When “me time” lasts three seconds

Janae Burris: I got a 3-year-old right now. I haven’t lotion past my knees in six months. I didn’t know. He won’t let me. He hates when I do self care.

Excuse me, rubbing my hands together. He’s like, stop right there. I just pooped somewhere. I pooped somewhere in this house and you’re gonna have to find it.

Andrea Marie: We are Moms Unhinged, a nationally touring standup comedy show. Join us in our podcast as we explore everything from motherhood, midlife, crisis, marriage, divorce, online dating, menopause, and other things that irritate us.

Meet comedian and mom Janae Burris

Andrea Marie: Hello everyone and welcome to Moms Unhinged, the podcast. I am here with the amazing Jenna Burris, who is absolutely incredible. She has been on so many moms unhinged shows, traveling all over the country. She is a pro at Comedy Works Denver. She opens for people like Josh Blue and Beth Elling and Gary Goman.

I’m just naming my favorites and I’m like, but so many, so many people. Welcome Janae.

Janae Burris: Thanks for having me.

Andrea Marie: Super fun. We were just traveling together. Where did we go?

Janae Burris: We were going from Parker to Boulder.

Andrea Marie: Oh yeah, that was that.

Janae Burris: from Parker to Boulder.

Andrea Marie: But we were. 

Janae Burris: Where did we go? It was me, you and Stacey. Oklahoma. Oh my Oklahoma.

Andrea Marie: It was Oklahoma. How could we forget? We got snowed in Oklahoma. Our flights got canceled, rescheduled till Monday, which was not acceptable. So we just started driving, had to change cars in Wichita.

It was a whole thing. Got you home by your birthday party, which is, that was the goal. It was. 

Janae Burris: Thank you so much for that.

Andrea Marie: That was the operation. We’re like, we are getting you home for your own party.

Janae Burris: It’s a Hallmark movie: Home For My Birthday.

Andrea Marie: Where was the lumberjack? I don’t know.

Janae Burris: I know. That’s the part that was missing. Where’s the sweet man?

Andrea Marie: Where is the sweet businessman who came home?

Janae Burris: The neighbor who’s now grown up.

Andrea Marie: Yeah, what?

Janae Burris: You were a little kid when you left, you were scrawny and now look at you. Yeah, no man. 

Andrea Marie: Lifting? No. Oh, it’s all right. It’s all right. So you have a 3-year-old, Ezra.

Janae Burris: I have Ezra, I have just the one Ezra. He’s three, he’ll be four in a few months.

Andrea Marie: Oh, a few months. Wow.

Janae Burris: Just a few months, he’ll be three. It’s crazy to see everybody’s kids growing up. It is just, it’s going really fast. When I watch other people’s kids and I see my nieces and nephews, but then in my situation, I’m like struggling hour hour, just hanging in there. 

Andrea Marie: It is. It is wild how slow the clock can move when you’re like, God, it, I’m like, one time I was like, God, it must be kind of close to lunch, and it was 9:30. like, what? What? 

Janae Burris: The time change, it gets dark here at five, and so at for a month, I feel like I kept being like, okay, time for a bath. Time to get ready for bed. It’s 5:15. What? I don’t have another couple hours in me. Has to end now.

Andrea Marie: I know. That’s how I felt. I’m like, I’m out of ideas. 

Janae Burris: I am out of ideas. I’ve given you the snacks. I played with you, we watched the show. We’ve already gone to the park. It’s done.

Andrea Marie: Yeah.

Janae Burris: Get in your pajamas. It’s done. Day over.

Seeing two lines at 41

Andrea Marie: Oh my goodness. Oh, man. , Well I wanted to dive in a little bit. So you had Ezra, you talk about, it’s so funny, talk about having Ezra as an older mom and, just so, so funny. And had a partner who you were with for a little while and t hat has kind of shifted and changed and we were kind of talking a little bit about.

Janae Burris: Everything changed. I had Ezra when I was 42. I was with my ex ex that I just saw in Long Island for like 10 years and then we, you know, last couple years of the relationship, we were long distance. It was barely together and so we officially said our goodbyes and was just like, you know, I gave him back anything.

We did our thing and then like a month later, I got pregnant. By someone else. I was like, ohh. 

