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Doris Yeltsin, New Stand Up Show

This Friday head over to Doris Yeltsin, a new stand up show co-hosted by me and the harmfully effervescent Jackie Monahan (LOL tour, heretv.com).

Our line up of one star after another is:

- John Oliver from "The Daily Show," duh. His solo special John Oliver: Terrifying Times debuts Monday on Comedy Central. Come see him before he goes from locally adorable to globally unstoppable.

- Amy Schumer, the breakout star from Last Comic Standing. Last seen with a mic in her hand in front of Night of Too Many Stars talking to too many stars like Sarah Silverman.

- John F. O'Donnell is one of Comedy Central's Fresh Faces. He is presently building an empire of humor in Long Island City. We've plucked him away for the night so enjoy him while ye may.

- Greg Barris is the producer of "Heart of Darkness." More than a standup show, it brings the oddballs together where they belong, just like in Greg's home state of Florida.

- Mara Herron is the rising young talent behind The Lighthouse show at Kenny's Castaways. She, along with Jackie and Amy, performs unwifely duties on Housewives With Attitude.

Or, refer to the flyer above. It was hard! Cutting off heads is more work than you'd think. Sweeney Todd at least had a razor and Helena Bonham Carter for encouragement.

If the show floats like Hope, it will return to the lower east side harbor every month or so. But that's only if we get some asses in the seats. Or on the stools. The joint is Moroccan.

(A couple of people have asked me about the name. It's a family name. My mother and Jackie's mom had a show called Doris Yeltsin. My mom's mom and Jackie's mom's mom had a show by that name. We're proud to keep it going!)

At The Risk of Seeming Cynical...

now that Flavor of Love is in its third season, I'm starting to suspect that Flav is not as ready for a relationship as the show would like us to think.

Label me an armchair psychologist, but if over 3 seasons, produced virtually back to back, you haven't found one suitable girl, I'm going to wonder! And don't say you're too busy for a relationship. Anyone motivated can find time between concerts and recording sessions and shopping for Viking hats to make room for a sweetie.

Maybe I'm just an online GED student who ran into glass doors as a child, but a lot of these women are real for Flav. And that's the problem -- they're too real. They are too vulnerable and human, aching for a connection he can't offer. See past the crimped hair, peach mini-dresses and demo tapes, Flav!

Wake up, America! This guy wouldn't know a good woman if she crapped on his mansion floor. Because she did.

And watch out, Bret Michaels. Get a third round of Rock of Love going, and I'll be convinced you're the thorn to your own love life's rose.

Fiber Force

Michelle tells America how delicious Fiber Force cereal got her around the biggest wedding day obstacle.



Find out more about what makes Fiber Force special at biggco.com/products.


For a breakfast that really matters, dig into Fiber Force.

My Stripper/Screenwriter Name Is

Chupacabra Riley

Answers to FAQs

What is the worst thing anyone can accuse you of? Being a studio gangsta. I was when I started "the game." But then the accusations got more pointed and people were talking. Things looked really bad when I showed up at the Vibe awards hoping to win a Hitachi magic wand. Had to act fast! So then I started dealing. At first just to school kids, which was easier. The rest of the story has been painstakingly tattooed all over my back in a prison yard. (If it looks a lot like multiple shiv wounds, that's just the way they do it.)

So, you are fan of tattoos? No. Tattoos are like other people's children. Only you can see how bad they are.

How fast do you type? In Word, 65 words per minute. In Instant Messages, about 8,897 LOLs per minute.

How do you work your Mojo? I definitely inherited my mojo. In fact, my mojo is crank-operated and ancient. It smokes and makes horrible grinding noises. Never take it to bars.

What would you like to see in bars? An Aughties Night...bring back the the 80s and keep it in the context of the Aughts. Wheel out widowed Nancy Reagan and just try to get her to say something. Have the Cosby kids recreate the opening dances with shot knees! Quiz people: Is It From Then or Now? Hold up a terry cloth tank and shorts -- Did an inner city basketball team wear it circa 1982, or is it from American Apparel, circa yesterday?

That sounds great. I know! Somebody call Moon Zappa's agent...I mean her temp agent.

PINny For Your Thoughts

Today, I spent time bill paying online. Turns out you can spend money on the internet, not just your thirties.

All the owed parties require a PIN to access their bill paying systems. Why? Who is going to pretend to be me and nefariously pay my Verizon bill? Has that ever happened? Is that identity theft you need to worry about?

"I checked the cable online. It was paid in full. Not by me, I'm broke. Seems someone stole my identity and bettered it."

Get rid of the PIN. Let the bill paying elves were so afraid of do their magic work.

From The False Start Files, Part II

10/2/06 Just One Shadow Citizen's Opinion

Around the country, voters are getting ready for the election. But what about the rule you can't vote for? You all know what I'm talking about, but can't without seeming like a hopelessly outdated 60's reactionary - the Shadow Government.

Personally, I think the Shadow Powers-That-Be focus too much on international policy. I'd really love to see some action on shadow domestic issues, like making Dick Cheney's corpse seem more alive.

