Feline Ponzo Scheme, Part 2

Embarrassment, Optimism and So Many Cats

Hi! Wonderful human. This is part #2 of Feline Ponzi Scheme. For maximum sense-making, please read Part #1 first. Of course, I can’t promise it will make total sense either way; there’s a lot of bad judgment on display.

Also, if you just came here for a Coconut Rum Ball recipe, check that out here.

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So, I continued my preparations for CAT Talk: Ideas Worth Shedding.

I bought a new shirt for the occasion.

Okay. I didn't buy a new shirt. But I did tuck the old one in.

Okay. I didn't tuck the old one in.

I did don a tee shirt and then layered another shirt with buttons over it. Which is essentially butch/transmasc tuxedo, right?

This is what Canva suggested for a “radical tee shirt.” Canva is obviously programmed by nerds who like math jokes. I mean.

I started to feel confident about the show, which led a friend to say:

"I don't get it; you are a slightly goofy looking, slightly mobility impaired, genderqueer masculine person who's had two lovers die and five botched knee replacements. Why do you approach life with the same positive expectation as a mediocre, cis-gendered, heterosexual white man?

This also contains a Canva suggestion: a venture capitalist. And TBH this is what 100 percent of the venture capitalists at my coworking place look like. They don’t have the angel wings externally, but this is definitely the self-portrait picture they hold inside their heads.

I didn't have the answer. But my therapist has a theory.

You didn't think you'd be able to read an entire two-part essay about queers and cats and not have a therapy reference crow-barred in, did you?

My therapist called my positive expectation orientation "deep biological optimism." When I asked what she meant by that, she thought momentarily and said, "Well, some people see the glass as half empty. Some people see the glass as half full. But your reaction is, "Oh, someone gave me a broken glass? Awesome, let's dig the Grand Canyon together. I'll hold the sharp bit.'"

​So I felt confident in this show.

But then, four days before the debut, Trump was elected president.

So it's one thing to do an ill-advised TED Talk parody show about cats. And it's another thing entirely to do an ill-advised TED Talk parody show about cats to people who understand much of the world is mere days away from teetering into chaos.

Under such circumstances, if you do not--at the very least-- acknowledge the context, you are thrown into the role of People At The Beginning Of An Apocalypse Movie Who Are Just Having An Ordinary Day.

The cats would be watching the apocalypse and eating popcorn. You know they have a plan and it involves us as food. As soon as the popcorn runs out.

Except worse, because your ordinary day is performing an ill-informed TED-talk parody show about cats.

My solution was to adapt my slideshow. I'd project a screenshot of one of Trump's terrible tweets and then a photo of a cute cat. And then a tweet. And then a cat. And then a tweet, and then a…

This is an actual screenshot of a slide from the show. I am not including a Trump tweet here because I know better. Now.

Ah. Well. You get the picture.

The long-anticipated day of the show came. I put on my shirt. My two shirts. I might have even tucked them in.

As I began Showpacalypse, I looked out into the surprisingly large crowd, and by their differing reactions, I could see two groups of people in attendance.

Some folks in the audience hadn't seen the show advertised as part of a comedy festival. They thought they were watching an actual cat-themed, non-parody-type TED talk.

Other folks clearly thought they were at a comedy show.

As the show progressed, I became steadily more alarmed because I realized I didn't know which one I had created.

The moment arrived when I was scheduled to begin changing into a cat.

(If this part is surprising to you, you should probably read part 1)

The first action I would take to start my cat metamorphosis was a subtle cat grooming gesture: licking my hand and rubbing it against my forehead.

In my imagination, while planning the show…

(planning is perhaps a generous description)

…I thought if someone on stage licks the side of their hand and rubs it against their face, this is an obvious action, and the audience, of course, would understand I was becoming a cat.

I don't know if you've ever been in the audience for an ill-advised TED talk parody show about cats, one that isn't going well. But this gesture could apparently be easily mistaken for anxiety.

So, it was not obvious, and the audience, in fact, did not understand that I was becoming a cat.

My next cat transformation cue was to bat at the laser point I was holding in my hand.

Again, in my imagination while planning the show…

(And again, planning is perhaps a generous description)

…I thought, well, if someone on stage bats at the laser pointer they are holding in their own hand, this action would be obvious, and the audience, of course, would understand I was becoming a cat.

But–and you may already know this if you use a laser pointer in your daily life–a laser pointer is actually a laser projector. You can't convincly bat at a laser pointer you hold in your own hand unless you have a very long arm.

Not just an NBA all-star long arm. A cartoonishly long arm.

Being neither James Lebron nor Inspector gadget, me batting at the laser pointer I held in my hand looked like I was –at most– shooing away a mosquito.

So, it was not obvious, and the audience, in fact, did not understand that I was becoming a cat.

I'm not saying I wasn't apprehensive by this point in the show.

I was beginning to get worried.

But the next cat cue was going to be drawing on whiskers. And I thought if someone on stage draws whiskers on their face, this would be obvious, and the audience, of course, would understand I was becoming a cat.

I could not imagine a scenario in which the audience wouldn't understand what this gesture was attempting to communicate. I didn’t account for two things:

1. I didn't account for the level of trauma-related dissociation that watching Trump's tweets projected 12 feet high directly in front of them would cause for the audience members.

2. I did not account for how performing an ill-advised TED talk parody show that isn't going well (and also where you're turning into a cat, and no one notices) would cause my face to be covered in copious amounts of flop sweat.

So when I pulled out my Sharpie and attempted to draw the whiskers across my face, the marker mostly just slid off.

So anyone who didn't have their full attention on me at the exact moment of whisker application could look up at the short, smudgy marks and think, "Man, doesn't that comic know they should wash their face?"

So, it was not obvious, and the audience still did not understand I was becoming a cat.

The very last cat metamorphosis action was planned as a grand finale. I would say goodnight to the audience, but of course, not as a human, as a cat. Also, the goodbye would take place with the stage lights down, although I hadn't managed to communicate this to the person in the tech booth.

So, what I intended:

I was supposed to make a loud, intense cat-yowling sound.

on a darkened stage

To people who knew that I had been becoming a cat.

But instead, what happened

was I made a loud, very nervous, intense cat-yowling sound

On a fully lit stage,

in front of people for whom this whole turning into a cat thing was a complete surprise.

The reaction was, appropriately, one of stunned, awkward silence.

I had to add each of those faces individually. See how much I love you, dear reader?

So, I did what any well-trained, responsible, experienced performer would do in such a situation.

I darted off, huddled behind the curtain, and waited for the stage to darken. And at that moment, when both the stage and the house lights were off, I dashed out from my hiding place, ran at a full sprint through the back of the theater, up the stairs, out of the venue entirely, and two blocks down the streets onto the B train.

Because it's NYC, no one even looked up. And if anyone did happen to notice a panting person dressed in a butch tuxedo covered in flop sweat and a light outline of whiskers, they only shrugged. "I guess that semi-prestigious alternative comedy festival must have booked another ill-advised TED parody show about cats."

And then returned to something more remarkable on their phones.

I’ve got a bonus post today: the first installment in There’s More To Life Than Being Happy Yknow Cooking Project: Nancy’s Coconut Rum Balls.