I am surprisingly charismatic when I am having a chat with the camera.

Oh yeah, today I talk about sleep.

Definitely time to shear my beard and trim my hair so I am ready for the summer.

But yeah. There’s a kind of warm glow to me when I am relaxed and chatting with the camera in my usual casual, unscripted way.

Script? I don’t need no stinking scripts!

The evidence shows that I really could be a YouTube star if I could just pull myself together enough to create truly fun, funny, insightful content that looks professional and has enough rewarding content to keep people coming back.

And I can totally do that. Even if it means I have to actually jot some things down first.

In like, a bare bones outline of sorts. Just enough to remind me what I planned to do. Like I used to do for my standup.

Just needed a word or two to remind me of my jokes.

This brings us back to the idea of doing my own little satirical news program. I know it’s within my technical capabilities – all I need is to refresh my memory as to how to work with overlays and I can add the images and clips to make it a newscast.

Hmm. I’ve had the idea to introduce myself by saying, “Hi, my name is Michael Bertrand and I have no idea what I’m doing. ” for a long time.

Could be a fun, slightly provocative way to start my little show. You have to admit, that would make you want to watch the video to see what the heck happens next.

I will keep it in mind.

What would I call my little show? I’d be tempted to call it “Definitely Not The News” but that sounds too derivative. Maybe be utterly ironic and call it, “Bullshit and Lies”.

Has a nice ring to it. And again, you’d probably be intrigued. What kind of lunatics would call their show that?

Answer : my kind.

And imagine how hilarious it would be if the young people decided that their most honest and reliable news sources was a show called “Bullshit and Lies”.

Might help in case the powers that be try to sue me for libel or whatnot.

What? The show is CALLED “Bullshit and Lies”. And now you want to say people believe what I say despite that?

You, sir, are severely undermedicated.

And I know I would do it with my usual wacky, unpredictable, self-referential, context-aware Monty Python ish style. So it would be a newscast style show but I am more than capable of weaving whatever other kind of crazy content I want into that simple format.

So if I decided to make a go of this idea, I guess making a video for the day would involve trolling some halfways decent news sources for stuff I can riff off of so I can slay politics with my snarky opinions.

That sounds like so much fun.

And just think of the trouble I could get myself into with my barbs!

And of course, that would just be the “monologue” style portion of the show. From there I could do a lot of other stuff once I get the monologue stuff down.

Like fake movie trailers, fake ads, fake PSAs, and pretty much any other type of parody media you can think of. For instance.

Yeah, I could have a heck of a lot of fun using comedy to throw my truth bombs out there where they can blast away the REAL bullshit and lies.

There is so much toxic ideology and garbage thinking that needs to die out there.

And I am just the assassin for the job.

More after the break.

---

Building myself up

I think the big problem with my attempts to build my ego and my confidence up is that I don’t really have a solid foundational sense of self to build on.

So it kind of feels like I’m trying to cross the Grand Canyon with a house of cards.

I think some solidity is accreting over time, so there’s that. I dunno how stable it is, but I think it’s there to stay even if it still is in the process of settling in and therefore parts of it are still moving around some.

Still, I would be much better off with a layer of bedrock solid self knowledge under me. Right now my lack of anchoring in the real world makes my sense of reality fluctuate far too much as the sands of my mental (and chemical) state shift around.

Unfortunately, if I am to develop that solid self, I am going to have to make like a Boomer and go on a voyage of self-discovery and (shudder) FIND myself.

Gack. Just typing that made my eyes roll like marbles.

But, like a lot of sappy, wimpy shit from my childhood, there’s a lot of truth to it. I feel like I am trying to finally finish going through my 20’s in my 50’s, and that means that backpacking through Peru is not exactly an option for me.

In fact, disability and lack of money means that I can’t really go anywhere. It would be tricky for me to even go to a convention if it was in Richmond, for fuck’s sake.

Which leaves going on a voyage of self-discovery online, which immediately sounds pathetic and lame to me.

I mean, it’s possible. I can dimly imagine the sort of steps I’d take. But it’s not exactrly the sort of thing that fills me with anticipation and wonder.

Still, I could try exploring Discord again, looking for new people and “places” and avenues to express and develop myself around people who don’t already know me and therefore I can reinvent myself a little.

Same fox, but with way less baggage! It’s Fruvous Lite!

And that would mean being willing to just try shit on impulse. Self-discovery is not the sort of thing that can be planned and executed logically, it comes from trying things thart seem like a good idea at the time and seeing if they work for you.

That flies in the face of my usual cautious, thoughtful nature, but that thing has grown out of control like a cancer and needs to be pruned back anyhow.

Caution means doing things carefully, and with forethought.

Cowardice means not doing anything at all.

I need to start making the other choice.

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.