Everybody Get’s Leucky, the fundraiser that we threw last Saturday, was a complete success. We were able to raise around three thousand dollars for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society with the help and support of our friends, family, coworkers and community members. The event went off without a hitch and everybody but me was able to get nice and drunk in the name of Cancer. I was also able to make a lot of people who had no idea what was going on pretty uncomfortable with my inappropriate cancer jokes.
Our hosting establishment, Mile High Spirits, couldn’t have been more generous and easy to work with. They went above and beyond to make sure we were comfortable and successful and even donated a piece of the bar action to the cause. I can’t say enough good things about the bar and everybody who works there.
We had an amazing turnout, with the bar being pretty close to full in the late afternoon, but things changed a bit when our crowd left and the Saturday night LoDo (LoDo is a neighborhood in Denver that is synonymous with “douchebag bros”) crowd arrived. We shut down the event during the transition, but I still found myself getting LoDo’d when I was cornered by a drunk meathead close talker who wanted to school me on sales. You see, he himself works in sales and wanted to make sure that I understood the tenants of selling things. He was concerned that I wasn’t connecting to the audience of drunken idiots enough, despite the fact that we were selling raffle tickets left and right. In an attempt to understand more about Leukemia so that he could think of a way for me to better sell it to the audience, he asked me what leukemia does to me. His face was literally three inches from mine, so close that I could smell the cocaine on him and feel every drop of saliva that flew out of his mouth with every word. I answered “it kills my immune system” as I wiped the liquid that flew out of his mouth off of my face. Oh did I mention that he does sales for COMCAST? That’s as LoDoey as it gets.
Other than that, the night was a total success and I’m so proud of everybody that worked on the party with me. An event like that doesn’t just happen and it’s not a simple task to pull off, but we managed to get just about everything right. As I write this I am bragging to all of the nurses and doctors at the chemo clinic about what we accomplished last weekend. I’m annoying everybody with my pride! DEAL WITH IT.
Other than that I’m somewhat speechless about the whole thing… so instead of writing anything original, I’ll just share with you the speech I gave on saturday. It didn’t come out exactly as written, obviously, but this will give you a decent idea of the terrible jokes I said in front of a crowd of indifferent drunk people:
welcome to everybody gets luecky! the party where everybody gets leukemia! yaaaaay
for those of you that don’t know, we’re raising money today for the leukemia and lymphoma society. we’ve got a lot of prizes and fun stuff in store…but more on that later. first i’d like to talk about myself because that’s my favorite thing to do as a narcissist.
i’m jason the cancer troll. you may recognize me from clogging up your facebook newsfeed with hilarious content. i was came down with a case of the leukemias in late january after i noticed some strange bruises on myself. i showed them to my girlfiend and she said “oh don’t be a pussy, those are just “sorority girl bruises”….so naturally i suspected her of beating me in my sleep. after i went to the battered husband’s shelter i went to my doctor because i thought i had a strep throat…..turns out it was cancer!
remember the opening scene of breaking bad when walter white’s doctor is telling him he has cancer and the camera zooms into walter’s face who is lost in thought and not really paying attention to the doctor? the same thing happened to me when the doctor first told me, except unlike on breaking bad i could hear my inner monologue. there was only one thing i could think about, i realized that my entire life was about to change and i had a moment of absolute clarity, i realized that absolutely nothing was more important in this entire life than THROWING MYSELF AN AWESOME CANCER PARTY, YEAH!!! WELCOME TO THE PARTY, BITCH
so anyway, lets talk a little bit about why we are here. there are three ways to cure cancer: hugs, drugs and money. it’s my goal tonight to get as much as i can of all three…so lay them on me!
does anybody here have cancer of any kind?
cancer isn’t all bad, it’s a great way to lose weight.. i actually dropped 40lbs, but gained 20 back because i was too skinny to fit into my skinny jeans. for those of you that don’t know me, that 40lbs was all muscle…i used to be buff as hell. for those of you that do know me, shut up. it’s also a great way to quit smoking and drinking, a wonderful excuse to take a two month break from work and still get paid, it’s easy to trick people into giving you things out of sympathy… though my favorite benefit of cancer is the excuses it allows me.
chemo excuses: don’t have to go to work, don’t have to do any hard labor….