Andrea Marie: Goodness. Well, at 40, at 42 you?

Janae Burris: Yeah, I was 41 and then I had him at 42, but I didn’t even, I dumbly it. It is just dumb. This is pure stupidity. I didn’t think I could get pregnant for no reason. Well, only the reason is that I had never been pregnant. So I’m 41 thinking I’ve never been pre pregnant, never had a pregnancy scare. 

Andrea Marie: Yeah. 

Janae Burris: So I can’t get pregnant. Let’s rock the streets. Let’s do it all. Let’s do them all and then I was like, oh, yeah, yeah. You can get pregnant.

Yeah, you are fertile. 

Andrea Marie: Oh man, oh my goodness. But you know, Ezra’s such a blessing. He is just so fun.

Janae Burris: Wouldn’t have chosen it. Honestly. I was not pursuing that. I had hit a point in my life. So I break up with this guy after 10 years and we had talked a lot about marriage and that didn’t happen. And I was like, you know what? That’s fine. Like I was saying goodbye to my niece who was two years old and enjoying her, and I had my best body.

It was like my skin clear, my body got nice, my head caught up to my body and I was feeling confident. So I wasn’t gonna choose to be a parent. I wasn’t gonna slow down to have a kid, and I was still, even though I was 40, I was still feeling like. I can move about the cabin freely. I could go wherever I could move to New York.

I was thinking like, what’s my next move? And then my next move was just like, boom, you’re gonna be a mom. That’s what’s happening next. 

Andrea Marie: Yeah.

Janae Burris: Yeah.

Andrea Marie: I mean, it changes everything. Changes everything. You can’t even.

Hearing “high risk” pregnancy for the first time

Janae Burris: Yeah, it changed everything immediately though, is the funny part about being a mom versus being a dad is soon as you find out you’re pregnant, life changes.

So everything changed immediately. Life had to adjust. I immediately though, felt like I’ve gotta earn some money and I’ve gotta stay busy through this pregnancy. 

In a geriatric pregnancy, but also high risk. I was 41, high risk as a 41-year-old. Also as a black woman, black maternal health was something I was like, really like researching and so I was kind of scared in my pregnancy, like, can I carry a baby? Now I know I can get pregnant, but can I carry a baby?

Can I carry it to full term? Can I have a healthy child? Am I too stressed out? Is my lifestyle just gonna suit a baby? Sorry. I was just very focused on staying busy, trying to stay healthy, and I didn’t know what was gonna happen after the kid came.

Andrea Marie: Yeah.

Janae Burris: And so I was just deeply in the pregnancy, like, I don’t know, maybe I’ll be dead.

I don’t even know.

Andrea Marie: But that is scary. ‘Cause it is, I mean, like, you know. I didn’t even think about that aspect of, yeah, it’s scary to be like, oh, my life is changing. But then also like, oh, what? You know, this is a scary time in general. Just having this baby at 41.

The numbers behind Black maternal health

Janae Burris: Yeah. I used to know the statistics easily, but I feel like it black women are three to four times more likely to die from a complication due to their pregnancy or giving birth, three to four times more likely than like their white counterparts. And it’s really has to do with medical bias.

Andrea Marie: Ah.

Janae Burris: It’s not anything in particular that, you know, you and I have differently going on in our bodies. It’s medical bias. A lot of times black women are not listened to, their concerns are not heard. Serena Williams almost died, so it’s not even an economic issue. You can be a very wealthy black woman. You have your concerns dismissed because of medical bias, because your doctor.

Believes that your skin is thicker, your doctor learned in an old book that you can handle pain better. And so it just keeps happening in this country. And so all of that was on my mind, like the whole pregnancy, just thinking I’m gonna have a kid and then I could end up passing away soon after that.

So, and I did end up having preeclampsia after I gave birth. And so it, so I ended up back in the hospital after I gave birth for like, I don’t know, a few days I was on my antibiotics and stuff. I had to have my baby in the hospital with me. I wasn’t allowed to get out of the bed. David had to live in the hospital with me for a few days as I recovered.

Shooting a comedy special while very pregnant

Janae Burris: And I actually shot a special while I was pregnant, no one’s ever seen. 

Andrea Marie: Oh, that’s right. I remember that. 

