Hey, Chris Fairbanks here with some show announcements coming up very soon. On March twenty third, I'll be at the Meyer Theater in Green Bay, Wisconsin. The next time I'm at the Laughing Tap in Milwaukee, and then I'm at City Winery in Chicago. I'm closing out all these shows with the haunted Renwick Mansion in Davenport, Iowa. Ooh, sounds scary.
And then in May, starting on the tenth, I'll be in New York City the Apple that's big at the Bellhouse, followed then by Jam and Java in Vienna, Virginia that's very near DC. And then I'm closing out these shows with City Winery in Philly, Philadelphia. Thank you and you're welcome.
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Do you need to ride? Do you Need with Karen and Chris. Welcome to Do you Need a Ride? This is Chris.
Fairbanks and this is Karen Kilgarreth.
You know Karen before we record. Sometimes if I haven't left the house in a while, I will go and try and experience something so I I have something to share with you. But I didn't have to try hard today. It's something very exciting happened. I'm very excited to share with you. What is it. I went golfing. I promised this isn't a golfing story. But I hit There's one hole there that's real short, it's a three par hole, and before it there's a couple mounds of grass, so
you can't really see the flag. And I saw tiny coyote like it looked like an actual puppy, and it was like pouncing playfully. It's before coyotes get mange and they get upset and then they don't they really don't want to be around people. But he was very a frisky coyote. And I hit the ball. I could not see the ball went behind these mounds and then but
I saw exactly the direction it went. It went to the left of the green, and I knew I probably didn't land on it again, and I ran up the I saw the little coyote run off after I hit. I thought, oh no, I wonder if I got close to him. He got scared and I went. As I walked up, my ball was right by the hole, Karen, I know this coyote picked up my ball. He understood the rules of golf, and he had it in his little mouth, and he dropped it near the hole. And I don't know if rules wise, I if that is
a playable ball. I think so. I think it's a It's the same as if it bounced off a tree and went near the hole. I swear I did not see him do it. I wish I did, but I'm very certain. I'm ninety percent certain this cute little coyote puppy had my ball in his mouth.
What if you actually got hitley hit? Listen to my theory, because there's another way to look at this. What if you got a hole in one and that coyote took the ball out of the hole.
See nice, I did the hole. They when they get older, I can tell they are not fans of golf, and we are just there and they don't even respect us. They don't. They will hang out on purpose and act like they're bathing, because we know those coyotes they don't really they're not worried about looking sharp. They're not a fan.
You're saying, a young coyote is going to help you before it gets cynical, before it learns the ways.
Of the before he listens to the pack. Exactly, this baby coyote was still had this hopeful. I just love it. And I of course went online and there's a lot of footage of little coyotes they're always young, playing with golf balls in the dark and some I just I'm so excited by it. I just wish I could have seen it.
That was like your own little legend of bager Vance coyote version.
Yeah, what if it gave me life advice? Right when I came up like a.
Justin land, right as you walk up to the ball, Well, congratulations.
I thank you. I think they are in order. Congratulations, I think they are due. And I did par that. If that's a good ending, I think it's because.
The words are meaningless to me. I don't know.
It is the goal of golf.
Get it in three, you got it in two?
Yeah, I got it in three. If it was a birdie, boy, that would Oh my god, what if a bird swept down and grabbed my ball?
And then what birdie? That? What if they're all so used to you guys golfing at that golf course that they all know how to help you numbers wise?
Yeah, I would love I would love it if there's a parrot somewhere that yells four four, That, of course, is when a ball's heading towards you, a helpful parrot. I just you know me, I got an animal fever. I just lately since the big bite. Oh, since that dog bit me my friend I did, I almost got big yesterday. This isn't But I hugged my friend and he just got a new dog. And the dog did not like that. I hugged him, and he had a classic Spuds Mackenzie bud light face and he lunched at me.
But he just nipped, just nipped at my sweatshirt and I'm like, hey, Greg, cool new dog. It didn't happen. It was just a close call. God. Yeah, it made my day and it can only be made better by our guests today. I'm so good at it.
That was the segue on par with your coyo.
Do you take you same today's guest? You know from clubs and colleges across the country. Yeah, he's a damned delight. He's always been supportive and sweet and everyone put your ears together for our friend Kurt Bronolder. Hello, how are you buddy? Hello?
Loa, I'm so excited to laugh. I heard when you said went golfing.
Enough. It got me going ridiculous, what are you eighty? Oh there's more to this story.
You said wet golfing, but the like because of like the zoom digital stuff, I heard wank offing. I mean it was like he says wank offing and not wanking.
Off like that was. I went off on that and then came back to be like there's a coyote involved, and then I was like, it's a golfing story, okay, but it was a cool It was a cool three seconds. Do you know how your brain can go to like fifty thousand dimensions within the space of you taking a breath.
That's what happened, right, I like the you do that Chris Wind start this podcast telling me about a time he went wank off it. I'd just be like excuse me, no, thank you, Freds of Private.
I'm just thinking of a kid that's his parents immigrate here and he's new to us school and he wants to relate to the other kids they're all coming of that age, and he says, do you guys like whank coffing? And they're like, you're you're gonna like it here kid.
The new Australian guy's weird.
That's probably how they do say it in Australia.
Yeah, when golfing, Kurt, what's going on? What are you after?
Tell what's going on, Kurt?
What's your what par are you shooting these days?
What's up? It's your wane coff game? I do.
I really hope that that coyote put that. I just want I want him to have helped you so badly.
Now.
Also, I love that you were searching a very specific search when you found many videos of baby coyotes playing with golf balls.
Yeah, it's common because they are I see them, and we see we've just gotten used to. Sure there's rattlesnakes also, which you know we avoid those. But the coyote do not want to be our friend, and I want them to be because a lot of them are really dog like and cute, not that they have to be cute for me to like them animals.
