Maryanne Ventrice's What Did You Just Say to Me?

CMJ 2006 Diary
By Maryanne Ventrice

Full Article

Happy Thanksgiving!

A Teenager’s Written Account of the Very First Thanksgiving, November 1621

Things Not to Say at the Family Thanksgiving Table

How to Make it Through Your Family's Thanksgiving Dinner Without Making Enemies, an Ultimatum or a Complete Ass of Yourself

Holiday Attack Ads, Part 3: Christmas Kicks it Up a Notch

Long-Forgotten Holiday Specials #6

A Quotidian Christmas
First Broadcast: December 2, 2005
Mom heads back to the stationary store after people she had long written off as friends send her a Christmas card. Dad begrudgingly realizes that apparently no one else can be bothered to go shopping for gifts he can give his wife. A coworker decides the office holiday party is the perfect occasion to showcase their lightening celerity with alcohol consumption. An in-law concludes that this year the entire family is going to celebrate the holidays her way. A child’s greed is once more overindulged, resulting in crippling dissatisfaction later in life. A sibling goes ballistic over the proper placement of dessert forks. No one waters the tree.

Holiday Attack Ads, Part 2: Hanukkah Responds

Sean Crespo Will Teach You Satire

Disturbing items I am going to plant in my backpack to get back at the security guard who KNOWS I work at this federal building...

1. A jar of human balls.

2. 8 hundred million paper clips.

3. Old school porridge (hot) with raisins and hummels floating in it.

4. The cast of RENT.

More...

Long-Forgotten Holiday Specials #5

An Evening with Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
First Broadcast: December 14, 1971
In this live one-deer special, a struggling and clearly inebriated Rudolph attempts to resurrect his career and reach a more mature, metropolitan audience with a series of slurred dramatic monologues, mostly spoken cabaret-style singing and extended Lenny Bruce-like rants on politics, race, religion and "the clap." To this day it remains the only television holiday program to feature a host screaming obscenities at his own reflection in the mirror.

Special guest appearances by Gore Vidal, Black Panther founder Bobby Seale, Chief Justice Warren E. Burger, The Lawrence Welk Show Champagne Music Makers and the surviving members of The Banana Splits.

And the Word of the Year Is: Carbon Neutral! (Wait that's two...but still, Huzzah!)

As I bought my ticket to fly home for Thanksgiving this morning I was thrilled to find an optional add on for TerraPass. For $5.99 I was able to make my flight "carbon neutral," meaning that my $5.99 would go directly to funding alternative energy projects such as wind farms, which directly lead to reduced carbon emissions, thus making my trip as beneficial to out environment as it is harmful and netting it out to zero carbon impact...or some such thing. I'm sure that sounds like a lot of hooey to many of you, but the idea that these little green solutions are making their way into the mainstream is really exciting to me.

On top of that, during my daily trip to my favorite crunchy, yet slick, site, Treehugger, I came across this article:

Word of the Year: Carbon Neutral

It's good to know that in the same year we see the opening of a Creationist museum, we're also witnessing the mainstream greening of our culture. I guess that leaves us reasonably neutral.

Holiday Attack Ads: Part 1

With the recent electoral victory of the Democrats in both houses of Congress, one would think that the partisan rhetoric that has divided this nation in twain for well over a decade would cease to inundate us all.

Unfortunately, though the election is over, the holidays are nearly upon us. And you know what that means. Once again, Christmas and Hanukkah are starting in on their own smear campaigns against one another, vying for the hearts and minds of Americans young and old. Luckily for you, we managed to obtain copies of both sides' campaign ads by posing as a small NBC affiliate in the midwest. They fell for the ruse and sent us their tapes, and now we're going to post them for you our beloved audience weeks before they will even air.

But be warned, you're not going to believe what you're about to see, the level of raw ugliness and the willingness to sink to unthinkable moral depths simply to make a point. It's all there, in spades. This sort of behavior is pronounced enough in tightly run political battles, but compared to America's two most prominent religions, the Swift Boat Veteran ads look like a dissertation AGAINST factual relativism.

