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Self Help?

My AI wellness app chirped this morning: “Today, practice mindful breathing and set Growth Goals for your family.”

Fantastic.
Meanwhile, I’m already out of breath from rescuing a LEGO from the toilet and mediating a hostage-level screen-time negotiation with a 10-year-old who has suddenly discovered constitutional law, maritime rights, and the phrase “that’s not fair” as a legal doctrine.
My Growth Goal?
Survive breakfast without anyone bleeding or crying. And yes, that absolutely includes me.

These apps think parenting is like assembling IKEA furniture—with all the pieces included, clear instructions, no mystery bolts, and a friendly Scandinavian voice assuring you this should only take 12 minutes? No warning label that says “Step 7: Your child will emotionally collapse because the banana broke.”
Also.
Try doing it while sprinting to the dog before an “accident”, maintaining a calm smile, and reassuring your wife you’ve “got everything under control,”.
Has an app ever met a dad in the wild? Not the Instagram dad with the matching outfits and artisanal pancakes doing a dance while cooking in a showroom kitchen. I mean the real one. The coffee-stained, emotionally supportive, quietly panicked dad who’s been awake since 5:12 a.m. because someone had a dream about sharks, even though we live nowhere near water.

Tell me—what’s your latest “wellness” tip versus reality moment at home? Because if mindful breathing actually worked, I wouldn’t be standing alone in the bathroom, whisper-counting to ten like it’s a sacred monastery.

Self Help?

The latest buzzwords in my feed are energy management and digital detoxes. Meanwhile, comedians like me are managing energy by pouring something brown into a plastic cup at 1 a.m. in a green room that smells like regret and stale weed, staring at a phone like it owes me money.
We’re not chasing micro-joys. We’re negotiating with them. Applause, a decent laugh, maybe a slice of pizza that’s been sitting under fluorescent lights long enough to develop 5min. That’s the win. That’s the night.
Turns out, you can’t really charge your aura when the only apps you use are Maps, Notes, and Doom Scroll. Late-night performances are where wellness goes to die. Your “bedtime routine” is finding your hotel room in the dark, wondering how your life choices led to a king-size bed and a mini-bar.
I love the idea of zen. I just keep meeting it in places that serve whiskey in short glasses and cut the jukebox at last call. There’s something beautifully unbalanced about trying to be mindful while living on stage, road miles, and the quiet fear that the clip you just posted will either make your career or be ignored entirely.
So who else is out here trying to balance inner peace with outer chaos and a drink that burns a little? Drop your survival tips. Or your confessions. I’ll be in the green room, staring at my phone, waiting for validation like it’s a bartender who should know my name.

Self Help?

They say “Rise and grind!” I took it seriously. Now I’m climbing a mountain of coffee at 6am, searching for motivation at the summit and hoping there is an easy way down. If greatness is waiting at the top, someone please deliver donuts (and good ones, not that cake bullshit). Pretty sure “grind” wasn’t meant to involve an actual caffeine overdose. Next time, just send the motivational meme—my ambition’s strong, but my follow-through isn’t. #RiseAndGrind #DadLife #fauxtavation

Self Help?

“The early bird catches the worm… but the second mouse gets the cheese.”

What does that even mean? Get there early, but don’t do shit once you’re there? I’m doing self-help right, right? Happy Monday! #MotivationMonday#CoffeeFirst#DeepThoughtsNotRequired

Self Help?

Online, people say you should practice “radical self-awareness”: know your purpose, your passions, maybe even your blood type. Meanwhile, as a dad, husband, and comedian, I wake up every day with my only real question being, “What city am I in, and where’s the coffee?” Bonus points if I remember my actual hotel room number and don’t call the crowd by the wrong town. Maybe my most self-aware moment is realizing confusion is my brand.

A buddy saw me wandering the lobby of a hotel in Maine and asked if I was remaking Down and Out in Portland. Accurate.

I’ve had a sinus thing for the last two weeks and I’ve been in five cities all over the country (bad routing), and it’s starting to feel like a fever dream. Just me, my scarf, and a bottle of NyQuil wandering America—like On the Road, but sadder, quieter, and with an earlier bedtime.

Now I’ve been home for two whole days, the sinus thing is finally clearing up, and I’m starting to feel human again. Which is great, because naturally… it’s just in time to pack a bag, forget where I put my keys, and head back out on the road.