Janae Burris: I shot a special. It actually is beautiful. It’s almost four years. It is four years old. 

Andrea Marie: Yes. 

Janae Burris: It is beautiful and friends edited it for me, because I didn’t realize that after you have the child, you will never have that much energy or time again.

Andrea Marie: Or time. Time at all. 

Janae Burris: Being almost nine months pregnant was gonna be the height of it. It was like, no, no, no. After you have the kids, you’ll never be able to get this thing edited. You won’t have any money, you won’t have any time. You won’t have the bandwidth. You really won’t give a damn. So I should have finished editing before I had the baby, but I recorded it like two weeks before I gave birth. 

But I talk a lot about black maternal health. My maternal grandmother passed away pregnant at the age of 29, pregnant with her seventh child. And we don’t, I never was given like really clear answers about it, but later as an adult going, oh, black women die at a higher rate, she may have had preeclampsia.

Who knows what she had? But she died pregnant with her seventh child, leaving my mother and her siblings, you know, to be cared for. And so that’s in the family. And so it was just on my mind. I could not stop thinking about it at all. Like, can I? I never thought about raising a child. I was just like, survive the pregnancy

Andrea Marie: Then we’ll figure out. 

figure it out. 

Janae Burris: I’ll figure it out after that.

Andrea Marie: Yeah, oh my gosh. That’s a lot. That’s a lot of, I didn’t even realize those numbers were, were like that. So that’s really upsetting. 

Janae Burris: Hate to be a downer on the comedy podcast. 

No, no, but you know what it, I appreciate like, you know, bringing that up because it is like, you know, just people don’t know some. Yeah, I didn’t know. It’s good to know always. 

So a beautiful, healthy child. I had a pretty easy delivery. I only got to experience like one or two contractions and I pushed for maybe 30 minutes and he was out. And so he came out healthy. And after I dealt with my body, I was fairly healthy. It was a blessing and just something I never.

You know, life just puts you on a path sometimes and then actually the path is okay. It’s okay. It was fine. The pregnancy was fine, delivery was fine. Baby is great and he is almost four and smart and healthy and funny and handsome, and a handful.

Andrea Marie: You know, you’ve brought ’em along on some trips or to shows, and it’s so fun. I’m not around three and four year olds very much anymore. And when I’m like, oh yeah, that’s right. They just are busy, busy, busy. You know, just running around everything is like, let’s look at this. Now, let’s look. We’re done with that. Let’s you know. 

Janae Burris: Busy, that is the word to describe him. He is busy and he’s an only child and we don’t have cousins and stuff around, so he’s always trying to get me to be busy with him and I’m like, honey, mommy is old. And mommy has a lot of stuff to do, so you have to keep yourself busy. But he wants me to play and he wants to control what I’m doing.

Single motherhood and the gig vs. babysitter math

Andrea Marie: Yeah, yeah. And that’s another thing you are, it’s gotta be so challenging. I know it’s so challenging with everything that you do. You’re basically your own business, your own boss, your own, you’ve got to fill your schedule work to get to these shows and then also handle a 2-year-old or 3-year-old, whatever, you know. All those things.

How do you do it?

Janae Burris: It is really just, I put one foot in front of the other, quite honestly. I don’t have a big grand to plan.

Andrea Marie: Mm-hmm.

Janae Burris: I wake up every day thinking, can I make some more money to, you know, take care of us? How do I make some more money? Okay, say yes to this gig. Now, gig locked. How do we get to the gig? And who’s gonna keep the child?

How much am I making on that gig? Is it worth it to get a sitter or should I drag him with me? He’s much better at being, he’s almost four now. But initially I did have his dad as a partner. You know, I got pregnant by a friend. We weren’t really a couple, we became a couple committed couple.

After we had our kid, we were like, let’s see if we can do this. And unfortunately that didn’t really work.

Andrea Marie: Mm-hmm.

Janae Burris: Because as I said, I became a mom as soon as the test read positive. He can become a dad when he wants to become a dad, but he was pretty good and under, he was supportive of my career, and so I could leave Ezra home and I was working like crazy at that point.

