Let's Call It Rant Stimuli

So recently, after the Colin rant, I have stuff in my head but I'm not sure how to form it into a focused rant with enough of a point that I can post it on here shamelessly. Basically, I'm having rant problems - not because I'm running out of Whose Line to talk about, no frickin way. But because I don't know how to organize the rest of my thoughts in the right way. And as a perfectionist, I will only accept the right way.

But just for fun I've been exploring a few Tumblrs - I'm not on Tumblr, but I found a few public ones. And they are beautiful. There's Fuck Yeah Whose Line, which I have been checking faithfully, and Fuck Yeah Colin and Ryan which has also been checked faithfully. And among my explorations of fandom, I have found something that will at least stimulate conversation, at most an entire rant.

It's a thirty day meme.

Every day there is a question - What's your favourite cast member? What's your favourite game? - and so on and so forth. And every day for thirty days I will answer the appropriate question. Just tonight I found the list of things and I scrawled them down in my barely legible writing (it's like a secret code! Only I can read it, and others who have both had practice and who concentrate hard), made even less legible because I was writing quickly and because it's nearly two in the morning. Yes, I have literally been enjoying Whose Line and the fandom of Whose Line for three hours. I need a life. Where was I when they were handing out lives? I was over here watching Whose Line, that's what. DEAL WITH IT.

Anyways, starting hopefully tomorrow, this meme will commence on this very blog, hopefully with lots of ranting and lots of otherwise useless screenshots, and hell, maybe even a few Youtube videos. It is, after all, a show, right? Videos are kind of essential.

Just thought I'd warn you.

Also I have lots of useless stuff that won't work in a rant but are Whose Line related anyways, and they will be spammed at various intervals on this blog.

Just a warning.

Think I'll go to bed now.

Cause I Have A Life And Stuff

Yeah.... I was bored today...... so I ended up making this.

A tribute to the Ry/Col telepathy. I love the look they give each other the minute Ryan is speaking with an australian accent. ADORABLE!!!!!


Yeah.... I don't have a life.... I'm cool.

One Of a Kind

I'll go back to Whose Line rants soon, but I just had an epiphany and it's going to be hard to explain right, and at first you're going to think "No sh*t, sherlock", but bear with me.

The epiphany I had is this:

Everyone is different.

That would be the "No sh*t, sherlock," moment. But just see me through here.

We all know it in theory. We know in theory that everyone is different. But how well can we really know it if we don't know the personality of every single person on this planet earth? There's somewhere around six billion people in the world, and not a single one is exactly the same as any other.

Are you starting to see the hugeness yet?

In theory, we know that everyone is different. And yet, we still end up saying things like "everyone shops at [insert random store here]" or  "everyone likes [insert musical artist here]." As if we were the odd ones out. But the truth is this: everyone is the odd one out in their own mind because everyone has something different about them.

Let me try explaining it like this:

I often think that I am very different than everyone else, because I'm into old, unpopular shows and old, retro music and I don't like to..... well, to show myself off and so on and so on. And I often say the word "everyone" to show how different I am from "everyone." But to anyone else, I am part of that "everyone". No matter how hard we try to separate ourselves from that "everyone", we will always be part of that "everyone", because we can't possibly get everyone in the world to know my singular personality, and get everyone to know that I am different than the rest of the world.

Because absolutely every person is different.

I'm sure everyone finds some trait about themselves that they think is strange or weird or unusual, or apart from "everyone". But to every other person, they are part of the "everyone" because no one can know everyone well enough to separate them from the "everyone". Does that make any kind of sense?

We like to pretend that we are the only ones in the world that differ from the crowd. But everyone differs from the "everyone" in some way. The "everyone" doesn't actually exist, because if every person is different and are separate from the "everyone" then the "everyone" is nothing.

I'm starting to confuse myself. Is ANYONE understanding what I'm trying to say?

