Ep. 425: The Liberal Redneck

to read? Come on, who does that podcast description? Yeah? All right, that's what I'll tell him. Steve's answer to you is reading the podcast description like everybody. You can. You can learn how to spell it and everything. All right, everybody. Joined today by comedian and commentator Trey Crowder. Yeah you might. You might know him as you might know him as the liberal redneck or Chattanooga Phil chat Charlie. Yeah, we're gonna get to that in a minute. Also also by

our beautiful lovely engineer Phil Krin's here nest is here? Okay, chattan Uga Charlie. You were you're you're fixing talking about chattan Nuga Charlie. Yeah, you asked if I had been any TV shows and said, I played this guy Chattanooga Charlie and Veronica Mars. I was like, you know, quite a stretch. Obviously they had to show my range, but yeah,

I know a guy from Tennessee they could do this, right. Yeah, and another while I get to that in a minute, but you said, so, like, what kind of character was it? And so John Mullaney, this great comic, had this whole bit making fun of law and Order, and he's like, I love how they always go to interview some bartender and this guy like refuses to stop stacking by boxes to discuss the horrific murder that has occurred, right, yeah, right, And I said I was one of those guys like

it was. It's set in like southern California, but it's a Southern themed restaurant owned by Chattanooga Charlie, and there's been a series of bombings and so like I'm sweeping up peanuts while talking about these terrorist attacks or whatever. But that's pretty much it. It was a lot of fun, though, Oh, I was gonna say after and I normally don't read comments like this because you know, I'll get fired up

or whatever. But when those episodes came out. I saw a lot of people on the internet being like, I thought this episode was pretty good, but like that Chattanooga Charlie guy. I don't know what that accent was supposed to be. But that's not that is not Tennessee. I hope he realizes that. Good luck to him in the future. Yeah, it was terrible. People think that my accents fake all

the time, like all the time. You know, well, I can imagine living in la and oh, I mean out there for sure, but out there, like yeah, people will compliment me on it. They'll be like, oh, I love that accent. I mean, if it's real, Like if that's your real accent, I don't know if it's because like so I think you're a methodist. That's exactly what. Yeah, we're in Hollywood. Maybe they're like, oh, maybe he's prepping for a role as a possum detective. But uh, but

I'm talking about on the internet and stuff. You know, people just don't I don't know, they don't buy it. But this is all Clay County, Tennessee. You're right here. This is just what it is. When you when you tour, when you tour for you for stand up, you tour as the liberal redneck. No, I just tour as Tray Crowder. So yeah, when your commentary, like you have your commentary bits,

is well, how I became familiar with you. Yeah, and that's true for most people, and like, uh, but I didn't want to be like, you know, I purely identified as a character or whatever, like, because I was doing stand up for six years in Knoxville and around the South before I ever put those videos out, and I was always just Tray Crowder on stage. So I kept

doing that. So when you start doing your commentary video as you kind of launched that character, and I mean, it's it's a character and that it's like me cranked up a little bit or whatever. But I had a I had been doing a bit about that on stage at the time, like basically just talking about how everybody thinks my accent means a certain thing because that's the only thing they ever see this accent portrayed as in

the media or whatever. So I wanted to balance the scales by being just as crazy and redneck in public, but saying a bunch of superliberal stuff that should throw people off or whatever, and I would do that on stage. It worked. It worked in like Southern clubs and everything like it was working, and I told my friends, I think I want to do a like an internet video series based on that idea, and everybody's like, you totally

should do that. It sounds like a great idea. And then uh, finally I got around to it, and then yeah, that's the thing that blew up and sort of allowed me to go full time and everything, and it's what most people know me for. But have you have you seen the curb your enthusiasm where Larry You know, he doesn't like ever have to talk to anybody, so he gets he loves in LA and he does like to talk aboys some one day he gets himself and to make America great again. Hat. Yeah, like nobody where he

goes don't says anything to him. Yeah, so he's sitting a restaurant, no one sits by him. Yeah, I mean that he finally gets to live his dream of having zero social interaction. It definitely would be would be useful out there, but but I only every time I see somebody in one of those hats in LA, they're usually like doing the talking for everybody else, Like they're in a gas station up by the clerk just like going

in on you know, inflation or whatever. But I just wanted to clarify the commentary that we're speaking of his stuff that's on Instagram and I put them on all the social media okay side YouTube. Yeah, it's like it's like Twitter to tell you what it is. First off, news commentary, Yeah, common current event. I'll take like something that just happened, and then I'll do a little like

comedic rant about it. And I always, dude, try to like actually put jokes into it so it's not just like Soapbox Center or whatever, because like I you know, I'm a comedian. I want them to be funny and I have this is my real accent, and I'm a progressive,

so like, I mean there you go. You know, well, like people at first, like people are like there's a lot of people in the South that you know who are also like me, who when they see it, their reactions like, oh, finally somebody who like both sounds and thinks the way I do. Right. But and then the people in like the rest of the country, like on the coast and stuff, they're like, well, this is neat.

I didn't know this was a thing. You like, you're like seeing a unicorn, you know, like it's a novelty. You know what I was trying to today when I was driving around driving my kid in school, I was telling about who's coming out on the show, and I got to talk about I had to explain the terms, right. I was like, you know, this guy is like the liberal redneck, and I said, I was trying to think of what's the opposite of a liberal redneck and to

be that I come up with us. Remember William F. Buckley, It's like like the very austere British conservative guy, and there's like that's the opposite of a little redneck would be William F. Buckley Junior. You know that the best I come up with conservative barraste might be a little bit more understood. Kids. I'll try it when I get

home for dinner night. I'll try it. H speaking of my kids kind of man, we were in um we're in so we went down to Baja for spring break and we're coming home, like I see this thing that I see like a like a there's a guy standing in there. There's something like just so distracting where he's like a fit, thin dude, but he's got one of those he's got like you know when you get like a like a big beer gut that just hangs real

flat down over your belt. Yeah, and that realized those fanny pack made to look like a big hairy like fanny pack made it look like a big hairy gut hanging out of your T shirt. Classic dude. I kept being like, what is that? It doesn't match his skin. They call that a dumb lap. No, they oh, I don't know, you're belly dun lapped over your belt. I like that, but man we um. Yeah, we had a great time. We did a lot of spearfishing down in Baja. And then I had something um like, if you look

at the fishing regulations in Mexico, which is always confusing. Um, they got, so you don't need any license to fish from the beach. Okay, so any saltwater fishing from the beach, no license. There's a license for fishing from the boat. But I actually got checked in Mexico by like the Baja version of a game warden and got a warning because he said you need a fishing license. It's very hard to get through this conversation because I don't speak ship for Spanish, and he knew like some English. So

he was trying to help me out. It's like, you need a fishing license, man, because I'm fishing from the shore. But then there's a third category that I think they added it in recently, is so there's fishing from the shore, there's fishing from a boat, and then there's fishing underwater. Oh so you're a spear fishing You mean underwater? Right underwater from the shore. You need a license? Huh I got off on a warning. Did you recognize you? No? Definitely not. Uh. Okay, people got it right in here.

We need to do so we need what should where are they supposed to send these uh to meat eater at the meat eater dot com. Normal spot. Yeah, we'll do normal spot, and but they should title it chettikett. Okay, so we know what to look for. Yeah, we have we have a call for submissions. We're doing a show all about etiquette, which really to call Chettikette because we use our etiquette guy Chester to help us wade through

etiquette problems. We get all kinds of etiquette things anyways, like recently the guys that play leap frog with their tree stands on the same tree on State Land where they always moved their climber above the other guy's climber and all that etiquette questions or like, um, you know, you take your There's a guy that takes his brother in law hunting at a spot, but then his brother in law, his sister, and his brother in law get divorced, and the brother in law keeps going to the spot

and he feels like how could that because they got divorced, so you can't go to the spot anymore. Shit like that etiquette questions, chetica questions. You got to send us a shitload of chetika questions. How did Chester become the etiquette guy? I don't know. I don't know how that happened. I think I think largely because etiquette sounds because Chatticotte

is funny. Yeah, that's usually how they go around. Like there's no real reason other than we were talking about etiquette one day and someone made the joke about Chetticutte

and he's like, he's a very ethical kind Yeah. Oh you know how it was too is we were we were talking about boat launch etiquette, right, Yes, there's a bunch of questions about boat launch etiquette, and Chester, having been a fishing guide, had a lot of opinions about how to how one should get their boat in the water in prompt fashion when add a crowded boat launch, and so someone made the Chatticott joke. So it's not

like he's particularly credential necessarily. It's just that Cheticott sounds funny, and jannice E tikuittunny j Yeah, it sounds like another disease bad casey. Oh. Also it's late. We got to throw a birthday wish to Carter Hudson, who just turned eleven the other day on St. Patty's Day. Whenever someone on this podcast swears he the uh, Carter's dad has to explain to his wife why it's okay that he listens to his show that has cussing in it. Loves

the show. He didn't quite read that right. He says that everything that you do, the kid also does. So the kid's like, well, if Steve's cussing on his show, I can cuss two and his dad has to explain that that's okay. Oh, there's value. We're really really cleaned. Um it up. I think big times. It's the show is laughing. Well, it's just I also edit bear grease and there's some very different sensorship rules. He's got a guest that says, I don't know what the hell I

was hearing. It'll be like I didn't know what the baby was here? Yeah? What Sam? Pretty much? So happy birthday to to Carter Hudson Nanks his dad Morgan for right and in um northing. Speaking of kids, So this is so we've been talking a bunch about the book you've been working on, which isn't out yet, but we have a new kids activity book, Catch a Crayfish Count the Stars, availed for pre order now. Now. We announced this book on Amazon. There's if you scroll away, beep

down on Amazon. It's a ranking of all books being sold at Amazon at any given time. When we announced that Catch a Crayfish Count the Stars was up for pre orders, I'm holding my hand right now. I'm holding the facts simile of it in my hand right now. Fun Project Skills and Adventures for Outdoor Kids. It shot up to number three. Really yeah, that whiney bastard, uh the King's kid he was still talk about talk about chopping down the apple tree. What's he got left? Do

you know what I mean? Like? What like if you're playing like a long media game. What's left? Yeah, he already blew through the Netflix documentary and all the book tours. He did it all. He's like, it's so bad. I don't have to work. I live in this big palace. First of all, my mom, like many people's mothers, died and and then and I and I hate all that. It's like, what he What's he gonna do? Now? I know he's like for a while he was like a mental health expert. I guess, goodness gracious, so he was

still beating us. Well, do you think he put all his money in that Silicon Valley bank so he'll he'll be just fine. He did so catch crayfish, count the stars. So it's a here's the deal. It's a if you, if you're raising outdoor kids, do you want your kids to feel to have a lot of projects in front of them that will foster a sense of understanding for the outdoors, a sense of comfort in the outdoors, knowledge about the outdoors. It's a great book. A lot of

it's kind of dangerous. We had to put if you read it, there's a lot of language like, no, this is very dangerous. It's very dangerous because there's machetes and stuff and fires and hatchets and everything in there. So there's certain things that you got to do, projects that your kids would need supervision on. There's certain things they can do on their own. But it's everything arrangement from like gardening stuff with understanding how gardening works and plants work,

all kinds of foraging stuff, fishing stuff. If they're interested in hunting for their own food, how to get them up to speed on that, building their own sorts of weapons like blowguns and frog gigs from natural materials. Basics on navigation, navigation with the sun, navigation with stars, all

laid out and achievable. Little day projects, even a bunch of stuff about in the home, So things that you can do on bad days inside your house when you can't get outside, that would really educate kids about ecology, biology, um even even some like basic principles of wildlife population dynamics. I helped write the piece about how to build a PVC bow. There you go, that's easy, cheap and lots of hours of fun. My kid killed a cotton tail rabbit with one of those PVC bows. My nephew did

as well. No UM show, it'll show you how to do that. It's it's it's a super cool book. I listen to this. I heard a friend of mine in Wisconsin. His two boys who are probably I don't know, nine and twelve, nine and thirteen, their project. As soon as they get that book, they're gonna work on all summers. They're gonna launch their own YouTube channel and make a video about doing every single activity in your book. Someone's gonna get sued. I might sue these kids at the time.

