Laughter, giggles and even a few snorts escaped the doors of the Burney Center on Nov. 15. Writer and comedian Grant Lyon warmed the crowd with comments about the seating arrangements.

“This is a strange seating arrangement,” he said before he began mimicking thoughts of groups within the audience.

He pointed to the second row, contorted his face into a snooty expression.

“We want a row to ourselves,” he said in a nasally accent.

Then he waved out to the back of the room as though the group he was waving to was miles away and said, “All these seats in here and I want these damn seats right here!” while stomping his foot on the stage.

The students immediately loved him.

Lyon related his first comedic story to UNCW students in particular.

“What is the mascot here? A Seahawk?” he asked. Then he looked out and said: “Just because you added “hawk” on the end of “sea” does not make it badass.”

The students laughed and he continued, “Now if it were an eagle, well that would be different.”

Lyon studied at the University of California in Santa Cruz and his mascot wasn’t any more intimidating.

“You know what my mascot was? A banana slug, that’s not intimidating! At least you guys get to say ‘Hey! I’m gonna peck your eyes out’ what can we say? ‘I’m gonna secrete ooze and look really weird.'”

Lyon stuck to the college theme throughout his routine and commented on getting older, having roommates, and moving back in with mom.

“You know after college I moved back in with my mom,” he said. “Yeah, that was an awful decision. Never do it.”

The crowd started to laugh and he said, “No really. One time I was eating cereal and my mom came in and told me to stop eating because I was eating out of the orange bowl.” He then mimicked his mother and said, “The Halloween Bowl.'” 

Lyon explained that when you live with a bunch of guys you’d be lucky to even get a bowl.

“Do you know how mad it makes me to eat cereal out of a Frisbee, or better yet, do you know what it’s like dipping each Cheerio individually in your milk?”

The audience laughed and he acted out placing a Cheerio in a glass of milk over and over again. He then continued talking about his mom and the orange bowl.

“You can only use the orange bowl if you’re wearing a costume,” he mimicked.

So then he told us the next morning, he came downstairs in spandex and a cape, so he could eat out of the orange bowl.

His mom asked, “Oh, what are you supposed to be?” and he said “I’m an angry graduate who wants a damn bowl of cereal.”

Living alone didn’t prove to be any better, though, as we found out in Lyon’s next story. He had a possum living in the wall that he thought was a ghost, because his house was the “oldest house in the neighborhood,” which translates to “Nothing works here.”

“The screeching was terrible, and I thought a little boy died in here and was mad I had an X-box and all he had to play with was a stick and a hoop,” Lyon said.

Rats chewed through the floor, a wall of flies waited behind the front door and fleas occupied the couch.

There was one good time he remembered out of that house, though.

“We didn’t have any blinds on the windows, and the neighbors didn’t have any either, so one night this couple was getting it on hardcore making out, and my friends and I were all watching intensely. Then out of nowhere, shirts off, they start reading! We waited for hours, but they never got back to it,” Lyon said.

“I had blue balls worse than that guy did,” he said.

Lyon had plenty of stories, and he interacted with the audience often by commenting on what they were wearing or how they looked at him.