I just moved at the beginning of the month and barely had to lift a finger! of course it was because i physically was unable to do anything other than lie at the floor on the time thanks to an irritated spinal column due to too many spinal taps. (have any of you had a spinal tap? i’ve had seven… IN ONE MONTH. that’s too many, if you didn’t know). So we hired movers to do the dirty work for me. While i was lying on my floor with my head propped up against the wall, one of the movers told me that he was a cancer survivor himself. He had colon cancer…which he had surgically removed ONE MONTH AGO. one month after he had cancer cut out of his ass he’s bending over and lifting my furniture for me… and I couldn’t even stand up. it was pretty emasculating, but whatever.
the excuses continue on at home, too. as i mentioned i just moved last week, well actually my girlfriend and I moved in together…. so she had never lived with me before I had cancer, so I was able to convince her that all the farting i do around the house is a product of cancer treatment, and that the little curly hairs all over the toilet and bathtub are a result of my hair falling out from chemo. yeah, none of those things happened before cancer, honey, really!
wait, shit, she’s here isn’t she. LOVE YOU SWEETY.
but really, she’s been amazing and deserves a round of applause…the amount of weird cancer shit she’s been able to put up with is very impressive. she has to deal with a weak, complaining, anemic, pale little man in her house… though to be fair it’s in her genes to do so because she’s jewish. heyoooo.
it’s ok, i can make jewish jokes, i have cancer.
cancer is a great way to get you out of an awkward situation, like when you make an antisemetic joke in front of a crowd of strangers. it’s a perfect way to change the subject…for instance:
i was walking out of the walgreens on colfax a few weeks ago with two giant bags full of medications…. pills, syringes, and shit… and a homeless guy tried to ask me for money, so i instinctively shouted “I HAVE CANCER” at him and walked away. it works well for two reasons… first, the word “cancer” usually elicits sympathy no matter what, but also the fact that “I HAVE CANCER” is no where near an appropriate answer to the question “can i have a dollar?”…it’s all a part of my “bewilder and disappear” strategy… like punching somebody in the neck and running away.
somebody on the internet the other day posted a question asking for good excuses to leave work early. i said “well something that i’ve had reasonable success with was LEUKEMIA. ENJOY YOUR HEALTH, ASSHOLE”
this is basically the idea behind cancer trolling… harmless teasing of all things cancer. making light of something so terrible…whether it be making fun of myself, the disease itself, or the fact that it’s such a societal taboo. i always think of that seinfeld episode when jerry purposefully bombs on stage and says “what’s the deal with cancer?” and a guy in the crowd shouts “I HAVE CANCER”…. except he was serious because it was the 90’s and irony hadn’t been invented yet.
three types of people: givers, takers and doers. i’m a taker, you are givers… anna is a doer
it’s ok to be a taker sometimes. people need help, especially when they get sick, and its ok to take things to help you get better. that’s where the givers come in, you are all givers by participating and donating. you are doing a great thing by giving. sometimes i’m a giver, right honey???
and then there are doers. doers go out there and take the extra step and put in more effort than anybody needs to do. my fundraising partner, and friend, anna is a doer. a few months ago she was reading my blog, cancertrolling.com, and some hokey shit that i wrote when i was high on steroids inspired her to run the colfax marathon for the luekemia and lymphoma society. when she told me that there was fundraising involved i said “well we’d better throw a party!” and here we are! this event would be nothing without her, she did most of the work and has put so much heart into this and she deserves a round of applause. I’m very proud to be able to work with you for such a great cause, and even prouder to call you a friend. awww. also guys, she’s single.
Then I went on to introduce our guest speaker from the University of Colorado School of Medicine, Dr. James Degregori. He’s an awesome guy that is going to cure Leukemia and we were lucky to have him.
Oh I should mention that every time I got on the mic, which was many, that I said “welcome to Everybody Gets Leucky, a fundraising event where everybody is given Leukemia!”… just to make sure people were paying attention….