I once found a coyote who was just asleep on the side of the road in Griffith Park and so I called and I was like, something's wrong, and so I called Animal Control.
First, I called nine one one and they're like stop and then.
And what's your emergency. Well, it's more of a concern.
We got a sleeping coyote where I am and I think he's having nightmares.
And so I waited. So then I got in touch with the animal control. They're like, we'll send a park ranger. Whatever we send. And then while I'm waiting.
He he just like wakes up, stands up, and trots off. And then as he trots into the woods, like the Animal Control pulls up and I'm standing.
He's like did you call? And I was like, he just walked away. He's like, yeah, of course he did.
And then he just drove away. Oh wow, he bother what if.
That is like a pranking coyote? And he's like he's just trying to mess with that Animal Control guy because he's the enemy.
Yeah, that's one thing we've learned I think is they love pranking humans. Yeah, they are the guy upset Usually he has to scrape up roadkill with a shovel. He should have been delighted. Yeah, probably took care of itself. Pal.
It's that's the first thing I thought of. When you said I saw coyote sleeping next to the side of the road, I'm like, oh, no, that's just what Lauren told you, that he was dead. It sounded like someone was really trying to keep you from the harsh Yeah, the harsh reality is of Griffith Park.
They nap all the time. Usually it's on a nearby ranch, Kurt, they go off to a ranch to ranch, I mean, I know about it. Look out with it on bananas. What's has there been any weird what's your favorite animal related bananas? I mean, there's so many animals.
We want to make t shirts that say birds but holes bananas because it's mostly birds, butt and butt whole stories.
What's my favorite? Oh, my favorite.
One of my favorite animal stories is there was a crow in Oregon. It showed up at a elementary school and came in through a window into a science class and then was just like sitting, like jumping from people's kid's desk to kid's desk. They put a little hat on it and it was totally okay with it. There's like a photograph of it wearing a tiny hat and it was talking and it was talking, it was saying words,
and it was cursing a lot. And so because a lot of people don't know the crows can talk, but crows are hyper smart than they and a lot of them can talk if they're humanized or whatever it's called.
Yeah, and uh, which all you have to do to do that is put a hat on them. It's called humanized, Karen.
I mean, yes, once you put a.
Hat on it, it's humanized. Okay, it's a trade.
It makes a sound and then it's humanized.
And the story behind it, So all these kids were like fascinated, and you know, the teacher was fascinated.
They had to call. They called a bunch of people and like animal control wouldn't come, and then wildlife rescue started to come. But then a kid who was not in that class recognized the crow and was like, that's my neighbor's crow friend, like not her crow. So what had happened?
This is the craziest story is that this woman who lived like twenty miles away. She fed this crow every day. So it wasn't like her pet or anything. It was a wild crow. But she would feed it and talk to it, and it could talk, and it was very
smart and everything. But it really annoyed her neighbor. So when she went out of town for the weekend, her neighbor kidnapped the fucking bird and drove it like fifty miles away and led it off somewhere because it didn't want the because you know, the woman said, the bird would go after the neighbor a lot, because the bird saw the neighbor as like the threat to her friend.
Yeah, they do that. Crows will shit on you. They like, out of your jib, dive bomb you. And then the bird slowly made its way back towards the area, but didn't know where his friend was, and he was lost. But he found a Planet Fitness and he stood, this is so crazy. He stood on top of the Planet Fitness the door and just talked to everyone who was going in and out of the Planet Fitness until he saw a friend of the woman who was coming out
and then taking her son to school. Followed that woman's car and then followed the boy who was the son of the friend of the woman who knew the crow. And then the woman came and picked up the crow and brought it home. Holy shit, Oh my lord, that's crest. Was it that crazy? I like that, and correct me if I'm wrong. This whole crow story doesn't involve him flying at any point. It's mostly vehicular travel and hat wearing and.
And crow napping, tons of crow naps.
I want him to have gotten on top of the planet fitness, to have used a.
Ladder, and then a helicopter picked him up and drove him back to his old neighborhood. There's women on Ticked, or there's a woman, I should say on TikTok who did a thing where she was feeding crows and they kept more and more kept coming into the tree in her front yard, bringing her presence, which is my favorite when they bring little shiny things like here, you like this, it's a bottle cap, which is the cutest. But then she was like, as she walks, they follow her up
the streets. So it like if you were I would just imagine like a fourteen year old goth doing this, and then you have like an army of crows walking behind you. Awesome, Like it would be a dream come true.
Oh yeah for me.
And they can communicate to other crows what you look like, so you could go into a new neighborhood and the new crows would come flocking to you that she's.
Great, you'll get really good corn or whatever crow phone.
I oh my god, how did they do that? How is that proven? How did they communicate with each other? Until they do? They describe what you're wearing?
There was That was another story where it was like they showed like they had one group of crows where like a guy would harass them all the time, and then another one where another guy would like give them treats all the time. And then they like went to a separate I don't know murder of crows that was nearby, and that murder had communicated what the guy looked like who harassed them, so that they started harassing the guy who harassed the other Murder of crows. It was crazy.
It's straight up. I don't know how they I don't know how they do it. I mean they obviously they talk. They can talk.
You know how they do it? Gossip?
Yeah, yeah, it's biggest.
They get little little kitchen tables and they sit around and they talk massive shit.
Oh god, I hope it was a top hat.
That's just it was a little Santa's hat, That's what it because it was around Christmas time.
And what bold child? I that the idea of doing that, putting a hat on a crow. Actually that's a that kid had.
I mean, I mean the crow was sitting on their desks and just being like, eat my ass because it was cursing a lot.
Is that really what it was saying.
