Surprise

On a day when by all-rights the lead story should be the discovery of the oldest human skeleton ever found, giving new indications to how we evolved, Letterman’s roller-coaster ride is on the tips of the tongues of most in the entertainment world.

With an auspicious start to the new season, Letterman hosted a pair of presidential guests, highlighting a star-studded lineup for the week. President Obama and Letterman had a charming and humorous back and forth, and Letterman seemed like he was with an old friend when Bill Clinton was on his couch.

The results in the ratings was overwhelming. Letterman blew a way the Tonight Show by the largest margin in 15 years, and dominating in the 18-49 and 25-54 year old demographics.

As news of Letterman’s domination of the late night market hit the wire, David Letterman was taping his show for tonight. According to a press release by Worldwide Pants Inc. Letterman made some shocking personal revelations during today’s taping. Letterman has been the victim of an attempted extortion. At stake was the exposure of Letterman’s sexual affairs with members of his staff. Another revelation Letterman made while exposing the attempted blackmail.

At the top of his game, with the numbers to prove it, and Mr. Letterman all the while is entrenched in the kind of real life turmoil that must put that type of success into perspective.

At least Letterman will have some material for his monologue about today’s announcement of a remarkable discovery, truly shedding light on the evolution V. creation debate.

The Missing Link

Earlier Today CNN added new fodder to an age old debate. With the announcement of a remarkable anthropological find, the question of God and how we all got here just got more interesting.

The discovery of Ardipithecus ramidus, quaintly referred to as Ardi by the scientists who have been studying the 4.4 million old 4 foot, not quite human, not quite chimpanzee skeleton. As project co-director and paleontologist Tim White from the university of California, Berkeley told CNN “this is not an ordinary fossil. It’s not a chimp. It’s not a human. It shows us what we used to be.”

As C. Owen Lovejoy, an evolutionary biologist at Kent State University and project anatomist, told CNN Thursday”what Ardipithecus tells us is that we as humans have been evolving to what we are today for at least 6 million years,”

With the country already in the midst of a heated debate on who or what God is, and how us as human beings came to be. Comedians all around the country should be paying attention to this historic addition of evidence.

As it turns out Man did not evolve from chimpanzees, our closest genetic match on the planet, but both chimpanzees and humans both evolved from the same ancestor, who’s story is yet to be told, as their remains lie somewhere under volcanic rock or mounds of earth. Just waiting to tell give us more material for the Debate on God.

knowledgebrain.com

I am writing this as an experiment.  Nothing you read in this piece from this point, with the exception of spelling and grammar, will be edited, rewritten or thrown out.  Basically, I am writing a stream of consciousness piece to demonstrate how I like to write jokes.  I know this is supposed to be an opinion column but like the title says, “I Got Nothing.”  Who am I to give a “how to” on joke writing, you ask?  I’m the one typing these words that you’re currently reading, so stop asking stupid questions.  I read about comedy all the time and I can say I’ve never come across an article or column such as this so I guess I’m also a groundbreaker, bitches.
 
First I need a premise.  It doesn’t have to be brilliant, just something I hate.  Hate is too strong a word.  What irks me?  What doesn’t sit right with me as I sit here at work, not working, spilling my brain for you?  Healthcare?  No, too easy.  Patrick Swayze?  Not feeling it.  Let me check out the web to see what’s going on in the world.  (15 minutes later)  I got it.  I just saw video of a chimpanzee doing karate.  It seems original enough for this.  Might not make it into the act but it will certainly do for this column.
 
Now, how do I begin this joke?  “I saw a chimpanzee doing karate on the web.”  Well, that sucks as an opening statement.  It sounds like a monkey chopping up shit on a web.  That would be one big fucking spider.  Let’s go broader before we get to the chimp.  “People have too much time on their hands.”  That’s better.  Now explain the set up.  “I saw a chimpanzee trainer teach a monkey karate.”  Don’t like how that sounds.  Chimpanzee trainer will be hard to say and I might fuck it up on stage, especially if I’ve been drinking.  I shouldn’t drink before I perform.  “I saw an animal trainer teach a chimpanzee karate.”  Man, this joke sucks before I even write it.  Fuck it, finish this turd and move on.  Need a punch line.  Where’s the surprise?  Not much of one.  I need to lead them away from where I want them to go.  “People have too much time on their hands.  On the internet, I saw an animal trainer teach a chimpanzee karate.  Is this really helping the cause?  Are too many chimpanzees getting their lunch money stolen?  This animal has five times the strength of a human and now it can do spinning round house kicks?  If we’re going to waste our time teaching animals human behavior, can we at least teach them something practical, like fellatio?”  Ok, technically that’s a joke but it sucks ass.  Back to the drawing board.
 
Let’s simplify.  “I saw a guy on TV teaching a chimpanzee karate.  I think it’s great that The Ultimate Fighter now has Kimbo Slice.”  Too racist and not even funny.  Well it’s kind of funny but it’s just a set up and a punch line; nowhere to go after that punch.  I could do the same joke but make it political.  “I saw a guy on TV teaching a chimpanzee karate.  I think it’s great that George Bush is keeping active.”  Kimbo was funnier.  What is it about this premise?  What’s the truth here?  A guy teaches a chimp how to do round house kicks.  It’s kind of cool but that’s only because it is always cool when an animal does anything like a human.  He could teach it how to play the piano.  He could teach it sign language.  He could teach it to drive a car.  How about teaching it to avoid captivity so it can spend it’s time being a chimp and not impersonating Jean Claude Van Damme?  What about karate?  What is it used for?  Defense?  Offense?  How do chimps normally defend themselves?  Why would an animal trainer want to teach a chimp karate?  Lots of options here.  What is my opinion at the core of all of this?  I guess I think this guy who teaches chimps how to do karate is a real self-righteous attention whore who exploits animals through stupid and probably inhumane tricks just to get on TV and YouTube.  Whatever, let’s just say it all.
 
“I saw this guy on YouTube who taught his chimpanzee to do karate.  He was jumping and spinning and kicking and punching and the whole time I’m watching this I’m thinking, big deal, I see monkeys doing karate every time I watch UFC.  Put a TapOut shirt on this chimp and he could pass for your average Ultimate Fighter contestant but with better ears, teeth and sexual orientation.  Why would you want to teach a chimpanzee karate?  Are the other chimps in the neighborhood stealing his lunch money?  Does this chimp lack discipline in his life?  No, it’s a fucking chimpanzee!  This is a wild animal that could rip your face off and now you want to give him proper technique?  Do you want to make sure he rotates his hips as he rips off a nut sack?  If you’re going to waste your time training chimpanzees to be like humans, why not teach them something a little more practical, like Twittering.  I’d be more interested in what Bubbles has on his mind than Ashton Kutcher.  The ironic thing about the whole thing is that while this douche bag trainer is wasting his time teaching the chimp to defend itself by throwing round house kicks, I’ve found it’s much easier to defend myself by simply throwing shit.  You don’t need a black belt when you have a brown hand.”
 
There you go.  Not an instant classic but certainly open mike worthy.  What started out as a joke turned into a bit.  Hey, what can I say, I’ll take bits over jokes any day.  Since this is an opinion column, I’ll close by giving my opinion.  Bits take more thought to write than jokes.  Jokes can turn into bits if you’re not lazy and think it through.  Animal trainers are assholes.  There is my opinion.