Stay Positive: Weeks 2 & 3 By Ted Pettingell

Jun 18, 2015Ted PettingellArticles, Comedy, Lifestyle & Culture0

Ah that didn’t take long. Two weeks in and I already missed an update. I told you I couldn’t handle the pressure. All you kind folks throwing praise at me really got me overwhelmed and I as sure as shit didn’t want to write a subpar update and let you all down. I know thats not the point of doing this but oh boy do I like beating myself up for no reason.

A common interaction I have had the past couple weeks is “Hey, I read your article and it was really great I found really, relatable, or inspiring, or brave.” And I say “thanks, I’m glad you liked it.” But in my head I’m like, “Hey, they didn’t say its funny, am I wasting everyone’s time not being funny?” God, I’ve got a long way to go to self acceptance. I do apologize for missing a week. I have been very busy. More on that later. I’ll try to keep these as regular as possible. Anyway thanks for reading this, or any of the other nonsense I write one the internet, or just taking an interest in my existence. So here lets get to it.

The Negative

So, I missed a week everybody. That didn’t feel good. Except for the part that did feel good. You know the relief of apathy. Let me explain. Sometimes, I procrastinate, and by sometimes I mean anytime of have a deadline whether it be real or arbitrarily self imposed. It is a real poor work habit I have had for as long as I can remember.

When I was kid and I would get assigned school projects and I would put them off till the very last day. For years on the last day I would work like a crazy person to get the whole thing done in one sitting, which is a terrible way to do something and makes you not enjoy what you are learning at all. But I would always get things done because I was so afraid of what would happen if I didn’t.

Not that I would fail or anything like that but I thought my life literally depended on finishing an assignment. Like if I didn’t finish my teacher would turn into some sort of rage monster and consume me. I believed this into middle school. However at some point I missed an assignment, and you know what happened? Nothing. Sure, I got yelled at a little but I did not witness a mild mannered seventh grade english teacher turn into a hell beast bent on tearing my soul apart. Anyway, when you treat something like life and death and you survive it suddenly there is the relief of feeling alive. Down the line eventually you have to deal with the negative consequences but in the moment it is instant gratification.

Procrastinating is masturbation for the soul. Note change the name of this article to Masturbation for the Soul. And like real masturbation, if you do it to much it can be paralyzing. That wasn’t the only negative thing that happened the past couple weeks and I don’t want to blow missing an article out of proportion but I’ll leave it at that. I don’t want to talk about the general sense of ennui I feel a lot of the time because what would I write about next week.

The Positive

Well, I have been really busy everybody. I know that it probably doesn’t sound positive coming from the guy who just wrote about procrastination and apathy, but it is a good thing. Even if it is just a distraction from the crushing pain in my soul it is still some relief. But its more than that.

I’ve been writing for this site a ton. I did miss this column last week but I have started another column that people seem to really like and I have written a series or articles that are going to come out later this summer. As Rich Karski, America’s Fool, said, “Ted you’ve written more in the last week than you have in the last two years.” And he is correct in that. And I’ve once again quickly replaced him as the most popular writer on the site. Maybe next week he can write about how he heard a Cure song while he was crying about how much more people like me. I’m sorry, this part of the article is for positivity so I shouldn’t be mean to Rich, but have you met the guy? He really really deserves this.

I also started doing a podcast with Shawn Carter, its called Fart the Podcast and it is going to be as great as anything called Fart the Podcast can be. Look for it soon. I will bring it up every week until Carter starts posting them. Its also grilling season. I love grilling. I love cooking for people in general but there is something so great about grilling. It combines feeding human beings with my first love, playing with fire.

Grillmaster TP, grillin for the laaaadiez!

Oh and its just getting started. I found a five dollars off ribs coupon today and I’m going to be the most popular guy at all the cook outs. I also started working on a project that I am not going to tell you about but I think it may be the single funniest thing I have ever come up with, and thats saying a lot because I wrote suck all the dicks and that joke is amazing. But maybe in a few months when its done I’ll tell you about it. Or maybe it will be like most of my other things and never get done because I procrastinated the shit out of it.

Stay positive.

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Ted Pettingell

Ted is a contributor at UnSceneComedy.com. Ted loves comedy. He hates writing short Bios about himself. Ted is very good at comedy. He is not very good at writing his Bio. Ted is constantly working on his comedy. Ted rarely works on writing his Bio. Ted tell his jokes at all the major clubs in Boston. Ted writes his Bio on his home computer. Ted has appeared in several comedy festivals. His Bio has not. Ted was the Comic in Residence at the Comedy Studio in December 2010. His Bio took the month off to spend time with family. Lets review Comedy Good, Bios Bad.