Living a Dream

Not like that fake 100th post from a week or two ago. This is actually my 100th post at kevinpaulnye.blogspot.com, which would be more of an accomplishment if it didn't actually take me 6+ years. That's right, the first post on this site was in July of 2009 - about seven weeks after I graduated college, which is a seriously distant memory at this point. There've been some ups and downs along the way. Originally it was meant to be a journal of finding some legs in the entertainment world: I talked about my first ever stand-up comedy audition , talked about the week-long trip I took to New York with Lou-Chaz Bitsko, and even what my life would look like if it were a movie . Life changed: I moved to Chicago and wrote about people on the train biting each other's ears and just being gross , posted a total of five times in 2011, pretended to get back into blogging in 2012, then left this old thing dormant from August 2012 until November 2014. Oops. But now that I

People ask if every idea has been had before by someone else. The theory is that there are so many people in the world - and so many who have already lived - that you don't have a truly original thought in your head. In response to this question, I pose a question of my own. Who cares? It doesn't matter if no one has ever thought the exact things that you're thinking, because you're you and that means that it's different. No one has the exact experiences and lenses that you see the world through. When taking improv classes at Second City and iO Chicago, there were plenty of recurring themes, and while the majority of the lessons centered around freeing your mind and being in the moment as you're onstage, there was a specific explanation that stuck with me. As per Colleen Doyle (a teacher I had/genius whose shows with Dummy at iO were/are absolutely incredible), the characters you play are affected by your own life; you see what the character sees, but you

For realzies, guys. We just had our Improv level D show tonight...and it was friggin fantastic. Sure, there was a little mishap with the timing and we didn't get our allotted 25 minutes and they actually just cut the lights before we were done, but it was still awesome. I've got great news that sprung from this: My suspicions were true...this is my drug. After our level C show a couple of months ago, I didn't feel good about myself. The show went fine but I didn't like how I performed...I didn't feel like I was focusing on the right aspects of the scenes - I wasn't creating anything interesting, I was just kinda sitting back and letting it happen around me. I was passive, and it felt stupid. But tonight, getting off stage after that show...it was totally different. I felt like I performed well and was completely in tune with my scene partners and wasn't worried about what was going on in the crowd. It just felt amazing. I was on a huge emotional high for a f

As I sit here on my couch and watch the end of the Monday Night Football game (it's been a good one, fyi), I find myself struggling to successfully wrap myself in my blanket. I'm cold, but I need to figure out how to keep myself free to type while keeping the rest of myself warm. And now I realize something. THE SNUGGIE IS EFFING INCREDIBLE. Go ahead and make fun of it. Goodness knows that I have. I've made fun of my mom a bunch of times for having one. I even got one of my own when they gave them out at Cavs games last year and made fun of myself for having it. Occasionally I used it...and if the time was just right, and I really needed it...my god. That was a great invention. That's really my whole thought. I guess I'll move on and say that I actually got a job. It's part-time, but I may have gotten a 2nd one also. After routinely getting rejected from all kinds of jobs in all kinds of ways, I was walking past a shoe store near my house with a "help wante

Dear Couple Sitting in Front of Me on the Train, Let me start by saying that I believe that love, in all its forms, is an inherently beautiful thing. I believe that it is an important thing in a human's life to find someone who understands their neurosis, but beyond that, someone who actually enjoys it. It's wonderful to think there are people out there who want nothing more than to make you happy. But that's not what this is about. This is about your cutesy/lovey/nuzzling games that you played for 13 stops - aka 24 minutes. First of all, yes, I said it's great to have someone who understands you, but that someone should also understand that you both look like complete and utter assholes. I'm fine with having your arm around someone, but you (girl, who I'm now naming Megan) actually took the initiative to sit up straight, turn toward guy (who I'm naming Kyle), and properly give him a legitimate hug on an extremely crowded 1:30 A.M. train. My initia

Baby, don't hurt me . Sorry about that. This entry should really fall under the "makes you wonder" category and thus the other blog, but it's something that I've been thinking about since moving to Chicago, so it stays here - as this is the Chicago/entertainment world/whatever it is blog. I was on the bus home from the first time I've ever done improv on a stage in front of people who weren't my classmates (went alright, more nerve wracking than I expected) and I got to thinking. Over the last month or so I've had to say goodbye to an awful lot of people. Not permanent goodbyes, thankfully, as I think I've done a pretty good job keeping up with most of them. These people are my closest friends and family and they mean the world to me. So when I tell these people that I love them, it comes as no surprise. They say it back in most cases, and we go on our way. But we never stop and try to articulate it. There were at least two people who I had planne

I had another one of those moments today. It reaffirmed that I'm making the right choice by wanting to go to Second City and go after the ultimate goal of making people laugh all the time. That's actually one of the nice things about caddying, is that it makes me realize that I don't want to be caddying and would rather be out doing something I enjoy. Now that I'm thinking about it, there were actually two moments, and I'll explain them. Starting now-ish. I was forecaddying for a group of four really nice guys. Being nice guys, they asked me what I wanted to do and what I was doing and all those standards, so I told them I was saving up some money from caddying and was gonna head to Chicago in the fall to go after the dream of Second City and either Improv or Comedy Writing. As we talked about it, the one guy said something like this: "Well, you're looking at three CPAs and a business owner. They're good jobs, it's a great way to make a living...but