And there are issues even closer to me. Folks, I can't tell you how many times I've called 3-1-1 to get the "bakery" trucks to stop blocking traffic on my street. You don't drop off bread all day outside the house of the only Arab royal on the block!! Just deport the guy already. No one cares anymore. What are my secretly re-directed tax funds going towards anyway? More muscled hustlers at Bohemian Grove?

To sum it up, the only static I want to deal with is the one from Shadoe Stevens - not the shadow bureaucracy.

Olmos Paradise

Dream harder.









Dream smarter.












Not this guy.












This guy.











Olmos!

Getting Back To What Was Supposed To Matter

A blog post, like knitting and rehab, starts off with much good-willed determination. But stuff gets in the way and you never go back to the thing. Below is the first and possibly last in a series of incompletes from the last year.

1/1/07 -- Worst Cell Plan Ever.

One Missed Call: This Christmas, I asked Santa for the stupidest movie in all the world to be made and he gave it to me! (Sorry Alvin and The Chipmunks -- maybe your sequel?). The winner by a dial is One Missed Call. As they are forced to repeat in the commercial, you miss a call from a yourself, you listen to the message, you hear your death and then you die. You got all that? Oh and of course you can't outsmart it by deleting the message, which is filled with your screams of agony and last bloody throat gurglings. It's making me squirm already -- I hate hearing my recorded voice!

Anyway, have these people ever had a Verizon phone? Most of my voicemails sound like the dying.

The film is a remake of a Japanese film that was a lame copy of The Ring which was a movie remade in the United States and had Naomi Watts looking scared in front of innocuous video playing technology. However, I remember looking that way when my VCR ate a rental and I was going to have to pay Blockbuster every penny of Cocoon: The Return so I get it.

In Case You Were Worried This Blog Was Becoming Stuffy And..

too intellectual for its own good, here you go:

A fart isn't offensive. It's the soul of a dump escaping your body. And in that case, lentils are a very spiritual food.

Goodness, leave it to me to feature right out in the wide open, possibly stranded for weeks at the top of this scarcely updated blog, the makings of a disastrous google search: "I knew Claudia back in the day. Wonder if she did anything with her life. What's this? A fart blog. Oh, I guess not."

A while ago, a bravely anonymous commenter asked me "is your stand-up as incredibly smug and corny as your blog?" Since then, I've had a debate whenever I update if, like the Iconoclasts episode featuring Mike Meyers and Deepak Chopra, I've managed to blend smug and corny the way my readers expect. I haven't gotten around to it yet but there are some Nietzsche knock-knock jokes headed right this way.

This blog is important and I need to remember that! If it weren't, why would the people at my old job still check this thing about seven times a week? And if you thought there was a blog better for finding the search term "anal torture," well, think again.

So here I stay. There is a writer's strike and blogs will be more important than ever during this entertainment drought. But if the WGA has a problem with blogging, too, I'd love to get a small stipend to stop doing it. That'd be a-ok.

HO-lloween!

Halloween's almost here and with it returns the naughty costume for the seasonal whore. Sitcom writers have caught on to the triple X [job title] tradition, which I know by having watched "How I Met Your Mother" that one solitary time. People who work in offices joke about it. I'm blogging about it means it dead-center, maybe two years late even for comment. But the jokey awareness of hasn't slowed it down any.

At my old girlfriend's house, I discovered an expensive drill on a shelf. It was an unusual find considering she was more of a clothes horse than a remodeler. Her explanation was: "I went as a sexy construction worker for Halloween and I needed it." Sexy construction worker? It disgusted me -- such an unnecessary charade. Couldn't she just admit what she wanted, even on days when it isn't Halloween? To own a power drill, like any other dyke.

Years ago, a manager of mine, 25 and living with her fiancé, bragged about dressing as a dirty nurse and showed me and another lackey the bagged costume she bought while a lot of growling noises "Chris loved it [rrrrrrrrrrrrrow!]" Fiancé boner time! Keep in mind this woman was a costume designer who probably could've made herself anything. Her buying it is like a pastry maker bringing an Entenmann's cake to a party. Not that those cakes aren't de-scrumptiouslicious 100%. [This blog is sponsor-friendly. Come get me.]

I'll admit, I have my own naughty costume I want to give a whirl. This Halloween, I'm dressing up as a sexy prostitute. I'll wear the same clothes as a prostitute but a lot more sexy. And people will look at me and think I charge money for sex as a way to earn a living but really I'm pretending and I'll do it for free.

Wow!

An interview I did a while ago on Afterellen.com went up today and they linked over here. Considering I haven't blogged in ages, I feel a bit like I've been caught by the paparazzi leaving a limo with no underwear on, too drunk on celebrity to notice the wind howling outside "the lady cave." (Is that where Batwoman lives?)

Karey Dornetto, the woman I'm proud to call my eye doctor referrer and personal inspiration for wearing denim as much as possible, was interviewed. I don't know Sapna, Bridget or Sabrina -- the last comic stander! -- but I hope to soon. They also mentioned the LOL Tour which is peopled by my friends Jackie Monahan and Lisa Kaplan, both of whom I would want with me in jail because I think we'd seem intimidating in a group. I'm sure they can't wait!

