Timesuck with Dan Cummins - podcast cover

Timesuck with Dan Cummins

Jump down new rabbit holes with Timesuck, the weekly podcast that takes you on a fascinating and bizarre journey through history’s darkest corners, most shocking conspiracies, and wildest true stories. Hosted by acclaimed standup comedian and storyteller Dan Cummins, each episode blends dark humor with deep research to uncover hidden truths about infamous historical figures, unsolved mysteries, notorious serial killers, and more. If you crave the weird, the wild, and the unexpected, Timesuck is your next obsession! And check out the Short Sucks, a new series of 40-60 minute episodes two Fridays a month. These bite-sized stories are perfect for when you want a quick dose of Timesuck (or need more addictive content to consume while you’re waiting for your next Timesuck!)

Episodes

194 - Killer Kids

Why do some kids kill? Digging into that difficult and dark question today. Is it due to how they're raised? The type of brain they're born with? Playing too many violent video games? Gonna take a rational look at the roots of some irrational murders. We look at a lot of crime statistics, psychological studies, and numerous examples of kids who've killed. Learn what red flags to look for, today, on Timesuck. Hail Nimrod! We've donated $5,800 this month to the Alzheimer's Association. The Alzheim...

Jun 01, 20202 hr 21 min

193 - Ivan The Terrible

Ivan the Terrible. First true Tsar of Russia. And a dude who more than lived up to his "terrible" nickname, which actually is a mistranslation. Today we learn about the formation of Russia, and how Ivan The Terrible helped transform Russia from a minor Mongol vassal state to the beginning on what would become the Russian Empire. Hope you enjoy some truly crazy history, Meatsacks! New standup special and album, Get Outta Here; Devil! out on Amazon, AppleTV, cable-on-demand, Spotify, iTunes, Pando...

May 25, 20202 hr 23 min

192 - Russian Hitman Alexander "Superkiller" Solonik

Alexander Solonik, aka Alexander the Great aka Sasha the Macedonian aka The Superkiller was a legendary and mysterious Russian hitman in the 1980s and 90s who carried out contract killings primarily for the Orekhovskaya Russian Mafia group. His targets were generally the leaders of other criminal organizations, the hardest men to kill. Men other contract killers had tried and failed to kill. Today we talk about a man said to have fulfilled AT LEAST 43 murder contracts, including the assassinatio...

May 18, 20202 hr 26 min

191 - Serial Killers Leonard Lake and Charles Ng

Haven't heard of these two? By the end of today's tale, you'll be shocked that they're not much more infamous. Lake and Ng most likely killed over 25 people in central and northern California in the early 80s. Lake was a former Marine obsessed with preparing for a nuclear apocalypse, taking nude photos of as many women as possible, having sex with as many of those women as possible, and pursuing what he called, “Operation Miranda” - a sick plan based on the novel The Collector, that involved kid...

May 11, 20202 hr 39 min

190 - The Multiverse

Are there other yous living in other, parallel dimensions? Are there an infinite number of other yous? Where the Hell are they? Today we talk about multiverse theory and it is a fascinating brain-buster. We glance over the history of cosmology and look at some of the minds whose intelligent, relentless questioning and study advanced our understanding of the stars and our place in them time and time again, often at great personal cost. How much further could our understanding of the cosmos go? Wi...

May 04, 20202 hr 27 min

189 - The Children of Thunder Cult

Get ready for one helluva tale. Today's story is so crazy. The promising beginning, insane planning, and tragic pre-life-in-prison final acts of Taylor Helzer are hard to wrap one's mind around. Taylor grew up as a devout Mormon, a no-drug, no-sex, no-profanity, law-abiding-citizen until shortly after returning home from his two-year Mormon mission at the age of 21. Then he got married, quickly grew dissatisfied with married life, then started coming up with a preposterously delusional plan to t...

Apr 27, 20202 hr 30 min

188 - The US Civil War

The US Civil War. Fought over 150 years ago and still the bloodiest war the US has ever been involved in when it comes to the loss of American life. Well over 600,000 Americans died. A greater loss of American life than those who died in WW1 and WW2 combined. A terrible war where tens of thousands of those who did live suffered gruesome field-hospital amputations. The fighting was beyond intense - tens of thousands of troops marching should-to-shoulder across a field in the face of rifle and can...