I think that's a great, great idea. Oh, I just saw someone sent me an article yesterday. There's a there's a class action lawsuit a guy's doing against Buffalo Wild Wings. You hear this, Yeah, there's a class action lawsuit against Buffalo Wild Wings because their boneless chicken wings aren't wings, right to which Buffalo Wild Wings says, our buffalo wings aren't Buffalo. Our hamburgers aren't ham Also, are anybody's bummless

wings wings? I don't think they are. They're all no. This guy like I was, this guy's like I was led to believe I was eating a boneless wing and it's not. Yeah, I think I read somewhere He's gonna be disappointing when he finds out chickens don't have fingers either. It's funny. Thank you genuinely didn't know that. I didn't I didn't catch the I didn't guess the finger one because they had like that buffalo wings or zero percent buffalo.

The hamburgers aren't him. That's some others. There's no sticks and fish. Good lord, So back to the books. It shifts in June. If you order now, um, you'll get it in June. But you can order it now and hopefully enough for you order it where Harry there gets um does it line up that he would have got his name because of Harry Potter? Or was he born too early for that? M Thank goodness? Order now, Catch Crayfish, Count the Stars, Fun Project Skills and Adventures for outdoor kids.

Order now and you get it later. And there's a landing page. I can't remember what crink you put in the show notes. There's a landing page, and go to and read all about the book. So if you have any kids in your life, nephews kids, grandkids, neighbor kids, local kids, seem like they were gonna head for a life of trouble in crime. H get on this book and get them turned around, and it'll give your kids a raw edge to him, you know, tough little make

them tough little shits. Cridinal put the landing page thing in there, and I don't know if it's still open, but for a while you could go in and like sign up and get an early copy. So everybody do that. Oh, speaking of this kind of like speaking of kids, try you got two kids, two boys? Okay. I was talking one day about how I didn't like it that when you went to the doctor, a first person comes, yeah, and they want to weigh or whatever, and then they

go what's going on? And you tell them some long story, right, Like you got two kids. I had it recently too, because I'm like, well, this one had this strap symptom and then that went away, but then this one broke out in these little spots all over him, and then that one got that again, and then this one did that and that led to both of them to have this and now that one's fine, but this one's even sicker. Right, And then the doctor comes in and they go, what's

going on? Yeah, right, yeah yeah. And then if if it's some kind of specialist thing, like if you're not having ever referral. You'll just have to go to two other people and tell both of them what's going on as well. It's just an endless stream of explaining what's going on in various waiting rooms, bigger and smaller waiting areas. Yeah, as it gets smaller, you get more hopeful. Yeah, maybe they'll be here in a second. Right. So someone wrote

in about what that's all about. One thing it's all about and I know this to be true because I've seen it before. One thing it's about is you might tell them a thing and they got to go study up on them on Google. Yeah. Right, So if you like, if you go in and say like, yeah, man, I got trick and lsis from meeting raw bear meat, they're gonna go be like he's got a what and they're gonna go study up on Google. So when they come in and you tell them, they can act like they

knew what was going on. Another problem they run and do what's this person? Do their physicians assistant? So they wrote in about what's actually happened and when all this goes on. Another thing that's going on is people change their stories all the time. The patience, yep, she said the physician's assistant will come in and there's like they're like, what's what's going on. You're like, oh, this happened to my kid, and they happened to my kid and now

here he is. And then the doctor come in. He'll spin a different yarn, like the parent didn't like how it sounded coming out, and so they'll read they'll like edit the story. But when I went in, I just said, it's really complicated. Can I'll just explain it to the main man the main doctor. My case, it was a female, but I said I'll explain to them, and they're like, okay, cool. So I had no idea you could do that. But what they're doing is there's it's a thing called locates.

Did you know about this anyone? They're asking you. There's like a little anacronym of stuff they're asking you location, onset, character, alleviate, aggravate, timing, environment, severity comes out to locates. They're after the locates. But as I pointed out as a piece of medical unsolicited medical advice is just say I'll just tell the someone later, or you can like making recording and just play recording.

That'd be great. Then they can go as I was saying to your colleague, coming, let me pull it up my voice memo to play. This is what I said. This is the problem, right, you listen to as many times as you want. Um. This is you could have even a little googling to the bottom if you want it. Yeah, Like I saved you because I know you're gonna be go digging into web MD in a minute. UM. When I was a boy, When I was a little boy, they would have this thing. Every year. They would take

a UM. They would take one king salmon and put a tag in it and turn it loose Lake Michigan, And they did have a big fish in Derby. And if you were to be so lucky as to catch the king salmon that had the tag in it, you win boku money. I've never heard this applied to mammals, however, In South Dakota harvest a tag kyote get a free hunt lifetime hunting license. Correction South Carolina, oh well, you saved us a lot of time. On the next episode.

South Carolina Department of Natural Resources released sixteen more tagged kyote statewide recently. Is part of the Kyote Harvest Incentive Program programs created in two sixteen mm. So they catch some kyotes, they tag them, they release them for per game zone, for game zones for kyotes. Anyone who successfully takes and reports a tag kyote will be rewarded with a free lifetime hunting a free lifetime hunting license. They can debt. Here's where's Here's where they sweeten the pot.

Let's say you're getting up in years and if it's not gonna do you a whole hell of a lot of good. Right, say you're like forty nine, your star's fading, you can you can give it to your kid, gifted only that special one, right like the one you win, the one you win, you could give your You can say I would, I will bestow it upon my do I'd like to bestow this upon my daughter and make her a free lifetime hunting license. Did you anything? Is it opening on rez? I've read that far yet over

the last seven years, did you see that in there? No? I don't. Over the last seven years, one hundred and twelve kyles have been tagged and released. Huh so far under half? So in seven years under half, it's not terribly descriptive. I would have just have given the number. I would have given the number, so somewhere between zero and fifty six. Yeah, maybe they're just embarrassed of the number somewhere under half, yeah, meaning somewhere between undrea are somewhere,

So somewhere between zero and fifty six. Yeah, because if it said no one's gotten one yet, people aren't gonna get fired up. They're not gonna feel like everyone around you is winning. Um. Under half of the tag Kyleot has been reported taken. Kyot's tagged in any year are eligible for the life lifetime license. For information on the Kyote Harvest Incentive Program, you can go to the DNR

South Caroline's DNR page. What I imagine they're trying to get around is they're trying to get around the you know, for a long time there was just flat out uh bounty programs. I think they're they're striving for the bounty thing, but they're trying to gus see it up, gussied up in a more socially acceptable way. And it might be like a little unsavory to some folks if they were saying it's like cold heart cash. Is my guess of what's happening there a little bit south of there in Florida,

a huge correction on Florida mountain lions. Chester should be here because it's his fault. Yeah, that's true. We're doing an episode and I was throwing research questions to Chester on the fly and he was messing them all up. The episode was called Spitting and Strutting. We're discussing mountain lions being relocated from Texas to Florida. Yanni was present.

The gist of it was, I spent a couple of weeks in Florida, and everywhere I went I got a year fold from people about cougar recovery and the debate around weather. Many people feel that cougary carvery has gotten too successful. There has been too much leaning into and making sack or faces on behalf of the species that is not regarded to be imperiled anymore. And not only that,

and they're having a devastating impact on deer. Not only that, but people were saying how it's not even the same cougar that used to be here because they brought in super cougars from Texas and I thought it was just seven or eight. Chester got to reading on some crazy website, the Mountain Lion Foundation website, which is not like Wild Turkey Foundation, you know, it's like, uh not Foundation's Rocking mount Elk Foundation, Turkey Federation, Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation. It's

a it's like a animal rights organization. Anyhow, Chester got to spewing off about all kinds of mountain lions brought down from Texas, which is not the case. They brought in a total eight and it actually removed some, which really surprised me. Some of the mountain lions that they brought from Texas to Florida. So well, at its lowest number. We got it right here. If you want a quick, little more informed background on this issue, we covered just

quite well. Panthers used to be distributed everywhere, like everywhere in the lower forty eight across much of Canada, Central America, South America, from Tierra del Fuego to like you know, possibly up into Yukon Territory Mackenzie Delta. Even maybe this animals was the most widely distributed mammal in the New World I think globally, right, most widely distributed animal Western Hemisphere, let's go with that. As they got whittled away through

poisoning and other predator control things, bowing he's poisoning. You wound up where they were kind of existing in the wildest little corners, and the only population that held on in the east east of the Mississippi. The only population that held on was this little isolated pocket of them in southwest Florida. So from nineteen eighty six to nineteen ninety five, the minimum number of adult panthers, so this is adults, not male, not like all males, not all females.

The limited the minimum number of adult panthers fluctuated from twenty four to thirty two. I often use this as the greatest piece of evidence against Bigfoot. Go back to those years in South Florida when you had twenty to thirty mountain lions. They're still getting hit every year on the road. So few you have a population of a couple dozen, and they're still getting hit every year on the roads. But Bigfoot can go five hundred years. How many of them exist though, there's gonna be enough to

make love and reproduce. There's no primate that lives forever. Also, maybe Bigfoot knows to look both ways. Well, let mister smarty pants, maybe you know about the guy in Montana that put a big Foot suit on and jumped out in front of a car to incite a Bigfoot sighting. It was just struck and killed. That was struck and killed by two cars. That good. Why did he get hit? It's a dumber than actual bigfoot. From nineteen eighty six to nineteen ninety five, the minimum number of adult panthers

fluctuated from twenty four to thirty two. They brought in eight. They put some males in. This is interesting. They put some males in. Once they knew that those males had bread, they pulled a couple of the mails back out. Another correction is this from the This from the the journal. This is from Science. Correct the journal Science. There is no evidence in breeding is causing physical mail formations and negatively affecting recovery. Oh sorry, take all that out, Phil,

I was wrong. Maybe leave it in. I don't know you decide forget what I was just saying. Florida panthers, Okay, Florida planthers were suffering from the effects of inbreeding, including crypto chidism, low sperm quality. That's what I have, kink, no quality, kink tales, pelage, cowlicks, opportunistic infections in atrial septal defects. So they brought in to save this couple dozen animals. They brought in animals from Texas, eight not twenty.

Whatever the hell Chester was thrown around, No, I think he in total it was like close to forty that he added up over years. So now they got two hundred. Now they got a minimum of two hundred and fifty. And now it's starting to cause a lot of consternation among people who are feel sportsmen in Florida who are feel that they're having access issues, poorer quality hunting because of the great deference to this now recovered, this now recovered species that they feel is somehow not quite the

same because it was supplemented with genes from outside. Take your pick on that one. Waiting, let's get it. That was okay for it. Apology not an apology correction, No apologies. Another news bit. I were talking to these I met

this dude. So every year I go to, Yeah, every year I go to I'm mceing this year the TRCP Capitol Conservation Awards Dinner, in which TRCP they have an annual function in Washington, d C. Where they honor Typically they honor someone from the House, someone from the Senate, and someone from each side of the aisle, so Democrat and Republican House Senate, they honor them for conservation achievements, and then they'll usually honor someone from the private sector.

M seeing that event. I m sed last year and met this dude who was working on his project, and I told him I helped spread the word about his project. When Teddy Roosevelt was in DC, he would walk down to the Grace Reformed Church in Washington and Washington, d C. He laid the cornerstone of the church. Okay, in nineteen oh three. That was the year that Augustus Scofier published his magnum opus lagid q lanaire and I believe it was the first year of controlled flight by the Wright brothers.

If I'm not mistaken, just check that out, Yohnnie. That year he delivered an address at the dedication of the church. He Teddy Roosevelt kind of the one of the one of the fathers of modern conservation and a guy who put in who preserved fifty thousand acres of American land for every day that he was in office in the presidency, worshiped there faithfully on Sundays during his vice presidency and presidency.

If he had to skip a service, he would write a letter to the reverend of the church saying he would be absent. Anyhow, the church is up for sale, so what's gonna happen? Soone's gonna turn it into condos. But these guys have got this thing, say if Teddy's Church dot com and they're trying to get the jingle necessary, they need to raise six million bucks over the next two years so they can buy the building and resuscitate it and keep it as it is www dot save

Save Teddy's Church dot com. So if that speaks to you an honor of UM one of our great wildlife conservation land conservation heroes, UM, go check that out. I don't know if I'm gonna get into this. We're we're having quite a laugh about golf courses because there's this golf course that needs to like move because the squirrels are so mean. Do you're about this? The squirrels are so mean that it's like driving golfers off trade. Do you golf? Uh? Yeah, a little bit? You do? Not good?

Yeah I'm real bad, but yeah I golf a little bit lately. It's mostly so I like I started in Jackson County, Tennessee, and everybody there's a golf nine haul golf course there, and like me and my buddies would would golf barefoot and then like cut off t shirts and stuff and bring a cooler bear. Yeah, redneck style golf.