I don't know what it was saying, eat my ass. It was cursing. It was cursing. I know that because the woman puted him up was like, well he does. He does curse a lot. He does have a film. And if you if anyone doubts a single word, I just said. The article is in the Oregonian. I remember, you can google Planet, fitness, crow and the Oregonian.
It's a legit newspaper. I never even thought about that part. It really is. I thought you were gonna say some no, it's like I thought you were going to say, if you want to do it, you can google News of the Coast or whatever, where it's like uh huh, good yep, but it's really the most legit newspaper of the Pacific Northwest.
I could talk animal stories from bananas for forever, forever.
Really, I mean, it is what I asked of you.
And that is the joy of that podcast to me. It's just kind of like weird news. You go, oh yeah, I love I love that. I love the idea of it. It's it's delightful. You kind of can hear what's going on in the world, but it's not all the stuff that makes you to have a heart attack. But there's so much of it that there's now at this point, you guys have been doing it for.
Through three three years, three years.
But now it's like all these sub categories. It's like this again, one of these Like there's so many subcategories of weird news. It's amazing.
Yeah, and this is the you know, Last of Us, the Last of Us, which is all about like their zombies are like fungus instead of being what it usually it's a virus.
And I was immediately like.
Yeah, I know, because there was one we did about bees which was there's like a fungus that infects bees, it kills them, it kills them, then takes over their brain and makes them have sex with as many other bees as they possibly can until they sent until their bodies disintegrate, just to pass the fungus on to other bees. And so there's zombie bees that are just fucking constantly and it's crazy. So like that whole last of us thing is totally from like you know.
From bees, yes, from science.
From science. Well, Kurk, can you tell us your best butthole story?
My best but well, that's that's a pretty good butthole story because the fungus actually becomes their butthole.
But kind of sounds like you're lying a little bit, just you know what I mean, Like that sounded like a fifth grade lie where you're just like going with what Chris said.
You had me until fungus bu hole fun because that's exactly they I swear to God, that's part of it.
The bottom half of the bee becomes the fungus and so it like it like that's where it is. It just the whole bee is fungus at that point and it's you know, shoving it into places.
But I'm trying to think the best buttthhole story. Ooh, that's a good one.
I mean, like we used to have when we first did the original, like the thing that like the pilot that this was based on, we did a whole segment called What's Up Your Butt?
And it was just X.
Ray scans from emergency rooms of things that had been removed from people's butts. And we've seen a lot of those, but still the most surprising one is a full buzz light Year action figure, which I'm still I'm still confused as to how because it has arms that go out like this.
You can understand the dome part, but then the arms.
Are sticking up like this, you know, because he's saying to infinity and beyond. So that was the joke, was to infinity and be ouch a.
So that's probably one of my favorite butthole ones. Oh God, love it. When you did that segment, did you play Eddie Murphy's song put a Little Man in Your Book? Do you guys remember that song.
In your butt?
Put a Tiny Tree in your Butt? It's my sister and I had the list memorized. We lived in a small town. There wasn't a lot to do. Yeah, and uh, it was the whole list of things that you could, according Daddy Murphy, put in your in.
Your butt, put a put a whole rubber band in your butt, and it's very It was very catchy. It was very well written.
Yeah yeah, God just lock him in a room with uh coked up who did all that music with him? He spent like the weekend with Rick James. I think oh really made all those songs.
I don't think you're a party all the time and all that.
What were your favorite as kids?
Like, what were your favorite comedy albums that that happened to listen to?
Man Delirious I listened to and that's right when walkmans came out. So I have a very distinct memory of being on like the volleyball bus and my friend Patti Leoni snapped off one of the like you on your walkman, you could snap off us speaker and give it to somebody else and like then reattach it later. What you weren't breaking anything, And so we just held she had hers on, and then I held the thing up and
we listened to that thing. Because we would always we were tiny high school, so we'd have to go play other tiny high schools, so we'd have to drive like up the you know, California coast, up into like point Arena and up by Eureka and like so far away just to find another school that was also tiny and bad at sports, and so you know, we'd like listened to the whole thing both sides a couple times, like
there and back or whatever. So it was groundbreaking because it truly it wasn't like I felt like all the comedy I'd seen up till that point was like evening at the improv kind of mild everyone out of blaze. It was very like you can tell this joke at work or whatever, and it just felt so different, and it was just so genuinely hilarious. I just loved it.
I remember watching that I Guess on cable when Yeah, like over and over and over and raw delirious and raw over and over and over and over. Oh man, I was obsessed with both of those.
He's so good.
I'm almost embarrassed that my first album comedy album that I knew was Andrew dice Clay because it was on Yeah. He was on Deaf Jam Deaf American, and so maybe that's how I found out about it. There was older kids in my neighborhood that were listening to it, but it was the same thing. You're saying, Karen, it was like, if you're used to the Blazer comedy of Late Night MTV half hour Comedy Hour with Mario Joyner, it's insane that someone's talking about squirting shampoo on the floor because
he loves pert. I don't actually a lot of the stuff. I bet if I listened to it now, none of it would hit me the same way, but that it just happened to be the first.
You don't think nurse dirty nursery rhymes would hold on?
I know what. I never was into the und I'm like, this seems a little juvenile, and I was fifteen, But yeah, some of the stories like him getting very angry about expensive shampoos, so it would take the part shoot and shoot it all over the floor like someone's load. I take the joboba, So it was like a about him stealing shampoo actually, and I just thought, how hilarious to focus on that and tell it to a crowd of people. But yeah, I didn't like the rhyming. I've never liked rhyming.
I think the only actual tape I had, though, was Adam Sandler's do you remember that?
Yeah? Right?
