breast of the Fest for a wild ride of killer comedy from not just me but other comedy legends. Tickets are $25 - 35 and the show runs from 25 March until 4 April (no shows on Wednesdays and no Prue on Saturdays).
For fans of late night stories and feeling warm and cosy, come join me and my mate Darcy Fleming at The Night Cap. The show is 10:15pm at Storyville from the 23rd of March until the 4th of April (no fridays and 9:15pm start on Saturdays). Each show will have four great comedians including the likes of Daniel Connell, Ivan Aristeguetta, Peter Jones, Urvi Majumdar, Jordan Barr, Luka Muller and way way more!
Rating: 20/20 knowing only that if you enjoy even one link above you should also feel obligated to come see one of my shows. Hell, why not come every night?!
Final Rating (69/100)
Well well well, we didn’t quite get there did we. Plus we are moving into the season where no one ever sees your legs and the shaves are pretty routinely not worth it at all.
If you read this far, thanks as always for spending some of your time with me. I really appreciate it. I have been a bit of a weird mess lately, getting worked up about things that probably won’t matter a year from now though at the moment they feel like they really will. Sometimes it is hard to tell whether you are genuinely freakin out or if you are just really tired because you’ve moved right next to hospital and they love still using the sirens even in the middle of the night. Surely at 4am just the flashing lights are enough no?
Next newsletter we will be a week into comedy festival, which means we are weeks away from ending this promo spiral. Please, please, please if I can ask you anything - buy some tickets. I would love to have those shows be great and full and have picked all the best people to work with to make sure you more than get your money back if you attend. Buy tickets for friends, lovers, siblings, colleagues. Anyone you know that might live in Melbourne and fancy a nice time. In return I promise you not only a good show, but to keep this newsletter free and as amusing as I can possibly make it for at least the rest of the year!