While we here at Drink At Work don't espouse this sort of defamatory tone in getting out a message of any kind, we must admit that these verbally violent spots, which were created by several faith-based PAC groups, at least properly reflects the essentially volatile nature of most major Western religions which all believe in the exclusivity of their own people's ability to reach heaven and at the same time the inherently doomed nature of those not born under the same religious star.

So, like the good Christians and Jews that we never really were, we will forgive them their nature and simply try to listen to the messages hidden underneath all the mean words and hostile images. We hope you can too.

Leading up to the holidays we will be releasing about one ad and one response ad each week. Stay tuned for Hanukkah's response to this first ad on behalf of Christmas.

Yours,
DAW

Long-Forgotten Holiday Specials #4

Frosty the Businessman
First Broadcast: December 20, 2005
Everybody’s favorite gelid jolly man returns yet again, this time in search of regular employment and a credit history. Thanks to the impressive networking skills of the now-grown and successful venture capitalist Karen from the first cartoon, Frosty is soon up to his eyeballs in mind-numbing hedge fund activism, corporate raiding, “poison pill” boardroom defenses and SEC inquiries, all culminating in an exhaustively detailed proxy fight set to the catchy holiday ditty “ValueAct Capital LP vs. Acxiom Corp.” While parents may find themselves at a loss to explain the mechanics of “chastity loans” and “standstill agreements” to their thoroughly dumbfounded children, working adults everywhere will no doubt will be tapping their toes to a percussive score that perfectly captures Frosty’s celebrated joie de vivre slowly being drummed out of existence by the relentless beat of corporate life.

Long-Forgotten Holiday Specials #3

Girls Gone Wild Christmas Carol
First Broadcast: December 11, 2001
Ebenezer Scrooge is a despicable old miser with a heart as warm as a dying ember and a life as cold as the thin gruel he dines on nightly. That is until one Christmas Eve when he’s visited by wave after wave of nubile college girls just dying to flash their funbags for the camera and your holiday cheer. Watch Ebenezer’s unexpected guests jingle their bells and check out the boughs on Holly as these fun-loving freshmen doff their tees and drink until their hearts are pumping Cuervo Gold. This is your chance to re-experience a festive favorite or just spot your daughter gyrating topless to Für Elise. Also of note: Girls Gone Wild Meet Oliver Twist, in which a poor orphan is forced to eke out a pitiful existence as a street urchin…until he’s picked up by a Range Rover packed with 15 of the most stacked sophomores ever to appear outside of a Russ Meyer film.

Tonight in Portland, Maine...Heroes!

Click for the full size flyer and details

The Drink at Work crew will be in sunny Portland, Maine tonight joining DAWer-at-large Corey Pandolph for a night of "comedy, music and heroes." If you're in the area, stop on by, watch the show and say hello.

Dead-Frog Interview with Christian Finnegan

Todd at Dead-Frog has a good interview with Christian Finnegan here. Christian headlined our show last night and did a great job as usual. He's one of those rare comics who remains incredibly nice even as he starts to get bigger and bigger. He hung out for the entire show and was just lovely to have around. Check out his new CD, Two for Flinching in stores now.

Oh, and if you've seen any press on Christian lately you've probably seen this photo taken by yours truly. Yeah, I know. Christian looks good and everything, but I made him wicked hot.

Go See Ann Carr in The Winner's Circle Tonight!

In the hilarious and achingly human one-woman show The Winner's Circle, brilliant comic actress Ann Carr embodies one lonely yet resilient character after another. Presented with warmth, detail and humility, each character defines her own space and time, inhabiting them in a way that is by turns uproarious, embarrassing, sexy and sweet. While some performers might take these larger than life characters and play them merely for laughs — and there are certainly plenty of laughs — Carr has a soft and particular touch that makes each woman realistic, sympathetic and noble in her own way. I defy you to see this show and not walk out of the theater smiling.