I was like busy, busy, busy, busy, busy. And he would spend a lot of time with Ezra and sometimes he would bring Ezra to shows. And then once we broke up and I had to bring, I had to have Ezra on my own. It just, financially, I can’t pay somebody $25- $30 an hour for me to go make a hundred dollars. So I bring Ezra with me and I pass ’em to the nearest comic, and I’m like I am a mom until they call my name.

You know, I’m literally, I have pictures of me like breastfeeding backstage, and then when my name is called, it’s like pop it up. Somebody burp this baby. I’ll be right back in 45 minutes. I can hear him in the audience. I can hear him backstage.

I remember I took him to Aspen and he was backstage, and Patton Oswald was like, is there a baby in here? Because it just sound like a ghost baby in the rafters. I’m like, Ugh, that’s me. Sorry, sorry famous people. I brought my baby. We just make it work. Like I don’t have a big plan. I wish I was better about having planned, but I’m just putting one foot in front of the other.

You know, it got bad with his dad and I was kind of hollow, a zombie. But these kids give you purpose. They make you wake up in the morning and they make you pull it together best you can. And every day I just put one foot in front of the other for Ezra. Because I don’t have a choice to say, I’m not gonna do it today.

Moms can’t call in sick

Andrea Marie: Yeah. Yeah, there’s no day off. There’s no like, you know, we’re just gonna call in sick today.

Janae Burris: I tried. I’ve been sick and been like, Ezra, please, please. And he’s like, mommy, mommy, I’m hungry. And I’m like, I am dying. And he’s been a sweet boy where I can, he will just stay in the bedroom with me as I’m like, just gimme a second and he’ll eat five packs of muffins. I’m like, that’s fine. It’s fine.

We’ll deal with the constipation later. Just eat all the muffins you want. You want soda, you have soda for breakfast. Just stay in this room with me. And you know, you get up and it’s like, oh, you unraveled all the toilet paper, but thank you for giving me the time to recover.

recover Because you can’t properly, you can’t take a day off. It’s like I still have to be a mom through my migraines and you know.

Andrea Marie: Yeah.

Janae Burris: And he’s been a very sweet boy. He’s such a sweet boy.

Andrea Marie: Mm-hmm.

Janae Burris: Sweet, very loving, very smart, very funny, and very lately very intuitive and checking on me, and he sees when I’m sad.

Andrea Marie: Mm.

Janae Burris: He’s like checking on me.

Andrea Marie: Yeah. That’s so nice when they start really realizing that there’s someone outside of themselves. You know, I think that next stage where they’re like, oh, that other person has feelings too, you know. So that’s a nice bonus to as they get older.

The early days of stand-up

Andrea Marie: So tell us a little bit about your comedy journey. Like you went to school for in theater, and then when did you start doing standup comedy?

Janae Burris: I went to school for theater. For avant garde theater, and I took myself very seriously after college and tried to book work as an actor in LA. And I even joined the only avant-garde theater company in LA. I was a member for a while. What is it called? I don’t even know what it’s called anymore.

Woo. That was almost 20 years ago now. I just kept going to auditions where I was asked, do you do standup comedy? And I was like, no ’cause I was very like, I’m a theater. Read my resume.

Andrea Marie: I’m in theater.

Janae Burris: I’m trained. And I heard that a few times at audition and also sometimes, do you sing? And I’d be like, no.

And I have like, sort of anxiety about singing, but so with the standup comedy thing, I missed out on a few big opportunities and I was like, girl, you better go handle this. So I class, took class at the improv with Lesley Wolff and it like a eight week course with way too many people in the class.

We didn’t get any one-on-one like at all. But you know how standup comedy is, like if I like to take performing arts classes and be in rehearsals and things, so I had people to bounce ideas off of. I had people to hold me accountable, ask me out to open mics. You have a showcase date to perform in front of all.

I invited somebody I was hooking up with as well as my ex at the time, and he was pretty pissed off to see that other guy there. But I had one of the best sets of the class, of the like 25 people in our class. I crushed. And then I went on from there. LA is like a lot of open mics and bringer shows where you gotta bring to get your eight minutes.

Seems like every set is eight minutes. Like you just got. I never, I didn’t know what a headliner was, what a feature was. I remember applying for something that was like, where’s your home club? And I was like, what’s a home club? And so LA is just like eight minutes at a time and I was doing that.