Apr 20, 20202 hr 39 min

187 - The Kansas City Butcher: Robert Berdella

Robert Berdella. The Kansas City Butcher. The Collector. An insanely depraved cook and former art school student who kidnapped, raped, tortured and murdered at least six men between 1984 and 1987. Bob was known to many in the KC area. He owned and ran a shop called Bob’s Bazaar Bizarre - a booth at the popular Westport Flea Market where Bob sold occult objects, primitive art from around the world, actual human skulls, as well as a myriad of other hard to find and generally dark items. And when h...

Apr 13, 20202 hr 20 min

186 - The Sex Suck: Who's Doing What, Female Ejaculation, and More!

Let's talk about sex! What is "normal" based on data? Who’s having sex? What kinds of sex are they having? Are you having more or less sex than the average Meatsack? Are you having freakier sex? Or is it pretty vanilla? Gonna talk about kink today. What kinds of kinks are out there? Are you kinky? Why do we like kink? Why do so many get turned on by getting tied up or spanked or playing dress-up? Gonna talk about porn! How much is out there? Is it bad for you? Good for you? Both? Gonna talk abou...

Apr 06, 20202 hr 46 min

185 - Pandemic: COVID-19 vs 1918 Spanish Flu

What the Hell is going on right now? Why is the world in lockdown? Today I try and answer some biology basics: What is a virus? What is a coronavirus? Why is the governmental reaction to COVID-19 so much more severe than it was to SARS back in 2003, or MERS in 2012, or the H1N1 outbreak of swine flu in 2009? I also interview Amy Ward, MS, RN, CIC, someone with a masters degree in infection prevention and epidemiology, to get a feel for what the medical community thinks of this pathogen. We break...

Mar 30, 20202 hr 56 min

184 - John Dillinger: Public Enemy Number One

John Dillinger. J Edgar Hoover named him America's public enemy #1 for a reason. Dude LOVED to rob a bank. John lived and robbed during arguably the best time to be a gangster in America's history. Pretty Boy Floyd, Baby Face Nelson, Bonnie and Clyde, Machine Gun Kelly - America was full of people not afraid to walk into a bank with a gun and demand some money. And if the cops showed up, they weren't laying down their guns. It seemed like everyone was robbing banks in the early 1930s. Why? Parti...

Mar 23, 20202 hr 30 min

183 - Baba Yaga: OG Witch

Baba Yaga - OG witch and one of the many characters of ancient Slavic folklore. Today we explore Slavic folklore just like we explored Germanic folklore with the Brother's Grimm episode. The peoples of medieval Russia and Eastern Europe loved a good dark tale to teach their kids to be wary of strangers, listen to their parents, etc. Fear sells now and fear sold then, and Baba Yaga was scary. She was most often depicted as an evil witch living in a magical mobile home able to move about on top of...

Mar 16, 20202 hr 10 min

182 - Nation of Yahweh Cult: Murder, Manipulation, and Black Supremacy

At the height of its power in the late 1980s, the Miami-based Nation of Yahweh cult had satellite temples around the country and a lucrative business empire of apartment complexes, hotels, stores and fleets of Greyhound buses and Rolls Royce cars, all painted stark white. Its leader, Hulon Mitchell, jr., aka Yahweh ben Yahweh, estimated the sect's holdings at $100 million. And what did this cult believe? That white people are "devils" and that black Americans and Africans are the true Jews who s...

Mar 09, 20202 hr 44 min

181 - Oklahoma City Bombing

On April 19, 1995, at 9:02 AM, a Ryder moving truck parked at a drop-off zone situated under the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building's day-care center exploded in downtown Oklahoma City. The blast killed 168 people, injured more than 500 others, and destroyed one-third of the giant government building. Until the September 11, 2001 attacks over six years later, the Oklahoma City bombing would be the deadliest terrorist attack in the history of the United States. And it remains the deadliest inciden...