'THE WINNER'S CIRCLE'
Written by Ann Carr
Directed by Nina Morrison

Tuesday, November 7th, 8:00 p.m.
Theatre Under St. Marks
94 St. Marks Place (between 1st & Ave. A)
Tickets are $10 at the door
Running time is 1 hour

Take the 6 to Astor Place
the N,R to 8th Street
or the F/V to 2nd Avenue

Sean Crespo Will Teach You Satire

Best Western Rock
By Sean Crespo

Full Article

Daily Comedy Guest Stars

DailyComedy.com is a fun group blog featuring some of our favorite comics, including Tom Shillue and Jessica Kirson. And now, two of your Drink at Work bartenders, Carol Hartsell and Sean Crespo, have recently been added as "Guest Stars" on the blog...suuuuweeeeet! So add that to your list of humor sites to check regularly.

Drink at Work.com: 12 Steps to World Domination

Maryanne Ventrice's What Did You Just Say to Me?

What Is Indie? A Look Into the World of Independent Musicians
Interview by Maryanne Ventrice

Full Article

Long-Forgotten Holiday Cartoon Specials #2

A Q*Bert Christmas
First Broadcast: December 17, 1983
Straight from the 1980's—when arcade game characters such as Pac-Man and Donkey Kong appeared on everything from cartoons to Sunday morning TV political roundtable discussions—comes this confused retelling of The Gift of the Magi in which the mute title character sells his favorite watch only to wind up evading coiled snakes on a multi-colored pyramid in the dark, foreboding abyss for all of eternity. But what the cartoon loses in regards to O. Henry’s poignant storytelling flair and bittersweet sense of irony it more than makes up for with two mischief-making pineapples and a cataclysmic ending straight from the "Game Over" sequence in Missile Command.

The special was immediately followed by the little-seen holiday cartoon A BurgerTime Chanukah.

I Once Accidentally Used the Phrase "Hand Job" During a Meeting: A Very Special Quick Moment with Carol

I was in a meeting with my boss and her boss explaining the cost breakdown of printing a brochure. I was trying to explain the work associated with manually scoring and folding the pieces, and instead of saying, "manual work," or "done by hand," I accidentally said, "Well, it's a hand job..."

Now, while that was really, really embarrassing, I didn't lose my job, I wasn't sent home and I wasn't even asked to apologize. Oh, and my party didn't lose the midterm elections because of it either.

I don't know if this is spin after the fact, but it has been widely reported that the line John Kerry meant to read in his speech was as follows:

"Do you know where you end up if you don’t study, if you aren’t smart, if you’re intellectually lazy? You end up getting us stuck in a war in Iraq. Just ask President Bush."

He left out the word "us."

Have you ever told a joke and got so excited about the punchline you screwed it up? Yes. Have you ever condemned thousands of men, women and children to their deaths in service of a war that you knowingly justified on false claims? No. We've all committed verbal gaffes, but few of us are guilty of myriad crimes against humanity.

Of course, you may not share my opinions on President Bush's methods of leadership, his intelligence or his ideology, and that's fine (well, it's not fine, but I accept disparate opinions as necessary and unavoidable). Nevertheless, as an electorate, let's do keep our eyes on the ball, people. Red herrings are tasty, but they aren't criteria for making informed and honest choices.

xoxo,
Carol
(Committed to Fighting the War on Rhetorical Terror)

Sean Crespo Will Teach You Satire

Hipster Bacteria

Crespotivational E-Card 5

Crespotivational E-Card 6

Long-Forgotten Holiday Cartoon Specials #1

Santa Gets Pissed Off Yet Again and Cancels Christmas for the Umpteenth Time
First Broadcast: December 3, 1975
In The Year without a Santa Claus, Santa refuses to deliver gifts when he feels unappreciated by the children of the world. In Twas the Night before Christmas, Santa refuses to deliver gifts when he feels slighted by a letter written by a mouse. This time Santa’s hair-triggered temperment is set off when he has to find about a dear friend’s engagement through another source, making him wonder why he even bothers trying to get close to people. Plus, he thinks he’s fat. Soon he’s scrapping all flight plans, setting his elfin employees adrift on ice floes and burning his entire factory down (with several anthropomorphic toys still inside). And once more a determined band of misfits and towheaded tots must go out of their way and beyond their means to butter up the big man and show Santa what the holidays are truly all about—regret and recrimination.