Then my boyfriend Andy. I ended up getting a new boyfriend, Andy, and we ended up moving to Fresno where my family is. And I continued to do standup there, and they don’t have much. And so it was like casinos and we had this one open mic at a hookah lounge that I would go to casinos, bars and then I didn’t love Fresno, loved my family, but they were all focused on their children.

Everybody’s pretty focused on the kids. And I didn’t have a kid. And so Andy and I were like, we should go anywhere else.

Andrea Marie: Yeah, yeah.

Janae Burris: We were talking about Philly in Chicago, and then an opportunity came up for him in Denver and I was like, Denver it is. Let’s go. I’ll figure it out. It can’t be worse than Fresno. Lovely people, but the comedy scene just wasn’t, you know, the art scene for me just didn’t exist.

The weather’s also, it gets very hot. So we came to Denver and popped off immediately. You know, there’s a one, Comedy Works is here. So I was like, oh, a club, a home club. I understand. At the time when I moved here, like it was right before High Plains, so I got to check that out.

And then the Comedy Works contest was happening and I wasn’t in these things. But I got to check it out and scene. I went to open mics, met great people, went to, you know, to The Deer Pile, got to see the alt room shows, El Charrito, comedy room, and I just started to meet awesome people.

Also, people in Colorado were happier than in Fresno. You know, 2014 is when I moved and that’s when weed was legalized. And so there lot of transplants here. I come for the weed. It’s a benefit, but I didn’t come it. So I just met people who were happy to be here and I was not used to that. To just a positive turn.

And that changed my life just to be around this big sky and the mountains. And it’s a little cloudy today, but it’s beautiful here. And you are outside and I was taking pictures of leaves in the fall and I was loving it. I loved it in Colorado and it, I got an opportunity to thrive here and just grow my comedy.

And even grow my theater experience as well. Lots of great theater here. It’s been wonderful as an artist here. I felt supported and I felt like if I have the drive and the time, there’s endless opportunities. After a kid though, the time kinda and the drive, you’re like, don’t it anymore. I’m out. I’m out.

Andrea Marie: They suck the drive right outta you, don’t they?

Janae Burris: Yep.

Andrea Marie: Oh my gosh. Yeah well, you know, I mean, that’s the fun thing. I do think that Denver and Colorado has a great comedy scene for being, you wouldn’t even think. I think, you know, people think of LA and New York, but you know, Colorado’s.

Janae Burris: Were you doing comedy in Chicago? In the Chicago area?

Andrea Marie: I wasn’t, I’m so sad I wasn’t. You know, I lived there for, I grew up there, and lived there a little bit after college. But I came out to Denver pretty quick in 96.

And so I wasn’t really, when I came out here, I got into improv and was doing improv for a while. But yeah, I’m sad that I didn’t, you know, take advantage of the comedy scene in Chicago when I was there. But I go back there all which is, yeah.

Yeah, I’m going back next week. So that’s, that’ll be, that’s fun. Awesome. I love that. I love hearing, I love hearing about everyone’s journey and how they came to be where they’re at right now. I wanna circle back now to kids. And we had talked about an unhinged moment.

That’s what I like ask everyone on the podcast, an unhinged moment. It could be from with raising your kid or your own parents, your own mom, whatever, everything. Like something where we can all relate to, you know, even no matter what it is. Some people are like, I’m scared to say this, and I’m like, believe me, I’m sure there’s people out there who are like, I’ve done worse.

Looking at her mom with new eyes

Janae Burris: Gosh, what would I think? I know, and you told me, you gave me a heads up, but still I was like unhinged. Now I do remember my mom. So, this is retrospectively ’cause now as a mom, I forgive her for everything. I’m more understanding and perhaps as a kid, I thought it was some unhinged moments. But now as a mom looking back, being like, oh, she had five kids when she was like under 30 years old.

So I forgive her. She was a damn superhero. But my mom, I can remember. My mom, I just, I remember her throwing things sometimes.

Andrea Marie: Yeah, yeah.

Janae Burris: Throwing spatulas and just putting them, just being overwhelmed, you know, fighting off the wolves, essentially. Throwing shoes and my mom being young and just like, I feel like my dad was great.