I realized it while I was thinking today. I was on the computer, logging into my Google account. And I suddenly realized:

I am the only one in the world that is exactly like myself. I am the only one in the world with my exact experiences, birthday, obsession with Whose Line, possible mild autism, passion for storytelling...... there is no one else in this world with all of my traits and experiences that make me me.

And absolutely everyone in the world is exactly like that in that they are not exactly alike in any way.

Try to imagine the hugeness of this notion for one minute:

Out of six billion people (or thereabouts), who all have basic human needs, not one of those six billion people are exactly like any other. They ALL have different experiences. They ALL have different interests. They ALL have different insecurities, they ALL have different little quirks. And even if someone shares traits - for example, I share a birthday with a girl in my class, I share a love of Whose Line with a friend of mine, I share possibly autism with many people.... but I am the only one out of all the world with precisely the same COMBINATION of traits, and if I were missing even one of them, I wouldn't be the person who is writing this post right now.

Now think about that.

Now think about that again - but stretch the idea to fit around over six billion people.

It's kind of an amazing idea, isn't it? And it's true. It's totally and completely true.

And it wouldn't be nearly as amazing if it wasn't.

WLiiA Rant: Colin

So I've been thinking lately about how this blog is a great place for me to rant - no one wants to hear it in real life, and on here you can skip over it if you feel it's a waste of your time (which it probably is). Not that anyone reads this blog anyways. I've just gotta rant sometimes to get the thoughts out of my head and onto paper (metaphorically).

And what else would I rant about? What Rant is it Anyway?- that should give you enough of a hint right there. WLiiA. Whose Line is it Anyway.

And I've been contemplating what I should rant about. The people, and the role they play? The humour and its awesomeness? My favourite and why? The famous Ryan/Colin bromance?

So I finally decided I'd have a separate rant for every single person on the show (or at least all the regulars) and see what happens.

Starting with the crowd favourite - and mine! - Mr. Colin Mochrie.

"People you wouldn't want to get caught with under the mistletoe."

The thing about Colin is that he seems - generally speaking - like a soft spoken type of person. And a lot of people when first seeing him perform won't really be fans. But after seeing, let's say, about three games with him in them, he will ultimately become the crowd favourite. Because though he seems like a soft spoken person, when he's onstage and performing without a script, he can be the loudest, funniest, most random person ever. Everything he says is unexpected, and usually hilarious like hell. He's got this dry wit on one hand, and then on the other hand, he IS just saying whatever pops into his head, which is how he sometimes says things like

"We're watching animal porn!"
or
"There's blood in my stool!"

to quote a couple famous Colinisms.

Colin after he called himself "Big Louie Little Philly" in the scene.

And the randomness is probably what he's most famous for. He's said before that sometimes he is shocked at what comes out of his mouth, and you can see it during the infamous Animal Porn incident by the way he puts his head in his hands immediately after he says it, (which only adds to the hilarity), or the way he covers his eyes during the Slept With an Ugly Woman Irish Drinking Song after he says "it looked like someone had beat her."

The three stages of Colin's reaction after he realizes what he just said after the Animal Porn incident.

1) Laughter.

2) Shame.

3) Apology.

Everyone's reaction after Colin says "It looked like someone had beat her" as the last line of the Slept With an Ugly Woman Irish Drinking Song.

And anyone who knows even a little about Whose Line will probably agree that the best moments usually involve - if are not totally conducted by - Colin. 

But randomness aside, he also has this dry, sarcastic type of wit that will usually show if given at least thirty seconds to think of something. And to those of you say that thinking of it beforehand is not improv, you're wrong. Because the others are not expecting it, which makes it even better. 

An example of his incredible wit:

Ryan: Ooh, I've got a bit of a bug. Ooh. And I'm a little jittery. Jittery - bug. Jittery bug. Jitter bug!

Colin: Wow! Nice segue. 

LATER

Colin: You know one time I went to the circus and I saw this strong man bend a car - BEND A CAR? PAT BENATAR.

Ryan: *after a fit of laughter* Okay, you've proved your point.

