How to warm up your comic brain?

[Phil]

I sit down to write, I look at my material and I often think: "None of this is funny. Like seriously, nothing here is funny. I'm not funny. Why do people laugh at my stuff? I'd never make it in NYC. My material is hack."

So lately whenever this happens, I sift through the news and attempt to write 10 jokes on Twitter. After about six jokes, the self-loathing stops and I think I'm funny again and begin my real writing.

What do you do to warm up your comic brain?

(P.S. Half my days I hate myself, the other I love myself. I have no idea which reality is real anymore.)

[crlygrl]

Napalm. It's hot.

[Vercetti]

Actually I've had ideas spark from Twitter too. It's good for quick "whatever" kind of thoughts.

[funkyrhino]

What do you do to warm up your comic brain?

In my free time I'll ride public transportation ie the bus to shopping malls and in the shopping malls I have a lot of inner monologues going based on my surroundings. I'll also frequent bars I normally wouldn't like there's a particular club in town with mostly rednecks, thug types, cougars and everything else mixed in. You seriously will say "holy fu**" to yourself while walking around. Ironically it's the place I get hit on the most.

I keep my smartphone on me to jot down thoughts.

[Brian J.]

I find that throwing jokes away works for me. I'll throw away several jokes and then I'll start thinking about one in particular that had promise but just wasn't right. And then I'll rewrite it. Almost always it ends up improved.

[Ryan Carrier]

Weed.

Twitter.

More weed.

[Just Brett]

I used to think weed helped, but in the end I decided that it totally did.



Now I'm married and no more weed.

MY LIFE IS A FUCKING PRISON!!! (insert emoticon here)

[CaptainBreakfast]

Red Ginseng, get some water, walk to a park, enjoy myself, sit down, write.

[JuanCarlos]

Somtimes listening to comedy albums gets my comedy muscles a bit warmed up. Makes the switch from "go to the bathroom, go to the kitchen" brain to "comedy brain" easier.

[nixonjames]

watch/listen to comic's i like. pick out an idea or two that i like.
sometimes i take an exercise out of perret's workbook.
sometimes i get a handful of headlines.

i'm not getting up regularly right now as i have pressing matters through this month but it's much more regularly spontaneous when i'm getting up at least 3 times/week.

[JustinTee]

Just hanging out with my friends and trying to make them laugh works pretty well for me. I love my comedy buddies who I can bounce ideas off of too.

[UltraSoftMummy]

I pace around my apartment

[Phntmbanana]

I write more jokes right before I go to sleep than any other time during the day, I'm usually just about to go to sleep and then I end up staying up another hour writing down silly shit that I have to sort out in the morning

[dicknose]

Cocaine.

[Truncated Snorkle]

What I like to do is find comedy from the past, at least 60 years old, take the idea and give it a modern twist. Then I just say Twain, Groucho, Stan Laurel, Aristophanes or whoever was an influence.