That's the That was my introduction to golf. As I got older and moved to cities, and I found out that golf is like a fancy people game and they got a bunch of like rules that they really really care about. It kind of took a lot of the fun out of it for me. I didn't enjoy it as much anymore. So now I've got to like top golf or something and just you know, drink some bears and hit some or whatever. But yeah, I didn't like being, you know, repeatedly shushed or having to tuck a shirt

ban or whatever. That I've always been surprised at no old professional golfer ever emerged who didn't have the same like what informs the fashion sensibility of professional golfers. Like with football, you have no choice because you got to wear the uniform. But when you see them off field, it's a wide spectrum of dress styles right wide spectrum. Yeah, something about something with golf and forces like a very rigid yeah, sense of how one presents themselves of the public.

I guess, like I said, it's just fancy people stuff. You know, it's just it's just the culture of golfer. Maybe it's also because like the stuff they wear to play it, you can also just wear Yeah, you can just the course and you can't do that with shoulder pads. You know. That's a good point. You look like, yeah. Uh So someone wrote in with a very spirited defense of golf courses as ecological refuges. Great point, you can't.

It's better than having condos there. So he's pointing out, and I'll tell you what else he's There's this picture. I guess it's a famous picture. There's a there's a ecologist standing next to these cut banks and one is like a crop of one is a annual okay picture that you're standing next to a cutaway of a of a field where you've got a raw cutaway that's eight feet tall, like you just slice the earth, pulled it away, and you got to look at a help me out. What am I trying to say? A cutaway a soil

pit side view. There's a soil pit side view of perennial grass, and there's a side of the root structure of perennial grass, and a side view of an annual grass or an annual crop. And holy cow, the like a long standing grass, a long standing grassland eight feet of room. Amazing, it's so amazing to see this. What it like the He has a very spirited defense, And I'll point out, I don't like you know, I get what he's saying. Man, they got ponds. He counted up

how many white oaks around their place. It's a really good point. Let's just read the whole damn thing. Should I. They're they're gonna move an entire golf course because of main squirrels. Rules are too mean. There's some main squirrels, well that's small feet or or it's some yeah, yeah, tire. They squirrels like a noise in my backswine, chittering in my backswine. Can It's like they attack the golfers to

get their snacks. Right, that's aggressive. Let's read it. For instance, I work at a small private club near large city with a heavy population of fox squirrels. He points out. He points out, I'm quoting him, But I'm okay, He points out that, back to the quote, they aren't nearly as aggressive maybe as the ones down in Florida, but

we do manage them every winter. Then he goes on to say, um, they've managed the squirrels, but their numbers continually bounce back with the copious amount of acorns provided by the three hundred plus mature white oak trees. The property in general has a lot of wildlife for how small a property it is and how it's completely surrounded

by urban civilization. We have mink, kyotes, red fox, whitetail, deer, skunks, raccoons, all sorts of rafters, including bald eagles, waterfowl, and a whole mess of other rodents that are all over the place. Many golf course has become a part of the Audubon Society and our safe havens for many species of birds. For that, your pipe smaller, he goes on credit him,

are not like email friends. Yeah, here's why I'm very delicate about I can't get you know, the secret of why I do really need to tiptoe around the golf ish You don't you? I don't think so, Spencer. Well, it's I'll tell you later. Okay, really, Oh yeah, you don't know. I don't think do I know? Oh? You know? Wisconsin just the last I we're gonna talk about. I told you we had two and you can cut as

I do. No, no no know. Wisconsin is circulating a build to designate an official state rifle, the Henry Arms all Weather forty five seventy lever action. They point out in the build that this does not mean you have to buy one, though it is strongly encouraged. Yeah, you will not get in trouble for not buying one until they are. I just love to we gotta have Dug. I want

to hear what Bubbly Doug thinks about his state. If like, in my view, I get it because they MANU it's great because they manufacture him there, um, big Boy all Weather rifle. Um, it's so it's a hometown manufacturer in Wisconsin. It's a great rifle. But if you said to me, like, what's the what's the state rifle of Wisconsin? Well, who used to make that? That that slide action thirty OT six, I think it'd be something like that, like an old like yeah, like seven forty two would master? Yeah, like

one of those like hardcore. You know old deer guns everybody had, you know, like a like a something in thirty OT six. Right, That's what I was gonna say. I don't know anybody that hunted or killed a deer with the Henry old Weather forty five seventy. But it's made the Rice Lake based Henry repeating arms. So they make and it's a nod toward the you know, hometown gun manufacturers. So if you live in Wisconsin and you don't have one, you can expect visit from law enforcement officials.

Traded you like, learn about all these different old guns in your riflery class or shoot them now. Now it was mostly just like just target practice. Yeah, pretty much just was like a twenty two. We didn't like history of rifle or anything, although that would have been cool. I'm horrifically uh underinformed. They join they're joining nine other states who have state rifles. Oh man, that's a whole other thing. Okay, we'll talk about the Kansas Trail campan later.

I've told you didn't want to have more step and we'll talk about Burning Man um an hour later. How do you do you go to Burning Man? Now? But one of my best friends just did this past year. It might it sound pretty wild. It gives us license to get into this. I want to. I'm interested in how you're ranking the remaining topics as to the ones that will that you're interested in talking because I got a lot to say about Wisconsin's public or Kansas's public land trail camp. I don't have a lot to say

about and trash. Basically, when you go to Burning Man, it's a is he defending Burnie Man. I don't think it's just kind of how clean they make it exactly. Okay, he's explained just how clean it is after Burning Man. He was a volunteer there for the Volunteer Fire depart He volunteer at the fire department during the Burning Man thing.

They cleaned it so good. The festival has the undergoing extensive cleaning procedure where they cleaned the entire seven square miles of m oops moop matter, matter out of place, which he said ranges from straw glow sticks to nipple pasties. All right, what's a nipple paste picture that you had a little sticker you put over your nipple. That's it. Whole decoration you got it? Yeah, clothing like it's like

not the same as being fully. You don't want to go, you don't want to have any clothes on you exactly. It's like one step there's body paint, right, but that you know, that's a hard Yeah, that's a time investment. It doesn't leave a lot to the imagination. Then they do this. This is this is where this gets interesting. Here, this is what the BLM make. Here's what the BLM does to determine just how clean the site is. This is where this is. This is where this gets downright

scientific Bureau Land Management. They randomly select one hundred and twenty inspection sites, with each site being a circle with a radius of thirty seven point seven feet. Got it, I'm tracking one hundred and twenty times. You take a circle about thirty eight feet radius, lay it down, and then you have to inspect that circle. But now it sounded so scientific until I got to this part. We're

less than a palmful. Then it devolve, It devolves out of science, It devolves out of science land and goes and do less than a palm for less nipple pasties can be fined within that circle. If you find more than a palmful, Yeah, you clean. If you've ever hunted or hiked, backpack camped in this location outside of burning man right in and tell us how clean it was.

I'd like to know. Yeah, no, when I when I first so, I'm from Tennessee and I went to Bonarou when I was in my twenties, you know, big music festival. I went to like five of those in a row. And when I first have I found out about burning my end. I was like, okay, so, like what kind of bands are there or whatever? And I was like, oh, well they're not there's no lineup or whatever. And from that point on, I was like, I was like, so

what is the point of it then? And it's like an art festival, Like people go there and make like art installations, do a bunch of drugs and get wild or whatever, and then burn a fffig at the end of it, and that's pretty much the whole thing. But like those festivals are a marathon. You're filthy, you're tired,

you know, it's like gross. And if I'm not gonna be able to watch like Jay Z and Bruce Springstein, you know, and back to back nights, then like I got no interest in that, and I wouldn't even do the former and in my thirties, you know what I mean. Like, but in my twenties I was all for it, but I never really got Burning Man and I still don't. And now it's a bunch of like tech bros and stuff. I think on top of that, oh is it? I

think so they've like overtaken It's what I heard. So now everybody goes to Burning Man talks about how it's not the same as it was absolutely, just like with everything Nuther's Montana or Baha, yeah, bonarys same way. Um, where'd you grow up exactly? Clay County, Tennessee. It's uh, you know, Tennessee is divided into East, Middle, and West Tennessee. It's on the northeast part, like northeast border of Middle Tennessee. So it's like halfway between Nashville and Knoxville and forty

miles up on the Kentucky line. What were the what were the conditions like when you grew up there? When I was like a little kid, like up until I was like nine, it was a pretty idyllic and cozy little southern town. I felt like, like a nice little town and like just using my so there was this big textile factory. Oshkosh, bagosh, my overalls, kiss and stuff

ocos bagosh. They had a huge factory in Salina, and that was like the beating heart of the town's e common everybody's My great grandma worked there for sixty years or whatever. Yeah, that all the kids. Like, if you were a kid from Sliea at that time, I pretty much guarantee you had like a photo shoot, like a toddler photo shoot that was all oshkosh bagosh, right, like you know, sitting in a little wooden bucket with some overalls on in a little yeah, right exactly. Why don't

you guys do the side buttons up? Uh, leaping, flopping? It depends, you know, a little bit of both, switch it up, and people would do both, yeah exactly. But and then in my family in particular, like was a bunch of small business owners. Grandpa had a car lot in a garage, right, we worked on cars and sold them and stuff. And my dad had the town's video store, Crowder's Video Remember those. Yeah, really dug deep for that name because you have the little back corner with a curtain.

Oh yeah, it wasn't the curtain, it was a room. He was a converted single wide trailer in the back room I was forbade to enter, and that's where you know, all the boxes were a little bit bigger in size, and you know, like you know, somebody from the Baptist church, you know, couldn't go in there if there was anybody else in the store. Like that was the thing that would happen a lot, like people that that back room kept the lights on in that grocery. And then that

video store you get a double wide. There was a video store. Yeah, yeah, and uh Crowder's Video, Crowder's Video, and that market just dried up. Yeah, as you'll see in a minute. As you'll see in a minute, every by town we didn't even get to that point. But anyway, Uh, on the town square, my maternal grandmother had a little country diner called Cat's Cafe, And across the square, my openly gay uncle and his partner had a Delhi called

the New Day Delhi, a sandwich place or whatever. And Uh, all these businesses are doing, and the whole town or the whole downtown's populated by these little businesses and stuff, and everything's cool. Then in the mid nineties, as I like to put it, the factory left forever and the pills showed up for good at the same time, the factory being oshkosh, they left. They went to Mexico, like literally that that, you know, they moved to that operation

to Mexico, just packed it up and moved it. Yeah, and that was that, Like some of the was that some of the NAFTA. Absolutely, And that's got a huge it's a huge part of people. There's politics, you know, actually that town is rural and every and like redneck or whatever it was. You can look it up. For a very long time, that county was like a blue county in Tennessee because it was like old school didn't work in Man Democrats or whatever that type of thing.

