Chris Hymes - Gone too Soon

Folliwng the San Francisco 49ers win in their playoff game today against the Atlanta Falcons to move onto the Super Bowl, I was full of excitement and joy. The game was intense and emotionally draining.

Then a different emotion occurred. Sadness. I learned today that a fellow friend and comedian, Chris Hymes, passed away yesterday. Far too young for sure.

In 2007-2008, my buddy Brian Salwasser and I started an open mic comedy night at El Patron Restaurant in East Side San Jose. It was shortly thereafter that Chris decided he wanted to do comedy too. He thanked me for helping him as he tried to break into comedy but I shrugged it off since it was no big deal. After all, it was the comedians and myself that should be thanking him for all the stage time he provided for allowing us to perform at the restaurant. It didn't matter if the stage was only a piece of plywood on a couple cinder blocks (it was a Mexican Restaurant, what'd you expect?) because it was valuable stage time. After the open mic came to its end (business got bought by new owner), Chris had met many people through the show and through networking that he continued to perform elsewhere.

Later on, he was no longer in the comedy scene as much but eventually, Chris would have an amazing girlfriend, who also turned out to be one of my friends from Theatre in college. Every time I saw them together it would make me happy because they were happy. Chris had recently lost a lot of weight too and was updating how many pounds he was losing on facebook. It seemed like things were going well for him.
He had just celebrated his birthday on January 11th...

I'll miss you, Chris. Thanks for everything.

Here is a clip of him from Tommy T's in 2008 - his set begins around the 1:35 mark -

What's News 2

How's it going everyone? That's nice. I'm doing just fine myself. I hit up a couple of open mics this week as I try to get back in the swing of things for 2013. It felt good to be back up on that stage. I was going to hit up another mic tonight as well but I slept on my neck wrong last night which makes driving a real pain when looking left.... so instead, I'm writing this blog. Let's see, what's been happening in the world lately....

McDonald's Restaurants in the United Kingdom have announced that they will be making a change to their Happy Meals by replacing the toys with books. (Article here) By giving away the books with Happy Meals it will make McDonald's the number one Children's Bookseller in the UK. They might as well give away dictionaries while they are at it that include a new definition for the word "Happy."


And then there is the story of Notre Dame Linebacker, Manti Te'o', who had his girlfriend die from cancer during the season. Except wait, she never really existed? Story below...

So like the video states, people now believe that Te'o got Catfished. This is why I have always been more of a dog person. I still don't understand how he could go so long without knowing his girlfriend wasn't even real.   Was he in on the whole story himself? Did he go along with it to add to his legendary season so everyone would say, "Wow, what a strong and courageous man!" I'm not sure but if he was going along with it then I don't know why he couldn't make up a better story for a fake girlfriend. Your fake girlfriend can do anything you want and that is what was chosen? If the Catfish scenario is true then yes, it is really messed up -

but even  this guy recognized something fishy was going on.

With all the recent school shootings and tragedy - it was obvious that something needed to be done in America to help protect our students and staff. Not just at schools too but everywhere. I think we can all agree on that. But  then there was this ad that came out from the NRA that asks a dumb question -

Am I hearing things? Did they just ask "Our Obama's kid's more important than yours?" Why do Obama's kids go to schools with guards? Good question, NRA, but you seem to forget that Obama is the President of the United States of America. OF COURSE his kids are going to go to a school with guards. The school they go to also costs more money. Is Obama going to send his kids to a public school? In DC? Ha, yeah right! I agree that all kids should be safe but asking why the President's kids have it better is like asking why Bill Gates has a better and faster computer than you do.