Wait, I saw this. You posted a video of someone in the crowd telling you they were a veterinarian and then you said “OK, some of this might not be right …” and then that got a laugh.
Yeah, definitely.
I normally start shows by saying I have a degree in chemistry, and then asking who else does. If there’s anyone in there that has a degree in chemistry of a higher level or from a better university, I’m cooked.
What’s the worst heckle you’ve ever gotten?
I did a work in progress show last Sunday, and I was doing a joke about exothermic reactions.
This is the joke where you ask if the audience wants to hear about exothermic reactions and then say you don’t have the energy.
Yeah, and in my head, I swear it’s right. But I just hear a little voice that goes, “Actually, I think if you change that to activation energy, it will work much better.”
OK, fair, but yours also works, so …
I do one joke where I draw a line of best fit. In Edinburgh, I drew it as a straight linear line of best fit and then after the laughter died someone piped up and was like, “Actually, it’s an exponential curve of best fit.”
What’s worse is that I’ve done that joke many times and it wasn’t until someone said that that everyone in the audience was like “Yeah, they’re right.” It’s like oh no, I’ve done this joke 20 times …
Do you think of your sets as educational? Or at least informative?
Maybe a bit. But I’d probably put that energy to other things. Like I’m currently writing a book about the periodic table, and it’s like a young adult kids’ book. So it’s ages 10 to 15. That is actually genuinely educational where I’ve divided the book into groups of the periodic table, and then each group is related to their characteristics and their properties as an element, and then I sort of fictionalized them into personalities that match those properties. So that is educational. But it could lead to me producing, hopefully, more educational content like the book.