But then NAFTA, the Clinton's factory leaves, town gets demolished and it changes a lot, but nothing ever came into a place that factory. Really. You know, by the time I graduated high school, all my family's businesses are closed. You know, my mom is as addicted to pills herself. You know, people are sick. Everything just falls apart, and like, feel I want to back up to that that place leaving, Like how was that perceived by people? Did it feel

like a betrayal? Yeah, oh yeah, yeah, I mean I remember. I mean, you know, again, I was like nine or ten, but I can remember my parents, my grandparents like talking about it and stuff. I mean I can. I have a vivid memory of my grandpa that owned the car lot coming into my dad's video store and slamming like a newspaper or something down on the counter and saying, I swear to God, I'll never vote for another Democrat

as long as I live because of that. And like, yeah, I mean it was like a company town, you know what I mean, Like I said, everybody worked there and or like had somebody in their family that worked there. And like all the other businesses, like you know, people that work they are bought lunch at these restaurants or whatever that type of thing. It all, it all orbited around that plant. And yeah, I mean people knew. I mean even as a kid, like I knew, like everybody

knew this is really bad what's about to happen. And there was some optimism like well we can replace it with something or whatever. But I mean that you know, that's twenty five years ago, going on thirty years ago, and that you know, there's like a couple minor operations have come in and left and whatever else, but nothing has really ever replaced it. So it's been there's been like double digit level. I mean, I don't know right now, but I know for over a decade there was double

digit levels of unemployment. It was like, you know, one of the poorest counties in Tennessee for like years and years straight because of them that killed the video store. Yeah exactly. So I said, like, right, obviously the video store wouldn't have made it a long term anyway, but we didn't know that. You know, we didn't see the future coming. But it didn't matter because that killed the

video store. My uncle's Delhi, the my grandma's cafe is like that's still a restaurant on the square, but like it got rough and she was old and so that drove her out of it, and so you know, pretty much just ended everything. Yeah, it was pretty rough. So I understand why those people like in that place. I get why, you know, they don't trust politicians, Democrats in particular,

I mean, I get it. And I also get why that county went so heavily for Trump in twenty sixteens, because you know, he was telling them, he was speaking directly to that type of stuff and nobody else does because nobody cares about those people. And like Republicans Democrats both, no one cares about those people poor like rural people

like they just don't. I mean I do because that's where I'm from, but like you know, and so to have anybody even paying them any attention at all, I think was like attractive, you know, ye in a desperation way. Part of the reason I think we're talking about this earlier, when we're talking about getting you on Yani, you found your stuff and turned me onto it, and uh we had we had a laugh watching it. And what initiated

that was. It's not I'm not the first person to make this observation by any stretch, but it was like we're talking about, uh, the last thing that will be left that the whole country agrees. It's totally fine to ridicule and insult, Yeah, is poor white Southerners. I think you can always be No one will ever be like, well,

don't you do that. I was making like jokes about that in stand up when I started thirteen years ago, and it's still because even then, uh, it was already starting, and I would I mean, I mean, who else is there right now? Do you know what I mean? Like you said, like you said, oh, we'll get to that point eventually, but I mean, who else is? Yeah? Right? Pretty right? Like you can't name another group of people

that it's okay to make fun of. No, But also, like I'm as a comedian, I'm kind of totally okay with that. As long as people will allow me, as a you know, formally poor white Southerner to also make fun of other types of white people, then I'm good with that trade off. Do you know what I mean? Any kind of any kind of white person should be fair game, I think for me, because you know we're

gonna catch it too. I used to like, and I don't know what the real answer is, but I used to jokingly say that I thought that was because all these other groups of people, gradually over the years each stood up and we're like, that's not okay, you shouldn't talk about us like that, right. But Rednecks were never gonna do that because that would imply that they, you know, give a damn what somebody else thinks. It would put Marry the Cable Guy and Jeff Fox were the out

of business. It's just like you know, like the world tells them's like, hey, they're talking shit about you. Who is everybody? I'll tell everybody to kiss my ass and then that's the end of it, you know. Like, but I find it the southerns have a huge ship on their shoulder about pretty much the whole rest of the country, like looking down on him earlier. Think y'all were talking

earlier off mix about somebody else you work with, who Clay. Yeah, there's like the South and then there's like devil Country Clay. I've been dogging on our colleague Clay a lot because he was recently he was pitching this idea that he wanted to do, and he had an email where he pointed out that he pointed out that in Southern culture, you know, music is very important. Yeah, And I said, have you been to a lot of areas in America where you found music to be unimportant? Right? Have you

found it to be unimportant in the North? And then I sent Then I started looking up musicians per capita, and um I pointed out to him that the most musicians per capita and Beverly Hills, Right, So I think it'd be fair to say that in global culture, music is very important. Well, yeah, and yeah he sees he sees like he'd be like, I mean, I'm storytelling is very important in the South. Well, look, I mean a lot of Listen, Clay's not even here, but I'm about to go to bat for him. I think a lot

of them. I think a lot of the like of American music, like you know, has its roots originally in the South, and a lot of That's my buddy pointed out when I was dogging on Clay about this. He pointed out that like if you sort of do a music family tree, right, you wind up like like Southern blues winds up being like the trunk of the tree, is what he's getting. Yeah, I don't think that. I don't. I don't know if maybe Clean knows at We'll have

to get mine talked to him about this. But now they are, Yeah, they're musical paper like the most rednecked part of my county it's called pe Ridge, right, And it's also the part where like what they're known for is like they all can just sing like angels, like you know, yeah, everybody out there something in the water just yeah, like it's like, oh they're red as hell, but got pipes. Did you guys mess around outside a lot with your kids. Yeah, I'm kind of doing a

bit about that right now. Like I I've got I've got two sons or ten eleven, And I think about when I was at age, like I would me and my little sisters three years younger than me, Like we'd leave in the morning and just you know, be gone.

I mean literally all day, you know what I mean, and like obviously no cell phones, I'll checking in or something, just out like you know, playing in the creek, trying to catch crawl daddies or whatever, you know, climbing into old storm drains, just kids stuff, you know, but like climbing up the pile the piles of scrap material behind the abandoned factory, you know, fun stuff like that. But

uh but yeah, I men't. But today I'm you know, I'm not like I went, and I live in California, live in Burbank, California, you know, which is very suburban, but it's still a city. But I'm just not, like, you know, I'm mortified at the prospect of that. Like unless I had some way to like track them or whatever, I don't want them out there just running around all day. But that's what we did. Yeah, we would, I mean yeah, all day long in the summertime and stuff would be

just playing outside. And then uh, when I got older, like in high school and everything. I was never a big hunter but me and my buddy. The only thing of note in Clay County, Tennessee is a man made lake called Dale Hollow Lake, which for a long time not anymore. Unfortunately that that also left with the factory. We were the we were the home of the world record smallmouth bass. They did the world even took the

bass away from us. Yeah, the bass record world record. Yeah, that was on the sign coming welcome to Slige at home of the world record smallmouth bass. But like part of the local lore was always, and I don't know the truth of it, but part of the local lore was always there's always these rumors and stuff that the dude that it that it had been weighted down with like nuts and bolts and stuff, and that yeah, that

would never happened. Yeah, And so it was always like a yeah, it's like the town was divided amongst you know, whether it was legit or not. But anyway, so like summertime at the every day exactly, Yeah, stolen bass violer, but like, uh, now, I don't know off the top of my head. Hey, everyone fill here with a quick note. Immediately after the show, Trade had some research and found out that Selena and Dale hollow Lake still hold the

record for the smallmouth bass. According to him, he quote assumed the universe had taken that from us as well. My bad, Thanks Trey, and back to the show. Can I tell you a quick story? Yeah? Please? It has to do with the South kind of um. There's a song by Hank Williams Junior and Whale and Jennings called The Conversation, and in it they discuss Hank Williams Junior's mother, Aubrey, and first off trying to get Hanklingas Junior to come on the podcast. So if you're out there listening, my man,

please uh. Anyways, like Hank Williams and Hank Williams Junior's mom, Aubrey got a divorce or not, and then he got remarried right before he died. This all happened really fast. He died young and unexpectedly. Once he died. Once he died, there became a legal battle over who was able to call themselves Hank Williams's widow because he hadn't done the legal separation prior to getting remarried, and then he died

or after he get remarried. So in the end it was settled that Aubrey, Hank Williams Junior's mother became officially Hank William's widow, and in a settlement, this other woman had to stop saying that, and Okay, Aubrey was the first one or their Sorry, his first wife was Aubrey who he had been separated from but didn't get supposed to do like sixty days. I mean, I think he's supposed to be separated sixty days before he'd be legally divorced. Well, it turns out he had only done fifty days of

separation or something like that and then got married. Yeah. Then he dies and so they're like, you're that marriage. That's not actually his widow because he didn't legally get divorced. Yeah, so I get to be the widow. I'm pretty sure that my mama is still technically married to my step dad despite the fact that they haven't been together in twenty something years. They haven't done it. They just didn't do it. They never did it, never got around to that.

You know, what's a whole thing you still keep you still keep in touch with your parents. Well, my dad passed away ten years ago pancreatic cancer. But he was I mentioned earlier my mom getting you know, addicted to drugs and stuff when I was younger. So my dad most mostly raised us. And my dad was great, super close to my dad, but he was not really an outdoorsman.

He was more into like rock and roll and movies, Dave and Lynch movies and stuff like that, you know, but I do still his video store would be in a David Lynch movie, right. Yeah, he would have been so flattered to hear you say that. They're so thrilled to hear that someone interpreted it that way. He would love that. But but yeah, but my mom, you know, she's still kicking and we're like, you know, we're reconciled or whatever. Now I wouldn't say we're super close, but

we you know, I do keep in touch. I say, here at the holidays and stuff like that. Do you understand what you do mean? Like it? She does. She loves it. She loves like the attention and stuff like and actually she I gotta give her credit, like she is cool about all that. Like I had one of my early jokes that I had was like talking about where I'm from and how redneck it is or whatever, and I, you know, and I'd be like, yeah, you know, I love football and I hate shirt sleeves and whatever. Yeah,

I don't all this ship. And at the end, I'd be like, and my mama, y'all, my mama cooks the best crystal meth you ever had in your life, right, And like, uh, she heard me do that, and she sent me a text message. It was like, she's like, honey, I did not cook math right space, I sold pills. It's different, it's not the same thing. I was like, I know, Mama, but I can't you you know, it doesn't work with cooked Joe, Like you gotta talk about your home cooking. I can't use pills, you know, taking

some artistic license. Give me a break. But she's she's pretty cool about it all. So what was it that when you when you left, was it like in the movies, you know, like you um, you know, left with your thumb out and got on a hitch hiked out of town and never turned back. Not quite, but kind of. And also the other thing was I was always like the smart kid in my class, which is like, you know, bars not all that high. It's like's not crazy impressive

being the smart kid in this particular school. But I didn't know that I had no for of reference. So like by the time I graduated high school or whatever, like I literally thought I was like redneck Goodwill Hunting, you know, like literally because you know, he had a rough childhood. He's a super genius and the end of that movie's him just hitting the road never to return, right. I was like I thought to do with it? Yeah,

I thought I was Matt Damon in that movie. And a lot of my twenties was having to reconciled with the fact that I am not, you know, that brilliant the way that I thought I was, you know, but but yeah, it was kind of like that. And my dad also it was very much like that's part of like an another thing I've always regretted. I mentioned my grandpa had a car lot he before I was born, like before my time. He built and raced stock cars

on like the dirt track circuit in the South. He had his whole basement was full of trophies and pictures all his like stock car pass and stuff, and he was like a gear head, you know, Like my dad was real into music. But I never I noticed my grandpa never listened to music. And I was sitting with one and this like seventy nine Chevy pickup he had, right and We're sitting there and I'm probably twelve, and I was like, hey, Pap, why don't why don't you

ever listen to any music? And he just looks at me and just revs the engine up real alb bro and he goes, that's the only music of man needs son and uh so like but anyway, but he had the His outlook on me was like, you're gonna go to college. You know, You're like you're the you're gonna the first one of the family go to You're gonna go to college and get You're gonna you're gonna be a doctor or a lawyer. You're gonna work at some kind of office. You're not gonna be covered in grease

every day. Like you're not gonna you know what I mean. Like he wanted that kind of future for me, but I wish I'd to take him more of an initiative to like, you know, learn that kind of thing from him, but he never offered and I never asked learned how to wrench on cars all that stuff. Yeah, and I mean, you know, I'll like, um, like I'll do little stuff like the tires or breakpads whatever I put alternators, and it's always just like YouTube and a manual. You know,

you can't figure it out. It's not that bad. But like he just knew. He was just one of those guys you know, knew everything about engines and stuff. It probably would have changed, I guess, because you know, as cars, like modern day cars with the computers and all that stuff in him, that probably would have confounded him a little bit. But like the old school rides, who you know topped to bottom. I can't remember why even brought that up. I don't know. We're talking about your family

and growing up. I know where he's coming from, man, because um, thinking back to when you could climb in I remember like working on working on pickups when you're in high school, you would open the hood and sit on the front wheel. Well you'd be like sitting side there right, yeah, and everything's just laid out like, well, there's the starter, there's this, there's that. You know, it's just so simple and now, dude, it's like intimidating man wrenched on any kind of thing. Dude, when you left,

you went to college obviously. Oh right, yeah, well so that's the thing again. Act like I'm good Will hunting and he was going across the country. I went forty miles up the road to Cookville, Tennessee, which is also a small town, but to me, it was like the major metropolitan area of Cookville, Tennessee, you know what I mean.

Like Cookville was the town where if you're from Salina, that's where you go to get like school closed, if you're going to go to the movies, or if it's somebody's birthday, so you go to Red Lobster for a fancy dinner, you know. Like that's what Cookville was. And I also have a cow college there, Tennessee Tech University, which is where I ended up going. And I mean I loved it at a great time. But yeah, I

didn't go all that far away. But I already knew that I wanted to do comedy, did yeah, Because well, like I said, so, I grew up in my dad's video store, so like I always wanted to do something in show business like movies or whatever. And then when I was twelve, and I told this story a lot, but it's how I remember it. When I was twelve, me and my dad together watched Chris Rock, Bigger and Blacker when it aired on HBO, like we watched it live, and that's the Chris Rock special where he does this

whole bit about dads how nobody appreciates dads. It's always mama, this MoMA that daddy don't get no credit. All daddy gets is the big piece of chicken, right that bit. And my dad's just like losing his mind watching is and he's just dying. And that was the first time that I was like that in particular. Seems like it would be cool, right, but again, I'm a kid. I'm in the middle of nowhere whatever. I started keeping notes like for possible, like stand up bits and stuff like that.