Mar 02, 20202 hr 33 min

180 - Dr. Death: Harold Shipman

Harold Frederick Shipman AKA Dr. Death. Quite possibly the world's most prolific serial killer. From 1975 to 1998, he killed at least 215 people. The real number may be much, much higher. Harold Shipman was a British medical doctor who used the trust his patients placed in him to overdose them with morphine. Most of his victims were elderly. Most also were not terminally ill. He just decided, for reasons only known to him, that it was time for them to go. Head with me to England this week for a ...

Feb 24, 20202 hr 10 min

179 - Ruby Ridge

The 1992 Ruby Ridge armed standoff between the Weaver family and the federal government. Three people died and the American modern militia movement was born. Did the government use excessive force in dealing with Randy Weaver, who refused to show up to court and face weapons charges? Or did Randy Weaver's own consistently paranoid and terrible decisions bring the wrath of Big Brother to his door? This one got me fired up! I heard way too much about this incident growing up in Idaho, and after do...

Feb 17, 20202 hr 34 min

178 - Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge Genocide

Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge Genocide. An insane, Cambodian tragedy that was oh, so avoidable. Saloth Sar, aka Pol Pot, was a man with a dream. A horrible, delusional, misguided dream. He wanted to turn Cambodia away from being a constitutional monarchy and into being a Mao-influenced, agrarian, communist society where basically everyone was either a soldier, a rice farmer, or dead. He wasn't very smart, he was ruthless, and he was in charge. And a couple million people died. Find out how the ter...

Feb 10, 20202 hr 27 min

177 - The Brothers Grimm

The Brothers Grimm! German folklorists Jacob and Wilhem Grimm collected a lot of strange, old, primarily Germanic tales back in the mid-19th century. Tales like Cinderella, Snow White, Hansel and Gretel and so many more. More than 200 stories that inspired countless future authors and artists. Stories that companies like Disney cleaned up and turned into highly profitable family-friendly movies. But the original stories, NOT that family friendly. Not by today's standards. Turns out we meatsacks ...

Feb 03, 20202 hr 19 min

176 - Serial Killer Joseph Duncan

Joseph Duncan. What a terrible, terrible dude. This was one of the hardest episodes we've done yet. I knew it would be dark, but, I didn't know it would be THIS dark. The worst of Duncan's crimes happened just a few miles from the Suck Dungeon. In mid-May of 2005, Duncan brutally murdered three family members just outside of Couer d'Alene Idaho. He also kidnapped two more and did unspeakable things to them. And he sits on death row today for these and other terrible crimes. If the true crime epi...

Jan 27, 20202 hr 26 min

175 - Declassified Military Documents

Operation Iceworm. Operation Gladio. Operation Paperclip, Sea Spray, Acoustic Kitty, and more. What has the US government kept secret over the years, and why? How does information become classified? Declassified? What sensitive information has been leaked over the years and by whom? We dig into a lot of secrets today that are no longer so secret which can really make a person feel a little paranoid wondering, WHAT ARE THEY HIDING FROM US, NOW!?! Check out Lynze and I's new horror podcast Scared ...

Jan 20, 20202 hr 21 min

174 - Bizarre Mental Disorders

Boanthropy. Capgras Delusion. Alien Hand Syndrome. Clinical Lycanthropy. We go over a variety of rare and unusual mental disorders today and also give an overview of how we meatsacks deal with mental health and how many of us are dealing with more common mental disorders. I also give some insight into my own unusual thoughts and try to illustrate how, in some way or another, we are all "crazy." Hail Nimrod! Check out Lynze and I's new horror podcast Scared to Death. Listen on Spotify, Stitcher, ...

Jan 13, 20202 hr 20 min

173 - The 1977 Girl Scout Murders

On the morning of June 13th, 1977, at Camp Scott, in Mayes County, Oklahoma, the dead bodies of three young girl scouts, ages 8, 9, and 10, are discovered by a camp counselor. The girls had been raped and murdered hours earlier in the middle of the night. Who could've committed such a disgusting crime? Find out on a true crime, murder mystery edition of Timesuck. Check out Lynze and I's new horror podcast Scared to Death. Listen on Spotify, Stitcher, iTunes, Youtube, and more! Here's the iTunes ...

