A laugh is sometimes called a loud smile, while a smile is simply a frown screaming at you. Turn up the volume with today's Groupon: for $10, you get two tickets to Jason's Comedy Night, held at Jimmy’s Conference Center in Vadnais Heights (a $20 value). The monthly show is scheduled March 23 and April 20, both at 7:30 p.m., with general seating starting at 7 p.m.

Jason's Comedy Night showcases local comedians, surprise novelty acts, and other argonauts of entertainment in a new monthly variety revue. A former WCCO late-night radioman, bespectacled host Jason Jones discards the long format of a traditional comedy show, instead delivering a mix of shorter acts and featured performers. Musician Pete Capello kicks off shows with a mixture of soul, funk, and blues, setting the stage for left-of-center performers such as a pizza dough-throwing wunderkind, awakening audience members’ long-buried memories of UFO abduction.

Linda Aarons, formerly of Brave New Workshop's Six Ring Circus, will deliver hand-hewn jokes on March 23, and Colleen Doyle Justice and John Conroy take to the blue-curtained stage on April 20. Shows are taped live to air on MCN cable channel 6, allowing audience members with distinctive laughs or clip-clopping hoof hands to find fleeting local fame of their own.