There's a commonly used expression that says you should do something every day that scares you. I'm not so sure that this is a safe practice because I don't have the money to do a lot of scary things like parachuting, alligator wrestling, heli -skiing, or asking someone to marry me (easily the scariest on the list). That leaves me with less expensive fear options like driving on the wrong side of the road, walking into the Crip neighborhood with Blood colors on, or what I did today; stand on the top of a really shaky ladder and paint a barn on a very windy day. I realize that painting a barn isn't gonna get me the street cred that Coolio has, but I'll be damned if I didn't feel a gust of wind, wobble a little bit, feel my heart skip a beat, and then laugh about how awesome it was. My point is this: How great is that feeling? How cool is it to know that something could have gone horribly wrong, but it didn't? Does anything make you feel more alive than that

I planned on writing a poem to a complete stranger who happened to be my 100th follower. Instead, I'm now going to write a poem to Mike Eppich ( @Mike_Eppich on Twitter). Mike came in as my 100th follower. On the one hand, that's fun...on the other hand, he was my 40th (ish) follower who then decided to unfollow me in hopes of becoming my 100th follower and recipient of said poem. The shame is that it actually worked. The reason I have such a 'tude toward this character is because I played baseball with him for a couple years and have kept in very close touch with him ever since. He specifically requested that I do not write a haiku for him. So here's a haiku for him. Mike just quit his job He probably sucked at it 'Cause Mike Eppich sucks. So that's a start. But I feel like that's a total cop-out. Check out @Mike_Eppich and you can read his little bio, It's where he uses ellipses to fake some James Bond style. It falsely claims he works and sells unifor

Someone asked me today: if my life were made into a movie, would I watch it? HELL YES, I WOULD. Upon answering so emphatically, she called me out for being cocky. Here is my extended answer, including teasers, cliff-hangers, and the possible title. I justify my arrogance by saying that if I don't believe in my product, who in the world is going to see it? The movie about me would be executive produced by me, obviously. I have the final say in what goes and what doesn't. If my life were made into a movie, only the most important parts would make it...it would be like a 23 year highlight reel crammed into 2 hours and 12 minutes (any longer and I'm risking a major walk-out-to-pee-and-miss-the-important-stuff crowd reaction). For the meaty part, think about all the great things this movie would have! It would feature sports, love, friendships, hardships, heartbreaks, family bonds, and most importantly...frontal male nudity. Name one thing from that list that doesn't appear

Well, I got a job. Far from perfect, but I'm employed. I'm working in the Cavs team shop at the Q...which is cool. It's majorly part time, so I'm still looking into other things whenever I can. The story here lies in my first day. I found out I got the job on Friday and was starting Monday...in the team shop...on the day of a home game. That is to say that I was being tossed into the proverbial fire despite zero retail experience whatsoever (but at least I didn't lie about that in the interview, so I got that going for me). Not as intimidating as I'm making it out to be, but one could understand that it was a slightly tense drive downtown. Anyway, I got to the shop a little before 5:00 and was a little confused with the way things were going, but I got ushered through it all and made sense of what was going on. I was to be the guy in the Witness section; basically I'd just help people get stuff in that section and that was it. Well, the store doesn't op

It's become a funny existence. I wake up, I sit around, I catch up on Ninja Warrior, I eat, play video games, work out, watch the Cavs, and repeat. In between I apply for jobs, don't hear back, sulk, laugh, make others laugh, read things, write things, listen to music and occasionally sell things on eBay for my grandmother. But what am I doing? There are few things that I know are certain, and one of them is that my parents are displeased that I don't have a job - particularly my dad. I can't say that I blame him, but the real problem is that he acts like I'm thrilled about not having a job. I've got a big job fair that the Cavaliers are hosting on the horizon, it's later this month, and I really am starting to put the majority of my proverbial eggs in that basket...problem is, though, that the basket has slippery handles. I'm sick of not doing anything, but there's nothing to do. I can't keep asking people if they want to hire me when I know tha

It's no secret if you're reading this (both of you who read this, I mean) that I love having an audience, or at the very least, people to entertain. The more I think about wanting to be famous, the more I want it. I've been hearing people on the radio and seeing people on TV and everything they do or say makes me want to be successful...it's really outta control. Anyway, last week I was caddying at the golf course and I was with a pair of gentlemen named Pete and Kevin...easy names to remember, you know, with me being Kevin and my brother being Pete. Anyway, now that I've put space between their first and last names, they were Ditchman and Riley, respectively. Pete seemed to be a little down on his luck as of late; the economy and whatever he had been doing for a living were not a good mix. Kevin, on the other hand, was killing it. He was talking about taking jobs and how he wouldn't move to another city for less than $200,000 per year...which leads one to bel

One of the things I mentioned in the preface was stand-up comedy. I know that I'm a pretty funny guy, but I also know that for the most part, I don't think like a comedian. I'm funny when I tell stories to my friends because they know the parties involved - sometimes they are the parties involved, but that's another story. So the seed had been planted long ago to at least give stand-up a shot of some sort. I recall freshman year in college discussing how to get started in stand-up with a guy named Josh Wade, who performed at Marietta College. He basically just said you have to go for it...find open-mic nights and just start trying. Over time I had slowly gathered a little bit of material. There wasn't really a theme to much of it, which is dangerous. I watched enough stand-up that I realized that the good acts have something tying most of the jokes together, and even if they aren't together, there's at least an absurd segue into the unrelated joke. I had e