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Auggie Smith

The Church of Augiology

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Auggie Smith and the Wayward Masses

To the uninitiated, (or “non-believers” as they are commonly called by The Auggites) Auggie Smith is the founder and Grand Pubah for Life of what has come to be known as The First Church of Augiology. While not technically a religion, at least not in the fully tax exempt definition narrowly portrayed in the IRS’s Draconian codes, the movement of Augism is gaining momentum in this country, as well as other, more backwards countries who really don’t know any better. With the recent release of his new DVD and CD, Cult Following, more of the weary and downtrodden will quickly become zealous converts.

Smith was born. This we know to be true. Everything after that is rather suspect and apocryphal. Being a rather shy individual throughout his youth, Auggie attained the rank of presidency of the speech team and cleaned the bathrooms at his school, making his vows of chastity almost unavoidable.

“You can imagine how the girls just flocked to that – president of the speech team!” Auggie says in Duderonomy 4:16. “’Wow, look at that!’ All girls care about at that age is a guy who can conjugate a verb.”

He remained chaste until the age of eighteen, succumbing to the lure of the flesh and Auggie found it to be good. He began his journey into the world, preaching his message for the masses, never gaining the attention he so richly deserved. After many disheartening years, Auggie considered renouncing his calling and wandering the earth like Al Gore, broken and dispirited. As destiny would have it, he met two like minded individuals; Apostle Bob and Saint Tom. They gave Auggie the inspiration and hope to preach his sermons on their quaint morning show. Thus the cult of Auggie was born.

After years of spreading the gospel on XM and Sirius satellite radio, after performing miracles at countless comedy clubs throughout the nation by turning dollars into wine and even after he died one night on stage in Butztown, Pennsylvania, only to rise three days later in a defiled motel room, hung over, Auggie is ready to be your personal pathfinder. He has sacrificed his life to be your personal sherpa, guiding you through the pitfalls and the pain, making you forget, at least for an hour or so, that the world is a festering cesspool of rampant self-interest.

This messianic messenger of mirth is bringing his traveling revival show to a stage somewhere near you, to spread the one true gospel. What should one expect when entering Auggie’s church? The faithful will be blessed with a bellicose dose of reality, delivered in a breathless, rapid-fire rant, shining a stark light on the futile efforts of man. From the current political scene to Barbie being raw dogged by G.I. Joe as he has a ‘Nam flashback, nothing is sacred in this sanctuary. The pervasive daily fears we all surrender to will be lifted to reveal the true evildoers behind senior citizen NASCAR drivers, voracious vending machines and drunken pink bunnies.

“Really brother, wouldn’t it just be easier to stay home and not have to interact with any live people?” Aug asks. “I SAY NO! The fear ends now. The only way to win is to not be afraid, or to paraphrase a Stallone classic, ‘fear is the disease…Aug is the cure!'”

Why should you be a follower of Auggie Smith? Why should you become part of the Cult Following? Humbly witness all that Auggie has sacrificed for us: his wasted teenage years scrubbing bathroom stalls while we were partying and getting laid. His ongoing pursuit to ingest every street corner pharmaceutical product, keeping them out of our reach so that we won’t cause harm unto ourselves as well as his ever vigilante watch over all the bars and pubs across this great land of ours, safeguarding them until they are safely closed. These things he does for us…selflessly! He truly cares about our well being and tries to convey this clearly during his sermons. He forces you to see the inequities in the lives we witness as well as the ones we live. His inescapable diatribes hammer home the absurdities we all see in everyday life, yet are afraid to comment on. He speaks while we are silent. Well, to tell the truth, he speaks while we’re talking as well, but nobody’s perfect.

Just reflect for a moment on this truism that he has shared with us;

“Your bunny may be your relationship or your job, but at one time, you tried to give your bunny a bear hug and things got out of hand.”

How can one argue with this incontrovertible truth? How?

Watch the DVD. Listen to the CD. Catch him on The Bob and Tom Show, or better yet, witness the man in person when he comes to town. If you’re not completely satisfied…well, you’ll still be out the money for the DVD, CD and the tickets, but hey, doesn’t it just make you feel warm inside knowing you helped a potentially sober comedian attain a higher level of consciousness via many, many Jägerbombs?