Grocery Trap

Stuff by the grocery store register is like a psychological booby-trap for adults? I walked in for eggs, milk, and chicken broth, and suddenly I’m standing there holding a rubber chicken, a kombucha-flavored energy drink that promises “mental clarity,” and three packs of gum, because apparently I believe my future breath deserves the best.

How about a glow-in-the-dark stress ball and a novelty lighter with a Steelers logo? I say yes! Treat yourself, and call it what it really is:

Mindful self-indulgence.
A tiny emotional support purchase.
Wreckless adoption of useless happiness

Why Frankenstein (2025) Is One of the Best Shot and Acted Films I’ve Seen

Why Frankenstein (2025) Is One of the Best Shot and Acted Films I’ve Seen

Look, I’ve seen a lot of movies. Occupational hazard. When you’re always hunting for material, studying film, or just trying to forget you’re eating mozzarella sticks alone after a Tuesday night gig in Southern Ohio (no disrespect, Ohio, your bars close early), movies become part of the job.

So when I say Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein is one of the best shot and acted films I’ve seen in years, that’s not hype. That’s me putting my tequila and mozzarella sticks down and losing myself in a movie.

This isn’t a “root for the mob” monster movie. It’s a film that made me sit there like, Oh… this is why movies get made.

Jacob Elordi Does Something Special

Let’s start with Jacob Elordi as The Creature, because this performance genuinely knocked me out. I went in expecting the usual: grunting, rain, lightning, and some dramatic arm extension. Instead, Elordi gives a heartbreaking performance. He was more heartbreaking than Jay Kelly (thats not a rip on Clooney, it was his character)

He completely disappears not just under makeup and prosthetics (which are incredible), but in posture, stillness, and vulnerability. He makes The Creature sympathetic without ever making him safe. You feel for him deeply… while also being aware he could tear someone in half if things go sideways.

What really got me—and this is the comedian brain at work—is how Elordi captures intelligence without polish. This Creature is learning everything in real time: language, emotion, rejection. He’s essentially a newborn trapped in an adult body with no stable emotions. Rage, confusion, longing—it’s all there, and never overplayed. It’s the kind of performance that reminds you that acting is such a craft, not just famous people in tailored clothes and hitting marks.

Oscar Isaac’s Tightrope

Oscar Isaac’s take on Victor Frankenstein is just as compelling. He doesn’t play Victor as a mustache-twirling villain or a tragic saint. He plays him as something much more unsettling: a charismatic guy who is absolutely convinced he’s right.

Isaac nails that arrogance. Not stupidity. The kind of Ego (or is it the Id?) that destroys lives while insisting it’s progress.

He essentially is an abusive father who refuses responsibility, and a “son” who wants acknowledgment more than revenge—except, you know, with murder strength.

Cinematography

This movie made me notice everything.

Del Toro uses close-ups, colors, and slow pushes like nobody else. And then there’s that shot—the camera traveling through The Creature’s body, into his beating heart. It sounds gimmicky as I type it (and misspell “Creature” four times) but it is not. It makes it come alive. In fact, it may be his “It’s ALIVE!” moment.

The color work is gorgeous and unsettling. Warm sunlight with grotesque imagery. Cold shadows keep you emotionally off-balance like a great Goya painting.

Horror With Actual Humanity

Del Toro never lets the horror drown out the human story.

He’s always been great with monsters, but here the monster may be the most human person in the room (well, he and the sea captain are my favorites). Quiet moments matter. Silence matters.

Alexandre Desplat Understands the Assignment

The score deserves real credit. It doesn’t tell you when to be scared; it tells you when to feel the tragedy, music that happens to be in a horror film, not “horror music.” If that makes sense.

Why This Hit Me as a Comedian

At its core, this movie is about learning how to be human. Social cues. Emotional feedback. Rejection. Desperate attempts to connect.

That’s… me doing stand-up.

The Creature is performing humanity, learning behavior through observation and imitation, especially with the old man. Watching that, I kept thinking about the line between performance and authenticity.

That question runs through the entire film, quietly, intelligently.

I love Paul Thomas Anderson. Depending on the day, he and Peter Farrelly fight for my personal first place in the Director Hall of Fame. But I didn’t agree with Best Film or Director. In 100 percent honesty, I did not watch “Hamnet”.

Frankenstein was snubbed. This movie fires on every cylinder: performance, direction, cinematography, score, and philosophical weight. It asks hard questions without announcing them. It lingers. It stays with you.

That’s the point.

Frankenstein isn’t just one of the best horror films of the year. It’s one of the best films, period. Beautiful, unsettling, deep—and unforgettable.