Colin: Yes. You're not the only master of segues.

AND EVEN LATER

Colin: You know when I was a jocky - 

Ryan: Heh.

Colin: No, I was, just for a little while. And in our bed, well it was more of a cot, we had this sanitary paper for the fillies - wait a minute! Bed cot filly paper? RED HOT CHILI PEPPERS?

The "see how stupid that is?" look.

The smuggest look Colin has ever worn.

.... and that's just one example. For more, watch any given Weird Newscasters game where he's the main anchorman. You will be treated to a long and rambling story with a punchline from so far out in left field you won't see it till it konks you on the head. It's pretty much the only reason I watch the Weird Newscasters Games. 

Another thing about Colin is that he is totally the straight man. You could probably count on your hands how many times he's cracked up during a scene that wasn't someone messing up somehow. He could say one thing that gets the audience laughing so hard it hurts, that gets the other performers doubled over from laughter, that gets Drew to laughing so hard he can't read the next card, that gets Wayne literally on the ground, and he will have the most natural, serious look on his face patiently waiting for the others to get ahold of themselves, usually only smiling to make fun of himself. That's not just impressive. It's uncanny. I don't know how he does it, or why for that matter, but it almost makes it funnier because he makes it seem like the most natural thing in the world to go up and start singing

"Hey, I didn't mean to cook your dog! But hey these things just happen!"

in reply to

"If people wrote songs about embarassing moments."

or something like that.

But he's not at all a serious person. He just treats it like it would be the natural thing to say. It's pretty funny actually.

So he won't laugh on stage. When he's in character and in the moment of the scene. But when he's just himself, watching the others perform he is ALWAYS laughing. You can tell he enjoys what he does - you can always see it. He's said before that Whose Line was a lot of fun, that he was there getting paid to play with his friends and you can tell that he really enjoys it. Hell, he even laughs at Drew's lame points jokes (the points don't matter! Yes, the points are just like a wedding ring at a strip club. They don't matter). He's not afraid to laugh at himself............ and even less afraid to laugh at others. Now that I think about, I've never seen him laugh harder than the time Ryan broke the desk light by running into it headfirst. 

Ryan: Was that lit?

Colin: Oh yeah, it was. *pause* It would have been better if your head burst into flames.

Ryan: *laughing*

And while we're talking about Colin laughing at himself, he puts up with a lot of jokes at his expense. You can tell he's fine with it because they're all friends, but he's the one people pick on when they're stuck for a real joke. And really, from their perspective, why not? He's bald. He's canadian. He always plays the woman. He wears these weird hawaiian shirts that were completely tackled during what I call the Tacky Shirt Taping (an audience member suggested Tacky Shirt Man for his superhero name. No one ever let him forget about it. He later complained that he was missing bald jokes). He's..... a little older than the others, or at least looks it because of his baldness. And all that random stuff he says. And the fact that, as a master of improv, he basically needs to agree to keep the scene going. So they force some uncomfortable things on him. All in all, he's pretty much the Whose Line punching bag. Not that he doesn't make a few jokes himself. 

Drew: Hey, Ryan, tell your wife I had fun last night.

Audience: Ooooooooh........

Colin: Hey! Make fun of the bald guy! I'll be your lightning rod of hate! 

"LIGHTNING ROD."

And the lightning rod of hate continues to be one of my ultimate favourite tapings. 

Colin after Drew compliments him then says he had to humour him because he was bald.

Colin after Drew got booed for the bald joke.

"Canada: the upside".

Colin after Drew said yet another bald joke.

Colin forgiving Drew for the bald joke.

Ryan forcing a weird pointy thing on Colin's face while "measuring his head".

"And it can remove those pesky eyes!"

A really bad hangover: every sound was really loud and echoing and over-exaggerated and when Colin tries to comb his hair - silence.

Colin after first hearing his superhero name: Tacky Shirt Man.

Colin seeing if his shirt was dry yet (Tacky Shirt Man. Tacky. That man is a genius).

