Comedy Contest 88 (Blog 495)

This Matt Jones promo day, I won’t be posting one of his sketches but one of his podcasts about being a teacher! I taught guitar for a while and whilst I do know how to play, to be honest I’ve never been 100% sure I play the way I’m supposed to, as I’m largely self taught and the couple of years or so of lessons I did have were flipping ages ago. Therefore in the days I taught, I used to watch loads of Youtube videos of guitarists giving lessons so I could copy them. Youtube videos rarely any deeper than holding plectrums the right way, picking strings and playing chords. You’d think there would be a system stopping people like me from teaching, nope anyone can teach. Good for me, bad for students and their paying parents. It’s even bad for the people listening to the students. In the end it didn’t really matter as I never kept any of them, though. Ok, there was one kid I taught for a good few months, but he refused to practice so I taught him the same thing over and over again. Success! Very easy. I actually earned a good amount of money from him and I didn’t feel bad because it was his fault. I once applied for work as a teaching assistant in a school but got an almost immediate no. But not Matt Jones! Wow.

Matt said he teaches acting to children! Maybe I could teach comedy? It’s easy to do as comedy is subjective. I could ask ‘What do YOU find funny?’ Then when I get a reply, I could say ‘Do that.’ Judging by my past behaviour it’s something I am capable of. It is SOMETHING, certainly more than what one of my IT teachers did, who knew I was playing computer pinball all lesson and every lesson, she just let me and I certainly wasn’t an exception. I didn’t even get very good at pinball which is perhaps the most depressing thing. You can get an insight into my state of mind at the time with that personal observation, it wasn’t looking good. However… what would you rather have, something that starts out good but gets worse, or the other way around? Because in a way, that’s my life. My life that in my opinion is better than that of my school friends. Oh they had a great time? Well I feel great simply watching Youtube after the gym. My old chums would probably find that very depressing. When I go to the zoo? I’m so happy I could die.

Matt explained in an acting class, a child took things a little too seriously when he pretended to rob a bank and threatened to shoot people. There is being a convincing actor and there is someone really loving the thought of robbing people, and it seems to me Matt was dealing with the latter. Sounds like a future criminal to me. I guess part of the problem is, how would you report the person? You could say ‘Someone in my class threatened the other children!’ Then the other person would ask ‘And why did he do that?’ Then the first person would have to say ‘Because I told him to.’ Talk about feeling like an idiot. The first person could explain the child was really, really into it, but again he’d have to admit the behaviour was actively encouraged by him.

Matt said it’s probably too hard for his students to follow him on social media. I know how to find him on Youtube at least, you type in ‘Matt Jones Comedy’. Pretty basic stuff, but then again, are future bank robbers known for their intellect? Part of the problem is they often feel like they have no other options. A horrifying situation for Matt Jones I am sure, just know that I’m sure he’s a damn good teacher. A lesser teacher would just let the problem child play pinball all the time. I’m wondering what his CV would be like as he grows older. Maybe something like ‘I’m great at pinball (or at very least I’m better than the other two no hopers in my old class), I’m damn good at scaring the other children and I think I can scare adults, too.’ You have to write SOMETHING, don’t you?

Now check out his podcast, below!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mAaoTdUidAQ

Changing the subject, there’s an audio illusion on Youtube you can watch where a pylon jumps up and down, and even if you turn the volume completely off, you still hear a rumbling noise when the pylon hits the ground. I watched a random video on Youtube of another object crashing to the ground and the illusion didn’t work! Why does it only seem to work with pylons?? Maybe it’s your brain trying to make as much sense of the situation as it can? Your mind would be like ‘not only is a pylon jumping, it’s making no sound as well??? That’s simply unacceptable to a logical organ such as myself, I’m going to have to make the person I’m controlling think there is a sound, it would crush him if absolutely nothing made sense.’ I mean a normal person would have so many questions. ‘How can an object with no legs jump? Maybe they do have legs? If so, why were they given them? What is the pylon getting out of jumping? Why is it acting alone? Who taught it to jump and why? Why not do something useful like make a jumping car? I’d like a jumping car.’ etc., etc. And on that weird note… bye!