He got a lot of credit for being a great dad, but now I also put that in perspective of how we credit fathers. Like what’s the minimum a dad can do to still be world’s best dad? Not that my dad wasn’t great, he was great and he was attentive, but my mom, you know, she’s struggling with, I sense she may have had some postpartum depression.

And just general sadness. I can remember her staying in bed and being in the dark a lot and I thought that was unhinged. I’m like, oh, my mom was just like not being attentive. And it’s like, no, not all the time. It’s sometimes, but lots of, lots of holidays where my mom, we were church people and my mom would always wait till the last minute to get our dresses.

Like She did a lot of night before Christmas shopping to get the Christmas dresses. A lot of night before Easter shopping to get the dresses and just like scrambling to get five dresses and bows and everything, and Halloween costumes the last minute. And I always was just like, my mom just doesn’t have it together.

She’s just you. And you know, my cousins. My cousins would always have this beautiful hair and very clean homes, and my mom was like, our house was messy and our hair wasn’t always combed.

And people would sometimes be like, oh, poor you guys. Look at these poor little girls with their hair sticking up. Look at, oh, and their dad is being a real troop. And I started to believe that my mom didn’t have it together. But now as a mom to one child. My mom was a superhero.

My mom was a damn superhero and she was young and she always wanted to be a mom. She had her first kid at like 17, but she wanted to be a mom. You know, she lost her mom pretty young and that was her desire to have children.

And I don’t know that. You know, they didn’t have the Googles to be like, Hey, you’re struggling.

Andrea Marie: Yeah.

Janae Burris: Use some medication or something. You could use some help. right? But I feel like when I look at my sisters as adults, we’re all doing well. We’re all pretty adjusted. My father unfortunately passed away. My mom was widowed at like 36 years old.

Andrea Marie: Oh, wow.

Janae Burris: 36. But still my sisters are really, if you look at the children, my mom was pretty damn together you what she managed to produce. But I think I spent many years thinking my mom was unhinged and off. And it’s like, no, you know, she never really hit us. The shoe she threw at us in our direction.

Right? They never really hit us. It was more of a get away from me, I need a break type of.

Andrea Marie: It really is like, I never understood how. I’m like, how could someone hit a child? And I had kids and then I’m like, oh, I get it.

Janae Burris: How could they not?

Andrea Marie: I get it. It’s amazing. It’s amazing that children, so many children are not hit. Not hit. It’s hard. It is hard. And yeah, five kids. I cannot imagine. Five girls.

Janae Burris: Yeah, five girls. And then, you know, when my dad passed, I was a teen. My older sister was a teen. My third sister was a teen, and then the other ones were in elementary school, and then suddenly she had to be a mom to five kids without, you know, I look back on it. She probably needed therapy. She needed some therapy, she needed resources.

But you know, we had family, my family, my extended family, cousins, grandmothers, aunts, great people. But I think my mom could have used some more support. But me, my sisters and I are, we’re all pretty smart ladies and we love each other. I have good relationships with them. We’re empathetic humans.

My mom focused very much on kindness. Be a kind person. And my dad was very much like, be a trustworthy person, be a respectful person. You know, so we were, I wish they had been like, be money motivated, have some savings. Meet a man some money.

Andrea Marie: But it’s so much more important. I love that message more than like, let’s be like insanely clean. It creates so many, so many issues.

Janae Burris: Yeah. 

Andrea Marie: And anxieties. 

Janae Burris: So, they did a good job. 

Yeah. All my sisters are kind people, trustworthy people. I respect my sisters and they show her I could take them anywhere. These are people I could take anywhere and feel like they’re gonna be good. So I feel like based on that, my mom did a great job despite her seeming chaotic.

Growing up seeming like disorganized and a little flighty, forgetful. And she was young. She was young, and she was cute too. And I forgive her for all of that. And I just don’t see her that way anymore. I’m like, you did pretty good job, mom.

The kind of hard you truly cannot explain

Janae Burris: But it took me becoming a mom to recognize most mothers as a single person.

Very judgy, very judgy. Single people without kids, they don’t know what they talking about. They don’t know what they talking about, and I don’t like to hear their opinions about it.

Andrea Marie: So true.

Janae Burris: You don’t know what you’re talking about.

Andrea Marie: True.