Ryan playing Colin's shirt like a ukulele(?).

Ryan sucking on Colin's shirt (?). Note Colin's bewilderment.

"I'm Canadian!"

Drew: A thousand points to Colin for putting up with all the bald jokes.
Colin: LIGHTNING ROD
Drew: Yeah, good job chrome dome. OH! ANOTHER THOUSAND POINTS!

And that's pretty much where I've been going with this the whole time. Because he is the one people always make fun of. Even the producers join in making fun of Colin. Like the one time he wasn't a woman in a Whose Line game (it was a game as well as the name of the show) he was Sampson, and he was mad at Delilah for cutting off his hair. That continues to be one of my ultimate favourite reactions to a scene set up. Or the time that Ryan was Colin's competitive uglier brother who tried to prove that anything Colin could do he could do better. 

Colin: I like that they put the word ugliER.

Drew: Yeah, that's what I thought too........

And you know he's so used to it that pretty much any joke that is at the expense of anybody is usually at his expense. For instance, in the famous Colin Newsflash, he had no idea what it was until Chip made a bald joke.

Chip: I was wondering why you're not wearing sunglasses to protect you from that incredible shine.

Colin: ....... yeah. Well, a lot of people are because of the incredible BEAUTY of what is going on behind me. Artists are coming to make recreations of it and it's just - oh. The beauty. The beauty.

When Colin figures out the newsflash is of him.

Come to think of it, that Newsflash is probably the best example of Colin's uncanny timing and wit and randomness. That was what I call the Captain Hair taping (someone suggested Captain Hair for Colin's superhero name, and they were building on that the rest of the night. It still remains one of my ultimate favourite tapings, and one of Colin's most famous nicknames among fans) so he was used to  - and probably sick of - all the bald jokes. Even before he knows it's him:

Chip: How did it start?

Colin: It all started with a badly timed bald joke.

....which is just frackin uncanny if you ask me, and it killed the audience. And Drew. And everyone. And only after the scene was done did Colin realize, laughing:

Colin: Oh! I said the bald joke thing too!

Ryan: You did, you were right on it......

Chip: That's just freaky.....

Drew: That's why they call you Captain Hair.

Aside from everything that he says, Colin is probably the best dancer on Whose Line. EVER. When Colin dances, it's always good. Whether it be because Wayne made him break dance in every Action Replay, or because it was a Scene to Rap and he couldn't think of an actual rhyme, or the music just hits him (watch the Navy Seal Motown Group for that one) or just because he feels like it, you will never be disappointed. I have started off my morning with a dose of Colin's amazing dancing and it really helped with my day. Possibly the best was the Questions Only with Kathy Griffin. They were swimming, and Kathy says 

Kathy: Is this too hot for you?

Colin: Is this?

.... and proceeds to have the smexiest dance ever, to the point where Drew had to stop the entire scene just to make him stop dancing. Just thinking about it I can feel the laughter rising in my throat.

Colin is also the master of reusing jokes. And I'm not just talking about reusing the Captain Hair over and over again (although he did reuse that at least once.... "slightly balding superhero".......). I'm talking stuff he said that he found a way to fit into other things and recreate the joke so that it was funny in a completely different way. Like the time he said "there's blood in my stool" at the end of the Graduating Irish Drinking Song, and everyone was so shocked that he would go there that Wayne then used it for "disturbing things to hear someone yell out in bed". So then Colin, during the World's Worst coworker segment, says "Hey.... there's blood on my stool." 

There are other examples, that I know for a fact..... one of his signature moves is to reuse jokes from previous scenes..... but, and I feel shame as a Whoser as I say this, I can't think of other good examples. Please have mercy on me, community of Whosers. I feel ashamed.

Colin can carry the entire cast. I am not kidding when I say this. He has literally thrown Ryan over his shoulder and ran around the stage. In every game of Dead Bodies he has to carry around..... usually two people (like when he makes them fight. OH MY GOD THAT IS SO FUNNY. "Kick! Kick! Kick!" Oh my god......) and that takes strength that people generally don't expect from him.