Please, keep up the myspace friend requests. I'll have more news and a proper website for Under The Gaydar soon enough.

Holy Crap! Check Out This Foreign Poster for "Kn0cked Up"

I believe this is from France, where they are marketing it as a tragedy. In it, a grotesque, emotionally stunted man-child takes sexual advantage of a drunken woman one night, impregnating her. With this, the child becomes a father. Locked into a downward spiral, the hopeless mother-to-be pretends there's no such thing as Roe v. Wade or AA and instead begins a relationship with the t-shirt loving offender.

Shrug's List

We all want to be a missed connection on Craigslist. Someone picks us out of the teeming throng of faceless assholes surrounding us and bam. It's love! Or it's gentle stalking. Depends on who's posting. Either way, it's like winning the ego Power Ball.

A friend I hung out with Memorial Day weekend sent me this link, convinced it was me. I was there then. My name is Claudia. I am a w4w. I do have a vividly transporting smell.

Claudia, Catty Shack-- Memorial Day wknd - w4w

Hi there... If you get this, well, I definitely enjoyed meeting you almost two weeks ago, even if it was so late in the night. I'm more than likely coming back into NYC this weekend, and I know I will definitely be coming in the last week of June... So, if we wanted at all to exchange info (as friends or otherwise), I would be up for doing so... If you get this, therefore, and are interested, here I am (it's Robin)...

In case: we met at Catty... you, then (with your two friends), came over to my friend's place...

So you know, since returning to Boston from that weekend, the thing that I associate most with you is your incredible smell, which amazingly and literally brought me (in my mind's eye) to the beach...

But it isn't me. There was sizable inebriation happening but I think I'd remember going to someone's house with a cool visiting chick. If she'd written "kept dancing and making faces like Ellen but was not as funny," that would practically be a DNA match and I'd be writing to her, and not blogger.

I'm a Missed Missed Connection. Good luck, real Claudia! She sounds great/insane!

Show Shorry!

I'm putting on my Liza with a "Xanax" to announce my show line up for tomorrow and apologize for not being the blogger I should this past month. It's taken me a while due to the incredible nature of my existence: I mean, whoever said ennui is for the rich is way out of line.

Grrrr! We hate cool!

Tuesday, April 24, 10:00
CHECK YOUR COOL
Parkside Lounge
317 E. Houston (at Attorney St.)

This Tuesday, April 24/7, we are thrilled out the eye sockets to present:

*Anthony Jeselnik (Jimmy Kimmel, Premium Blend, Carson Daly)
*Todd Levin (Premium Blend, How to Kick People)
*Matt Daly (Boston Comedy Festival)
*Adam Cole-Kelly (The Rejection Show

and your hosts Claudia Cogan (Sirius OutQ), John F. O'Donnell (Comedy Central) and Jiwon Li (ESPN).

Directions: Take the F to Second Avenue. Walk east along Houston. Parkside is on the corner of Attorney St., one block east of Clinton.

I Just Calls 'Em Like I Sees 'Em

Or rather, Matt McCarthy, children's book revisionist, does. Matt, with no warning, ransacked my flickr account, extracted the picture of an unsuspecting zebra at the LA zoo and added the narrative excitement. And the best part? It's a true story.

Unhappy Gilmore

The Power of Positive Linking

Couple more articles over at fakegaynews.com:

- Gay Rights and Lack of Parking Linked

- Socially Inept Lesbian Resists Hot Woman

Guys, let's make this viral, instead of bird flu:

Sara and Brandy of the Kissing Booth made a video about a naughty leprechaun who puts all sort of "P" in St. Patrick's.

If I was writing a shitty article about it for TV Guide, I'd call it "Green Scream!" Look for me, playing it all the way to the last cubicle, as "woman on the can."

We Should've Done It Years Ago

On local cable, there's a delectably atrocious ad for the Select Dental practice which runs about once every five minutes. It's bad acting and sexuality-defying husband and wife casting have taken area wiseasses by storm. I wanted to show it to those of you all over the blogsphere and share my theory that the husband and wife are not bad actors, they were directed to act like Tom and Katie Cruise and did a brilliant job -- he's the talker, the cocksure mouthpiece fielding the tough ones while she stands by, eager to show allegiance, quivering inside like an abused puppy who still hopes for love, fearful of the man who's all assurances until he SNAPS.

However, Dave Hill, a genius, made his own brilliant and succinct parody ten months ago, and which I only discovered tonight. Which NYC comedian has their finger on the pulse of the tristate and which one doesn't?

UPDATE: Matt Sears' dreamscape has been drilled into by Select Dental, too.

The Boulevard of Cogan Dreams

A fan* wrote to me, asking where my normal output of hilarious and unforgettable posts have gone. "Don't give up, Claudia. We love you!!!"

Aw. I love youtube, guys.

I've been away from the 'sphere getting some work done. Among these other projects, are things like this for publications like fakegaynews.com, a news parody site for 'mos, not some bizarre info source for gay-acting straights. Head over there if you can tear yourself away, which I doubt.


* on this blog, "fan" means a person I made up