I wishes it was mostly and songs so it wasn't stand up or anything. And it was the first time I heard sketch comedy. I think, yeah, I think you're right. Yeah, the goat in the back of the truck, there was a gut. He did all the voices. There was other people in it.
I remembered.
One where like he bought a bag of weed from a guy, but it was pencil shavings.
And that's all I remember, Like that is the extent that I remember.
I would listen to it over and over and over again, and I remember one word, like four words for one sketch.
Yeah, it's so funny that at that time though, I yeah, I don't think I did not realize comedy albums were a thing. I just didn't you didn't know that.
Yeah, I remember watching that whole like uh, like a live at the improvs and stuff, and I don't know, and I still want and maybe you guys have heard this joke and know what comedian this was. But I remember I was by thirteen. I saw this on like some variety show.
It was.
The joke was it was a dude, white dude in a blazer and he said, I was at the airport and I went to go to the use the bathroom, but they had a sign up that said please use floor below, and they didn't even put down paper or anything but that.
I would laugh at that. I'm afraid if someone said it tomorrow, even having you heard you say it just now. I love that Steve Middleman bit for real.
I want. I wanted so bad to be like Gary Mulder Dear. I just immediately know know the tomic by the most obscure airport jokes.
I know, I was actually getting excited there. I'm like, I bet, I bet, I know who it is. Damn, I don't.
I have one that maybe you guys can identify. That's one of my favorite, or I shouldn't say my favorite. It's almost like the first stuff I saw.
I loved.
I loved it all. I loved the people were doing it. There didn't seem to be any it was like they're making it up right now, that idea where like everything
about it seems so magical. But there was a guy that did this joke where he's at the grocery store and he says he he has all of his groceries and the last thing he has on the conveyor belt is a package of toilet paper, and then when he gets up to the when the woman's checking him out, he says to her, so for all of this, how much of like he's holding up the toilet paper, how much of this do I need for this? Is this enough?
This?
And he just keeps doing it.
You know who that guy is?
He was kind of he was blonde, He was kind of just like a regular guy looking. But I think about that joke all the time where I'm like, that's the you know, when you're trying to write comedy and you can't think of anything, and then you just start thinking of, well, like that's so easy, it's simple. Everyone can relate to it. And then you're just sort of like, why can't I think of it? Like like, where's my conveyor belt? Toilet paper?
Yeah joke, And little did you know you would have dozens of them by the time you were thirty.
It's my true inspiration.
It seems crazy to me, But the one comic that I saw on one of those shows late at Night that I related to was Jay Moore because he had on a leather jacket and a Bad Brains T shirt. And it's like, there's a comedian that listens to Bad Brains. Oh that's crazy. Yeah, he actually did. He produced some documentary about Bad Brains just recently I noticed, but I don't know.
But he was also a great stand up. He had great jokes, did amazing impressions, Like he was great.
Yeah, but it's crazy to me that I saw a version of him with like long surfer hair and a Bad Brains T shirt and a leather jacket, like he was trying that lookout. And he was also young. He was like one of the youngest comics I'd ever seen on one of those shows. Like, so thank you Jaymore for being my inspiration into getting into comedy.
The week I started comedy, like I had wanted to do it, and I was hanging out at this one like it wasn't really an open mic night. It was kind of booked, but there was like a bunch. It was like twelve comics a showcase night, I guess. But and I hung out there for like almost over a month before I could get up the gets to do it. And then when I finally did it, I'm like, I'm it's so original, Like I was convinced I was the only person like me to be doing stand up comedy.
In the way I was doing it. And a week later I saw Janie Garoffalo on half hour Comedy Hour and I just stood up and started crying and walked out of the room, and all my friends were like, oh, Karen, poor kid, And it was like, I was like, there was no reason for me to be doing stand up comedy anymore if she's doing it, like she had black tights and cut off jeans over her black tights and combat boots and like, you know, a cool shirt or whatever and cool everything, like that's what I wanted to
be like, And then she was doing her amaze, saying jokes like when she's saying to the waiter like tapping a wrist, like what time is it? And he's like, yes, was what is it? And she's like, oh, what bone is this? She's what else would she be asking? But what time is it? And he's liked, can I help you out?
Yes?
What bone is this? Like stuff like that, and then I was just like, oh, forget it. I don't I shouldn't be doing this. Literally started crying, and my friend's made fun of me so hard because it's just like, you know, how old.
Are I was?
Twenty?
Uh? That's crushing. It was.
It was terrible.
Yeah, especially at twenty. I can't believe you tried it at twenty. I didn't try stand up until I was twenty nine.
I was very old. Yeah. Oh quote unquote you can start any time, right, because you can't.
I had just flunked out of college, so it was almost like it was my last gasp of doing anything at all before I was like, Okay, I'll just be a gut or drunk right, never do anything else with my life. So it was kind of like I had to really paint myself into a corner. So it wasn't like a cool plan like had all this great you know, I was doing great stuff and I was working up to it or whatever. It's like, well, if I'm not in college, maybe maybe my parents will like it if
I do stand up comedy. Just like, no, it's not a solution.
Yeah, where Yeah, what were your parents like what you said you wanted to be a comic current were they supportive? I'm still not sure if my dad knows. I think he knows. I think he knows. I'm sure he knows maybe, And I think my mom. My mom was just.
So she was so supportive without ever understanding anything that I did. Do you know what I mean that it just was like slotted in with everything else. You know, at least you're not wearing a phone cord as a belt anymore. Like that's sure what she was thinking, like, that's fine, Okay.
Did you just rip it off an old phone one day? Like was up your punk rock era?
It sure was? It sure was had a it would be a classic outfit. Would it be a phone cord?
And it was a curly Q phone cord around my waist, just tied with a wean a ripped Wien shirt and purple hair and that was.
Yeah, and.