Colin carrying Kathy around with one arm while making someone move with the other.

And all of this is what makes Colin such a frackin' adorable individual.

Drew: Questions that are difficult for mommy to answer.

Colin: Mommy, how come no one looks like me on Friends?

Drew: Yes, if you were listening, I said difficult.

Audience: Booooooooooo......

Drew: *muttering* What the.... alright......

Colin: I'm adorable.

And he really really is. I don't know how to explain it. Maybe I've just been watching too much Whose Line. That's probably the truth of the matter. But the fact is that I see him as a totally adorable individual. Not in a kiddy way, and not in an old man way either (He's not THAT old!). Just.... I don't know. I'm not really ATTRACTED to him. It's not attraction. It's just he's adorable in a way, like...... like he never grew up kind of. Yeah that makes sense. I'm not attracted to him, I just think he's adorable because he's got this joy in what he does and it's just nice to watch. 

And who doesn't like a guy with a sense of humour, am I right?

I kid, I kid. But I know that if I ever met him I would totally be gushing. 

Anyways, he's just frackin' adorable. It's weird that I think like that but it's true. HE. IS. ADORABLE.

I DARE you to find something not adorable with this screen shot!

Anyways, in conclusion, Colin is.... I won't say funniest, because everyone is hilarious in their own right, but probably the most unexpected one on  Whose Line. And he's my favourite. Cause he's awesome. Want the reasons? Reread the post. I'm not going to recap everything I said.

Anyways...... here's to my first real rant about Whose Line. More to come. :)

Peace out,

Me.

P.S "THE CANADIANS ARE COMING, THE CANADIANS ARE COMING!"

Ready For Grad, I Guess

There are some doubts about whether it's really my "style", but as I don't know what my "style" is, we were focusing on what looks good on me. And this looks really pretty on me, if I do say so myself.

Almost makes me forget that the whole concept of school is sort of the bane of my existence.

Peace out.

In Which I Obsess Over the Cure for Depression

ANOTHER obsession, you say? Yes. Yes indeed. It is called Whose Line Is It Anyway.

Now, I would HOPE that most of you would know what this is, but as it was cancelled quite a while ago and has been mostly forgotten (then again, they said Earth was "Mostly harmless") I will explain the concept of the show - hopefully without too much ranting. But hey, if I rant, so what. It's my frackin' blog.

The concept of the show is that it is all improv. None of the show is scripted. They do a bunch of improv games based off suggestions from the audience or cards that the producer/director/writer guy gives the host (Drew Carey). And as improv is as a rule, hysterical, it's brilliant. Since the show is formatted as a game show, the host gives one or two or all of the performers some meaningless points at the end of each game (the points don't matter) and then randomly chooses a "winner" at the end of the show. Although I wouldn't say randomly. I don't think it's quite coincidence that Colin and Ryan barely EVER win - as far as I can tell, Colin only wins when they're playing Props at the end, and even then he usually won't win. As for Ryan.... I'm almost certain he only won once and sat out of a hoedown. And, considering how many bloopers there are of Ryan at the desk, I'm not surprised he only won once.

Now usually my obsessions are at least one of two things: 1) weird, random, hard to understand and totally obscure, 2) Way out of date. The exception to these rules being the Simpsons.

And Whose Line is sort of an exception. It also sort of totally conforms to these rules, depending on how you look at it.

1) weird, random, hard to understand, totally obscure -- it is weird. It is very random. Hard to understand though? Not really. It's improv. You don't really need to understand any of it, because half the time, they don't know what the hell they're saying. Obscure? I suppose. Now it is, anyhow. But is the humour obscure? Hardly. And that's what the show's all about, you know. The humour.

2) I suppose it's a little out of date now, seeing as it went from 1998-2005 or thereabouts. But not out of date in the sense that the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy was out of date. The jokes are still relevant. The humour's still relevant. You can barely tell that it was made so many years ago, just watching the show.