Janae Burris: It’s hard.

Andrea Marie: It is.

Janae Burris: It’s hard.

Andrea Marie: Yeah You don’t even know the level of hard.

Janae Burris: You don’t know how hard this is.

Andrea Marie: You can’t describe it to anyone. Well, Janae, this has been amazing. This has been so fun. It’s so fun catching up.

Janae Burris: Got to the subjects. I am always like this on podcasts. I get very ADD.

Andrea Marie: I know. I love it. I love it. It’s always, it’s all about having, this is my selfish way to catch up with everybody and have some fun conversations and it’s a bonus for all you listeners out there listening in on this. So thank you. 

Janae Burris: We didn’t about how we’re gonna be sister wives. We didn’t get to address that.

Andrea Marie: I know. We didn’t get to that at all.

That’ll be part two.

Janae Burris: That’d be part two. Tell my future husband, hey, if you have a good ex. Pass him on to your friend. Okay, you don’t have to like him. Let somebody else like him.

Andrea Marie: I know you can give them the manual. You get the little download.

Janae Burris: The man. Yeah, this is what he likes. This is what he doesn’t like. This is his cat.

Andrea Marie: Don’t talk to him before 9 about this type of thing.

Janae Burris: Okay, okay. Send them my way. But thank you for what you’re doing. I talk about every time I do a Moms Unhinged show, I take a break to kind of give you a shout out. ‘Cause you know, my perspective on what you’re doing is like, I feel so blessed because I didn’t know how I was gonna continue to be a comic.

I’m one of the moms who was a comic first and then had a kid, and I just didn’t know what I was gonna do. I was like, I don’t think I’m gonna be able to be a comedian and travel anymore, which was a dream, and then this Moms Unhinged thing happened and it was like, wait, I can still travel. Oh, I’m actually being paid.

I’m getting a place to stay. The rental car is there. The other people on the lineup are fantastic. I drag my baby sometimes and these other moms, I tell my mom, I’m like, their moms too, mom. He’s safe. He’s in, they’re watching him. They’re loving on him. So thank you for creating this space.

And also opening my eyes to like the fact that moms are a good audience. Moms still wanna laugh. Moms are a fun time. Moms are very fun Moms like a raw dog who, like, more fun than that? And like meeting all these wonderful women in the audience that I used to ignore as a comic. I never paid attention to the moms.

And so thank you for doing what you do. And moms are people too, okay.

Andrea Marie: Yeah. That’s right, that’s right. We’re tired, but we’re people.

Janae Burris: We’re people. We’re tired people. We are people.

Andrea Marie: Well, why don’t you let everyone know where they can connect with you? We’ll definitely have all the links in the show notes here, but tell let people know how they can connect with you.

Janae Burris: You can connect with me, you can always find me in person here in Colorado. I always call myself a Colorado comedian, and I love this place. I’m a regular at Comedy Works. I’m also part of the new talent team, so you’ll catch me every Tuesday if you’re a new comic. I’m the lady you’re talking to.

I love to encourage people to try comedy ’cause it changes lives, especially love encouraging women. I will give you extra support if you’re a woman who wants to do comedy. Find me online at @negativenegro on Instagram. That’s where I post most of my shows, janaeburris.com. If I’m keeping my calendar updated, and I’m also the host of Film on the Rocks, so maybe I’ll see you this summer.

If you come to a show of film on the Rocks and lots of Moms Unhinged shows if Andrea keeps hiring me. 

Andrea Marie: Definitely if you guys are interested in doing comedy, Janae often runs comedy workshops where she teaches. She runs them pretty regular.

Janae Burris: Athena Project, if you’re teen who wants do comedy, Athena Project Arts. I love working with them. Love working with women. I have four sisters. I have many aunts. I’m a girl’s girl. Wish I could be lesbian, but that’s not how God made me. And, know, not yet. Not yet. But love women. And I’m still gonna hook Andrea’s ex-husband one of these never even seen. Don’t know what he looks like. Doesn’t matter.

Andrea Marie: He’s a nice guy. Alright. Alright, thank you Janae. Thanks so much.

Janae Burris: Thank you.

Andrea Marie: Thanks for listening and make sure you subscribe, share, and follow us on the socials to get more comedy clips.