Yep, that was that was And honestly she she missed most of the worst haircuts because I was at college when I did them. At one point I had a completely shaved head with just at I left the front and the front just this like little a coxcomb of hair in the front that I would then sculpt into two horns with pamad like like an hant sniffing out his his his place to go.
Well the visual uh huh wait, I saw an Alice put together a very nice bio of you, which is always funny when it's someone that you already know, and then you're like, oh, I would like to know where he went to college. Finally the information I've wanted. But you went to Johns Hopkins. Were you pre med or was that a medical situation?
No, that's what I wonder it was not. I mean I was not meet pre med. I was a philosophy.
So you know the classic place you go for an English philosophy degree, Johnson's University. I like to be in a minority wherever I go, of what other people are doing. Yeah, there was like four other four other people that were also doing that and we all lived together, but we.
Were definitely like not. The campus was very pre made.
Yeah, and there was a big building on campus that Bloomberg had paid for Mike Bloomberg, and it was just like we are making weapons.
WHOA. So yeah, So I think now it's a lot different, Like there's a theater department now, I think at Johns Hopkins.
But when I was there, it was just like all the plays, we were just putting them on by ourselves.
And what why was that your I imagine you got good grades, so you had a choice if you got into Johns Hopkins.
You know, I think I only got into two places. I got into Johns Hopkins in Middlebury, and I decided to go to Johns Hopkins. Yeah, my dad had gone there and that was what I was. He was gonna help me if I went there.
So I was like, oh, okay, yes I will, I'll go.
I'll go there and the thing you don't want me to do, it'll.
Be yeah, it'll be great. I well I can.
I can study useless things anywhere, pay for it.
Yeah. Everything that I wanted to do in college, they started those programs. Like the year I graduated, they all of a sudden there's a new building and they're like, oh, yeah, we teach pre film, animation, graphic design, everything I wanted to do prior to that. They're like, you can either teach art history or become a studio painter and try and do shows gallery shows. And I'm like, I don't.
I want to draw things and get them in magazines and they're like, yeah, we don't know anything about that. And then all that you yeah, yeah. I was like I should have taken a break and then come back, because yeah, now there's like a full on people put out animated films there. Just it's amazing to think of like if I had started making things at a younger age that because like then I left, I left school
and then just started improvising. I was just improvising from like twenty two to twenty nine and not making a goddamn thing. I just wish I was making things earlier, you know.
I was just I had convinced myself that improv was like like some It was just like jazz man is the only art form that exists that is just created on the spot and it doesn't have a record, you know, Like I thought it was like so noble that I had nothing to show for seven years of work.
Ye.
Yeah, it is because it was the nineties, right or two thousands, yeah, early two thousands, Yeah, early two thousands. I think that is what it was like pre internet mentality, and I came up in the midst of it where it's like, no matter what you did, you were a sellout unless you basically, you know, did exactly that, like did a thing that wasn't recorded, did a thing that wasn't rehearsed, did a thing that wasn't Nobody was paying you, like that was the only way to get invisible cred.
And then social media came along and it's like, Nope, we're all going to make some money and we're all gonna be nice to each other. Get used to it. It's a completely it's a one eighty, everybody.
It was a it's a real one eighty.
It took me so long to not see telling people that I was performing as bragging.
Do you know what I mean? Right?
It took me so long to see promote self promotion as not like being braggy about what I was just like it was like, yeah, like ten years, ten years, yeah, definitely, yes, yeah, I still struggle with that, and it's so bad.
I can't post another stand up clip. People are gonna think I'm riddled with confidence.
Here's what I think is interesting though, after all this time. My biggest regret because it took me a really long time to ever take an improv of class. That turned out to be my biggest fear because I've a lot of control issues and I like to see things exactly
how I see it, and then basically that's it. So stand up comedy is perfect, right because and then you're getting like applause for that, like he says, only my idea, it's only me, And so improv is like the opposite of that, and I was just like that, I can't do it, like there's no way. And my friend tricked me into doing an improv class with her because she's like, just come with me, you can audit, and I'm like, oh,
all right, I don't have anything else to do. So I went and the teachers immediately like no, no auditing, get up here, and I was like, this is like but I couldn't say that because it seems so unreasonable and kind of crazy where I'm like, this is my version of like of like jumping off a cliff or something like I can't do this. This is horrifying to me.
And the first scene that I was ever in, I just went to one side of the stage started flipping burgers, but like like as if I was dying, just kind of like ugh, and the guy walked in and I just slowly turned my back so that it's like stop. Chris Barnes, amazing improv teacher, he was like, Karen, stops that. Why won't you acknowledge the person in your if you made it so that it's a hamburger stand, why won't
you talk to the customer. I'm like, I don't know, I just don't want to, like it was all my instincts were perfectly incorrect, and it was it really was hard. And then once I started doing it, I was like, oh shit, this is like how you're supposed to be
in the world. Like yes, anding reality and like being in it with other people and seeing what they bring and reacting, not planning ahead and not like you know, controlling everything, but just going with what's happening, which is so much harder than it sounds for some people in life.
Yeah, up to that point, even in life, you were no budding.
I know, butted the fuck out of things. It was my way.
And also stand up is a no butt at almost the whole time. And I found it because I started doing stand up after doing seven years of improv and I was teaching improv. You know, it was like my whole life I struggled so much. It was like stand up was such a different brain that I was just like, I'm a very good impromiser. This is gonna be easy,
and get up there. And my first five minutes was too like you know, dead, like not a single joke worked, and I was like, this is a lot of material to not work.
Yeah, in a row.