Jan 06, 20202 hr 13 min

172 - Colonel Robert L. Howard/2019 Year End Review

Happy New Year! 2020 is almost here and we do a little a summary of what went on with Timesuck in 2019. It was the best of years. Hail Nimrod! Also, for a little inspiration, we cover the life and heroic times of Colonel Robert L. Howard - one of the most highly decorated US Special Forces officers in United States military history. His bravery in battle in Vietnam reads like the script for an over-the-top Rambo-type Hollywood film. His courage under fire is so inspiring. Let his life fire you u...

Dec 30, 20192 hr 10 min

171 - The Warsaw Ghetto - A Tale of Nazi Resistance

Ummm.... more Nazis this week. Not EXACTLY a normal holiday choice, but what's normal on Timesuck? Today we look at the Warsaw Ghetto - the largest concentration of European Jews was in Poland, and more Polish Jews lived in Warsaw than in any other city - forced to live in a "ghetto," a walled off city-within-a-city. And the Warsaw ghetto residents were treated horribly. They were shot, starved, and forced to live in squalor. They were taken by train to death camps. And they also fought back in ...

Dec 23, 20192 hr 21 min

170 - Nazi Search for the Holy Grail

The Nazi’s Search for the Holy Grail. We look at this today and also into so, so many other strange beliefs held by Heinrich Himmler, Hitler, and other occult-minded Nazis. Today we’re going real wackadoodle, talking about ice giants, the hollow earth, the lost island of Atlantis, and so much more. We’re looking into the origins of the myth of Aryan supremacy and Himmler’s quest for anything that might have given the Nazis the ability to conquer the world. Check out Lynze and I's new horror podc...

Dec 16, 20192 hr 21 min

169 - Stan Lee! And the History of Comics

Stan Lee! The man, the myth, the legend! The man who co-created 200 different comic book characters. The co-creator of Spiderman, Thor, the Hulk, the Fantastic Four, the X-Men, and so many other popular characters. The man who is still the face of the Marvel empire after his death. We go over this incredible creator's legendary life today and also go over the history of the comic book in this KA-BOOM! ZAP! POW! graphic novel edition of Timesuck! Check out Lynze and I's new horror podcast Scared ...

Dec 09, 20192 hr 23 min

168 - Killdozer

Killdozer. The story of one man, Marvin Heemeyer, who modified a Komatsu D355A bulldozer into a demolition weapon, and then go on a two plus hour rampage in the small town of Granby, Colorado in 2004. Why did he do this? Well, in a way it's very complicated. And in another way it's very simple. I do my best to make sense of it all and explain it to you in today's small town mayhem edition of Timesuck. Check out Lynze and I's new horror podcast Scared to Death. Listen on Spotify, Stitcher, iTunes...

Dec 02, 20192 hr 51 min

167 - The Son of Sam: Serial Killer David Berkowitz

David Berkowitz. The Son of Sam. One of America's most infamous serial killers. The man who terrorized the already terrible New York City in the mid-1970s. Berkowitz would kill six, injure nine others, and terrify millions. Why did he do it? Because demonic dogs told him to? Because he was mad that his birth mother abandoned him? Because of his romantic failures with women? It's a fascinating true crime tale, and we examine it thoroughly today, on Timesuck. Happy Thanksgiving and Hail Nimrod! Ch...

Nov 25, 20192 hr 25 min

166 - The Happy Face Killer: Keith Hunter Jesperson

The Happy Face Killer. Wow. What a dirtbag! What an especially hate-able dude, even for a serial killer. Keith Hunter Jesperson raped and strangled at least eight women in the early 90s. His crimes were hard to link together because of the spread out location of the bodies - women's remained dumped off the side of various roads as he traveled around the United States, working as a long-haul trucker. Keith wrote to the press during his murders and signed his letters with a smiley face, why he was...

Nov 18, 20192 hr 17 min

165 - Simo Hayha: White Death

Happy Veteran's Day to all our American men and women armed forces members. Much respect to armed forces members world wide. Going international today to talk about one of the most decorated war heroes in the history of Finland, and the sniper with the highest number of confirmed kills in military history: Simo Hayha. Nicknamed "White Death" by the Russian Red Army, Simo is estimated to have personally taken out over 800 enemy soldiers in just 100 days of fighting during Finland's Winter War of ...

Nov 11, 20192 hr 25 min
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