And I wanted to go to college. I wanted to get a Greek because I would have been the first of my family to do it. I wanted to do that either way. But I then knew I was going

to start comedy wherever I ended up after college. So because I knew that in college, I got an MBA, not because I have any interest in business, but just because I thought it would give me the best shot at getting some kind of job where I could like pay the bills and not have to do any that starving artist bullshit, Like I had no interest in that

type of thing, you know what I mean. I'd been pouring weighted tables enough, like get a good job while I was moonlighting as a comic, and so that's why I got it. And then that's exactly what happened. I got a job working for the US Department of Energy in Oakridge, Tennessee. Moved there, started stand up in Knoxville doing what for the Department of Energy. I was a contracting officer, so like uh, contract specialist eventually and then

a contracting officer. So like the federal government doesn't they don't really do much of anything themselves. Anything they do they contract out to like private, private industry. Statement. Well no, I mean they just you know, they they have contractors for everything, you know, like a federal employee. It's rare that they'll you know, do any of the like you know, brunt of the work or whatever. There's a contractor or

a subcontractor or whatever. Well, so I I had like a warrant they call it, and I was like I awarded and administered those contracts on behalf of the government, right, So, like I worked with the contractors and you know, made sure they were following the rules, made sure they were doing what they're supposed to do, you know, and then

they got paid and all that type of stuff. Competition was a big part of doing a request for proposals, and companies submit proposals and you have to put a board together and pick the company you're gonna Some of these contracts are you know huge, Ye, I'd make a lot of money on kickbacks. No, I never got to that point. It would have been pretty sweet though, because yeah,

you know that was going on. We'd have ethics classes and stuff where they'd tell us, you know, stories of people who have been caught, you know, like don't do that. But I'm sure people were still doing it. But I mean there was other little stuff like somebody's son in law company would get a maintenance contract, you know what I mean. There was still some like good old boy

type stuff that would go on there. But like, but the big dollar contracts, they were like heavily scrutinized, and had to be you know, competed in all that stuff. So but it was just a I had a top secret security clearance and all that. But like one of my contracts was the uranium processing facility, so like the nuclear weapon were they enrich the uranium you know that

goes in our nuclear weapons? Uh? And so I I would go to all these meetings that were like top secret and heavily like heavy security phones outside all this stuff, like very very high level of security. But it's my ran trying to listen to the water. But like I could, like you could have waterboarded me all damn day and I wouldn't been able to tell you any of it because it because like it just feel like no, I really like I really don't know because it's all like

it's all science and shit. You know, it's like it it goes over your head. So if you're like me anyway, So I was in those meetings and stuff, but I, you know, I didn't understand them. They were highly technical in nature, and sometimes people would think that it's a you know, like it sounds like a kind of cool job, but it was just an office job really, you know, it's kind of office spacey in a lot of ways.

When you knew that you wanted to do comedy when you were young, did you how did you perceive what it was you were growing up around I d're saying, I'm getting at I mean maybe, do you mean like meaning that until you I didn't fully understand where I grew up until I went somewhere else. Yeah, for sure. Like I didn't know about UM until I was in graduate school. I didn't know I'd never met Ivy League kids, yeah right, I didn't know about any coffee besides gas

station coffee. Yeah yeah, right, like all that shit, and then you go like, oh, oh, I know, yeah that was weird. I got a few growing up I've had. I've had stand up bits based on that premise too, because I went through a very similar thing. I knew. I mentioned Dalhalla Lake in the summertime, tourists from like Big Ten country, like Ohio and Michigan, you know, your neck of the woods that I just called it that

it's just like a reference point. I don't know, so yeah, right, they have really good sports teams at the college, but uh, people from up there, like the Midwest, the north northern Midwest that would like to us that was just the North, like you know Yankees. Yankees would come down Animal's Country. Yeah, Devil's Country, right, but of course, you know that's the thing. Devil's Country is just you got the South and then there's Devil's Country because California is like the devilist of

Devil's Country and it's not in the North. But they're like honorary Yankees in California. But anyway, uh, anyway, they would come down there and like go out on a houseboats stuff. They'd come to the lake in the summertime and it's like a huge reservoir. Oh yeah, it's a it's a big lake. It's also I was always told that it was one of the cleanest lakes in the country and all this stuff, and it's uh, I mean,

I think Delhalla Lake is awesome, like unimpeachable, uh to me. Yeah, And uh so people come out there going on a houseboats and stuff like that. Um so because of that, we were I think it's like in any place where they're a tourist, the locals were very aware. Like we all thought that the tourists, you know, thought we were all idiots, right, like the local yokels. You know what I mean like they like we were the like we thought they thought they were better than everybody else or

whatever else. And what's funny is in retrospect, these are like very middle class Midwestern people. These are like, you know, this guy's like probably an electrician or something, an electrician from Iowa, and we're like, look at this fancy playing a sum a bit. They couldn't afford the driving exactly, yeah, but we didn't know. You feel like you're like you're like townies at Martha's Vineyard or something, right, yeah exactly, but like, uh, there's just a And also it's just

a universal thing in the South. I don't whether you're in a like toown or not. Like you're just aware that everybody else thinks you're dumb, Like that's the thing you think, like the accent makes you dumb and all this stuff. And again I was a smart kid in my class. I thought I was like smart on a global scale. So like I took that very personally, like they used to really piss me off, right, I was like, you know, no that you know, I'm I'm as smart

as anything. Sons of bitches, you know that don't matter how I talk, you know, how do you become aware of it though, like at the age of twelve, Like, what has taught you that the rest of the world thinks that you're not as smart as they are? Like are your parents just telling you this? Yeah, people just talk about it and again but again especially that's why I brought up the tourists, just because that just that was just a general like consensus or the way it was.

You know what I mean is that like the tourists or up at the assholes. You know, I think we're all dumb. And it's like you just know that from a very early age, right, but um, but anyway, so I was aware of that, right, But there was a whole lot of stuff. So I knew the South was like that. I didn't know that my town was different from other places in the South, like other cities or other places that are not economically devastated or whatnot. Like I didn't you were the bottom, Yes, And I didn't

know that. And so like I get and I used to this bit like when I was in college or again, I started dating this girl who I considered to be a rich girl, but literally her dad owned an auto body shop outside of Nashville. Right, But like I was in the bathroom getting ready for a first date, like here's you want chance, fancy? Don't let me damn, you know,

like I thought, this is my ticket, you know. And uh like when I went to her house for for Christmas or whatever, you know, I'm in the kitchen like, why's all y'all's plates the same? You know, that's weird, you know, had glass tupperware. I was like, as I live and breathe, you know, like, uh, blew my mind. I was like, and I had a few moments like that. I was like, oh my god, I'm white trash, you know. But because I didn't know that until later. I remember

being with a bunch of college friends. They're all kind of you know, middle class would again rich to me. We're riding around going to somebody's house to pick them up, and they're from Cookeville, and it's like a nice neighborhood with like you know, like big suburban homes, nothing crazy, not like full on McMansions, but like, you know, nice houses in like a subdivision, right, well kept yards, yeah right. And we're going through there and I'm telling my friends,

I'm like, dude, this is insane. I was like everyone I was like, there's not a house this nice and all of Clay County and this neighborhood's full of them or whatever. And one of the dudes was like, are you serious about that? And I was like yeah, man, I was like, there might be one or two up on the lake, but that's it. And he was like, dude, that's poverty. And I was like, oh, shitty's right, that

is poverty, you know. So yeah, I had a lot of those, a lot of those realizations we had, Like it's so funny, it's without the whole Southern North thing. There's like a strikingly similar thing that happened where I grew up, where there's some people that around our lake.

We had like the Chicago people. There's a couple of places where they bought cottages around the lake I grew up on, and they'd come from four hours away from Chicago, and they were into the same stuff, right, They're into whatever, playing in the water. They're inefficient, but their ship was so much nicer. Right, But again they were working class people, but they had like glass tron boats. They had like

dedicated ski boats with stereo systems. Yeah, so when they would stop to like circle around and pick up a skier here that they were playing music, which would just blow your mind. How you play music out of a boat, right, And so they did the same stuff that just did it was nice. And if they went fishing, they had like a fishing boat, you know, so they were into the same junk. But it's just their stuff was nice. And you became aware of that was a sort of

first inkling that there's another way to go about ship. Yeah, you could be like the Chicago people down the beach everyone disliked. Yeah, even though they liked to do exactly the same stuff, right, it's just they did it with nice stuff, and that annoyed everybody. Yeah. Yeah, you know you complaining about you wouldn't complain about it being nice. You can play about being loud, right, loud music, yeah,

loud boats, I mean, yeah, a nice boat. Yeah. My buddy's dad and one friend whose dad was like the highway commissioner. So that's like a good job. That's nothing like in my town. Like as far as like the kids at school go, like you were, your family was considered to have money, Like if your family had money, and so I know that basically meant like your parents were still married and both had a job, right, and that like as being as having money by Salina standards. Right.

So my one buddy is that was a highway commissioner, was like a legitimately good job. And so he had a big bass boat, right, But that bass boat was our like you know, tube and boat, ski and boat whatever else. Like it's just it was just the boat used to boat for all the boat stuff, right. It didn't have an assortment of boats or specialized boats like we were just lucky to have just that one boat. When you started doing the well, what was the first comedy you did? Like, what was the first sort of

audience material? So? Um, Like I said, I how do you say when you start comedy? Don't know when you start writing. I guess he's right. When when you start being a writer, I guess in my mind, you start getting paid for your work. Okay, I didn't start. I mean you get paid gas money or whatever it bar shows and stuff. Early on the first time that ever happened, I was probably now, I started him saying, I mean about eighteen months sin to doing it, I'd get paid

a little bit. I'd MC at side Splitters in Knoxville, the comedy club there twenty five dollars a show, if that counts. I didn't go full time until the videos we mentioned earlier went viral in twenty sixteen, so I've been like full time for seven years. I started in twenty ten at Splitters, and we're your first jokes about poor Southern culture, Yeah, all of them. So you never thought that you had to go make up jokes about

stuff that other comedians were talking about. No, And it's kind of worked out because I still, like to this day, like for people who don't know they're listening or whatever, like hear the liberal redneck thing. The stand up that I do has always been and it's still like, you know, culture, It's not like straight up political, like I might getting us some political stuff, but I also talk a lot about just like how I grew up, or my hometown or you know, the South in general, how other people

think of this out. I got tons of jokes that make fun of California ever since I moved there, you know, like it's not just politics. But one thing I found is, like people in other plays, because I didn't realize either, like you were saying, you're like, you know, you removed the North South from it, and similar stuff was happening in my hometown. Like I didn't realize that until later, but like that holds true for a lot of people in a lot of places, meaning like a lot of

people can relate to that type of thing. Like the other day I went to my eye a new eye doctor in Burbank, California. He's like a mid thirties Armenian dude named doctor Hosseeppen, and he as soon as I came in, he was like, I know this is weird, but I'm a huge fan. He was like, I grew up. He was like, I grew up in a poor immigrant household, and he was liking so much of what you say.

Just yeah, right. And another time this dude come up to me after a show and he was like, hey, so I grew up my whole life in Cuba and I never knew it until listening to your set just now, but apparently I was a redneck. I guess, he was, like, because all that stuff you were saying like totally applied to me too, So like you know, um, it's a more universal experience than a lot of people realize or whatever.