In a row it and I was like, it had I had to like rebuild my brain for it. And once I had rebuilt my brain, I stopped doing improv. Yeah, it's I for a long time when I moved to Austin, because I moved there because of the big stinking Improv Festival. I don't know if either of you heard of that. I remember it just a couple of years, but that's my group went there, and that's when I got introduced
to stand up. And so when I moved there, I was like, oh, I can do both, because they would have like improv at eight and then nine o'clock there's stand up, and I'd be on both shows. And I did that for a while, but I realized there was like there was nights I was able to do stand up and absolutely it could not do improv and then vice versa. It's just obviously a different part of your brain. If you're feeling loose and playful, I don't you would think that would be helpful for stand up too, but
I never did well at both in the same night. Ever. Yeah, it's always alternate.
Yeah, it is very I've also seen some improvisers do stand up and eat it when on paper what they were saying was funny. But what I realized, like, there's a couple of people I've watched and I'm like, oh, they're doing It's not them doing stand up, They're doing the character of a stand up comedian, right, is what I think? Yes, as an audience member, that's what I
was feeling, like the audience was interpreting. Whereas if everybody other person is getting up, even if they're eating it, they're being themselves eating it, and that's the audience can feel. It's like that credit you're getting for just even standing there and saying your real thoughts as opposed to kind of doing a voice or being present, where immediately the audience is like, you're not actually doing it, so we're not gonna like laugh at this. It's an interesting I
don't know. I think I find those two things fascinating, and I really do. Having been in the nineties like improv phobic, I became such a believer after that, Whereas like that one class kind of just snapped me out of it, where it's like you have to be open to things to think things are funny and do me funny in the moment.
Yeah, that divide. That's what I experienced in Austin. People were like, you have to choose one or the other. You can't do both, and I'm like why not? And then so it was pressure from other stand ups and it's like you can't got rules, Chris. Yeah, they did rules and they were a lot. There was two camps and you couldn't be in both. Yes, very straight. It's obviously not that way anymore.
I also find when people come from improv to start doing stand up, there's an obsession with the form of stand up, and so all of their first jokes or I see it a lot at least, are making fun of the tropes of stand up or the like holding the mic or adjusting the mic like that bit. I've seen so, you know, so many times from people like starting off or like the idea of like ladies, am I right? You know, and like doing the things that
are like the callback to the audience. It's like people being like, these are all the things I noticed about stand up, but when you do them, the audience is like, yeah, doesn't we want to see like you.
Yeah, And there's a little bit of when you do a true I mean, I'm thinking of a very specific night. It was at Little Joy and I think Chris you were probably on the show, and everyone was doing having
very different sets. So I was like, what is going on with this audience because it was like one person would get up that you know, was hilarious and it would just be dead silent, and then another person would get up and they would be fine, but they would be killing and I'm like, oh, are those all your friends? What is it? And I was like getting very analytical about like what is this and how do we do
this or whatever? And then one person got up that was basically introduced by saying that they do improv or something, and that's what he was. It was like he was up there to go this is what stand up is, but almost sarcastically, and the audience might as well have all like cross their arms at the same time they were. It was so funny and interesting in that way where it's like, oh, you're going to do this five more times and then you're going to actually just be doing
it instead of doing the voice. Yeah, you don't have to have that thing up.
Yes, yes it is. It's like a.
It's an attempt to have like a critical I'm making fun of the the of stand up, but you're doing.
Stand up, you're doing it, You're in it.
So the audience feels the inherent honesty there.
I think, you know, yeah, or it's probably a product of the fact that Little Joy usually was just comics stand up other stand ups waiting to go out there? Yes, every time? And which is I mean that that That place is a block from my house and lately I've been going there to if golf isn't boring enough, I've really gotten into playing pool and there's like a league night down there. And now it's a shame they're they're close playing game you're going to play.
When my bingo is down on the corner.
I have a stick that's in my Amazon cart right now. I haven't pulled the trigger on it because they've closed for a month. They're renovating and they're actually Little Dooy's taking that performance space out and guess what they're putting in there, Uh, the pool table. So I'm doing this is going to be really bad for my career, but not my future on ESPN shot fair Banks, Oh yeah, snooker competition. How does he always know where to leave
the cup ball cubeball? Oh, there's a coyote in the on the table.
You and your coyote.
Yeah, that's a shame. I didn't realize I would miss that that space there's I was so embarrassed when I would go there because Monday night is a night for playing pool. And Anna Saragina and all those people that run a show right now, Megan Caster, they all would come out after a show and I'm like, oh, yeah, they're doing stand up, which is the thing I'm supposed to do for a living, and I'm just get to work. Yeah, I try and hide my black fingerless glove that I require. That makes me.
Sad that room is going away. Yeah, it was so cool.
It's kind of been hitting me the last couple of weeks of them being closed. Also the fact that I've been healthy and sober and waking up early because of my unhealthy Billiard's lifestyle is on hold.
Really makes you think, yeah.
It is there. No one gets on ESPN, bowling or playing pool without some damage to their liver, without a divorce, yeah, or without someone leaving you.
Kurt, do you guys? Two questions?
Two parter, I'm ready?
Do you still do? Hot Tub? The legendary comedy show.
Yes we do. We've started up again and it's Wednesday nights at Permanent Records Roadhouse and my favorite and you guys both have to come and do it anytime they want to get up. It's awesome.
It's outside, so you know, COVID friendly guys, and it's just such a cool space because as soon as like the show ends, there's a band that's inside, so literally as you're leaving your like, here's just a great local band that I've never heard of, and I just always like hang out and watch a couple songs and it feels very cool.
Yep. Last time I performed there, went in saw Frankie in the Witch Fingers, rocked out and bought a T shirt. Nice, I have a tea shirt. I have nothing to show for my set that night, but I do have my first on purpose Ti Di shirt. It's the coolest. It's one of the coolest venues in LA right now. It really is, and doing it this week, I'm very excited.
