Rocky Mountain Magazine & Meeting Place

By Anna Paige

Editor’s note: The following is the first in a recurring humor column that explores the perspectives of men, divulges their opinions on what they really want.

Entering into a room full of men can be challenging, especially into a room filled with men who are professionally clever. Projectile Comedy troop members David Overturf, Chas Llewellyn, Tom Paxinos, Aric Weber, Chad Korb, Jason Harris, and Zak Kreiter have just wound down some brainstorming for an upcoming comedy performance. Pizza boxes are stacked on the floor and they’re sitting in a large circle, jesting with each other as I enter casually.
I ask how the performances are going, knowing that they are one of Billings’ most popular acts. The comedy group performs each Thursday to sold-out crowds at the Alley Cat’s venue in the Doc and Eddy’s Plaza on Broadwater Avenue.
As we make small talk, they chime in on reasons they were drawn to improvisational comedy, including money, attention, women and fuel for their egos, but in seriousness, they all agree it’s a engaging activity they’re able to participate in regularly.
Projectile comedy was formed five years ago but many of the members were doing comedy in a variety of other outlets before joining the group. They have chemistry between them that propels their comedy machine, and it’s obvious when watching them onstage that they truly enjoy making people laugh.
After a brief exchange, we dive into a discussion on what men are thinking when they first meet a member of the opposite sex, entering into long-term relationships, and if divorce is an inevitable reality of marriage.