Services for the Church of Aug will be held at Wiley’s Comedy Niteclub on Thursday August 25th at 8:00pm (for a $5 tithe), Friday August 26th at 9:00pm (with a mandatory $10 donation). Saturday August 20th brings us to the conclusion of Auggie’s missionary work here in Dayton with a full blown comedy revival, featuring the comedy sermonizing of Deacon Tom Griswold from the Church of Latter Day Bob and Toms. Services for this revival will begin at 8:00pm with a secondary service held 10:30pm for all of those incorrigible heathens. For these special Saturday Night Sermons,  a collection of $20 is required. To make reservations, call (937) 224-JOKE. For more information, go to the Wiley’s website at http://www.wileyscomedyclub.com/ or add them as a friend on Facebook at Wiley’s Comedy Niteclub.

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The Aug Man Cometh

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Auggie Smith and the Subtle Dangers of Censorship

There are comedians who carpet bomb the audience in the statistical hope that most of their hurled bon mots and humorous bits land on target with an explosion and not a fizzle. Auggie Smith does not succumb to this temptation, instead relying on his rapid-fire delivery, spewed forth in a breathless scream of consciousness that leaves the audience no quarter. Aug is more of a consummate storyteller, weaving reality with the absurd so flawlessly as to draw the audience into a world of his own design. There are no “jokes” or “bits”, just an unpretentiously intelligent torrent of guttural humor and angst that rises and falls, peaking at precisely the right moments. The reaction from the audience range from apoplectic laughter to a shocked indignation, as if they had just received a Cheney scatter shot to the face. One walks away from the performance not remembering a single line verbatim, just a different viewpoint and an afterglow of a cathartic release.

His comedic fodder is comprised of broad political satire and a repertoire of staccato rants ranging from the oppressive fear being foisted on the American public to Barbie getting raw dogged by G.I. Joe while he suffers a ‘Nam flashback. He draws from the world at large, but he doesn’t feel the need to use the stage for his own political agenda.

“Personally, I may have particular views and vote for particular people and I don’t

care, you know, that I don’t expect people to have my political opinions when I’m on stage.” Auggie said during a recent phone interview. “I’m not trying to change minds, I’m trying to make people laugh.”

Freedom of speech is of paramount importance to Auggie, as it is the structure on which his craft is based, but also on a personal level that all people should be attuned to.

“Yeah, well, people’s view of what freedom of speech is completely messed up now.” he said. “Freedom of speech means that you might get your feelings hurt, and that’s exactly what it means. It doesn’t mean we don’t offend anybody. Freedom of speech is that people will be offended and that’s the point of it, and when you take that away, we’re, we’re done.”

The political and social sensitivity welling in this country and the ease in which people in general have the uncanny knack of finding offenses where none truly exist, seems to make the comedic landscape a minefield waiting for a big ol’ clown shoe to come along.

“Yeah, yeah….maybe they shouldn’t leave the house if they’re going to be offended by other people’s words. It’s probably best that you never come into contact with anybody else.” Auggie stated, somewhat perturbed. “That’s probably the best game plan for them…and what it is, is people have to be morally superior over others and they decide ‘Well, morally, I’m better than you so I can decide what you can and cannot say and what’s morally objectionable’ and here’s the thing; it doesn’t offend me. So is there something wrong with me? Am I a bad person for not being offended by that? You know, because that’s the way the logic has to go.”

It seems that the current political atmosphere is so devoid of humor that one is loath to joke about the powers that be for fear of risking a heated confrontation. It used to be that anyone could make a joke about Clinton’s indiscretions or Dan Quayle’s complete ineptitude, and there would be a laugh, regardless of any affiliations. Now it is like a simple satirical jest can get you labeled as being anti-American.

“The problem, you…you’re talking about a couple of different issues here. If you’re talking specifically about the current administration here, yeah. I think there are people who have forgotten that it is our job to be anti-establishment.” Auggie went on to state that, “It is the comedian’s job to, uh, comment on the government and it is a comedian’s job to have a problem with the powers that be. We’ve become so aligned with our various political parties, uh, that we do not see the humor in them anymore. That is true. Um, and the fact that this, this turf war that we have going between Democrats and Republicans, and so one political party has your best interest at heart, yeah, right, for Christ’s sake! Like they’re not just a collection of millionaires that are designed to further people’s political careers, and instead are… for you, the common man. That bothers me, that people are under that assumption.”

When Auggie Smith takes the stage, he is not there to entertain you; he is not there to tell you a couple of amusing little jokes. He shall rise to become your personal, self-proclaimed Sherpa, shepherding you through life’s mysterious and often frightening landscape. Give your life over to the Aug Man and he will guide and protect you from all of the sharks, senior citizen NASCAR drivers and violently voracious vending machines that besiege you on your chosen path. Praise be to Aug.

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