It also looks like a dive bar from the nineties, like the checkered floor, red vinyl booths, Budweiser, Tiffany lamp. I mean that like the first time I walked in. It was like my heart, like, this is a real blast from the past. But they're not being like kitchy or anything. It's just like, no, this is what a cool bar. This is what it feels like. Is what it looks like. Yes, and then that perfect stage at the end, it's I love that place.
The last the when you said the checkered floor, the
checker floor is a big thing. And I remember the very first time I ever encountered that was at this that no longer exists in Baltimore, Maryland, in a section of Baltimore called pig Town, And only Baltimore would have a section of town called Pigtown because it was where the slaughterhouses were, but then human beings lived there, and so it was like slaughterhouses and junk yards and salvage yards, and then a fucking neighborhood and Memory Lanes was there,
and it was like a fifty styled punk rock dive bar that would have shows there. And I spent my twenty first birthday there like getting drunk. Saw so many good shows there in Baltimore. Oh, it was a delight, a delight. If anybody remembers Memory Lanes and Pig the best.
They knew that you would think about it later. Memory lanes, Remember if you when did you first start doing things with shall?
Was that two thousand and four February twenty second, two thousand and four.
Because so, I bet the university's coming up. Living in I lived with Tig in that year. Tig was on the road for I think a couple months, and Kristen took over her bedroom and we were like roommates for just a couple months. And I can't remember where she had moved from, but I know she was new to town. That had to be. That was my second year in La So in La yeah, for a little mile. Oh it was New York. This was New York, two thousand and four, New York. I think when did she move.
I think she maybe would come out.
She would stay in Tig's back house when she came out for like pilot season and stuff.
Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, and this one of the okay, and she had done that a few times, but this time someone a DJ or someone was living in the back who I think broke in and stole tigs TV, one of the first things Tig ever bought. And I don't know why I went in her room. Don't tell her, but I peeked in there and there was just a broken window and her brand new TV was gone. And I called her immediately because I love spreading bad news,
but one, yeah, dude, doesn't. Kristen's stayed in there for a while and we'd have coffee in the kitchen, and I was, yeah, we lived together for a short time. Look at that.
Yeah, it's going to be eighteen years of stand of us doing the show.
That's amazing soon. That's great.
Isn't that crazy? Was hot Tub just a random why'd you name your show hot tub? Because we were trying to come up with the name and I had been in a hot tub, Okay, I not that that would be the story actual reason.
I had been in a hot tub in like for New Years, and so we were like, come, trying to come up with a flyer, and I had a photograph of we had like rented a hot tub because we had rented a house in upstate New York, I think to go skiing or something, and then we rented a hot tub because like the company would just come and like in laid a hot tub in the backyard and fill it up.
And so when you like arrived. It was like hot and ready to go.
It's like, uh, the fact that I had the wherewithal to do that at twenty nine blows my mind away, you know. And I have this awesome photograph of all of us in there, but all of our faces are obscured by like the steam, except for my one buddy Mike, who has this giant beard on and he's so high and he's holding a beer and he's like looking out and it looks like it's from the seventies or something.
And so I gave that photograph to a buddy of mine and he just like you know, just did some graphic design magic.
And that was like our first flyer, which was oh okay, hot Day and it was a wet Jubilee of Comedy was the name of it originally, and the originally when we had Hot Tub, there was an animal race that was happened every show for like the first six months of the show, and there was a lot of animals lost in the space. You would line them up and they would make it to a finish line.
Yes, we so we would like once we did cockroaches, the theater did not like that. We did sand shit, we did sandworms once they're disgusting.
We did crickets. The theater really didn't like that. Yeah, this seems more like bugs we were doing. We did snails. Well, the thing is we had to have animals that you could like keep it apo us. Oh my god, So we kind of stopped. We stopped shortly after. But and then we felt, you know, because we just started the show. We were like, people are gonna be really disappointed. This is by the way.
We would sell out at forty tickets and we were like, people are gonna be so upset that we've got.
Annibal races this comedy show. We were like, really worried.
There is a part the reason they're coming.
Yeah, people, you would always be like, what is happening? Why is this happening? At the end, people, it's surprising. There's this Brennan's pub near where I lived in Venice and they had turtle racing, which I did not. It was it's people yelling and screaming and the turtles are running in a panic like they are not enjoying it. Yeah, we realized it was they do know to go in a straight line, and people get very competitive and it's just not my scene. Not my scene at all. I
would prefer to play chicken shit Bengo. I prefer to keep going to these underground dog fights. I didn't bet at all.
Chris.
I'm sorry, but it's just the the energy in the room. It can't be duplicated, the passion.
I thought when you said that, I was imagining that you were having, like comedians that were on the show, bring a pet to race like. And maybe it's because when my sister was in garden. This is like the legendary family story. When my sister was in kindergarten, they had a day in kindergarten, so five year olds called pet parade, and you just brought your pet, dog, cat, whatever you wanted to school and so they could walk it in a circle at pet parade in the kindergarten.
So my sister brings our cat, Taffy, who was just one of them orange cats that we found in the crick and of course Taffy spends maybe twenty seconds there and there's dogs around and other cats, and Taffy flips out. My sister's trying to hold it as a five year old, and Taffy scratches her eye directly underneath, so she almost lost an eye, but instead it was just a scar she had till she was like in high school, but wasn't It wasn't like it almost looked like a crease.
But we talk about it where it's like who doesn't know that animals don't get along? Like those animals probably won't get along, and that the people in charge of the animals just got here. They're five or six years old, six macs and they're in charge of pet parade, like the most psychotic idea. I think.
I can't even imagine.
I wouldn't even let my five year old walk our dog current like at all at all, at all at all, So that is amazing that like that, that was like every cause there's definitely not it's not all small dogs.