But that's like the high, that's the high mark of art though man rights when you know, you you convey a particular experience and then it, you know, it resonates with people who haven't lived that same one. Yeah, they reflect on their own stuff. It makes them reflect on their own things and feel better about it, or they

laugh about it or right, you know. But yeah, I don't remember the exact material, but yes, it was talking about just my very first set was all about like and also at the time because I was really nervous and everything, and also I probably had a couple of

drinks because I was nervous. So I get on stage and like, so all of those things means like my accident was like way thicker, you know, I'm up there, like I'm from clay Knty, Tennessee, you know, like it just just belting out yeah without Maine in two and so it probably played because I was talking about how redneck my hometown was. I remember I talked about moonshine,

but I don't remember any of the jokes. It was talking about, like, you know, something about punching off makes you want to punch a horse, you know, or whatever else like somebody as we know the party's gonna turn up is when some old boy hols the moon shine out or you know, shit like that, pretty like honestly, pretty U like blue collar comedy tour e type of type of stuff, honestly. And then as I kept going, I started and now I started talking about more like

whatever you want to call it, social commentary. You know, I'd have bits about like i'd make fun of the Bible, or I make fun of the Confederacy, or I get into racism or homophobia or that type of ship, but always mixed with you know, the other stuff, the lifestyle stuff too. And now I'll talk about you know, I talk about my wife a lot, you know what I mean, So like trying to cover a lot of the bases.

Last night I was writing some kids materials. Well, you know, I just like, like, I don't want people to like, I don't want to just do the one thing, you know what I mean. I'm okay with people knowing me primarily from one thing, but like, I want to do more than just the political stuff. Like I men, one of the guys I work with a lot started a new podcast this year that's just us two hill billy's

talking about fancy people shit. Right. It's called putting on errors and it's like not, it's not political at all, And I mean we have a lot of fun with it. I think it's funny. You know. I try to like find places where fancy and trashy people overlap, like you know, cousin banging or you know, or like getting drunk on a boat or nading a logger or you know, stuff like that. Different. That's really that's a great little couple there. Yeah,

it's cousin banging and getting drunk on boats. Yeah, right, well more do you want? You know, the boats are different? But yeah, yeah, exactly know what you talk about doing a kid humor? Man, it's like can and I just want to spend it back. We gotta go way back a little bit because I thought you were going to ask the question when you but we didn't never get there.

The uncles, no, when you when you're like a kid and you're like, oh, I'm gonna do something in show business and even instead you said you were starting to write down things and you thought you could make fun of But my question is what in your head? What was going on when you're like, oh, I'm funny enough that I could present or were you like always kind of class clowney, Like what gives somebody something in their head with They're like, oh, I'm funny enough that I

can produce jokes. I like a lot of people laugh, like a lot of kids from a broken home situation. Whatever. I was funny, Like I was a smart kid, but I was also if I wasn't like class clowney, but I was funny. My friends would tell me, like, you know, you should be comedians some day or whatever. Like people would say that. And again, I cannot stress enough the inflated opinion I had of my own mental capabilities intellectual and creatively and everything. So like I was like, yeah,

I totally do that, you know. And I and I'm not just saying this. I really was aware even then. I was like, I was like Cassie, I'm still gonna have my accent right because I can't help it, but I'm not gonna be dumb and that'll be wild. I'm

ain't facetious. But like I was aware. I was aware even then that it would be like a thing, sure that I would have a thing without even trying to have a thing, just by virtue of who I am as a person, you know, Like I thought about that even then, um so, but don't get me wrong, I was still very nervous. Like so, by the time I get out of grad school and moved to Knoxville, I'm twenty three, and it was like I was very much like, all right, if you're gonna do it, do it like

it's either now or never. You've been keeping your little notes and saying all this shit for years, but either do it or don't. And so I signed up for an open mic. I stacked the deck in my favor, like a lot of first timers do. I brought a bunch of co workers and stuff with me. Yeah, most people their first time, they end up doing that, you know, they bring friends with them, and so it kind of

pumps up the response you get. And then I just got the bug, and I don't think I missed a I don't think I missed an open mic after that for like two and a half years or something. That first night, now, because I had my friends in the crowd, like, it went well. I you know, it wasn't long before I bombed, for sure, but by that time it was too late. I was just fully in it, you know, man, dude, That's like one of the things that like learning Spanish.

UM pretty much that learning Spanish and doing a learning Spanish and learning how to do um, and I'll never do it. I'll never do either learning Spanish learning how to do stand up. I think it'd be like really interesting man like saying bad hating to me, like I lost my arms and legs and ship. I would probably get into that. Yeah, usually something bad has happened to I wouldn't no, no, that wouldn't be my line of humor. But I'd be like I would walk away from certain

other activities. Well, yeah, I would walk away. Yeah, I would move away from certain activities, and I'd be like, I gonna learn Spanish and do stand up. I funny, I can't tell you how many times I have started and then ultimately stopped learning Spanish in my life. So I do absolutely. I've like picked it up so many times. I've had you know, both duo lingo and was that Rosetta stone or whatever? Um, I've yeah, and like I'll start to pick it up and everything, and then I

just stopped. For me. I I've always equated learning Spanish like learning to play guitar. For some reason, It's it's like something you ought to do. Something something that seems cool. It's like real easy to not keep up with, do you know what I mean, Like it seems cool, you pick it up and then like next thing, you know, you're like, oh damn, oh yeah, I don't do it so far away exactly right. Yeah, I've done that so many times that when we go to Mexico, Steve actually

thinks I have decent Spanish. Oh yeah, I got. I used to. I got to a point where I could, like I could read Spanish pretty like pretty well, you know, like I could uh, but I couldn't. I never was able to like uh, and I could speak a little bit of it, but I never could a native Spanish speaker. Talking was always its way too fast. I could never parse it, you know. But now I got next to nothing. It's my second most favorite country, next to America. Mexico.

In Mexico, yeah, I go there a couple of times a year, and every time I go there, I come home feeling just humiliated. So I haven't picked up much anything. I mean, well, living in living in southern California is like that too, you know. I mean It's like I told my said, that was another time I said, as though that they have sole proprietorship over that land. Yeah, but that's my like, my, that's where I go to

feel like a dick for having out learned Spanish. Yeah, but that was one of the times when I moved. When we first moved to La I was like, this is great, I'll finally pick up Spanish. Right seven years later, I'm like, you know, oh uh my Yamo Trey, Like I don't. I don't have it at all, you know, and it's everywhere out there. Um uh. I won't get back into like some of your career stuff, but I wanted to come in. You're talking about trying to write

kids stuff. Yeah, well not like not four kids, because that's most comics have kids. They have material about their kids and I never have. But it's like a starting path, Like I don't know, it's it's like it's a path you go down. Dude, I'm not a comedian. It's a path you go down. And I think it's like a decision you make. Okay, please a lab break. I'm literally last says I'm gonna start doing jokes about my kids, And it's like a path you go down, right, It's

a path you go down. Yeah, but you also can't help it. I made it. I just made a bet with my daughter for ten bucks that she bet me that she broke her toe, and then she didn't. I said, you didn't break her toe? She said, yeah, I did. So she gets the X ray she didn't break her toe, and I said, you one me ten bucks. She says, no, I'm not doing the beat because I didn't realize I hadn't broke my toe right home. That's like, it's the whole point of that, that whole thing. That's why like

that that that was the whole conversations about that. So they do stuff that's funny. But then if you if you deal in that trafficing that, you become like a dad. You become a dad comedian. Yeah, definitely, you're like my wife boy, the old ball and chain, right, that's the old badle ax. Yeah, that's part of I think that's

part of why I've never done it. But I think another reason for me is, like I'm not saying all of them, but I feel like a lot of comics that have kids, when they talk about kids, it's some version of like, you know, oh, they've sapped my life essence, you know what I mean? Like they drain your youth, they kill your dreams. Right, it's like some versions just I've just never I've just never really felt that way, and so like I just I don't know, I didn't

see the angle. I'm making a bunch of jokes and you know about how much I think it rocks to have kids. Yeah, that's a good thing though, because I've talked to I've talked to some comedians I like about this, where I've tried to explain it to them. I don't know if it resonates with them, but I would. I've said that you you approach stand up from a position of strength, because the like sort of the stereotypical stand

up thing is like, oh the old battle acts. They're like, oh, you know, no one at work takes me seriously, oh my kids whatever, you know, no one, I don't get laid right, But to do comedy from yeah, comedy from a position to strength, it's hard, but it's good. Like comedy from a position of of of of comfort, yeah right, comfort, happiness,

like feeling good about yourself and then do comedy. Yeah. Well, And that's part of the because I do think it makes it somewhat novel because that's usually how to go. The stuff I was kind of working on my side or thinking about, is it's all positive about having kids, like it sort of talks about everybody says all these negative things about it, and then I tell why, you know why I think it's positive, which is hopefully you know,

makes it different and it's fresh. But yeah, but I do, I mean, I do self deprecate, but I also like, you know, um, like another part of my opial I think is literally sometimes just like big work, it's like the sounding kind of smart thing like sometimes like crowd Connecticut or something, I feel like they're laughing, is like do you hear that? It seems smart but it sounded dumb. I love that, like uh, And so that's because I've also taught there's this uh, this media company that I've

worked with before, like doing some pilots and stuff. They're like a vice type of outfit, but it's not vice, and they're The guy that works here told me once it's the reason He's like, the reason we love you is because your pretension proof, right, He was like you He's like he's like he's like, you're never gonna come across to our audience as preachy or pretentious because your Southern because of in the unspoken part is like because of how dumb you sound, right Like it makes you

immune to that, Like you could be just as you know, superior, acting as you know, just as sanctimonious as anybody, but you're gonna sound all dumb while you're doing it. Well, you know, they done so on other Southerners though they have They have people read the same speech. Yeah right, They have people with different accents give the same speech, and then people rate how well they knew the subject matter. And the Southerners are like, damn, guy eated he's talking

about that. I did not know that was an actual study. Uh. I've got a bit about that, or that exact thing about how if you say the same thing to people in different accents, it'll impact them in different ways. The British person is gonna be more impressive, exactly right in in a Southern mail, it's gonna be less. It's gonna he's gonna be The material he gives is gonna sound less legit. Can you give us an example? Uh So?

The example I'm using right now is like, even if you pick a famous quote that sounds smart on its own like like John Lennon's life is what happens when you're busy making other plans. Right, like you said somebody in a French accent. You know, life is what that beens. We you're busy making us plans, people are like, you're so right, so we should have sex right now, right, Like I just want to have sex all of a sudden, I don't even know why. You know Australian accent. Oh

might watch what happens you're busy making other plans. People are like, he oh, yeah, well that's a party. This guy likes the party. I could just tell But if you say it in my accent, that's what happens when you're busy making other plans. People are like, oh no, he's not gonna tell us his plans. He I don't want to hear this guy's plans probably involved truck nuts and taky torches. Let's get out of here. But yeah, but I did in other literal studies, I'd like to

check those out. We're talking about it. You had a bit for a while. You had a bit for I want to talk with the inception of the liberal redneck. You had a bit for a while where you do sort of that it would be like that same joke he was talking about when you're talking about like having a liberal perspective coming from a rural Southerner. Yeah, but then you started doing it for real? Exactly what was it the guy you going on it? Well, when did you start to do this free standing without all the

without all the build up. You know, there's actually a very specific that I know exactly what it was because I had that bit for a little while. I told my comic friends, I'm thinking about making a series, an internet series based on that idea. Every one of them was like, that's a really good idea. You absolutely should do that. But at the time I was like, I was like, I don't know, man, I have to like save up money and buy a nice camera. I have to learn how to edit. I'm theed lighting. It'll have

to can't look like an amateur, you know. I thought there was like a barrier, you know. I thought I had to do better, like in terms of that. And then one day, in like the spring of twenty sixteen, North Carolina had passed that anti trans bathroom law they had right at the transgender bathroom law. You guys remember that, Yeah, do you remember, I can't remember, they passed a law prohibiting trans people from using but you had to go to the bathroom of your biological birth gender or whatever.