Now that's totally just me being defensive about liking the show, but why DO I like the show?

Because it makes me laugh. And when I'm in one of my lonely, sorry-for-myself depressive state of minds, that's very hard to do. "It's just a feel-good show" as Ryan Stiles once described it. When you see the performers burst out laughing right there on stage, it can be accurately called contagious.

The people they have on this show are GREAT. FANTASTIC. Colin Mochrie, Ryan Stiles - they are true masters of improv. Wayne Brady - he is the absolute master of improvising SONGS. And all their guest stars - Greg Proops, Brad Sherwood, Chip Esten (ahhh, Chip), Kathy Greenwood, Jeff Davis - are all great in their own right. And of course, the host, Drew Carey - the show just wouldn't be complete without his laughter and ribbing. No it would not.

Colin Mochrie

Ryan Stiles

Wayne Brady

Greg Proops

Brad Sherwood

Chip Esten

Kathy Greenwood

Jeff Davis

Drew Carey

I really am ranting now, for sure, but I've got no one else to rant to and sometimes a girl's just gotta rant. Alright? Good, cause I ain't gonna stop.

The thing is, half the humour isn't even in the scenes (although the scenes are ridiculously funny) - half the humour is just in the friendships the people have with each other. And it's OBVIOUS they are friends. Colin and Ryan had been doing improv with each other for who knows how long before Whose Line, and they have the best non-gay bromance in the history of the world. They can make fun of each other all the time (which is hilarious) and be fine because that's just what good friends they are.

Ryan: "Do you look like you've been hit by a bus three times?"

Colin: "You started."

Because Ryan is "a big stick with a big nose".

And Ryan worked with Drew Carey on the Drew Carey Show, so they're friends. Just the friendships are what make the show what it is. Colin putting up with all the bald jokes and the canadian jokes, Ryan putting up with being the "tall freak", the "big stick with a big nose", having to put up with everyone making fun of his terrible shoes. Drew putting up with the fat jokes, and "not doing a damn thing". There's so much laughter and fun on this show it's kind of impossible not to laugh.

Colin after Drew said an unexpected bald joke.

Colin after Drew got booed for saying a bald joke. And that's how Drew learned "don't make fun of the popular funny guy."

There will be plenty of other Whose Line related rants, I can assure you. But speaking of Whose Line as a whole, I've pretty much summed it up. If you don't already know what Whose Line is, check it out. You will laugh, I can guarantee that. If you don't, then you have no sense of humour. Kay, I can't say that. But seriously. If you don't then I will be very very very very very very very very surprised. 

That's all for now. Have fun getting the past few minutes of your life back.  Now, let's find some Whose Line I haven't seen.................

Book Trailers....... Hmmm......

There's a writer's website, called Wattpad. I've joined it, posted some stories, found some good stories, it's all good. Now, there's a little thing on it called Book Trailers.

Book trailers are pretty much movie trailers - just for books. A little taste of what the book's about, in trailer fashion. Sounds cool, right? It is. And, being fascinated with film as I am, I tried to make one for my friend Jacey's book Forever Desires. I'd say I succeeded pretty well. To make it I had to tear a lot of footage off of Youtube that technically doesn't belong to me, but it's not like I'm the only one. I don't mean to sound cocky, but I think that trailer is one of the better ones out there.

And I was looking on the discussions in the "Clubs" on Wattpad - basically forums - and I was looking at the book trailer one, looking at all these people advertising their book trailers. Saying things like "I'll make you a book trailer if you fan me" and things like that. And I looked at some of their examples on Youtube and some of them, compared to mine, weren't so great. Like, they were basically a slideshow of pictures with words on them. I could make that on Animoto. Do you know how long it took to make mine? A WHILE.

So I've been wondering if I should maybe open my own thread and start making trailers for people on Wattpad...... I think I could.

And because I know you all long for me to show you:

Here's the trailer I made for Jacey.

Enjoy.