There's just some normally big dogs that they're.
Absolutely And also Laura didn't my sister didn't have the cat on a leaf. We don't have that, so it was just her holding the cat for And also both my parents worked, no one was with her. I'm sure my carpool dropped her off with the cat and it was like good luck.
Yeah. Will refused to believe that day ever went off without a hitch. I do not think there is ever a successful cat day, what if it was?
It was always great until my sister and then she in it for everybody with taffy.
Well, I hope she believes that.
I do have a weird way to marry our conversation about hot tub and the pet parade is that for a hot tub? In I think two thousand and eleven, I did the nine to eleven Memorial Puppy Parade and it was at the top of the show, and we had we did exactly that.
We walked around the block. I had a marching band and everyone brought their dogs to the show, and then we marched around the block with a marching band, and I had a big banner that says nine to eleven and then we brought everybody back to uh there that we just started the show. That was just like how it happened. But this was not because there was a version of this that you did at Bridgetown and I
actually was in the parade marched with people. Oh there was a barching bed, but it wasn't an ID eleven memorial parade. It was just to celebrate. I think everyone was going to get cookies or donuts or maybe I'm doing what I've done many times and confused you with Andy Kaufman. He brought us when I was a child to get cookies.
Yes, that's right.
And that Bridgetown show, there was also a guy on a unicycle just as Darth Vader with a bagpipe that shot fire.
Do you remember him? No?
Yeah, like I think we marched past him and he did a performance while we were like marching past.
But it was this was crazy, like a steampunk. Did he have one of those utility kilts.
Yeah, he had a kilt on, yes, he had to, and he had a Darth Vader mask and a bagpipes that played music but then also shot fire out the tops.
That had to be a modification. Yeah.
Yeah, that wasn't a real bagpipe. That's not from the store. It doesn't come though.
They don't do that at Guitars Center.
But you hired that guy to be someone you passed or was it?
No? No, No, we hired that would be amazing. Yeah. I don't know if we paid him, but he was definitely part of the entertainment.
You invited him, that's what matters. He was invited. Well, I just want to say, because we should have you plug things like your newest special, Perfectly Stupid, that you just released at the end of last year, right.
M Yeah, you can watch it for free right now. It's called Perfectly Stupid, and it's on YouTube. And if you don't want to watch it on YouTube on your computer, you can watch it on Amazon for five bucks. The New York Times said it was good. So you know somebody likes it, just one person.
You know, you know it's anti trans the entire time.
What from the bottom, And yeah, it's I'm very proud of it. I'm very happy with it how it turned.
Congratulations getting Actually, to be honest, getting a great review from the New York Times is a big deal that they don't give those out easy.
I have been trying for eighteen years, and you did it, and it felt very good. I was like, oh good, even though I was paid nothing for the special, I am paid in kind words from the New York Times.
Yeah, Kurt, that's exactly was my situation. Pay for it on Amazon or it's free on YouTube. I like to give people that option. But I didn't have a review. I had a review in the Saturday Evening Post. It was a magazine Normaze illustrate yet nice. Well you know how a lot of my jokes are World War two era, yeah period bits.
Listener if you haven't watched it, because you also have two other commtists one two. Kurt is truly one of the best stand up comedians I've ever seen. You are, honestly, and I don't tell you this enough for directly enough, but when I watch you do comedy, I'm like, that is how it is supposed to be done. It's so smart, it is so truly delightful and beautifully developed and completely accessible.
Like it's not it's smart, not snobby, It's always hilarious and then gets more hilarious, Like you have blown my mind multiple times when I've watched you live.
Oh, I really thank you.
It's nice to hear that because I'm just writing all new material now and I.
Feel like a real idiot, isn't the It's the worst feeling. I really feel like I spent my entire career, especially since when I finally made a special a lot of the material was there's versions of it on my very first album, like it's spanning and embarrassing twenty and now I really feel like I have to start over, and that pressure has been sitting here for like three years, and it's still what I'm saying is much like the
loss of a loved one. It never gets easier, and it really does, no matter how many times you go through it. You're still like, well, I guess I don't have any more ideas. Yeah, there always is that feeling where and it's like it's simply not true, but it's very difficult to not feel it. I mean, it's true that you get fewer and fewer ideas. I mean, that's just how the world works.
That's just how brains work in time.
Yeah, eighty years old, being like, I gotta I gotta have one more.
Uh, delightful to talk to you. Thank you so much for doing You're the best.
Thank you put us both in a good mood. I'm gonna say a better mood I am. Yeah, Yeah, we're gonna be when we log off after this, we're all going to be alone in our place, just whistling. That's what people do when they're in a good mood, right, or if they're a serial killer, that they whistle to you know what I've just remembered. I fucking hate whistling. It's very cool, even if you're good at it. Don't do it and I'm talking to you guy from Scorpions. Wow, yeah,
now I do personal. That's my dog celebrating the wall coming down, the bur lit wall coming down. I know I'm more of a hasslehoff guy Chris Love.
And he didn't want that wall coming down. He was for it. He loves it.
Well watched Kurt anywhere you see comedy with a parade after. He's one of the best. And thank you for being on our podcast, Kurt. Thank you for talking about buttholes and animals too, all the assignments I gave you you've been listening to. Do you need a ride? Oh my god, this voice will never get better. D y nar Ai I a minute too. I got called up, I got caught up in. This has been an exactly Right production.
Produced by Annalise Nelson, mixed by Edson Choi. Our talent booker is Patrick Coottner.
Theme song by Karen Kilgarrett.
Artwork by Chris Fairbanks. Follow the show on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook at dinar podcast That's d y n ar Podcast.
For more information, go to exactly Rightmedia dot com. Thank you, Oh You're welcome.