So like a trans woman who is now a woman would have to go to mend room or that law or whatever. So anyway they had made that law. I saw this video that was going viral amongst the right, so like I saw people and I went to high school with sharing it on Facebook. And it was this preacher in North Carolina who was mad as hell about

this whole thing. He's like preaching fire and Brimstone out in the woods for some reason, you know, yelling at his phone and not being funny at all, not a dick joking site, just like just nothing, but but just you know, fire and brimstone, shocking all about the horrors of these animals in the bathroom with our baby girls and whatever else. And this video had like fifteen million views on Facebook, right, And when I saw that, it

was like a lightbulb went off. I was like, well, if that guy, if that thing is like the thing I'm trying to make fun of, then like I don't need any that fancy shit, like in fact, that would be a mistake, like I should just do it exactly the way that he does. I should just go out and yell at my phone, right, and now it's like the simplest thing in the world. But like I hadn't looked at it that way until I saw that guy, and then I realized. And after I realized, I went

out and I made the first one. The first one was about my home state of Tennessee, trying to make the Holy Bible the official state buck right, and it got like seventy thousand views or something, which I was over the moon about. I was complete anonymity at this time, Like I was blown away by that. So I was like, I'm definitely onto something. I'll keep going. I made the

second one. The second one was about the transgender bathroom law, and it ended up getting like tens of millions of views and went like crazy viral and changed my life literally overnight. So wherever that preacher is, I hope he knows it, like this was all his fault, mysterious ways. I'm right, buddy. So when when you had that and it took off, but you still would do normal, like you didn't just totally that then become your comedy bit though stage. Yeah, you had to keep it separate. Yes,

and I do keep it separate. But I'd like to say, and I've been you know, I've been touring post going viral for seven years now, and so I feel pretty comfortable saying that, Like, if people like those videos, I

think they'll like my stand up too. And I also think that maybe people that don't like those videos or don't want to hear just a bunch of political stuff would also still like a lot of my stand up because I'm still the same guy, right, So like I'm still like scratching a lot of the same itches or touch you know what I mean. I'm still like in the same ballpark just by virtue of just being who I am. But no, I do not like rant about

politics on stage as a stand up. I do, like, you know, more traditional stand up material about whatever subjects has you're there's a difference between you could have political differences right with your friends you grew up with. But if you're gonna have if you're gonna do political differences and then get tons of audience, right, I could see that causing friction. Do you have friction with people you grew up around? Yeah, I mean, I really hate to say this, but I mean some of them, I feel

like it's just broken now. There was like friction at first, and gradually it's nothing ever happened. It was never like, you know what we're done, Nothing like that ever happened. But I just at a certain point you realize, like I ain't heard from or talk to him in a really long time, and like that's also on me, you know what I mean. But it got not with all of them. A lot of my friends are like, they're like me. They're either a political or they're more you know,

they like lean left. A lot of the other Salina boys, you know, the group of buddies I grew up with them. I'm still tight with. But some of them, yeah, it got weird. But if I ran into them at Christmas or whatever, I know that it would be cool, Like we'd you know, hug it out. Might be slightly awkward, but it would be okay. But like we almost never used to talk politics at all ever. And one of

the times that just happened. I had rented a house bottom Dalhalla where everybody went out there, brought their kids and whatnot. And one of the guys I'm talking about like he comes up to being out of nowhere, like we're staying there drinking beer, looking at a fire on the lakeside or whatever, and out of nowhere. He's like, he's like, tray, you know me, man, He's like, you know, like I worked my job, I pay my taxes or raise my kids, like I'm a you know, I'm an

upstanding member of society or whatever. And it's like and he is, He's an all American family man, one hundred percent. And I was like, yeah, I know, buddy, And he was like, I just don't understand why you think I ought not be able to have a gun right. And I was like, well, I don't think that, buddy, you know, And he's like, what do you mean. I was like, I don't think. I've never said I don't know why you think. I think he just found out that I was like liberal and then assumed I wanted to take

everybody's guns or whatever. And I was like, I was like, I was like, you helped me move my grandpa's guns to my house, Like where you think? Like wh you think happened to it? But I told him, I was like, I was like, I I've never thought that was like, I just think that, you know, I think there's a lot of people in this country or dangerous or unhinged or whatever, and they shouldn't have a gun, and maybe we should try to find better ways to keep guns

out of those people's hands. And he was like, well, hell, I agree with that, and I was like right. I was like, I was like, so we pretty much are on the same page, right, you know, but like you just assumed that it wasn't the case, because I feel

like a lot of people do that. If someone self identifies as being on the other side of the fence politically from you, people tend to like automatically assign them to the far end of that special you know what I mean, And it works in both directions, and most of the time that's not that's not the case. Like those people do exist, and I could do without either one of them, you know, the extremest on either end.

I'm not not a big fan of. Most people are not really that far separated from each other on most of like the big things I think, you know what I mean, it's the centrist, the centrist redneck isn't funny. No, No, I'm not a centrist at all. I'm just saying, like, I think that if you were, it's not funny, right, Like, you know, it just has to be. That says a lot. I'm glad you get it. Yeah, no, it doesn't. You know, I don't need to do the whole. I don't need to do the whole. I don't agree with you on

everything because I pointing out the people. I don't agree with anybody and everything, right, including my mom and my wife. That's also so, I don't agree with anybody and everything. But I think I like you're that'sh it's funny. I like your I mean appreciate I could watch uh it's funny. It pains me that no one there might be a lot to it. It pains me that that very few people from the right of the political spectrum can do that kind of humor. M there's probably like a scientific

explanation for it. There's some that can. They've done it, like the right has very like some comedians have very effectively made jokes about the excesses of the left. But even like you're looking like Bill Maher right, he's from the left, right, but he's very good at making jokes about the excesses of the left. So they've been able to do that. There's it's like, I don't know, there's just a lack of there's not that much really funny

news commentary coming from the right. It's just they don't I mean, I agree with because it's like they if you have a right like a perspective from the right looking at commentary is much more likely to go what world coming to? Yeah, that someone needs to pay that's what, and they're less likely to do like, holy shit, dude, are you kidding me? And then joke about it. No, No, I mean, yeah, that's what that was gonna be My

response to that. It does seem like that's more of the default state of their commentary is more I a geared towards like vitriol and that sort of thing. That's a hot tip for comedian for right wing comedians. Just figure out how to do funny news commentary at night and you probably get a big show. Uh yeah, you know there's something like, uh, well, nah, he's not he's

not straight up right. When I was gonna say, I think one of the funniest dudes on earth is you know, Tim Dillon, and he's kind of you don't know, Tim Dillon he's so funny and he's like he but he's not, like, he's not super right wing. He's sort of got his own thing going on politically, do you know what I mean. It's hard to explain. I just uh, he's kind of you know, he's got a huge podcast and stuff lately. So I just thought that, you know, he might be

a reference point people know. He's like a he's a d He's like a very long Island d like New Yorker guy. He's like a like a tough talking kind of conservative dude. But he's also a gay man. And so it's like, but he's just I'm just saying he's not a lefty and he's super funny. So like and Nick de Polo, I haven't you know, he's been a comic for forever. I always thought he was super funny. I know he's very conservative. Like there's you know, there's

some Dennis Miller turn conservative. I was always a huge fan of his. Yeah, yeah, that's a good point. Um, so you know there's some when I'm watching yourself though, man, I'm always like I'm like, uh, I always have this thing in my head. I'm like, that's a good point, and um, I'll think, like if if you're talking about something that I'm not totally on board with your perspective on it, I'm listening, I'm like, damn it, that's a good point and someone would have to really think of

a good way to get around that one. I got nothing here. Really, I really appreciate all the stuff you're saying, because that's like I try to you know. I mean, that's what I'm going for a lot of times, Like even if you disagree with me, you can like at least have to acknowledge part of where I'm coming from. Yeah, it's like it's like really, um, it's really funny, fun compelling arguments and then you kind of you know it too.

Is like I guess for me, right, you know, for me being a Yankee, I guess maybe in some way I'm as guilty of the ship that you're talking about, the like stereotypes and stuff. You man, I don't know, it's funny, like you know it, it's it's somehow in my head. It's um. Maybe I'll like I'll never get over the surprise of like the joke in the first place. Yeah, right, yes,

it's the joke in the first place. If you're gonna hear someone you know as like you're there with with your sort of background vocabulary, way of expression, accent on a rant with a camo hat. I feel like, let me let me guess how this guy feels about the best feels about the bathroom is well, you know, I mean that's like I mean that right there is the whole sason, you know what i mean. I'm just like I could just I can hear it before you start, and then you like it winds up being like not

at all you want you're going to hear. I mean that is kind of like my whole thing right there, you know what I mean? Like that, what how you just laid that out? I feel like that's it's kind of putting it in a nutshell the videos at least, because I mean, yeah, it's none of it would like have worked the way that it does if people weren't thinking that or thinking the same thing, you know. I mean, I'm very aware of it, and I and I get it.

It's just like that's the thing too when it comes to South and stereotypes, I'm always like I'm not trying to say that they don't exist, like stereotypess this for reasons like a lot of those people are you know, a lot of that stuff is real. It's just that we don't have a monopoly on it. It's like you said earlier, I don't remember if we recording yet or not.

Walmart got brought up and oh and you and you were like, we got those people up here too, and like right, like that, well, let me let me do it right, because Yanni's not guilty of doing that. I did that right. So what Clay, our colleague Clay who tell about earlier, has a UM. He has a very good podcast called Beargreas Podcast, and in it he's exploring them. He's from Arkansas, and somewhere he found that like for some long span of years, Arkansas was the most maligned

state in the Union, not even over Mississippi. Well, I think it got beat by West Virginia or something. West Virginia. For a long time, Arkansas is the most maligned thing. And he's talking about the um sort of the persecution complex of yes of hill people, country people in Arkansas. And when he's laying this out to me, he was get into how there's when when you get into the complexity of it, though, he goes you know, not many people would guess that this world class art gallery. I

can't remember the name of it. You know, Crystal Bridges. I think, yeah, you would know that Crystal Bridges, this

world class art galleries in Arkansas. Right, and he goes and you might not know the Walmart all right, And I was laughing with I was laughing at being like, I feel that that is on the other side of the art, right, that's not coupled with Crystal Bridges just totally exports Arkansas, Yeah, totally, yeah, like as a total So when you came here talking about our Walmart conversation, we were laughing about me and Clay's sort of public debate about yeah, what what in the popular imagination when

people think of Walmart and sort of how it's treated in the comedy world. Right, if you're gonna if a comedian is gonna do a Walmart joke, Yeah, it's not gonna be about sophisticated business practices, right, it's not gonna be about revolutionizing yeah, supply chain innovation. Yeah. Yeah, it's like you're limiting edge logistics. I'm a new bleeding edge logistics. Bet about Walmart, it would be a wild angle to take, but they U. Yeah, well it's not just like comics

doing bitsy. I mean there's like, you know, people of Walmart. Like it's like, you know what I'm talking about, Like, so there's a sub bredded. I think there's an Instagram. It's like they just post pictures of people of Walmart and the y in their natural habitat, you know, the the chipsisle or whatever like and you know, so I mean it's just like it's a thing. You know, it's not.

But anyway, you said that we're talking about that. I said something about it and Jannest was like, well, to be fair, like we got those up here too, And that's all I'm saying. It's like, especially since I started traveling as a comedian, everything going all over the place.

Like if you drive from Spokane, Washington to Seattle, Washington, which I have done, like the topography and everything is different, but like culturally speaking, you start seeing a lot of very familiar stuff if you're from the rural South, you

know what I mean, the same thing between San Francisco dichotomy. Yeah, right, like you know the whole Like there's the man out self identify as Rednecks, but there's you know, redneck adjacent people and pretty much every state in this country, I mean, eastern Washington on the rednecks proud of it, no doubt, right, yeah, I know some of them are, like some of them are, yeah,

proud of it. And I think like the way country music, Nashville country, like radio country music has gone in recent years, is added to like the sort of like, you know, having that as an identity strongly wherever you're from, like if you're from Maine or wherever, you know, but like redneck and proud, you know, because it's become more of a like just like a cultural identification or something the

country recent years. Yeah, right exactly. But yeah, that's the only genre of music that I'll that like, I don't.

I don't have like favorite genres. I have like artists that I like and whatever, but like radio countries, only when I take like personally you know what I like, I uh, I don't know, I can't stand it, like I like, well, like the stuff that is on the radio, not like yeah, you know, like not what they call Americana, right, which Americans like Stargill Simpson, Jason Zwell, Tyler Childress whatever. And I've always thought like as far as I could tell,

Americana is just country music. That's good, right, So they can't call it. They can't call it country, have to call it something else. But uh but yeah, like the last time I went downtown in Nashville, because I grew up going to Nashville all the time and I still go every year and do shows and stuff. But the last time I went downtown the real touristy part Broadway, Second Avenue, Honky Talking, right, I was in town with

this camera crew. They're all California people, and they wanted they wanted to go Honky talk, like they specifically wanted to go downtown, and I was like, I don't want, you know, but I was like the the local guys. I was like, Okay, I'll go with you. And we get down there and they're like, uh. I just get

in there and I have a couple drinks. I'm looking around and it's like to me, I just see all these people that are like like cosplaying as my cousin Kenny Ray or something like that, like you know what I mean, Like they go down to go to redneck fantasy camp or something, you know, and like it just uh, I don't know. I'll just I'll get my red up

as it where I'll get annoyed. The last time I got kicked down, I got kicked out of a bar down there because they started playing Courtesy of the Red, White, and Blue, and everybody's singing along while this dude and a cut off camo shirt like white it stands on the bar, and waves of American fly back and forth across everybody else and all this stuff. And I started screaming. This is no longer true. I've since found out, but this, at one point was true. I started screaming at the

top of my lungs. Toby Keith is a registered democratister Democrat, and they kicked me out for it. But uh and you were lying anyway, now he was He's not, you know you are. You're right. I was lying because I said he is a registered Democrat and that's not. He's not anymore. But around the time, that's emblematic of himself. That is, You're right, it's true. What do you call it?