ANNA: What goes through your head when looking at a woman for the first time?
TOM: Which head?
ZAK: Does she have insurance?
ARIC: Tainted?
DAVID: This one’s going in the trunk.
JASON: I put it in categories of ‘take home tonight’ or ‘take home to mom.’ I want to know what the goal is right off the bat.
CHAD: That’s the first thing that is runs through your mind?
ZAK: We’re those guys you hear about with really huge egos, but really low self esteem.
ANNA: So you must be making up for something?
ZAK: Oh, we’re all making up for something.
ANNA: You were picked on in high school?
JASON: He was the weird, stinky kid (pointing at Zak), I was the fat kid, he was the music kid (Chad), he was the goth kid (Aric), Tom was the –
TOM: Don’t say it…
JASON: Gay Greek kid. He was the skinny kid with beady eyes (referring to Chas).
ZAK: They didn’t have schools when Dave was a kid. (Dave is the oldest of the group, at age 34. The others range in age from 24 to 29).
ANNA: What are important attributes you look for in a woman? What about in one you could take home to mom?
ARIC: Strong knees.
ZAK: One eye focused on me = take home to mom
JASON: Visual is a lot of it at first judgment. When I start talking to them, I can easily weed out the ‘take home tonight’ and the ‘take home to mom’ based on goals. If you say, ‘What do you do,’ and they’re just like, ‘I don’t have a job. I just like to drink,’ it’s like, all right. Or, if they say, ‘I’m going to school, and I run a business, and my parents are rich,’ it’s like, ‘WINNER’ (he says in an excited, high-pitched voice).
TOM: That’s a winner to you?
ARIC: Do you shake her hand?
JASON: Really she doesn’t even have to have a job. If she says ‘My parents are rich,’ she’s already a WINNER.
TOM: When you look at somebody, first off they have to be physically attractive, right?
JASON: I’m dead serious. If I see a girl that is all right, and then someone says, ‘Dude she’s totally loaded,’ I could put up with that look.
CHAD: I though you were going to say something noble for a second, like, ‘I can look past the looks if she’s got a great personality…’ But, no, it’s ‘If she’s got big money, I can get down.’
JASON: It’s all about the money for me.
ARIC: I would say goals are a huge, though. It’s that maturity level, especially for me. It’s the mindset having goals would generate. That’s attractive.
ZAK: What blows us all away, being comedians…
ARIC: Blows us?
ZAK: If we can find a chick that can actually, genuinely, honestly make us laugh.
TOM: That’s the number one thing.
ZAK: Being comedians, we laugh all the time.
TOM: It sounds so cliché, but I want a girl that makes me laugh. I could look past the physical side to a certain extent if they were hilarious, if they really made me laugh.
ARIC: The maturity and goals thing that Jay mentioned is huge. Massive. You can meet so many girls that are kind of funny, but they’re (in feminine voice) “Don’t you hate it when your parents make you do things?”
JASON: We’re talking about adult girls, Weber.
ANNA: Who’s single here? (All but Chad and Zak raise their hands). Anybody married? (No marriages). Anybody divorced? (No divorces).
CHAS: I will get engaged.
ARIC: I will get divorced. It’s one of my goals that I have, and I have to meet a woman with the same goals.
TOM: Do you really plan to be divorced?
JASON: In all sincerity, I’ve never found the girl that is perfect, so when I am dating a chick, it seems like: ‘Yeah, I can see this going for like ten years,’ and then, poof (makes gesture with hands of exploding bomb).
TOM: Do you think with that mentality you’ll never find the right…
JASON: I don’t know Tom, that’s what I’m worried about!
TOM: Don’t you think you’re putting up a big wall? You’re looking for a girl that is going to fail.
ARIC: You’re looking for the girl that will break your heart the slowest?
JASON: That’s what I’m going for.
ZAK: No, the quickest. You want the quickest, right?
JASON: My whole plan is to find a decent girl, like a starter wife, get the family going, and then upgrade.
ZAK: You want to have kids with the starter one?
JASON: Yeah, she’ll take ‘em.
ZAK: WHAT?
JASON: I grew up with a single mother and was fine. (After a brief survey, it’s discovered that Chad and Aric’s parents are the only parents still together).
TOM: Don’t you think it’s some kind of coincidence that those whose parents are still together can see themselves in a long-term relationship and those whose parents aren’t together don’t really see themselves in one?
CHAS: I think that’s false.
TOM: Really? You see yourself in a long-term-getting-married-forever sort of thing…
CHAS: Absolutely. I don’t want to get a divorce.
ANNA: I want to talk about this concept of divorce. You are setting yourself up for failure (directed at Jason).
ARIC: Isn’t that a ridiculous attitude?
JASON: Here’s the thing. When you buy a lottery ticket, do you really think every time that you’re going to win? Or do you hope you’re going to win? I hope I’m going to win.
ZAK: Listen, you can’t just go through the lottery tickets. You can’t go ‘Oh, that’s going to be a winner, that’s going to be a loser.’ You can’t do that with girls, either.
JASON: Yes, you can!
ZAK: Why are our parents divorced, then, if you can just go through and pick the winners?
CHAD: Because people make frivolous decisions.
JASON: Exactly. I really want it to work. I’m not saying I want it to fail. I’m very much a realist, rather than an optimist or a pessimist.
TOM: Don’t you sabotage yourself that way? Don’t you become a self-fulfilling prophecy?
JASON: No, no, because I’m not trying to. If the relationship works…
TOM: But in the back of your mind, you are, though. You’re like, ‘Ahh, it’s not going to work. No matter how much I love her, it’s not going to work.’
JASON: You want to get into all this magic, voodoo bullcrap.
TOM: What do you mean, magic voodoo bullcrap?
JASON: ‘Back of your mind’ stuff. I only have one mind with one space in it.
ANNA: You have to admit the divorce rate is pretty high. Half of us in this room are going to end up divorced.
JASON: I think it’s convenience. With the Internet, we expect stuff to be fast and perfect. When your relationship gets too hard, it’s just like, ‘Screw it. I’ll get a better one.’ I upgrade my computer every year, why not upgrade my wife every ten?
ZAK: What’s the shelf life on a wife, these days?
CHAD: You think 10? I think that’s a bit long.
JASON: That’s my goal. I expect to get married around 30ish, and about 40 that’s when I hit the door and upgrade to a 20-year-old.

Projectile Comedy performances take place at 8 p.m. each Thursday (with the exception of the last Thursday of the month) at Bones Brewing, 1425 Broadwater Ave. Reservations are recommended. Call 839-9231 or visit Projectile Comedy online for more information.

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