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So Proud of My Son

 

     

 

On September 30, 2022, my son, Ian Kennedy, opened his business, Naughty Axes Playhouse, at 4407 SE 29th Street, in Del City, Ok.

I'm so proud of him.

The place looks great. Especially when it was all decked out for Halloween.

He and his partners built all the targets, lanes, and remolded the interior of the building themselves.

They did a great job.

I didn't even realize my son knew how to use a hammer for anything other than demolition.

I had such a great time during their Grand Opening.

Throwing sharp objects at stationary targets is really a fantastic way to relieve stress.

It's great exercise. Especially for tightening up those flabby underarms.

I am bound and determined to become efficient enough to enter a tournament.

Wonder if they have a Senior's division in pro axe throwing competitions?

Not only is he starting his own axe throwing business, he's also starting his career as a comedian.

He's already performed at the Bricktown Comedy Club a few times.

He's always been a funny kid.

I’m not good with humor on paper.

I’m good at comedy comebacks.

If I have someone to bounce snarky remarks off of, I can be really funny.

Of course, I am probably the only one who thinks I’m funny.

Comedy on paper is a whole other entity.

It’s hard to judge how others will react to humor.

Will the reader get the joke?

People tend to take my jokes too seriously. Especially on social media.

My humor is usually more annoying than funny.

I’m annoying in real life. No surprise I’m annoying online.

So, how do you write humor?

Asking for a friend.

I've stopped trying to write humor.

Occasionally, I make myself laugh aloud with some scene or dialogue no one else ever finds funny. Other times, my friends laugh aloud at things I never intended to be humorous.

My friends tell me I have a tendency to edit the humor out of most of my work.

I've discovered I am so much funnier when I am not even trying to be funny.

When I attempt to be humorous, people take me too seriously. When I attempt to be serious, people laugh.

It's a catch 22.

So, I don't even try to be funny. I just let it flow.

I write the story, the situation, and the dialogue without worrying about whether or not it is humorous.

That may sound like terrible advice. Especially from someone who tends to edit a manuscript to death. 

So far, it's worked for me. (No money back guarantees it will work for anyone else.)

In 2021 I wrote a one act play for the Namron Players Theatre's annual 24 Hour Play event. The script was about everything going wrong at a wedding rehearsal. The situation suggested it was intended to be humorous. But, some of the dialogue sounded angry.

I turned the script over to the director and cast with minimal input from me, other than the words on the paper.

Not allowed to participate in the rehearsal of THE REHEARSAL, I worried the director and cast would interpret the script as a serious drama.   

Luckily they interpreted it as a melodramatic, comic, telenovela type soap opera. They caught and hit every joke, and every intentionally over the top silliness. The performances were hysterically funny.

They made me look so good.

No one was more surprised than I, at how funny the script actually turned out to be.

A different director, a different cast, a different audience, a different reader might have overlooked the humor.

So my suggestion for writing humor is write the situation and hope your reader sees the humor in that situation.

Of course, I seriously advise you read and research humor from someone who is actually funny.

That would not be me. 

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