Um blue dog? Uh? No, when something's that, like a small thing is emblematic of something larger, microcosm, microcosm of the American soulf and held it. Yeah, you're right. Man, I want to come see you do a show sometimes. I'd love it. Yeah, Montana's I am. Yeah. You go to tray Crowder dot com check it out. Also got a special on Amazon right now. You can find there as well, which we watched. It was funny shows coming up Montana. I was actually about to say, I need

to get on to my agent about this. Montana is one of only like four or five states left in America that I have not done stand up in. Have you done Alaska? That's one of the other ones. Alaska, Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota. I've been to far I got Maston Fargo on accident. On accident, I sort like we somebody else. Yes, Yes, the elevator doors open, we're holding pizza. We're going back to our tail round to record a podcast. Elevator doors open,

just pandamon them pepper spray. Ever, some dude runs by bleeding from the nose and a wife beater like, you know, trying to get the hell out of there. We're like, we start coughing, throwing up and stuff or you know, almost thrown up. It was wild, And then the hotel was really weird. Is they It's almost like they wouldn't

even acknowledge that it had happened. Like like, after we try to talk to him, we're like like, we're not like, we're not trying to complain, We're not gonna file charges or so anybody or whatever, but just like just what was that about, you know, And they're like, we, uh, you know, I really shouldn't speak on that kind of thing. I don't know what to tell you or whatever. Like they just wouldn't. They just wouldn't even acknowledge that this

incident had occurred. So I still don't know the details of it. But yeah, I got I got inadvertently macedon Fargo. The show was fun though, South Dakota is one of them though, so yeah, but I'd love to come back to Montana and do a show up here. I just even when I got here, just driving around, I was like, I need to send my agent an email about making that happen. Yeah, tell us. I just realized there's all kinds of people here, right, Yeah, more and more, right,

But yeah, I don't know. I don't know, man. I feel like like music, you're you're surprised by um, you're surprised by the musicians that come through here. Yeah, I mean because because you know, relative to the relatively low population, you're surprised by the musicians, but you're not often surprised by well me and Crean saw Chappelle. Yeah, but but there's not like it's not like a big stop. It's not like a big stop for like, it's not a

big comedy stop. Right, Maybe that's changing. Maybe I'm wrong. I feel it's a big comedy. So yeah, I think there's like a new club that someone from California moved here to open. I don't remember what it's called. I've never been there, but it last best coming. Yeah, yeah, yeah, right, then there's a little problem where I don't go out that heard that I mean other than not out I know, yeah, yeah,

I don't. That's one of the things. One of the upsides that I had in mind for having kids, like I told you other trying to think of like the positives having kids or whatever, is that kids are like a cheap code for getting out of shit and like canceling plans, like no one's ever gonna question you can get out of whatever you want to get out of it.

As you get older, like getting out of stuff. It's like way better than going to stuff, and when you got to go to something, when you got to go to something, you don't want to go to these one of your kids exactly that way, you can come exactly focus on them, talk to them, pay attention to them, and then leverage them as why you gotta go, why you gotta go, why you gotta get out of there? Exactly? Love it? Yeah, I love it. It's a great thing. It drives a real wedge in my marriage that I

don't like to do stuff. Yeah, I don't like to go out in public. Right, Yeah, I mean my wife's the same way. But I tell you, I mean you're probably travel even more than I do, I guess or not, right, like in a super public way with it. We kind of hold up. Yeah, right, we totally hold up. But is that But is that why because you travel so much when you're back here you just don't want to do nothing? Or also you just can't go out? No, it's older, I get yeah, right, I just don't want

to do it. I just don't. I don't want to. I just don't like engaging that much. You know, it gets a problem I got to work through totally or not. We could also just not which is probably what you just gonna get yourself one of them red hats. Oh yeah, I'm talking about people. Oh yeah, brother, I feel like, man, I never knew it could be so fun to go out. I knew it a lot more fun. I need to get, Like, yeah, I need to get a Biden hat and go out.

No one will talk to me. Do we still enough time to take and tell me why all soulinders are just born good storytellers? Oh yeah, this is good to explore your prejudice. Yeah, his prejudice or you better at it. Oh man, you know, I don't want to I want to start any kind of uh, you know, regional dispute or anything. But got in supremacy of storytelling supremacy. But it's definitely like a thing. And like I got this one, buddy. He's just a good old boy. His actual like his

nickname is Porno. Actually nickname's Regulars, Like you know, Porno ducks Sunshine, right, But anyway, Porno's like he's like a machinist, you know, works in a factory. Good dude, everything pretty damn country from my hometown and all this, and he's just like but he's not any kind performer is what

I'm saying. And but he's just like just a natural masterclass storyteller, do you know what I mean, Like he'll just anytime he's done anything, like if you ask him about it, you know you're in for a good time, you know what I mean. Like the fair he came

to visit me in Knoxville from our hometown. This man at this point in time I'm talking about, he was probably thirty two, thirty one, thirty two, first time he'd ever driven on the interstate, right, And so like I knew that was gonna be funny when he got there, right, you know, Man, he comes through just like all out of whack. It's like sweating and like god, damn something, Oh he's animals out here, you know whatever. And then it's like tell me all about it, porno, you know,

And then he does, and it's always tremendous. As for why that is, I wish I had an answer for you, I don't know. You know, some things are just like ingrained culturally, I guess. Like and also we're big and I mean this in a I mean this in a good way where like we're big bullshitters. Yeah, do you know, like just naturally like I'm agreeing because I understand that you're saying that in a positive light. Yeah, right now, abellish things for either you know, comedic or dramatic effect

or whatever. It's just like that's also a big thing culturally. It's like everybody's like a little bit fool of ship, but in a fun way, you know. And I think that you know, that helps him telling a story if you're the type of person to do that kind of thing. And when I married a gal from the South, from North Carolina, and when I got introduced to the South, I feel like I would go and visit just feel like,

this is great. I'm just gonna listen to people talking, laugh my ass off, yeah now because the accident, because the stories are good and I'm laughing, it's great. So I was entertained by it. So when you went to Michigan for the first time, were you like, fuck, these people were boring? Oh yeah, that's a good way of putting it. Did you think they were great storytellers? Uh? No, No, but I didn't think. I didn't think they were boring or anything. I mean, my first first time I ever

went to Michigan was up that old day job. I spent a week in Michigan at a training thing with other people. They worked for the Department of Defense, So it was like a pretty like buttoned up affair, do you know what I mean? But I remember one time I don't know the specifics of it. We were broken up into a group. We're having to decide on something. I couldn't agree. One girl said one thing, another girl said the other, and I said, quoting old brother where

art Thou? I said, well, I'm with you fellers right, like just playing around, And I could tell that they both just thought I was just saying that, do you know what I mean? Like they had no idea it was. I was quoting a movie or doing a bit or whatever. They were just like, okay, that doesn't help, but all right,

But but yeah, no, I don't know. I like, I've gone to appreciate the Midwest because I think that, like, um, well, because I also like why, I don't know, I don't know where you're from originally, but you're talk about getting introduced to the South, Like I feel like you guys in particular, like your whole thing, Like this is gonna sound so dumb, but I can remember I can remember being surprised also to find out that like hunting and fishing and all that type of stuff was so big

in other parts of the country too. Like as a kid, I thought that was all South shit. Yeah, right, like because it was such a huge thing there, and I knew it wasn't a thing everywhere, and I thought that was like like a Southern thing, but obviously it's not. And so I'm saying, like, it's just I just feel like there's a whole lot of overlap, you know what I mean, like cultural overlor in terms of interest and whatnot. Like you're gonna sound different, but still you know, it

shouldn't be too alien to you. I wouldn't think a lot of you can definitely find a lot of common ground. I would think, you know, sportsman for sure. Man. Yeah, but uh but yeah. But are people in Michigan good telling stories? I don't. I don't know. Yeah, right, I think, Well, let me here's the way of putting it. Here's what I'm trying to wrap her up. I gotta tell you one last story. Me and Ronnie Bang okay, missile, Me and another very Yankee person. We were down in South

Carolina one time. We're with some guys, we're working up a custom load for a rifle. So you go out shoot a couple rounds okay, and you go back into the reloading bench and mess around and the amount Like he was losing his mind because the going in, getting the ice tea and talking and everybody sits down. Yeah right, and he's like, holy shit, man, this should take twenty minutes. He was the thing. Yeah, the world and he like he went on rant yeah afterward about he went on

a rant about what in the world, you know. I think he attributed it to there's no sense of needing to um. He at treated that there's no sense of needing to get like the wood cut and the crop in right because the cold's coming. Yeah no, yeah, yeah,

winter is not coming. I'll say. It's like, you know, he just cut though this cut would later now is not gonna be able to go anywhere because the snow life definitely does move at like a slower pace like legitimate layers, like I feel like a lot of rednecks lost Southern people, will you know, take half an hour or forty five minutes to say goodbye, to like leave a place. Show Man's like, well, better get out of here.

You know, and then they stand up and they're like you talp the page lately, you know, just start a whole new thing, and then, you know, and then end up in the driveway standing by the truck having a whole separate conversation for ten fifth table minutes. Get in the truck, roll the window down to keep talking, you know, highly pull out on Yale on their way out the

guns from Birmingham, Alabama. Whenever we try to leave your house, it'd be a three hour affairs off for us, four different dishes or something, and you know to take well, you're gonna drive up and blow away. There's Midwest comics that do best bits about the Midwest Goodbye, and it's very similar. Well stay right there, yeah, yeah, like start by putting your coat on, then stay at the door and have another beer, and then you have to stay longer because you gotta let that beer wear off, and yeah,

so on, so on and so forth. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. It is, like I do think there's like a lot of cultural overlap really between the because also it's like that's all as far as like the coast coastal elites and all that stuff, you know, the Midwest.

Also is that's flyover country? Do you know what I mean? Like, there's it's all the middle part of America that you know, the coast looks down their noses at or whatever, and there's just I don't know, there's a lot of I think there's a lot of common ground there or should be, but I think it's probably the Southerners who would hold it up because you know, the whole Yankee thing. No, yeah, all right, man, tell people how to find you pretty much just by name, which is spelled round because I'm

white trash. It's a t r a E Crowder. How are they supposed to spell it t r e y generally? Oh tr a e r a E Crowder dot com or just that's how people can find your shows. That's find my shows and the special But any social media you use, it's also I'm also just Trey Crowder on there, except for Instagram because of some bitch scoped me. So I'm official Tray Crowder on Instagram. But the rest of them are just Trey Crowder, so pretty much just called

scoped scoped. Yeah, I said scooped, scooped, Oh yeah, no, I know, I was asking you scooped you you know, like you know, like contact information online, you dex them docks docks. Yeah, yeah, docs. I thought I thought sculped was getting I mean, I kind of feel like that maybe works better. Really start having Well that's what it is. If he gets scooped, Like as a journal somebody beat you to the story or whatever, you get scooped. And that's I think why I said that. But I didn't

even really think about it. But scoped, I like scoped better. It's yeah, it's act like that. I was called unawares right, Yeah, yeah, I didn't see it coming. Yeah, like even happened to Trump. You had to do the real Donald Trump because someone else picked up is yeah. Thing all right, man, Some people find you there if you're if you're if you're a big left and you'd like to laugh, we'll check them out. If you're a super right wing guy and you want to be all pissed off and laugh, check

them out. Yeah, either way, were welcome either way. A lot of rightway people come to my shows because they get drugged there by their spouse or whatever. And usually usually at the end of the show they're like, I didn't agree with the damn word you said. But you are funny. Though I like to give you that, I think you'll dig as redneck. Anyway, Thank you guys for having me. This was great. Appreciate it man, good, Yeah, thanks for coming. All right, all on, see your gray

shine like silver in the sun. Right on, all right, all alight on, sweetheart, we're done. Beat this damn horse to death to take it the new one and ride. We're done beat this damn horse today, so take your new one and ride on.